Maisy Weicherding

Maisy Weicherding, Central Asia researcher @amnesty
Views are my own. Retweets are not endorsements.

[Al Jazeera English @AJEnglish]

A Palestinian woman returning to Gaza through the reopened Rafah crossing described the harsh treatment she endured from Israeli forces at the border, where she says she was blindfolded, detained and had her belongings confiscated.

[Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt @FranceskAlbs]

ISRAEL HAS NO AUTHORITY OVER GAZA. Yet it continues to create "conditions of life" to destroy the people trapped therein. Obliteraring all medical infrastructure, even emergency one like @MSF, is a way to ensure people's agony and death when they survive bombs and sniper fire.

[Amnesty International USA @amnestyusa]

SHAME on the Trump administration for greenlighting an ADDITIONAL $6.5 billion arms sales to Israel, while Israel continues to commit genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Israel continues to attack and kill civilians and block sufficient lifesaving aid and supplies. Congress must BLOCK these weapons sales and STOP appropriating foreign military funding to Israel.

https://t.co/LpVOzNdRLA

[Muhammad Shehada @muhammadshehad2]

Hind Rajab's mom, Wesam, made this brilliant speech on Saturday:

Ladies & gentlemen,
I'll begin with no introductions.
On January 29, 2024, my daughter Hind Rajab was trapped inside a car, under direct fire.

Hind was a five-year-old child.
At that age, children don't think about politics, & don't know the meaning of war.
All they know is fear… & the hope that someone will come to save them.

Hind didn't die suddenly.
Hind waited.
She waited for help,
For her cries to have meaning.

She said:
"I'm scared…come get me."

This isn't a literary phrase.
This is the last thing a child said,
who knew she might not survive.

She said a sentence that tore my heart apart:
"Mom, they're lying. Stay with me!"
At that moment, I realized the betrayal.

An ambulance was sent to her. It didn't arrive. It was bombed.

This means one thing:
Saving a life wasn't allowed.

Today, 2 years later,
I'm not standing here to tell you a sad story.
I am here to speak about responsibility.

I will pose a weighty question:
What is the value of a human life when it is Palestinian?

Because what happened to my daughter Hind,
Had it happened anywhere else, would have shaken the world.

But it was in Gaza.

And that is why time was allowed to pass,
& the crime to be forgotten.

I ask you to imagine, even for a few seconds,
The magnitude of pain that mothers in Gaza carry when they lose their children.

Imagine the bitterness of the pain,
When you cannot save your child,
Or even reach them,
Or know what their final moments were like.

This pain lives with mothers
every day,
& with every breath.

What happened to Hind is not just a personal story.
It reveals how a child can be left to die, before the eyes of the world, without accountability.

You live in countries that believe in the rule of law,
that teach human rights,
& sign agreements to protect children.

But Hind was not protected.
Nor were the paramedics.
Nor was the truth protected.

I don't blame the people of the world,
but I do hold silence responsible.
The silence that makes the crime possible,
& makes its repetition easy.

Your presence here today
means that you have chosen not to be silent.
And that is important.

But what is more important, is what happens after this event.

Will Hind remain just a name at an event?
Or will she become a turning point?

I am not asking for the impossible.
I am asking for something very simple:
That the life of a Palestinian child be protected… as if it were your own child's life.

If the law cannot save a child, then it is a law that needs to be held accountable.

And if the world only acts when the victim resembles its own children, then the world needs a new conscience.

Hind is no longer here.
But her story is a trust.
And a trust is not preserved with words,
But with actions!

[WDI.Afghanistan @WDIAfghanistan1]

😡 The Taliban has banned women from speaking to one another. Khalid Hanafi, Taliban’s minister for virtue and vice, declared it forbidden for adult women to let their voices be heard by other women, further restricting existing bans on speaking and showing their faces in public.
@sarahadams @TRobinsonNewEra @naomirwolf @jk_rowling @ThePosieParker

[Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla]

This new graphic from @thenerve_news could be so much bigger but we wanted to show 3 essential nodes in Peter Thiel’s sphere of influence: Silicon Valley, Washington & the UK.

In Britain, our govt is so naive about Thiel & what his company Palantir really is.

[Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla]

I’ve put TECHNOFASCISM in all caps because it’s a new form of power, repression & political control.

And we have to understand the stakes. Please read & share 🙏
https://t.co/f8GTX2BCpc

[Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt @FranceskAlbs]

Who believed that "if they only released the hostages"? Who believed in the ceasefire?
After killing 500+ people in about 3 months, Israel- armed and supported by the US - continues its genocide in Gaza undisturbed.
Don't let it become the new normal. Stand up against genocide!

[Eva Karene Bartlett @EvaKBartlett]

This is heartbreaking.

"Dr. Hossam’s lawyer warns: his heart is exhausted, his body shattered from continuous torture, and the freezing temperatures in his cell are worsening his suffering.
Between cold walls, the doctor who saved hundreds of children and the wounded is left with no adequate food, no heating, and his health is deteriorating day by day.

🔴 Every moment of silence is a contribution to his suffering.
Any delay in saving him could be the moment that costs him his life.

✊🏻 Speak about him… spread his name… do not let the voice of the doctor who saved lives fade away."
https://t.co/NZnI5jZILW

[Maha Hussaini @MahaGaza]

How Israeli forces searched for the last captive's body in Gaza:

[Euro-Med Monitor @EuroMedHR]

🧵Large-scale exhumation operations carried out by the Israeli army east of #Gaza City, under the pretext of searching for the body of the last Israeli captive, are deeply alarming.

This pretext does not justify violating the sanctity of the Palestinian dead, tampering with graves, or desecrating human remains. Any search operation must be strictly limited in scope, subject to rigorous humanitarian safeguards, and conducted under neutral international supervision.

Over the past two years, cemeteries across the Gaza Strip have been systematically destroyed. Graves have been dug up and vandalised, bodies tampered with, and dozens of remains transferred, acts that constitute serious violations of international humanitarian law⤵️

[William Dalrymple @DalrympleWill]

Like anyone who has tried to speak up for the Palestinians over the last few months, I have been multiply abused by Israel's defenders, including by some friends, for giving credence to the terrible casualty figures coming out of Gaza. Now it turns out they were accurate all along: a minimum of 70,000 corpses have been counted by health officials in Gaza, and the number still buried under the rubble may be many times that.

But I'm not holding my breath for an apology...

[Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt @FranceskAlbs]

Life under Israeli occupation.
Unchilding.

[Bisan owda @bisan__bisan]

This is today’s story from Gaza streets, take a break from the harsh reality and get to know more about the beauty hidden in our communities, and a vital way of resistance.

[AJ+ @ajplus]

Days after TikTok came under U.S. ownership, Palestinian filmmaker Bisan Owda's account was banned.

While it was later reinstated under pressure from NGOs, here’s what she told AJ+ about censorship of Palestinian voices.

[Sarah Wilkinson @swilkinsonbc]

UN Special Rapporteur @Irenekhan warns the israelis are smearing Palestinian journalists –killing the messenger [literally] to kill the story

[Al Jazeera English @AJEnglish]

A huge military operation In Gaza to recover a single Israeli body exposes a grim moral paradox: Precise forensics for the occupier, and mass graves and lost identity for the occupied and bombarded Palestinians.

Read here https://t.co/ri8ScGNmLI

[WDI.Afghanistan @WDIAfghanistan1]

If you are a woman in Afghanistan with a toothache, you can’t get treated.
Because women are denied the right to education, they cannot become dentists and male dentists are not allowed to treat female patients.
Currently, only a limited number of women dentists remain, and they are not enough to meet the needs of the entire female population.
And the only things women are allowed , stoning, banned from rights and remove them from society 💔

[Charlie Young @CharlieNotOld]

🏮REVEALED: Peter Thiel’s spyware firm Palantir have over £630m in UK Government contracts. They’re laced through the NHS, the Home Office, and the military: including our nuclear weapons.

By @carolecadwalladr, Max Colbert and myself for @thenerve_news