Fatima Ann Sulaiman

Consultant // Trustee @ramfelcharity // Emerging Writer // All views my own.

[Save the Children UK @savechildrenuk]

It is an unspeakable tragedy that innocent children continue to be killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, with another 20 children becoming the latest victims of this conflict.

A school being used as a shelter in central Gaza was shelled, killing at least 22 people, including 15 children.

In a separate incident, five children were reportedly killed by a drone strike while playing on a street corner in northern Gaza.

We simply cannot accept the violence that Palestinian children continue to face as normal.

We are continuing to urge the UK government to use their power and influence to secure an immediate, definitive ceasefire, and suspend all arms sales to the Government of Israel.

[reb @rebmasel]

“what radicalized you?” probably my basic human empathy

[Save the Children UK @savechildrenuk]

710 Palestinian newborn babies have been killed by Israeli forces during the ongoing war in Gaza.

No parent should have to go through the agony and heartbreak of losing their child.

We simply cannot accept the violence that Palestinian children continue to face as normal.

[Moira Donegan @MoiraDonegan]

The whole purpose of the post menopausal female is to lean forward, look at you unblinkingly through her huge glasses, point one boney finger at you across the diner table and go “Now you listen to me. You have to have your own money. You always. Have to. Have your. Own. Money.”

[Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London @RAMFELCharity]

🎉🎉🎉
Over 20yrs after arriving in the UK, our client has finally been given leave to remain.
This is great news, but she will have to wait 10 more yrs & pay over £14,000 before getting permanent status. She'll be over 70 by then.
Settlement routes & visa fees need reducing now.

[Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London @RAMFELCharity]

With 80 anti-racist and migrant rights organisations, we've written to
@Keir_Starmer
asking for Parliament to be recalled to address the scale of this crisis. The new govt must change the dial, and foster zero tolerance for far-right, racist and anti-migrant narratives.

[John Amaechi OBE @JohnAmaechi]

In the light of recent carnage, you may be tempted to utter the time-honoured phrase:
“This is not who we are!”
I encourage you not to indulge this delusion.
I welcome those counter-protesting and those doing clean up.
But many of us have known for years that this IS who we are.

[Nesrine Malik @NesrineMalik]

Today, The Guardian dedicates several pages to voices from the ground in Gaza.

I am very grateful to those who spoke to me, in impossible circumstances, from tents and pavements and street corners. All the interview are in print today.

[Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London @RAMFELCharity]

You painted over Mickey Mouse wallpaper so that asylum seeking children would feel as unwelcome as possible and said grieving widows "benefit" from the UK's immigration system.
All you know is cruelty, hatred and division.

[Wagon Burner 🪶 @oodhamboi]

People don’t realize that the way you’re treating Palestinians right now is the same way you’d treat Native Americans.

So willingly dismissing the concerns & voice of people experiencing genocide shows how invisible Indigenous people globally actually are.

[Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London @RAMFELCharity]

🪇🪇🪇
Our client's been given leave to remain
She worked as a @NHSuk nurse, but fell out of immigration status
She's been homeless for a decade, unable to regularise her status & resume work because arbitrary rules say she must first be here 20yrs
Does anyone benefit from this?

[Mothin Ali @MothinAli]

Outside agitators are not welcome, but if you're willing to listen and learn I'll happily host you!

[Jacqueline (Jacqui) Mckenzie @JacquiMckenzie6]

A few years ago I was in one of those ramshackle hair salons in South London having my hair braided. The salon was run by a fabulous woman of African heritage & to pay the high rent, she rented out corners of the shop to people who provided other services including nails, false eye lashes, eyebrow threading etc. I didn't always appreciate the place as it was noisy & untidy. But there was always something equally enjoyable about the experience; the gossip, the unsolicited advice about improving my appearance or relationship, the craziness, the music, the people trying to sell you pretend Gucci bags, & the children running around if you went at the weekend. It was a place of escape & one where I felt safe.

I happened to be there one day when immigration enforcement turned up. Everyone froze, including me, as the operation is one of true terror; it could easily have been an armed robbery such was the menacing command to stay where we were. I noticed a customer returning from the bathroom make down a side corridor which I knew led to a back exit; I've seen the movies & thought I didn't fancy her chances as they'd have had that covered. They hadn't & I never saw her again.

The immigration officers went straight for the nail person who was of Vietnamese heritage. She had all the right papers. They then turned to the African heritage staff who were all British citizens. The owner was made to go to her flat above the business to retrieve evidence of her British status.

None of us customers were questioned. One burly red-faced officer said something that sounded like false intelligence, but I can't be sure. I watched on curiously but angry, promising myself that I'd only intervene if necessary. Immigration enforcement came & immigration enforcement left after about an hour of questioning & checking.

When they'd driven off, the only white member of staff, doing the eye lashes, looked ashen! I looked quizzically at her. She was unsure of her immigration status as her father had told her he'd sorted it but she was unsure. She was Albanian. She was the only person working in the place not to be questioned which was not lost on any of us including white customers waiting for nails and eye lashes.

The workers all laughed, & it was business as usual but not for the owner who said that that was the third time & she was fed up of it. She felt targeted & harassed. She wanted to close shop. She did though I don't know if this was the reason.

In the next few weeks, the Home Office will mount similar operations across countless businesses. There are issues in some of these industries, sure. I've long worried about some of the women in the nail shops. I also know that a large number of them have regularised their stay in the UK & if they started off as trafficked victims, have managed to escape this evil & live their lives on their own terms. This is not an easy feat but it happens. Others won't be so lucky. But the exercise afoot is not concerned with whether people have been trafficked, or of their working conditions.

What will happen is that British people, settled people, people with leave to remain, mainly Black & Brown people, will be harassed & terrorised in front of petrified & suspicious customers, thereby causing much harm to legitimate businesses.

And like the #HostileEnvironment, the exercise will impact more on people legitimately in the UK, like the experiences of the #Windrush victims, than it will to curb illegal migration as the National Audit Office reported of said policy. This will be all the more the case that the operation was announced ahead of time.

[ً @BALUCIAGA]

i’m v pro-abortion. and i don’t need a woman to be a rape victim or to be molested to empathise with her choice. it can be as simple as, “i don’t want it”. that’s valid, that’s fine, do it. i support you.

[Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London @RAMFELCharity]

👑👑👑
We're underwhelmed by the #KingsSpeech.
More talk of so-called deterrence & no mention of #saferoutes. Without this, more loss of life is inevitable & families will remain separated.
Labour need a human-centred approach.
People move
They always have
They must accept that

[Fascinating @fasc1nate]

In 1963, the famous photographer Richard Avedon took a picture of a man named William Casby.

William Casby, born in 1857, was 106 years old at the time. In his hands, he was holding his great-great-granddaughter, Cherri Stamps-McCray.

The image amazes me because the elderly gentleman holding his descendant so tenderly, was born into slavery more than a century prior. Casby would eventually live until 1970, dying at the age of 113.

His great- and great-grandchildren are alive today, and many of them remember him.

It puts into perspective just how relatively recent slavery existed. Because as faraway and distant as it may feel now. Even in modern-day America, there are people who have active memories of talking to former slaves.

[Nick Beake @Beaking_News]

Colleagues at BBC Verify have analysed footage of the aftermath of the Israeli strike this morning - and have confirmed it took place within an area designated as a humanitarian zone, according to the IDF website.

[Alf Dubs @AlfDubs]

It's Coming Home