CORBYN GRILLS U.K. F.M. ON ARMS TO ISRAEL

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy announced this week that the United Kingdom has suspended 30 arms export licences to Israel. That amounts to not even one-tenth of its 350 licences to the settler-colonial state, which has k*lled more than 40,000 Palestinians since 7 October, and as many as 186,000 deaths as of early July, according to a Lancet medical-journal report.

Continued……In this 2 September clip, Jeremy Corbyn, a UK MP, long-time Palestine advocate and former leader of the Labour Party, asked Lammy what effect the suspension would have over Israel’s military onslaught in Gaza. Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) also questioned if the UK Royal Air Force base in Cyprus, RAF Akrotiri, launches surveillance drones that the UK flies over Gaza.

Lammy said the UK only exports 1 per cent of the arms Israel uses, saying the United States and Germany, among others, ship Israel far more. He declined to answer about the drones, referring to question as an ‘operational’ issue.

Video credit: @ukparliament

CHINA OFFERS AFRICA BILLIONS AND ‘STRATEGIC’
PARTNERSHIP

Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged $50-billion in loans to African countries and promises to create one million jobs in the next three years. He made the offer at a Beijing summit this week, attended by over 50 leaders from the continent.

Xi said China was ‘ready to assist in the development of the African Continental Free Trade Area and deepen logistics and financial co-operation for the benefit of trans-regional development in Africa.’

Continued….. He added, ’the Western modernisation process has brought profound suffering to the vast majority of developing countries’ claiming China seeks to protect its interests and ‘resolutely defend each others’ legitimate interests.’

Although the president tried to present China and Africa as equals, referencing their shared experiences with European imperialism and colonialism, some scholars aren’t buying it. Macharia Munene, Professor of International Relations at Kenya’s United States International University, argued the lavish welcome for African delegates was designed to appeal to their ‘vanities.’

Do you agree, or can China and Africa really develop a powerful strategic partnership for the future?

CIA WHISTLEBLOWER: WE KILLED 6 MILLION

In this 1989 video, John Stockwell, a high-ranking CIA official-turned-whistleblower, reveals the appalling human cost of the agency’s covert operations around the world. Stockwell spent most of his 13-year career with the CIA in Africa. Between 1975-76, he was chief of the Angola Task Force - overseeing US involvement in the Angolan Civil War. He also served as a case officer during the Congo Crisis, a period in which Larry Devlin, the CIA’s station chief in the vast central African country, orchestrated the overthrow and murder of pan-Africanist leader Patrice Lumumba. Stockwell’s astounding estimate of six-million casualties resulting from covert US operations does not, of course, include the body count clocked up over the 30 years since this clip was filmed. His book ‘In Search of Enemies: A CIA Story’ provides detailed insights into the agency’s work and its profound implications, particularly in Africa. Does the six-million figure shock you?

DECOLONISING MATHS AND SCIENCE

Flicking through typical maths and science textbooks, you often get the impression that all the great discoveries were made by White European men - thanks to the fact they’re mostly named after White men! This then reinforces the illusion that Western civilisation is more advanced than other civilisations.

However, once you start decolonising the history of maths and science, it quickly becomes clear that many of the big theorems and laws had already been discovered long ago by non-Western cultures (not forgetting also that women often played key roles long brushed over).

Continued……Take Pythagoras’ Theorem - a bedrock of geometry and physics. Why is it ‘his’ theorem when the ancient Babylonians and Egyptians had worked it out long before him? But that’s just the tip of the ice berg.

In this clip, Instagram’s self-declared ‘cool fact sharer’ @humantenleven takes us on a lightning tour of theorems, laws, identities and principles that should all, really, be renamed in honour of non-Westerners. It’s not so much about priority, even - but, as he notes, a (currently missed) opportunity to learn more about other cultures.

Video Credit: @humantenleven/Instagram

Today, we remember Afro-Jamaican historian, journalist and activist Joel Augustus Rogers, whose work challenged scientific racism and the social construction of race, and helped popularise the study of African history. Rogers ‘looked at the history of people of African origin,’ said historian John Henrik Clarke, ‘and showed how their history is an inseparable part of the history of mankind.’

Rogers was born on 6 September 1880, in Negril, Jamaica. After serving in the British Army, he migrated to Chicago in 1906. Rogers then moved to Harlem in 1921 at the start of the Harlem Renaissance, when African artistic and intellectual pursuits flourished.

Rogers’s extensive travels and research provided the basis for disputing that Black people were inferior to white people. He wrote books on the history of Africa and the African diaspora, with his work spanning the academic fields of history, sociology and anthropology.

Continued….. Rogers’ noscripts include ‘100 Amazing Facts About the Negro with Complete Proof: A Short Cut to the World History of the Negro’ (1934), the ‘Sex and Race’ book series (1941-44) and ‘World’s Great Men of Color’ (1946). 

Despite some referring to him as an ‘amateur’ historian, Rogers’ work plays a critical role in the study of Africans, with his writings still used as reference points.

He passed away after a stroke on 26 March 1966, leaving behind his wife, Helga.

Rest in power, J.A. Rogers.

WAR AGAINST H*MAS OR WAR AGAINST HUMANITY?

While all eyes are on G*za, Israeli forces have launchd a major military offensive on the West Bank. At least 39 Palestinians have been killed and 130 wounded since the assault began last week, according to news outlet Al Jezeera.
Thousands of soldiers were seen assaulting Jenin, Tulkarem and the Far’a refugee camp near Tubas.

However, can this really be framed as Israel’s war on H*mas, given the region is not a Hamas stronghold? The AP news agency reported 10 H*mas fighters were k*lled in the first few days.

In this episode of Africa in 90, African Stream’s Ahmed Ghoneim (ahmed.ghoneim.official) blasts the mainstream narrative.

And he says media reaction would be entirely different if White Europeans were getting k*lled, displaced and colonised.

As the great Kwame Ture once uttered, ‘racism is not a question of attitude; it is a question of power.’

ACTIVIST: ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE ATTACKS BLACK PEOPLE

In this clip, Nick Cruse (@socialistMMA), an activist with Revolutionary Blackout Network (@revblacknetwork on X), breaks down how the pro-Israel US-based group, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and other Zi*nist organisations target Black people in the United States through smear campaigns. Judith Varnai-Shorer, the former diplomat to Israel’s consulate in Atlanta, said young Black people are a problem for Israel.

Pro-Israel supporters have raised the alarm about the growing support for the Palestinian liberation movement, particularly among Black people in the US, who increasingly understand the connection between African and Palestinian oppression, with Israeli military forces training US police in deadly tactics.

Continued….. Former ADL staffers told the press in January that the CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt, has ‘redirected the ADL’s day-to-day work to target pro-Palestine activism rather than focusing on antisemitism in American life.’

Aside from the ADL, another group, the pro-Israel lobbying group, American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), announced it would spend $100 million to oust anti-Zi*nist US politicians in this year’s elections. At least two Black congresspeople, Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, lost Democratic primaries to AIPAC-backed candidates.

Haaretz reported that Israel secretly targeted primarily Black US lawmakers through fake social media accounts and websites.

Recently, Mondoweiss reported on how US universities are collaborating with Zi*nists, the FBI and local police forces to clamp down on pro-Palestine student activism on campuses this autumn semester.

Video credit: @hotspothotspot (X)

Continued….. However, her shocking death has again raised concerns over femicide in Kenya. Between 2016 and 2023 there have been over 500 cases, according to Africa Data Hub. It estimates 75 per cent of the killings are committed by a person who knew the murdered woman.

Kenyan Sports Minister, Kipchumba Murkomen, said Rebecca’s death, ‘is a stark reminder that we must do more to combat gender-based violence in our society, which in recent years has reared its ugly head in elite sporting circles.’

Rebecca is the third sportswoman to be killed in Kenya since October 2021.

May she rest in eternal peace.

RACISM IN ITALY: SISTER SHARES ORDEAL

Being Black in Italy can get you a lot of unwanted attention. In a series of TikTok posts, influencer @thehighlowfashionista recorded how uncomfortable she felt from the moment she arrived - with constant stares and rude gestures. In this particular selfie video filmed in a restaurant, she gets the middle finger from a man sitting in the corner behind her - and says he’d relocated himself there just to give her more abuse.

Of course, one shouldn’t generalise from one person’s bad experience. But her trip appears to have taken place late last year - the same time an Ipsos survey of Italian attitudes towards Africans was published (“Africa and Health: The Opinion of Italians”). This found that most Italians themselves believe that people of African origin frequently suffer from racism in their country.

Continued…….. That’s certainly been on display in Italian football - where fans have treated African-origin players like Mario Balotelli, Victor Osimhen and Romelu Lukaku appallingly.

If you are black and have been to Italy, what’s been your experience like?

African Stream founder Ahmed Kaballo says people shouted racist abuse from cars when he visited the Italian city of Pompei in 2018. Let us know your experiences in the comments. Good and bad.

Video credit: @thehighlowfashionista

HOW WESTERN MEDIA PICK THEIR STORIES

A humorous yet accurate short video shared by @nile.nights (Instagram) on how the mainstream Western media selectively chooses to report news.

While Russia’s war on Ukraine (rightly) receives extensive coverage, other places in the world suffering from devastating violence and catastrophic humanitarian crises - such as the Congo and Sudan - barely make the news.

This attitude of the mainstream media is also reflected in the policies of Western governments. On the one hand, great support was offered to Ukrainian victims at the onset of the war. They were received with open arms by European nations, while immigration policies towards Black and Brown refugees differ starkly. The British state offered between · £350- £500 per month to house a Ukrainian refugee.

Continued……However, no such policy was offered to Sudanese refugees despite Sudan being a former British colony and many of the problems the country is grappling with today can be traced back to British divide and rule polices in the country. Certain comments by certain reporters suggest why that might be. In 2022, CBS News correspondent Charlie D’Agata, while speaking on Ukraine, said that it “isn’t a place, with all due respect, like Iraq or Afghanistan, that has seen conflict raging for decades.

This is a relatively civilised, relatively European - I have to choose those words carefully, too - city, one where you wouldn’t expect that.”

That same year the BBC interviewed a former deputy prosecutor general of Ukraine, who told the network: “It’s very emotional for me because I see European people with blue eyes and blond hair … being killed every day.” Rather than challenge the outrageously racist comment, the BBC host replied, “I understand and respect the emotion.”

Conservative UK poiltician Daniel Hannan echoed those sentiments, writing in The Telegraph that Ukrainians “seem so like us. That is what makes it so shocking. Ukraine is a European country. Its people watch Netflix and have Instagram accounts, vote in free elections and read uncensored newspapers. War is no longer something visited upon impoverished and remote populations.”