Urgent Open Letter to UN Secretary General António Gutteres

by Anthony Kalulu • May 17, 2018 at 5:00 am

Since the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals three years ago, and with only 12 years until 2030, little has been done to put the extremely poor in the path of their implementation. The poor are still being left on the sidelines. In a remote area like ours, in eastern Uganda, there is not a single event, as a result of the SDGs, happening on the ground, to end poverty. Our struggles are the same as before.
We believe this should be more about listening to, and fostering partnerships with, the people who directly live on less than $2/day...Above all, we believe our request reflects what many poor communities all over the world are capable of doing towards zero poverty, if only the people who live on less than $2/day were placed at the helm of the 2030 Agenda and its implementation process.
if you could give us a voice, dear Mr. Guterres, what we are asking of you, is #1). As the 2030 Agenda is centered on "bringing together people and ideas", we would like to ask you, if convenient, to put us together with any technical teams from the global north, to train us on turning the rural smallholder farmers' fruit crops (in eastern Uganda) into consumer-grade intermediate food products — especially fruit purees & concentrates.
#2). To get our plan rolling, we are also requesting you, Mr. Guterres, to pair us with a team of influencers (e.g. the SDG celebrity ambassadors), to give us a voice only via social media by teaming up with us on this crowdfundraiser, so we can leverage the power of new media to raise support for our planned solution.

Farmers and volunteers work on organic fertilizers at the Uganda Community Farm demo center. (Image source: UCF)

Dear Mr. Guterres,

Since the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals [SDGs] three years ago, and with only 12 years until 2030, little has been done to put the extremely poor in the path of their implementation. The poor are still being left on the sidelines. In a remote area like ours, in eastern Uganda, there is not a single event, as a result of the SDGs, happening on the ground, to end poverty. Our struggles are the same as before.

On the one hand, getting a voice heard from a secluded part of the earth, like ours, is virtually impossible. On the other hand, even the many SDG-themed programs that have come up, such as the SDG Action Campaign or the SDG Fund, have maintained a distance between their work and the people living at the bottom of the pyramid, and have thus brought nothing new along with them to emancipate the poorest of the poor.

Continue Reading Article

Behind the smoke screen

by Scott Johnson • May 17, 2018 at 4:30 am

You can see why NBC News might want to smear the work of the Gatestone Institute (the dirty work I wrote about here yesterday). Gatestone has posted Pierre Rehov's video Behind the Smoke Screen on Hamas's Gaza production. From inside Gaza, Rehov reports the reality of the so called "peaceful demonstrations." He invites viewers: "Watch Hamas hate speeches. See how they build their propaganda at the expense of brainwashed, deceived and manipulated unfortunate people. Understand why Israel has no choice but to protect itself using lethal force." Like Richard Kemp's Gatestone column "Smoke & Mirrors" yesterday, Rehov's video is more informative than the sum total of everything NBC News has on offer today.

Scott W. Johnson is a Minneapolis attorney and a fellow of the Claremont Institute. For twenty-five years, his articles have appeared in most major news outlets.

Continue Reading Article

Why Does the Media Keep Encouraging Hamas Violence?

by Alan M. Dershowitz • May 17, 2018 at 4:00 am

If this were the first time that Hamas deliberately provoked Israel into self-defense actions that resulted in the unintended deaths of Gaza civilians, the media could be excused for playing into the hands of Hamas. The most recent Hamas provocations -- having 40,000 Gazans try to tear down the border fence and enter Israel with Molotov cocktails and other improvised weapons -- are part of a repeated Hamas tactic that I have called the "dead baby strategy." Hamas' goal is to have Israel kill as many Gazans as possible so that the headlines always begin, and often end, with the body count. Hamas deliberately sends women and children to the front line, while their own fighters hide behind these human shields.

Hamas leaders have long acknowledged this tactic. Fathi Hammad, a Hamas Member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, stated as far back as 2008:

Continue Reading Article