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Showing posts with label Courage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Courage. Show all posts

Sunday, August 16, 2026

The first anti-AI protester to be jailed has a message for OpenAI, Anthropic and Meta: ‘Regain your humanity’: “It’s absolutely frightening and appalling that these CEOs and AI experts know the dangers and they are pursuing it anyway,” Kaufmyn said before she was imprisoned. “That to me is unconscionable and reprehensible.”

A protest against AI outside OpenAI headquarters in San Francisco, California, on 11 July. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

Kaufmyn in front of her home in Berkeley, California. Photograph: Winni Wintermeyer/The Guardian
Wynd Kaufman, 69, chained and locked the front doors of OpenAI’s headquarters last year with members of StopAI
Robert Booth
Sun 16 Aug 2026 04.00 EDT

An activist who blocked the entrance to one of the world’s biggest AI companies is believed to have become the first person jailed for protesting against artificial intelligence as supporters dub her the “Rosa Parks of AI risk”.

Wynd Kaufman, 69, surrendered herself on Friday to authorities in San Francisco. She was found guilty by a jury for her role in an action last year that saw members of the group StopAI chain and lock the front doors of OpenAI’s headquarters in protest against the pursuit of artificial superintelligence.

The retired teacher from Berkeley, California, refused to move from a sit-in protest in February 2025 and pleaded not guilty to multiple misdemeanor charges. She was convicted in June of interfering with a business, trespassing with intent to interfere with a business, unlawful assembly and refusal to disburse a riot. On Friday, sheriff’s officers handcuffed her as fellow campaigners sang to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic (Glory, Glory Hallelujah): “Rise up, rise up and join us/Do not let the tech bros destroy us.”

“It’s absolutely frightening and appalling that these CEOs and AI experts know the dangers and they are pursuing it anyway,” Kaufmyn said before she was imprisoned. “That to me is unconscionable and reprehensible.”

She said she was willing to go to jail not because she was a martyr but because it was an “issue of sounding the alarm, challenging the system and hopefully trying to get the message out”... READ MORE   https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/16/california-openai-protester-wynd-kaufman

 AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes or watch videos) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]

*Meanwhile, more than a thousand researchers at frontier AI labs this summer signed a letter warning of “a real risk that capability development rapidly accelerates beyond our ability to understand or control the resulting systems”. 

Monday, December 8, 2025

Meet Arwa Elrayess—the first Palestinian elected president of the Oxford Union in its 202-year history.

Husam Zomlot & Arwa Elrayess
Husam Zomlot

Ambassador of the State of Palestine to the UK. Former Ambassdor to the United States. 

 
Meet Arwa Elrayess—the first Palestinian elected president of the Oxford Union in its 202-year history. 
 
I’ve known Arwa and her family since she was a teenager. 
 
She is from #Gaza, and now she’s making history at #Oxford, championing open debate on human rights, justice, and equality. 
 
Despite silencing campaigns against her, her election shows the power of young Palestinian talent and a growing global movement for justice. 
 
From Zohran Mamdani in New York to Arwa Elrayess at Oxford—it’s the same movement, the same demand. And it is unstoppable. 
 

 https://x.com/hzomlot/status/1997694456691122591

 AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies] 

Friday, December 5, 2025

"I experienced hunger, I experienced bombing and shelling, and I have experienced exile and loss because I am Palestinian, because I am from Gaza, all I did was I was born in Gaza. Gaza is a small place that is very beautiful, it has a lovely sea, and lovely weather, not like the weather here. There is sun, and no wind. I am here today to tell you how Gaza is beautiful and how people there are very nice, and all the children love to play and they love to go to school and they love to be children like other children. I am here to tell you about Palestine, our culture, our traditions, and that we love life, we don’t like destruction and that we don’t deserve what we have lived through and continue to live through.”" Renad from Gaza

renadfromgaza  2025 

AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES & QUOTES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies]  

https://www.instagram.com/p/DRpVMTGDNxz/?img_index=1

https://www.instagram.com/p/DRpVMTGDNxz/?img_index=1https://www.instagram.com/p/DRpVMTGDNxz/?img_index=1https://www.instagram.com/p/DRpVMTGDNxz/?img_indeDuring my participation in the International Day of Solidarity with Palestine at the Palestinian embassy in The Hague, I shared with the world part of my story and how I became not a child anymore.


This is part of my speech:

“Today, I am here without my family, without my mum, not in my home country. The only thing I have is my voice and this is the only reason why my mother allowed e to leave, when we got the opportunity to leave Gaza, she let me leave because she knew my voice will be the voice of people living in Gaza who are without food, without water, without shelter, and who are now living in tents in the piercing cold.

I experienced hunger, I experienced bombing and shelling, and I have experienced exile and loss because I am Palestinian, because I am from Gaza, all I did was I was born in Gaza.

Gaza is a small place that is very beautiful, it has a lovely sea, and lovely weather, not like the weather here. There is sun, and no wind. I am here today to tell you how Gaza is beautiful and how people there are very nice, and all the children love to play and they love to go to school and they love to be children like other children. I am here to tell you about Palestine, our culture, our traditions, and that we love life, we don’t like destruction and that we don’t deserve what we have lived through and continue to live through.”

AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES & QUOTES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies] 

Renad Attallah

 https://anniesnewletters.blogspot.com/search?q=Renad+Attallah

Saturday, November 15, 2025

Guardian’s former Gaza correspondent named young journalist of the year in UK awards Malak A Tantesh, 20, ‘showed immense talent and bravery’, said judges at Media Freedom awards in London

Malak Tantesh (right) with family members in northern Gaza. Photograph: Enas Tantesh/The Guardian
AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES & QUOTES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies] 

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/14/gaza-correspondent-young-journalist-of-the-year-media-freedom-awards

Senior international correspondent
Fri 14 Nov 2025 09.33 EST
The Guardian  

The UK’s Society of Editors has named Malak A Tantesh, the Guardian’s former Gaza correspondent, as young journalist of the year in the national press category at this year’s Media Freedom awards.

The judges said Tantesh “showed immense talent and bravery in some of the hardest conditions ever faced by a journalist, she continued to report while having to forage for food and facing the constant risk of bombing and the threat of targeted killing”.

Tantesh, 20, reported for the Guardian from Gaza for 18 months. She described the impact of the war, losing close relatives and witnessing the aftermath of bombing first hand. She wrote about her family’s return to her birthplace in Beit Lahia, to find their home in ruins and their orchard destroyed. “My memories are crushed and buried,” she wrote.

In October, Tantesh published an article looking back on two years of war, which took the people of Gaza through a “gateway to hell”. There were times, she wrote, when the surviving members of her family envied the dead.

Tantesh and her father Amjed return to the rubble of their home in northern Gaza. Photograph: Enas Tantesh/The Guardian
According to the UN, at least 248 journalists had been killed in Gaza by September, more than in any other conflict in modern times. There have been repeated allegations that Israel was deliberately targeting journalists. Israel has denied the charge, while claiming that some of the journalists its forces killed had been Hamas operatives.

Receiving the award on Wednesday, Tantesh thanked her parents for “raising me to be the person who I am now”.

“They are still there in Gaza, suffering what I was suffering during the past months,” she said, and went on to thank her sister Enas, who worked alongside her as a photographer in Gaza, and her cousin Seham, who has now taken up her position as correspondent. They had stood with her throughout her time working in Gaza, she said.

Tantesh also acknowledged the support of her editors and colleagues at the Guardian and “all the people who have stood with me all the way”.

The Guardian’s editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, said: “I am thrilled that Malak’s brave, meticulous, moving reporting, delivered under the most awful of circumstances, has been recognised by the judges. A brilliant journalistic future is ahead of her.” 

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/14/gaza-correspondent-young-journalist-of-the-year-media-freedom-awards 

 AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES & QUOTES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies]

Monday, October 6, 2025

"The value of human life should not depend on nationality, religion, or political alliances...." On this week’s cover of The Lancet, a new letter: “Gaza’s healthocide: medical societies must not stay silent”.

On this week’s cover of The Lancet, a new letter: 
“Gaza’s healthocide: medical societies must not stay silent”. Read the letter and more in our latest issue: hubs.li/Q03LX2fw0

Oct 04, 2025

Gaza's healthocide: medical societies must not stay silent


The catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza, with the apparent deliberate targeting of health-care infrastructure and personnel, has highlighted a profound challenge to the global medical community. Hospitals are under siege and clinicians are operating without basic supplies, power, or safety. We are all deeply concerned about the suffering civilian population in Gaza and Israeli hostages, who are both living under inhumane conditions after the massacre of Oct 7, 2023.
 
WHO and UN agencies have reported at least 772 attacks on health care, with 94% of hospitals damaged or destroyed and more than 1500 health-care workers killed—the highest toll ever recorded. No independent or neutral organisation has provided evidence that Hamas deliberately used hospitals or other civilian facilities as human shields. Even if proven in the future, such claims could never justify systematic attacks on the health-care system. This is a violation of international humanitarian law and demands explicit condemnation. Most medical and surgical societies worldwide have remained silent or issued vague statements about Gaza's healthocide. A recent analysis found that only 24·5% of US speciality societies commented publicly on the Gaza conflict, in contrast to previous crises in which medical societies mobilised resources and expressed support.
 
The value of human life should not depend on nationality, religion, or political alliances... READ MORE  https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(25)01735-0/fulltext
AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine, or at least fair and just laws and policies] 

Friday, October 3, 2025

"A ripple effect- They may not have reached Gaza's shores, but the crew still delievered... For the first time sine October 2023 Palestinain could fish without being shot at by the Israeli navy (they've been too busy chasing the flotillas)."

OFFICIAL UPDATE FROM GLOBAL SUMUD FLOTILLA 

Organization CONFIRMS the Israeli naval forces illegally intercepted and boarded the Global Sumud Flotilla’s vessel Sirius along with other boats in international waters. 

 38 PEOPLE from 16 COUNTRIES KIDNAPPED

The people of Gaza thank the Global Sumud Flotilla for giving them an opportunity to fish by distracting the occupation forces whose mission is genocide by hunger.

 Global Sumud Flotilla Commentary
Images of activists Rima Hassan and Greta Thunberg have emerged as they are being deported — both smiling defiantly. 
 
Their courage exposes the injustice of a system that deports those bringing aid, while protecting those enforcing an illegal siege. 
 
You can detain people, but you can’t deport the truth
 
Middle East Eye
“From the sea to Gaza - we will not forget you. We will not let you be forgotten. This is the voice of humanity.” 
 
These were the last words recorded from the Marinette, the last active boat of the Global Sumud Flotilla, before Israeli forces intercepted them on Friday. 
 
With roughly 500 participants from different countries aboard at least 42 vessels, the Global Sumud Flotilla set out carrying humanitarian aid in an historic effort to open up a humanitarian corridor in the Gaza strip.   
 
It was the largest civilian-led initiative ever to try and break Israel’s illegal blockade of Gaza.   https://x.com/MiddleEastEye/status/1974069720119656459
  
 

Israeli Embassy in Athens under siege last night as the city comes out to protest the holocaust in Gaza and the IDF kidnapping of comrades on the Global Flotilla.