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Israeli lawmakers have recently passed a bill creating the first black letter law distinction
between Christian Arabs and Muslim Arabs. The bill itself pertains to the makeup of
the public advisory council under Israel's 1988 Equal Employment Opportunities Law.
The bill was introduced to the Knesset, Israel's legislative body, by Labor, Welfare, and Health
Committee Chair, Haim Katz. His goal is to increase representation for minority workers
including women, Christians, Muslims, and fundamentalist Orthodox Jews. The new law,
which passed in the Knesset by a vote of thirty one to six, was sponsored by MK Yariv Levin,
a member of the right-center Likud party.
Despite the wide margin, the bill was hotly debated for several weeks by the labor committee.
Opponents claimed that it forced needless distinctions on people, and accused Levin
of attempting to employ a "divide and conquer" approach to Israel's Arab population.
Mr. Levin himself seemed to agree with this assessment of his motives, telling the Israeli
newspaper Maariv that Christians and Jews were "natural allies". Throughout his interview
with the paper, Levin refused to refer to Christian Arabs as "Arabs" and called them
"Christians" instead. He also praised Christian business acumen and said Arab Christians deserve
to be recognized as distinct from the Arab Muslim population. He added that Israeli Muslims
invite their own marginalization. He is also quoted as saying that they "[...] want to
destroy the country from within."
Some members of parliament also said that offering specific civil protections to Christians
in Israel will prevent the kind of sectarian violence Christians in nearby countries like
Syria and Egypt have experienced in recent years.
Fortify Rights, an independent human rights group based in Southeast Asia, has obtained
leaked documents from the Myanmar government - formerly known as Burma. They detail a systematic
campaign of state-sanctioned ethnic persecution against that country's Muslim-minority population.
Based on this latest information, Fortify Rights produced a report entitled "Policies
of Persecution" where the authors claim the government's policies have been specifically
designed to make life so intolerable for the Rohingya Muslim population that it will eventually
be driven out of the country.
Over the Myanmar government has legislated restrictions specifically for Muslim regarding
marriage, child bearing, relocation, and even whether they can construct new buildings,
including places of worship. Security forces have been told to enforce the new regulations.
Matthew Smith, executive director of Fortify Rights, calls the state policies and practices
against Muslims "plainly abusive". In an interview with Associated Press, he claimed that the
amount of planning and knowledge that the authorities in Myanmar put into creating these
laws specifically targeting the Rohingya constitutes "crimes against humanity". Meanwhile, the
Myanmar Times quoted a spokesman for the president of Myanmar, Ye Htut, as having no comment
other than to refer to the Fortify Rights allegations as "baseless accusations".
The leaked documents underpinning the report are dated from the early Nineties through
the late 2000's, and all the policies mentioned are still in place and being enforced, including
orders for security forces to "spot check" Rohingya homes for the purpose of obtaining
family lists. Fortify Rights' full report on Myanmar is available on its website, fortifyrights.org.
Link in the description bar.
When people think of Santeria, they commonly associate the religion with the island nations
of the southwest Atlantic. West Africans brought to the new world as slaves during the sugar
trade melded their traditional beliefs with the Christianity of the Western World, creating
in the process several different mystical traditions like voodoo in Haiti, and Santeria
which evolved mainly in Cuba.
As to what a follower of Santeria is called, there is no official word. The terms santero
and santera, or "priest" and "priestess"', only apply to the clergy. The priesthood is
ceremonially conferred onto qualified candidates by other priests, and a santero provides services
regardless of the asker's faith.
One of the least understood aspects of Santeria is the adherents' use of ritual animal sacrifice.
Because of this, santeros can get quite a reputation, even in places one would least
expect. In Houston, Texas, for example, you can find santera Faizah Perry who recalled
for the Houston Chronicle a time when she was approached at a Houston gas station with
a demand for magical protection after some men recognized her as a santera. Perry insists,
however, that she and the members of her temple are just average people and their activities,
including blood sacrifice, are devotional, not magical. She adds that "It simply doesn't
go like that."
Divination and spirit guidance are vital to the Santeria religion, and the sacrifice is
considered a sharing between an orisha, an intercessory deity who takes the animal's
blood, and the faithful seeking favor who ends up cooking and eating the meat. Surveys
estimates are likely out of date but suggest there are more than 20,000 Santeria practitioners
in the United States.