Israeli security forces refused entry to three U.S. solidarity activists for attempting to participate in a human rights delegation. They were treated as criminals, while their only goal was to learn about the reality of life for the Palestinian people. Sarah Martin, member of Women Against Military Madness, and Katrina Plotz, of the Anti-War Committee, refused voluntary deportation, and the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv informed us that they were forcibly deported Sunday evening. The third traveler, Karen Sullivan also of the Anti-War Committee, was already deported and returned home to Minneapolis on Sunday.

Sarah and Katrina are expected to return home on a flight arriving at 12:37pm. A press conference with them, their families and supporters, will happen at 1pm in the baggage claim area of the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport (Lindbergh Terminal).

Read More | Related: URGENT ALERT: Minnesota activists jailed in Israel

[Ed: Councilperson Mary Cheh has now called for the resignation of Att. General Peter Nickles.]

A U.S. federal judge called for an investigation into the conduct of the Washington, D.C., Office of the Attorney General for its concealment of crucial evidence in a case brought by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund arising from the mass arrest of nearly 400 peaceful demonstrators, legal observers, tourists and bystanders on September 27, 2002. The Judge has ordered the Attorney General for D.C., Peter Nickles, to submit an affidavit under penalty of perjury explaining his office's conduct in this case, and the loss and destruction of crucial evidence. Read More | PCJF's Motion for Sanctions: Here || Donations

A military spy infiltrated Olympia and Tacoma activist groups, Port MIlitarization Resistance and Students for a Democratic Society. A public records request recently revealed his identity, and unveiled an intelligence network of police, military, and federal agencies working together to gather information on Washington activists. Read More

Related: Abrahadabra: A Collapsed Building In 4 Parts | Spy for the US Military Exposed

On July 25th, An estimated 4,000 people across Northern California joined thousands of demonstrators across the world to this past weekend to participate in the Day of Action, a globally coordinated event to express solidarity with the Iranian people challenging results of the country's controversial June 12th election. Bay Area residents poured into San Francisco's Civic Center Plaza on Saturday to participate in the demonstration, spearheaded by District 5 Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi, the first Iranian-American to be elected to San Francisco public office.

A protest was held on the steps of Cambridge City Hall to support Harvard professor Henry L. Gates vs. the Cambridge Police. According to the event organizers, the arrest of Prof. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. by a Cambridge police officer - after Prof. Gates showed two forms of identification to a police officer who arrived to find Prof. Gates safely in his own home in a predominantly white, upscale neighborhood known as “Harvard Square” - has brought the struggle against racism to the front pages of newspapers throughout the US and around the world. Read More | Watch Video

From the newswire: “Christopher Alex Cornstalk, age 44, died July 17, 2006 from natural causes in the city of Markham, Illinois… A funeral was held and Mr. Cornstalk was buried. The story should have ended there…[But] a number of "Chicago Rescue Workers" (emergency room, fire department and police staff from several Chicago-area cities and villages) participated in a Facebook group named ‘Did You Know This Alcoholic Indian?’.”

The group appears to violate the federal law which mandates strict confidentiality of medical information and identity. What’s more, Native American Facebook users who discovered the group expressed outrage over the characterization of the group. Facebook has since deleted the group, and the Chicago Fire Department has all but disavowed any connection, but the controversy continues. Read more

The national coordinator of the American Tea Party movement is standing behind David McKalip and has pledged her help as he struggles with the fallout over the racist email he sent showing President Obama dressed as a witch doctor.

(At left: National Tea Party coordinator Amy Kremer.)

Read More | | | Related: Cartoon by Mike Flugennock: "Teabagger: coming 9/12" | "Freedom Works" Tea Party: September 12 March on Washington

Members of four major unions (TWU, which has been without a contract since March, AFSCME D.C. 33 and 47, which have been without contracts since June, and SEIU 32BJ, which has suffered salary cuts), joined by supporters from around the city, marched on July 21 through Old City to the Constitution Center, where a conference of state legislators were meeting. Their main message was painted on a white banner in green and black lettering: "DON'T CUT THE BUDGET ON THE BACKS OF PUBLIC EMPLOYEES!"

RELATED: "Are their families more perfect than our families?": Municipal workers rally

"Today was supposed to be a very sad day," said a member of the Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign (PPEHRC) to begin the press conference at Rosemary Williams's house this afternoon.  The sheriff had arrived at nine in the morning with an eviction notice.  Ms. Wiliams was packing.  Her son, his wife and their two small children had gone to their other grandmother's house.  Plans had been made for emergency foreclosure resistance.  "We were ready to go to jail," said Cheri Honkala of PPEHRC.  But twenty minutes before the press conference was to begin, one phone call changed everything.

Low-income and Sec. 8 tenants held an informational picket Friday morning at 10am (corporate media invited, none attended) against so-called nonprofit slumlord Central City Concern.

With signs that read, "Defend Tenant Rights" and "Greg Must Go!" tenant organizers picketed the $33,000,000 per year, so-called nonprofit landlord, Central City Concern. For a year, tenants have protested, written and organized against CCC management practices. CCC has persistent pest control problems in many buildings (cockroaches, mice, bedbugs), crime and kickbacks inside the buildings to/by CCC staff (prostitution, drugs, etc.), sexual harassment of tenants by managers (the "Greg" in question, above), and lack of transparency and accountability: it is an 'oral preference' that CCC board meetings outlaw tenants attending, or speaking at, CCC board meetings -- and the board minutes are secret.

Today's picket was prompted by the reinstatement after suspension of Greg Green, a building manager who is accused by tenants of sexual harassment of tenants, along with promoting/getting kickbacks on drugs and prostitution inside the buildings. Read More | Related from Colorado IMC: Green Valley Ranch Citizens Confront Corrupt HOA Board

Initiative I-100, also known as the "No New Jail" initiative, would have asked Seattle voters to require "the city to analyze successful and cost-effective jail diversion programs, address the effects of racial disparity within the incarceration system, work collaboratively with King County, and put the matter of a new jail to a public vote before a new jail could be constructed." Activists gathered 13,000 signatures to put the question of whether to build a new jail up for a vote, however, the campaign was 5,000 short of what was needed to qualify for the ballot. Despite this setback, Wednesday's rally against a new jail showed that the battle against Seattle's proposed new jail will not end. Read More & Pics | Related: "Destroy ICE Prisons" Tacoma Banner Drop

The central thesis of Resistance Behind Bars is truly profound. In clear, non-academic language, Law argues that recent scholarship documenting and radically criticizing the increased incarceration rates and mistreatment of women prisoners "largely ignores what the women themselves do to change or protest these circumstances, thus reinforcing the belief that incarcerated women do not organize." Alongside academia, Law also harshly criticizes radical prison activists, arguing that "just as the civil rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s downplayed the role of women in favor of highlighting male spokesmen and leaders, the prisoners' rights movement has focused and continues to focus on men to speak for the masses." Read More | Related: In This Culture of Discipline and Punishment - Your Panopticon is Watching You!

Around 70 people marched through downtown Rochester yesterday, July 20th, to call for an end to RICO charges against 24 local residents. Organized by Activists Against Racism Movement (AARM), the march started at the Federal Building, wound through the city and ended with a rally at the city/county jail. Powerful and energetic, the march sent a message that community safety will come when people unite together to fight for justice not by longer prison sentences or harsher policing. Read More & Pics | | | Background: Members of the so-called "Wolf Pack" Gang Proclaiming Innocence | RICO LAWS? PROVE IT!!

"Copwatch 13" writes:, Two Oakland police officers, Phong Tran and Scott Hewitt, shot and killed Parnell Smith on Wednesday, July 15th, near the corner of 16th Avenue and International Boulevard. Smith, who was unarmed when he was shot, was running away from Tran and Hewitt as they fired on him. On Thursday, when grilled about why police would shoot Smith if he was only running away, Oakland Police Spokesman Jeff Thomason initially said, "This was a gunfight...it was a gun battle that took place in the streets of Oakland." However, on Friday, Thomason acknowledged that his earlier statements were premature. Read More & Pics | | | Related: No Justice No BART Takes the Truth to the Trains | Murder Charge Sticks for Johannes Mehserle | Advance the Struggle’s Analysis of the Oakland Rebellions of January

Kettleman City is a small town in the southwestern San Joaquin Valley. The city is next to the I-5 Interstate Highway and is the site of the largest toxic waste dump in the western United States. About 200 residents held a march and rally on Saturday, July 18th, to protest a cluster of birth defects that has recently been exposed.

Maricela Mares-Alatorre is a mother and has lived in Kettleman City for 31 years. She also helped organize the march. Mares-Alatorre said "in the past we have fought a lot of issues with our local toxic land fill, which is the largest in California. Currently they are in the process of an expansion, but what we are asking for is a moratorium on all of those permits until there is an investigation as to why there are so many children being born with cleft palate. We have had a cluster here — in a 14 month period from 2007 to 2008 five children have been born with cleft palate. We just found out this morning that there is another woman who is pregnant who will also have a child with cleft palate and we believe that until that is investigated and they know why it is happening that there shouldn't be any more permits issued."

Maura Alatorre is one of the mothers whose child was born with a cleft palate. Alatorre said she was at the rally because "it is in honor of the children that were born with these deformities and thanks to the attention that everybody is putting into this rally, there will be attention put to the problem in Kettleman City and that will help."

On Friday, July 17th, Kings County health officials said they were on a fast track to investigate the high incidence of birth defects in Kettleman City. The US Environmental Protection Agency also released a statement on Friday saying that it will be working with the county and the state to determine if the incidents are related to environmental factors. Photos and Audio Report

A group from New Orleans traveled to the Gaza Strip in June 2009 to document, witness and talk with people affected by Israel's massive attack in December 2008 and January 2009 on this 140 sq mile section of land bordering Egypt and Israel/Palestine. [Report] includes recordings of several speakers who went to Gaza, along with the delegation's answers to audience questions. Photo by Abdul Aziz. Read More & AUDIO

Related Stories from New Orleans Indymedia: Starting Over in Gaza - Report from a New Orleanian in Gaza | New Orleanians in a delegation during the siege | Local Protests Continue in January | Protesting the Attacks on Gaza via New Orleans | | | Past Coverage from Indymedia.US: Protests Converge on Anniversary of Gaza Occupation, Relief Caravans Push On

RELATED: http://dc.indymedia.org/feature/display/131852/index.php

The family of Honduran public prosecutor Jari Dixon Herrera were attacked by police on Tuesday shortly after he made statements to CNN en Español and other international media in Washington denouncing the recent military coup in Honduras. Dixon's mother’s house, located in the town of Talanga, was first shot at repeatedly by police agents with automatic weapons. The agents then broke the door of the house down and entered the residence, beat Dixon’s mother and arrested and took away his brother.

Jari Dixon is currently in Washington, DC, as part of a delegation of Hondurans that has been meeting with members of Congress, representatives of the World Bank, the State Department and human rights organizations to discuss the rights abuses committed by the Honduran de facto authorities.

On Thursday morning, July 16th throughout Oregon a loud sign of relief followed by cheering started to spread as word came from Washington D.C. that the Obama administration pulled all six Records of Decision on the WOPR (Western Oregon Plan Revision). This is a big victory for the forests, salmon, critters, rivers, workers, and citizens of Oregon. Read Full Report | Portland Indymedia Coverage

The nation's food security could be at risk in a warming climate, say a group of climate scientists and other experts representing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Iowa State University, the US Climate Change Science Program (US CCSP), and the Great Plains Institute, in a new report called the Corn and Climate Report.

"High temperatures can lead to crop failure," said Professor Eugene Takle of Iowa State University. "There are likely to be other pressures as well, from unpredictable rainfall and snow cover to northward migration of diseases, all of which threaten the Midwest's ability to produce corn and other agricultural commodities." Read More | Related: A Brief History of Ashland, Oregon’s Green Welcome and Sustainability Center

Massachusetts ranks high among those prisons that are overcrowded. There is poor medical treatment, according to the inmates, prison racism, abuses, and poor nutritional food among some of the complaints. What Massachusetts prisons do have is a large number of Correctional Officers. In a state that is suffering from unemployment, and an over loaded budget, the hiring of Correction officers don't seem to be affected at all.

One Massachusetts inmate Darrell Jones could see the abuses and racism in Massachusetts prisons, and decided to watch, take notes, and eventually report on an audio tape what he felt was going on. Upon release of the audio tape on the Internet, the next day he was thrown into "the hole." He was soon transferred from OCCC to MCI Norfolk, where he currently housed. Here is my interview with Darrell, where he speaks his mind on the issues of Massachusetts prisons, and what happened to him when he spoke out against the system. Read Interview | RELATED: Voices from Behind the Wall

Both Staughton Lynd (a Marxist from the US) and his co-author Andrej Grubacic (an anarchist from the Balkans) of the book Wobblies and Zapatistas: Conversations on Anarchism, Marxism and Radical History, are public supporters of the Zapatistas, who they argue have set a powerful example of revolutionary organizing that should influence anti-capitalists around the world. Much like the historical traditions of the Haymarket Martyrs and the ‘Wobblies’ (the Industrial Workers of the World) in the United States, Lynd and Grubacic argue that the Zapatistas have synthesized the best aspects of both the Marxist and anarchist traditions. READ MORE | RELATED: New Book Surveys Oaxaca Uprising to Teach Rebellion

On July 13th, defense attorneys for Joseph Buddenberg, Maryam Khajavi, Nathan Pope and Adriana Stumpo (the AETA 4) presented oral arguments on their motion to dismiss the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. The AETA 4 are being represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Civil Liberties Defense Center (CLDC), and other well-respected civil rights attorneys, including Tony Serra. The defense demanded that the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) be struck down as unconstitutional before Judge Ronald Whyte of the United States District Court, Northern District of California in San Jose.

The AETA is being used for the first time since its passage by Congress in 2006 to do exactly what civil rights advocates feared it would do - criminalize activities protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The oral arguments presented on July 13th were not about the allegations as directly applied to the AETA 4, but rather that the whole case should be dismissed now because AETA itself is unconstitutional.

Brad’s murder is being used to railroad a fellow political activist

“Juan Manuel Martinez Moreno, the man falsely accused of Brad’s murder, is also a part of this movement, also a man of principle. That Brad’s murder is being used to railroad a fellow political activist is the most profound insult to his memory. And it is not the first time that his death has been used in such a way.” Read Full Report | | | VIDEO: 1 2 | | | From the Indypendent: Picket Against Impunity, Innocent Man Facing Conviction in Brad Will’s Murder | | | friendsofbradwill.org

A high level delegation of Honduran members of congress, politicians, and lawyers is arriving in D.C. tonight (Sunday). While in D.C., they will be meeting with the State Department, members of Congress, and others to discuss the coup d'etat in Honduras and their call for the immediate and unconditional reinstatement of President Zelaya. During their stay, they will also connect with grassroots activists in DC and NGO's. Stay tuned for more information. Read Full Report by Lisa Sullivan, SOA Watch Latin America Coordinator

Last week, demonstrations were held on July 6 in solidarity of the 42nd anniversary of Israel's occupation of the Gaza Strip. San Francisco, protesters gathered at the UN Plaza (pictured) and in Washington, DC, hundreds converged on the Israeli Embassy.

The following morning, former U.S. Congresswoman and Green Party presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney arrived in New York's JFK airport after being jailed for a week in Israel for carrying relief supplies to Gaza. Audio from WBAI: Mckinney Lands in NYC, speaks to Wake-up Call | | | Reports from Free Gaza Movement: June30 | July7 | | | McKinney: Letter from an Israeli Jail

Meanwhile, another caravan, which organizers say is the largest ever US humanitarian aid convoy, has been delayed by the Egyptian government while en route to Gaza. Demonstrations have been called for Tuesday at the Egyptian Mission to the UN. Roundup from NYC-IMC

Dave Mahoney — prosecutor Richard Dusterhoft's "poster child of the RNC" — was sentenced to 90 days in jail by Judge Paulette Flynn in Ramsey County Court today.  With four days credit for time served plus good behavior, Mahoney will likely serve 56 days of the sentence, making his last day in jail September 2 — the one year anniversary of the Poor People's March on the RNC in St. Paul and two days before the anniversary of his arrest.

Arriving in court wearing a "Defend the RNC 8" shirt and with 20-30 friends alongside, Mahoney put on a sweater before facing Judge Flynn.  Speaking in support of him, attorney Bob Kolstad said that he was "honored to have been chosen to represent Mr. Mahoney," and referenced his close ties family and friends whom he said "are very dedicated to what I consider a valid cause."

On July 5th health care reform advocates counter protested a right wing "tea party" demonstration at a busy intersection in San Jose, California. The Raging Grannies, in colorful costumes and carrying "Patients Not Profits" parasols, joined members of other advocates of a single payer health care system. Angry "tea party" demonstrators, who said they are against any health care reform whatsoever, carried signs with their slogan Taxed Enough Already. Their t-shirts, buttons and placards proclaimed their anti-gay, pro-gun and pro free market health care position. Read More | Related: http://dc.indymedia.org/feature/display/131836/index.php