Friday, July 25, 2025

FASCIST AMERICA 2025: Like Always The Real Nexus Between Corporate Capitalism And White Supremacy In This Country is Manifested Via Theft, Greed, Hatred, LIES, Discrimination, and Apartheid and This Social/Economic Dynamic Is On Steroids Under An Openly Fascist Regime

F.C.C. Approves Skydance’s $8 Billion Merger With Paramount

The deal, which came under intense scrutiny by the Trump administration, was hailed by the F.C.C. chief, who welcomed “significant changes” at CBS, a unit of Paramount.

Listen to this article · 6:03 minutes 

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Brendan Carr, sitting with a giant seal of the Federal Communications Commission on a wall behind him.

Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. Credit:  Tierney L. Cross for The New York Times

by Benjamin Mullin
July 24, 2025
New York Times 

The Federal Communications Commission said Thursday that it would allow Paramount to merge with the Hollywood studio Skydance, clearing the way for one of the most highly scrutinized media deals in the last decade.

Brendan Carr, the chairman of the F.C.C., said in a statement that the agency had approved the deal after receiving assurances from Skydance that the new company would be committed to unbiased journalism and would not establish programs related to diversity, equity and inclusion.

“Americans no longer trust the legacy national news media to report fully, accurately and fairly,” Mr. Carr said in the statement. “It is time for a change. That is why I welcome Skydance’s commitment to make significant changes at the once storied CBS broadcast network.”

Mr. Carr’s approval was the biggest remaining hurdle for the $8 billion deal, which has generated near-weekly headlines since it was announced last July. And it effectively ushers in the beginning of a new family dynasty for Paramount, which has been controlled by the Redstone family for decades. David Ellison, son of the tech billionaire Larry Ellison, plans to take control of the company when the deal closes.

In recent weeks, Paramount has been engulfed in turmoil stemming from the company’s strained relationship with the Trump administration. The company paid $16 million this month to settle a lawsuit brought by President Trump. Critics — including CBS’s “Late Night” host, Stephen Colbert — said the settlement was effectively a payoff to secure approval from the Trump administration, claims the company flatly rejected.

Mr. Colbert said last week that the company was ending his show next year, leading some prominent Democrats to claim that the move was politically motivated. The company has denied that, saying the program was canceled for financial reasons.

In recent days, Skydance took steps to assuage Mr. Carr, telling the agency that it would install an official at the news division to ensure fairness in its journalism and committing to avoiding diversity, equity and inclusion programs at the company. In his statement, Mr. Carr lauded these steps, saying they would “begin the process of earning back Americans’ trust.”

Anna M. Gomez, a Democratic commissioner on the F.C.C., said in a statement that the agency had used “its vast power to pressure Paramount to broker a private legal settlement and further erode press freedom.”

“Even more alarming, it is now imposing never-before-seen controls over newsroom decisions and editorial judgment, in direct violation of the First Amendment and the law,” Ms. Gomez said.

Spokespeople for Paramount and Skydance had no comment.

With the deal expected to close shortly, the future of Paramount’s management team, including its three co-chief executives, is hanging in the balance. Though George Cheeks is expected to stay on under Skydance, the two other chief executives, Brian Robbins and Chris McCarthy, have not disclosed their next steps. Skydance has also said that the company would look to cut costs after the merger closes, raising questions about the future of the company’s work force.

The F.C.C.’s approval is a coda for one of the most tortured deals the media sector has seen in years. Though Paramount initially said the deal would close in the first half of 2025, the companies ultimately had to extend that deadline.

After the deal was announced in July, Paramount began a period to see whether other suitors would top Skydance’s offer. Though some would-be acquirers, including the businessman Edgar Bronfman Jr., explored bids, no offers that were superior to Mr. Ellison’s materialized.

Meanwhile, Paramount was dealing with Mr. Trump’s lawsuit. Filed just before the election in November, the complaint said CBS’s “60 Minutes” had misleadingly edited an interview with Kamala Harris, the vice president and Democratic presidential nominee at the time, giving the Democratic Party an unfair advantage in the election. Although most legal experts said the case was baseless, Paramount settled the case rather than risk being dragged into a long legal battle with Mr. Trump.

The lawsuit caused no shortage of agita at CBS News, particularly at “60 Minutes,” a hallowed bastion of investigative journalism. Bill Owens, the longtime executive producer of “60 Minutes,” resigned this spring, citing corporate pressure that infringed on the company’s journalism. Wendy McMahon, the president of CBS News, was forced out a month later.

While Paramount never killed any critical stories about the Trump administration, some journalists at CBS News said they felt that the company’s close scrutiny of segments involving Mr. Trump amounted to corporate interference.

As the merger neared its conclusion, some of Paramount’s most popular programs came under the microscope. News reports surfaced about discontent among the creators of “South Park,” Comedy Central’s popular scatological cartoon, stemming from negotiations over the future of the show. And the cancellation of Mr. Colbert’s show led to a rebuke from Jon Stewart, the host of Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show.”

Some of those disputes appear to have been quelled, for now. But the aftereffects on the network’s programs still linger. This week, “South Park” ran an episode featuring Mr. Trump in bed with Satan, with Jesus urging the denizens of South Park to strike a bargain with the president to avoid corporate interference.

“The guy can do whatever he wants now that somebody backed down, OK?” the cartoon Jesus said. “You guys saw what happened to CBS?” he added.

Benjamin Mullin reports for The Times on the major companies behind news and entertainment. Contact him securely on Signal at +1 530-961-3223 or at benjamin.mullin@nytimes.com.

See more on: Paramount, Skydance Productions LLC, Federal Communications Commission, Shari Redstone, Donald Trump, CBS News


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FASCIST AMERICA 2025: The Homicidal/Suicidal/Pathological Madness That Presently Rules America And Its Deadly Consequences Today

WHITE SUPREMACIST POLITICS IN RURAL AMERICA
(ESPECIALLY IN ARKANSAS)...

"RACISM IS EXPENSIVE"

VIDEO:
https://youtube.com/shorts/kOYI5sYxAMM?si=zTdYUfXLjB_7sIgN
 

 
Amy Sherald Cancels Her Smithsonian Show, Citing Censorship
 
The artist said that she made the decision after she said she learned that her painting of a transgender Statue of Liberty might be removed to avoid provoking President Trump.
 
Listen to this article · 7:49 minutes

An image of a transgender person posing as the Statue of Liberty.

“Trans Forming Liberty,” by Amy Sherald.
Credit: Kelvin Bulluck

by Robin Pogrebin
July 24, 2025
New York Times
 
Amy Sherald — the artist who rocketed to fame with her 2018 portrait of Michelle Obama — has withdrawn her upcoming solo show from the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery because she said she had been told the museum was considering removing her painting depicting a transgender Statue of Liberty to avoid provoking President Trump.
 
“American Sublime,” set to arrive at the museum in September, is a much heralded exhibition of works by Ms. Sherald and would have been the first by a Black contemporary artist at the Portrait Gallery. She is particularly known for her sensitive, serene portraits, which led to her selection by Ms. Obama. Some of her work, such as her transgender Statue of Liberty, has also been fueled by social concerns.
 
“I entered into this collaboration in good faith, believing that the institution shared a commitment to presenting work that reflects the full, complex truth of American life,” the artist said in a letter sent on Wednesday to Lonnie G. Bunch III, the secretary of the Smithsonian, which runs the Portrait Gallery. “Unfortunately, it has become clear that the conditions no longer support the integrity of the work as conceived.’’

A painted portrait of a woman in a black and white dress.

Ms. Sherald’s portrait of Michelle Obama is owned by the National Portrait Gallery. Credit: Mark Makela for The New York Times
 
Ms. Sherald in a statement said she had been “informed that internal concerns had been raised” at the Portrait Gallery regarding the inclusion of her painting, “Trans Forming Liberty,” which features a transgender woman holding a torch in the posture of the Statue of Liberty.
 
“These concerns led to discussions about removing the work from the exhibition,” her statement said. “It’s clear that institutional fear shaped by a broader climate of political hostility toward trans lives played a role.”

The Museums Special Section: 

Black Cowboys Ride Again: Museums have taken up the cause of dispelling the perception of a whites-only West.

A Symbol of Hope in St. Louis: The 19th-century Old Courthouse is set to reopen in May after a $27.5 million renovation.

A Museum and the Sea: Rising sea levels are forcing the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut to address the sustainability of its campus.

Ai Weiwei’s World: A show now at the Seattle Art Museum is the largest in the U.S. in the 40-year career of the renowned Chinese artist.

More on Museums: Artists and institutions are adapting to changing times.
 
Ms. Sherald said that Mr. Bunch on Monday had proposed replacing the painting with a video of people reacting to the painting and discussing transgender issues, an idea she rejected because she said it would have included anti-trans views. “When I understood a video would replace the painting, I decided to cancel,” she said. “The video would have opened up for debate the value of trans visibility and I was opposed to that being a part of the ‘American Sublime’ narrative.”
 
Asked to respond, the Smithsonian did not address Ms. Sherald’s version of events, but said in a statement: “While we understand Amy’s decision to withdraw her show from the National Portrait Gallery, we are disappointed that Smithsonian audiences will not have an opportunity to experience ‘American Sublime.’
 
“The Smithsonian strives to foster a greater and shared understanding,” the statement continued. “By presenting and contextualizing art, the Smithsonian aims to inspire, challenge and impact audiences in meaningful and thoughtful ways. Unfortunately, we could not come to an agreement with the artist. We remain appreciative and inspired by Ms. Sherald, her artwork and commitment to portraiture.”
 
The Smithsonian has been under scrutiny by President Trump who in March issued an executive order that asserted that the country had “witnessed a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our nation’s history” by the institution. He argued that the Smithsonian had “in recent years, come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology.”
 
The administration’s review has been particularly focused on the Portrait Gallery and in May, Mr. Trump announced on social media that he was firing its director, Kim Sajet, for what the White House characterized as being partisan and “a strong supporter of D.E.I.”
 
The Smithsonian subsequently released a statement and a resolution by its board that reasserted its independent authority over personnel. But the resolution also emphasized the institution’s commitment to reviewing exhibition content for bias.
 
Ms. Sajet resigned several weeks later, saying, “Together, we have worked to tell a fuller, more American story — one that fosters connection, reflection and understanding.”
 
In her letter, Ms. Sherald said: “Portraiture has always been my way of asserting presence — of creating visibility where there has too often been erasure.” She continued. “When that visibility is compromised, even subtly, it alters not only the artwork, but the message it carries. I cannot consent to that.”
 
Featuring about 50 works, the exhibition, “Amy Sherald: American Sublime” is the largest, most comprehensive presentation of the artist’s work to date. The show was organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, where it first opened last year before moving to the Whitney Museum, where it is currently on view through Aug. 10. It was set to open at the Portrait Gallery on Sept. 19.

A woman in a dark dress.

PHOTO: Ms. Sherald has sought to use her art to broaden the concept of American identify. Credit: Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images for MoMA
 
Ms. Sherald’s decision comes at a time when the Smithsonian has been grappling with how to respond to President Trump’s assertions that its exhibitions have insufficiently celebrated the country and excessively emphasized issues of diversity. The institution manages a portfolio of 21 museums, plus libraries, research centers and the National Zoo. As noted in the resolution it adopted in June, the Smithsonian has asked the directors of its member organizations to review their content for any bias.
The June 9 resolution from the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents stated: “To reinforce our nonpartisan stature, the Board of Regents has directed the Secretary to articulate specific expectations to museum directors and staff regarding content in Smithsonian museums, give directors reasonable time to make any needed changes to ensure unbiased content, and to report back to the Board on progress and any needed personnel changes based on success or lack thereof in making the needed changes.”
 
The Trump administration also criticized the content of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, where the President in February installed himself as chairman, for what he has called “woke” influences, drag shows and “anti-American propaganda.” Republicans are now seeking to rename the Opera House after the first lady, Melania Trump.
 
The scrutiny has raised the level of caution among some arts organizations, who want to avoid ending up in the cross hairs of the Trump administration, particularly if they benefit from federal funds that help attract essential private dollars.

 
“For Love, and For Country,” which Ms. Sherald created in 2022. Credit: Joseph Hyde
 
Ms. Sherald has been open about her activism. One of her works is a portrait of Breonna Taylor, whose death helped galvanize national protests against police violence. The painting is now jointly owned by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington and by the Speed Museum in Louisville, Ky.
Another work, “For Love, and For Country,” features two men embracing in the posture of Alfred Eisenstaedt’s photo of a sailor kissing a female nurse on V-J Day in Times Square. Ms. Sherald has described the image as a contribution to conversations around the military and sexuality.

Both are in the show at the Whitney that had been scheduled to travel to the Smithsonian.

In explaining her decision to withdraw from the exhibition, Ms. Sherald said in her statement, “I cannot in good conscience comply with a culture of censorship, especially when it targets vulnerable communities.”
 
“At a time when transgender people are being legislated against, silenced, and endangered across our nation,” she added, “silence is not an option.”
 
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: 
 
Robin Pogrebin, who has been a reporter for The Times for 30 years, covers arts and culture.

The Latest on the Trump Administration:

Trump Told Park Workers to Report Displays That ‘Disparage’ Americans. Here’s What They Flagged.
 
Descriptions and displays at scores of parks and historic sites have been flagged for review in connection with an executive order from President Trump.
 
Listen to this article · 11:49 minutes
 
Learn more

Four visitors to the Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia read a display on a wall that details slavery during colonial America.

An exhibit at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia recounts the brutality of slavery and was flagged for review. Credit: Hannah Beier for The New York Times

by Maxine Joselow and Lisa Friedman
Reporting from Washington
July 22, 2025
New York Times
 
At Cape Hatteras National Seashore in North Carolina, the Trump administration is set to review, and possibly remove or alter, signs about how climate change is causing sea levels to rise.
 
At Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, the administration will soon decide whether to take down exhibits on the brutality of slavery.
 
And at Castillo de San Marcos National Monument in Florida, Trump officials are scrutinizing language about the imprisonment of Native Americans inside the Spanish stone fortress.
 
According to internal documents reviewed by The New York Times, employees of the National Park Service have flagged descriptions and displays at scores of parks and historic sites for review in connection with President Trump’s directive to remove or cover up materials that “inappropriately disparage Americans.”
 
In an executive order in March, the president instructed the Park Service to review plaques, films and other materials presented to visitors at 433 sites around the country, with the aim of ensuring they emphasize the “progress of the American people” and the “grandeur of the American landscape.”
 
Employees had until last week to flag materials that could be changed or deleted, and the Trump administration said it would remove all “inappropriate” content by Sept. 17, according to the internal agency documents. The public also has been asked to submit potential changes.
 
In response, a coalition of librarians, historians and others organized through the University of Minnesota has launched a campaign called “Save Our Signs.” It is asking the public to take photos of existing content at national parks and upload it. The group is using those images to build a public archive before any materials may be altered. So far, it has more than 800 submissions.

 

Carlos Bernate for The New York Times

Excerpted submission from park employee:

“Ocracoke Ponies: we do not believe it to be in violation, but would like someone to review if messaging of climate change and sea level rise reduces the focus on the grandeur, beauty and abundance.”
 
The directive on national parks is part of a broader effort by Mr. Trump to promote a more positive view of the nation’s history. In his executive order, the president also took aim at the Smithsonian Institution, claiming that it had promoted “narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.”
Critics have warned that these moves could lead to the erasure of difficult periods of American history, as well as contributions made by people of color, gay and transgender figures, women and other marginalized groups.
 
“The national parks were established to tell the American story, and we shouldn’t just tell all the things that make us look wonderful,” said Dan Wenk, a former superintendent of Yellowstone National Park. “We have things in our history that we are not proud of anymore.”
Kristen Brengel, senior vice president of government affairs at the National Parks Conservation Association, said many Park Service employees are obeying the executive order even though they disagree with it.
 
“Park staff are in a bind here,” Ms. Brengel said. “If they don’t comply with this directive, they could lose their jobs.”
 
Elizabeth Peace, a spokeswoman for the Interior Department, the parent agency of the Park Service, said the Trump administration’s move “is not about rewriting the past.”
 
“Interpretive materials that disproportionately emphasize negative aspects of U.S. history or historical figures, without acknowledging broader context or national progress, can unintentionally distort understanding rather than enrich it,” Ms. Peace said in a statement. “Our goal is to foster honest, respectful storytelling that educates visitors while honoring the complexity of our nation’s shared journey.”
 
Several Republican lawmakers have applauded the administration’s efforts to purge the federal government of “woke” initiatives that portray historical events or figures as racist, sexist or otherwise flawed.
 
“Our monuments should celebrate our founders and tell the story of what makes America great, not push woke talking points to please radical activists,” Senator Jim Banks, Republican of Indiana, said in a statement.
 
Already, the Interior Department has taken down sticky notes that Park Service employees used to annotate an exhibit at Muir Woods National Monument in California.
The sticky notes, which park staff added in 2021, were an attempt to present a more comprehensive history of the monument. They highlighted the Indigenous people who originally cared for the land, as well as the role of women in the 1908 creation of Muir Woods.
 
They also argued that while “influential, philanthropic white men” are frequently credited with preserving the site, problematic aspects of their legacies are often overlooked. For instance, John Muir, the famous naturalist for whom the park is named, used racist language in writings about African Americans and Native Americans.
The notes were removed last week pending a review in connection with the executive order, according to Joshua Winchell, a spokesman for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which includes Muir Woods.
 
“As we implement the order, we will review all signs in the park as well as all the public input we receive about the signs,” Mr. Winchell said in an email.
 

In addition to reshaping the way the parks present history, the executive order could result in the removal of information about the risks that climate change poses in the present day. At Cape Hatteras National Seashore, for instance, the internal documents show that a Park Service employee asked the Trump administration to review a sign that explains how rising seas are threatening the habitat of wild horses.
 
“We do not believe it to be in violation, but would like someone to review if messaging of climate change and sea level rise reduces the focus on the grandeur, beauty and abundance,” the employee wrote.
 
As global warming has caused ice sheets and glaciers to melt, water levels around Cape Hatteras have risen by about one foot in the last century, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. They are projected to rise by another 10 to 14 inches by 2050.
“From a scientific perspective, there’s no question that a warming planet is generating that long-term sea level rise,” said Robert Young, who directs the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines at Western Carolina University. “I guess you could have a discussion as to what degree it is the National Park Service’s job to point that out.”
 
But Patrick Gonzalez, who served as principal climate change scientist at the Park Service during Mr. Trump’s first term, said that is precisely the agency’s job.
 
“Communicating the science of climate change helps to educate the public on complex scientific issues, and it provides incentives for people to live more sustainably and reduce their carbon pollution,” said Dr. Gonzalez, who is now with the University of California, Berkeley.
 
At Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which straddles Tennessee and North Carolina, park officials have also flagged for review a plaque about the harm that air pollution poses to plants and animals. The plaque notes that “fossil fuel-fired power plants, motor vehicles and industry are the primary sources of these pollutants.”
The bulk of the content identified for review in the internal documents addresses the struggle for equality of Black Americans, from slavery to the civil rights movement.
“Text addresses slavery as the primary cause of the American Civil War,” one Park Service official noted of a plaque at the Stones River National Battlefield in Tennessee, the site of one of the bloodiest conflicts of the Civil War.
 
“This is both historically correct and legislatively mandated, but we ask for further review to confirm it is aligned” with the executive order, the official wrote.
 
At Cane River Creole National Historical Park in Louisiana, a park official noted an exhibit about slaves who tried to escape but were captured. The official was concerned because the exhibit identified the enslavers by name and mentioned that returned slaves were publicly whipped.
 
Rolonda Teal, an anthropologist who has studied the Cane River park, said that Congress established it in 1994 to preserve the history of two plantations that housed hundreds of slaves for over 200 years.
 
“If you don’t talk about the names of the slaves, the names of the enslavers, the whipping of the slaves, then you’re only telling white history in America,” Dr. Teal said.
 
“Why would you visit a plantation if you don’t want to hear the whole story, and how could it be a plantation if there weren’t slaves?” she added. “So that’s the ridiculousness of it all.”
 
On the National Mall in Washington, a sign labeled “Working Waterfront” describes what had been a 19th century wharf and a landing spot for goods moving along a Potomac River tributary. “You might hear the shouts of dockworkers, many of them enslaved people until the end of the Civil War,” the sign says. A park employee called attention to it, asking, “Is the word ‘enslaved’ OK here?”
 
And at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, also in Washington, a park official raised concerns about books sold at the gift shop, writing, “Not sure if they’re all considered disparaging, but they are about either Malcolm X or Freedom Riders or slavery.”
 
Clayborne Carson, who directed the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University and helped design the memorial, said the concerns about the books underscored a longstanding inability to confront racism in America.
 
“It’s sad to see a lot of things I thought would be resolved in the past have kind of come back,” he said, adding, “I don’t know how you can have a better future without looking honestly at the past.”
 
At the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, park employees flagged an exhibit panel that discussed the bell’s travels across the country during the post-Reconstruction period. The panel “calls out the systemic and violent racism and sexism that existed at the time,” employees noted.And at the nearby Independence National Historical Park, where the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution were debated and signed, park staff raised concerns about an exhibit that memorializes nine slaves whom George Washington had brought from Mount Vernon. One panel emphasizes the intentional brutality of slaveholders, which included whippings, beatings, torture and rape.
 
 
PHOTO:  Hannah Beier for The New York Times
 
Independence National Historical Park
Philadelphia
 
Excerpted submission from park employee:
 
“The following panels and illustrations may need revision if found that they are inappropriately disparaging to historical figures ... The artwork depicts Washington’s hands in the foreground; one with the Fugitive Slave Act, the other with a quill signing the Act, in the background a posse of white men are depicted with clubs and guns shooting at four black men (one who has been shot in the head) presumably escaping from slavery.”
Other content flagged for review addresses the federal government’s fraught relationship with Native American tribes:

At San Castillo de San Marcos National Monument in Florida, a park employee highlighted a panel on the imprisonment of Plains Indian tribes in the late 19th century. The panel noted that the U.S. Army had sent 74 prisoners from the Cheyenne, Kiowa, Comanche, Arapaho and Caddo tribes to the fort after the Red River War, which sought to force Native Americans onto reservations.

“Text of panel needs review for language referring to tribes having choice of extinction or assimilation,” the employee wrote. “Language of U.S. Government giving the ‘choice’ of extinction could be considered negative toward the United States.”

Julian E. Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University, said the president is insisting on a narrow vision of America that he and his followers find most comfortable.

“President Trump is a storyteller and I think he wants a vision of history that he believes matches his understanding of the country,” Dr. Zelizer said.
Documents detailing the Park Service’s internal communications plans, also reviewed by The Times, instruct agency officials to respond to queries by saying that the Trump administration is focused on “historical accuracy.”

ABOUT THE AUTHORS:

Maxine Joselow reports on climate policy for The Times.
Lisa Friedman is a Times reporter who writes about how governments are addressing climate change and the effects of those policies on communities.

A version of this article appears in print on July 24, 2025, Section A, Page 14 of the New York edition with the headline: Park Workers Flag Displays That ‘Disparage’ Americans. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper
 
The Latest on the Trump Administration:
 
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TODAY 1pm ET: Q&A With Mehdi on His Shocking Jubilee ‘Surrounded’ Debate
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July 24, 2025



PHOTO: Mehdi debates 20 far-right wingers on Jubilee’s debate show, ‘Surrounded.’

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https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/5/5/mosab-abu-toha-wins-pulitzer-for-gaza-essays

News|Media
Palestinian author Mosab Abu Toha wins Pulitzer Prize for commentary

The poet gets the prestigious award for New Yorker essays ‘on the physical and emotional carnage in Gaza’ amid war.


Mosab Abu Toha has been outspoken about his experiences in Gaza [File: Hassan Jedi/Anadolu]

by Al Jazeera Staff
5 May 2025

Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha, who has been targeted by pro-Israel groups in the United States for deportation, has won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary.

Abu Toha received the prestigious award on Monday for essays published in The New Yorker “on the physical and emotional carnage in Gaza that combine deep reporting with the intimacy of memoir to convey the Palestinian experience” of the war.
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“I have just won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary,” Abu Toha wrote on social media. “Let it bring hope. Let it be a tale.”

The comment appears to be a tribute to his fellow Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer, who was killed in an Israeli attack in Gaza in December 2023. Alareer’s final poem was titled, “If I must die, let it be a tale”.

Abu Toha was detained by Israeli forces in Gaza in 2023 before being released to Egypt and subsequently moving to the US.

“In the past year, I have lost many of the tangible parts of my memories – the people and places and things that helped me remember,” Abu Toha wrote in one of his New Yorker essays.

“I have struggled to create good memories. In Gaza, every destroyed house becomes a kind of album, filled not with photos but with real people, the dead pressed between its pages.”

In recent months, right-wing groups in the US have called for deporting Abu Toha amid a campaign by President Donald Trump cracking down on noncitizens critical of Israel. The author cancelled events at universities in recent months, citing fears for his safety.



The Palestinian poet told Al Jazeera’s The Take podcast in December that the feeling of inability to help people in Gaza has been “devastating”.

“Imagine that you are with your parents, with your siblings and their children in a school shelter in Gaza,” Abu Toha said. “You are unable to protect anyone. You are unable to provide them with any food, with any water, with any medicine. But now you are in the United States, the country that is funding the genocide. So, it is heartbreaking.”

In other Pulitzer categories, The New York Times won prizes for explanatory reporting, local reporting, international coverage and breaking news photography on Monday.

With the four awards, the New York-based newspaper received the most prizes from Pulitzer’s 14 journalism contests this year.

Winners of the award, named after the Hungarian-American newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer, are selected by a board of journalists and academics and announced at Columbia University annually.


Mosab Abu Toha

@MosabAbuToha


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I have just won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. Let it bring hope Let it be a tale

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/22/opinion/south-africa-white-afrikaner-trump.html

Opinion

Guest Essay
A South African Grift Lands in the Oval Office
by Richard Poplak
May 22, 2025
New York Times

[Mr. Poplak is a journalist and filmmaker based in Johannesburg]

Listen to this article · 9:15 minutes

Learn more

Credit: Marco Longari/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

In March, a South African lobbyist for white rights named Ernst Roets appeared across from Tucker Carlson in an episode on Mr. Carlson’s YouTube channel called, “Man Charged With Treason for Speaking to Tucker About the Killing of Whites in South Africa.” This being the Tucker Carlson Show, at least two pieces of misinformation were shoehorned into the title. A man hadn’t been charged with treason for speaking to Mr. Carlson and white folks weren’t being killed in South Africa — at least, not at a rate higher than the rest of the population.

The title was correct on one point: Mr. Roets had indeed been interviewed by Mr. Carlson before. On the first occasion, he decanted an entire grievance mythos into the MAGAverse. The gist of his argument, as Mr. Carlson summed it up in his recent podcast episode, was that South Africa is shockingly racist against white people — “far more than apartheid ever was” to Black people.

In South Africa, Mr. Roets’ particular brand of performative victimhood is greeted not with jail time or the gallows, as it would be the case in some countries, but mostly with memes. Bazillions of them. The vast majority mock the notion that Mr. Roets’ constituency — white, right-wing Afrikaners disgruntled with the status quo — are in any way singled out for mistreatment by the government. In fact, no one community in South Africa has benefited more from apartheid’s economic legacy than white South Africans, yet for years a small but vocal group has decried what they consider to be institutional discrimination against them, making their claims on television shows, podcasts and social media.

But as Tucker Carlson goes, so goes the Trump administration. In February, after halting lifesaving aid for African H.I.V./AIDS and malaria programs across Africa, President Trump signed an executive order that, among other things, offered refugee status to “ethnic minority Afrikaners,” the vast majority of whom are white. In the middle of May, with uncommon efficiency, a plane chartered by the U.S. government spirited almost 60 new refugees to the United States, where they were met by a welcoming committee.

As we say in South Africa, ’n Boer maak ’n plan. A farmer makes a plan.

Contrary to the claims in Mr. Trump’s order, there is no evidence that the civil rights of white South Africans have been systematically trampled on, or that white landowners face disproportionate violence. They own farms that occupy about half of South Africa’s area, despite making up around 7 percent of the population. No white-owned land or home has been forcibly taken by the government under a new land law mentioned in Mr. Trump’s order.

These lobbyists travel into and out of South Africa without hindrance, facing no bans or financial repercussions. (Such opportunities, most readers will be unsurprised to learn, were not available to Black dissidents during apartheid. They were banned, jailed or forced into exile.) Recently, an opposition party has suggested bringing treason charges against an activist group, an idea drawing some enthusiasm among members of the government. But good luck pulling that one past South Africa’s highest court, which has a liberal bent. Mr. Roets and his backers live in a democracy — a noisy, messy, contested one — but a democracy nonetheless.

What is happening in Nelson Mandela’s Rainbow Nation? And why are the MAGA movement and Mr. Trump — who are mostly disinterested in African affairs — so concerned with the welfare of this particular group of South African citizens? The short answer is: white. The more substantial answer is that South Africa’s transition from apartheid to democracy is wildly misunderstood. “The perfect term for it is transplacement,” the political analyst Ralph Mathekga has said. “What that means is that the old system did not die. It is “still breathing.”

The miracle of South Africa’s first free elections in 1994 was not, as most people assume, the “peaceful” transition to democracy and the ascension of Mandela to the top job, but rather the fact that apartheid’s engineers and upholders were allowed to compete in the first place. They won 20 percent of that vote and assumed a leading role in the government. The old oppressors served alongside the formerly oppressed in a “government of national unity” and had enormous influence in drafting the country’s new constitution. The document could not have turned out better for Afrikaner nationalists, who were asked to give up none of apartheid’s spoils in exchange for a liberal constitution that enshrined their rights.

To this day, the bulk of South Africa’s private wealth remains in white hands. And while life is demonstrably better for the Black majority — especially with regard to nice perks like habeas corpus, freedom of movement and universal suffrage — South Africa is, by many measures, the most unequal society on earth. The white minority is the major beneficiary of this arrangement, but there is a caveat. Even within this cohort, wealth distribution is lumpy. Much of the Afrikaans middle class that was forged and protected by the apartheid system now struggles to make ends meet. Compounding matters, the government runs along rails of corruption and double-dealing that enriches a small Black elite connected to the African National Congress, Mandela’s party that still dominates South African politics.

The decline of the middle class is a global phenomenon, but in South Africa, as in parts of America, it takes on unambiguously racial characteristics. These grievances were blasted into America when Afrikaner lobbyists shared the myth of “white genocide” over the past decade, coinciding with the rise of Mr. Trump. They falsely allege that the South African government is responsible for a campaign of targeted violence against rural “Boers,” the Afrikaans term for farmer. (Boer has a secondary connotation in the language, too: boss, or overlord.)

There is no question that many rural South Africans, like many urban South Africans, have experienced almost wartime levels of violence. South Africa’s gruesome rates of inequality almost ensure this. The police are often useless, or worse. Organized gangsterism and industrial-scale stock theft reduce rural areas to occasional battlefields. But to allege government complicity in the murder of white farmers — let alone genocide — is a falsehood that verges on a full-scale rewrite of South Africa’s history. (By contrast, apartheid itself was never designated a genocide, and no credible revisionist movement has ever argued otherwise.)

Give Ernst Roets and his fellow travelers this much: They intimately understand MAGA culture and its feedback loop, and bafflingly, America’s so-called culture wars have found enormous purchase in South Africa’s elite circles. One would imagine that a major upside of living at the bottom of Africa is not having to know the particulars of Nancy Pelosi’s stock portfolio, or being versed in Fox News talking points on the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop. But one would be mistaken.

By appearing on Tucker Carlson, by posting on X, and by exploiting the animus to Black governance by white South Africans such as Elon Musk, who is closely tied to the Trump administration, the Afrikaner right lobby has vaulted their cause to the top of the geopolitical discussion.

If any more evidence of this was required, it was settled by Wednesday’s meeting in the Oval Office between President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa and Mr. Trump. In a patented example of cringe diplomacy, Team Trump ambushed Mr. Ramaphosa’s delegation with a super cut video of former A.N.C. politician Julius Malema, a cosplay revolutionary who insists on singing an old apartheid-era struggle song called “Dubul’ ibhunu,” often translated as “Kill The Boer,” at his political rallies. For the likes of Mr. Musk and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Mr. Malema’s antics are clearly incitement to genocide, though no incidents of violence have been definitively linked to the song.

Mr. Ramaphosa’s obsequiousness in the face of Mr. Trump’s barrage was to be expected; he is a man of many comforts, who has grown unaccustomed to being challenged. Thankfully, there were golfers and businessmen present in the Oval Office to try to temper the exchange. But, as all of this should make clear, the race-baiting grift is alive and well in South Africa.

Indeed, South Africa helped define and perfect white supremacy, so take it from an expert: This is an effort to flip the narrative of apartheid, and cast former oppressors as victims. It’s an attempt to invalidate the end of legislated white minority rule in South Africa, and render white Afrikaners as victims of reverse racism, to say nothing of targeted mass murder. It’s about spreading the global white replacement conspiracy theory.

Make no mistake, democratic South Africa is, in many respects, a failed, violent and corrupt state. But the forgiveness extended to the white minority at the end of apartheid is one of the most exceptionally human and humane moments of our species’ bloody history. By turning their backs on this, by accepting refugee status and claiming the mantle of exceptional victimhood, right-wing Afrikaners have become bit players in MAGA’s noisy but empty scam. They leave nothing behind them, except their home.

And the memes. Bazillions of them.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Richard Poplak is a journalist and filmmaker based in Johannesburg.
More on South Africa:

Opinion | Lydia Polgreen
South Africa Is Not a Metaphor
June 1, 2024

Opinion | William Shoki
The Story of South Africa No Longer Makes Sense
May 28, 2024


https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/may/05/palestinian-poet-mosab-abu-toha-pulitzer
 

Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha pictured in San Francisco in November. Photograph: Marissa Leshnov/The Guardian

Pulitzer prize
Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha wins Pulitzer prize for commentary

Renowned poet and author wins prize for series of New Yorker essays on suffering of Palestinians in Gaza

The renowned Palestinian poet and author, Mosab Abu Toha, is among this year’s Pulitzer prize winners.

Abu Toha was awarded for a series of essays in the New Yorker documenting the lives and suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, where he has lived nearly all his life.

“I have just won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary,” he wrote on X. “Let it bring hope / Let it be a tale.”

His essays portrayed the “physical and emotional carnage in Gaza that combine deep reporting with the intimacy of memoir to convey the Palestinian experience of more than a year and a half of war with Israel”, the Pulitzer board said on Monday.
 
Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha wins Pulitzer prize for commentary

Renowned poet and author wins prize for series of New Yorker essays on suffering of Palestinians in Gaza

Léonie Chao-Fong

Mon 5 May 2025 17.22 EDT

The renowned Palestinian poet and author, Mosab Abu Toha, is among this year’s Pulitzer prize winners.

Abu Toha was awarded for a series of essays in the New Yorker documenting the lives and suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, where he has lived nearly all his life.

“I have just won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary,” he wrote on X. “Let it bring hope / Let it be a tale.”

His essays portrayed the “physical and emotional carnage in Gaza that combine deep reporting with the intimacy of memoir to convey the Palestinian experience of more than a year and a half of war with Israel”, the Pulitzer board said on Monday.

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Abu Toha, 32, was detained in 2023 by Israeli forces at a checkpoint as he tried to flee his home in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza with his wife, Maram, and their three young children.

In Israeli detention, soldiers “separated me from my family, beat me, and interrogated me”, he wrote. He was able to leave and escape to the US after friends abroad applied pressure for his release.

Abu Toha wrote about the struggle of his family members to find food in Gaza, juxtaposed with memories of everyday meals before the war.

“I yearn to return to Gaza, sit at the kitchen table with my mother and father, and make tea for my sisters. I do not need to eat. I only want to look at them again,” he wrote.

He recalled seeing pictures of the destruction of the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, where he

regularly visited his grandparents and attended school. “I looked at the photos again and again, and an image of a graveyard that grows and grows formed in my mind,” he wrote.

He also wrote about the suspicion and indignities that he and other Palestinians face outside their homeland. He recalled telling a TSA agent who swabbed his palms for explosives during a layover in Boston: “I was kidnapped by the Israeli army in November, before being stripped of my clothes … Today, you come and separate me from my wife and kids, just like the army did a few months ago.”

The New Yorker also won a Pulitzer for its investigative podcast about the killing of Iraqi civilians by the US military and for feature photography for Moises Saman’s images documenting the end of Bashar al-Assad’s dictatorship in Syria.

This year’s Pulitzer winners in the arts also include Percival Everett for his novel James, a re-imagining of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of the enslaved title character, and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins for his play Purpose, a drama about a prominent Black family destroying itself from within.

Pulitzer prize-winning Palestinian poet on the war in Gaza: 'Why is our suffering not acknowledged?'


MSNBC

May 11, 2025

#israel #middleeast #hostages

Palestinian poet and writer Mosab Abu Toha joins MSNBC’s Ayman Mohyeldin, Antonia Hylton and Catherine Rampell after winning the Pulitzer Prize in Commentary for a series of essays he wrote for The New Yorker. He shared his experience within and outside of Gaza and what he’s doing to help those in need. 

https://hep.gse.harvard.edu/9781682539132/the-big-lie-about-race-in-americas-schools/
The Big Lie About Race in America’s Schools (Race and Education)
by Royel M. Johnson (Editor)
Shaun R. Harper (Editor)
[Publication date: September 17, 2024] 
 

See all formats and editions

A survey of the ways in which misinformation campaigns damage race relations and educational integrity in US public schools and universities and a blueprint for how to counteract such efforts

The Big Lie About Race in America’s Schools delivers a collective response to the challenge of racially charged misinformation, disinformation, and censorship that increasingly permeates and weakens not only US education but also our democracy. In this thought-provoking volume, Royel Johnson and Shaun Harper bring together leading education scholars and educators to confront the weaponized distortions that are currently undermining both public education and racial justice. The experts gathered in this work offer strategies to counter these dangerous trends and uphold truth in education.

In focused, practical chapters, the contributors examine efforts both broad and specific, from restrictive education legislation, to book bans, to twisting terminology like Critical Race Theory (CRT) and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), that are obscuring truth in public education. They demonstrate how this narrowing of allowable ideas does a disservice to all students and especially to those who are underrepresented in curricula, including students of color and LGBTQ+ students.

Ultimately, the book offers clear, actionable insights for educators, policymakers, and advocates who seek solutions that will counter recent trends and transform educational contexts within both K–12 and higher education. Among other actions, this volume advocates strengthening educational alliances through shared leadership, organized collaboration, and parental involvement. It also presents innovative countermeasures to help defend public education.

Reviews:

“For all the brave educators committed to teaching and leading for social justice, The Big Lie About Race in America’s Schools offers much-needed validation, encouragement, resources, and strategies to resist the efforts to silence them. It belongs in the hands of all those educators, parents, and policymakers concerned about the fate of American education and our democracy.”―Beverly Daniel Tatum, president emerita, Spelman College, and author of Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations About Race

“Legislative bans on teaching, learning, and diversity, equity, and inclusion programs are predicated on distortions about how race and racism have shaped public and private institutions. To counter these fallacies, Johnson and Harper have assembled an excellent collection of essays that help make sense of why these attacks on the freedom to learn or ensure multiracial inclusion and equity are occurring, and perhaps more importantly, what we can do about it. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in fostering democratic, open, and equitable K-12 and higher education that prepares students to repair our fractured multiracial democracy.”―Janelle Scott, Robert J. and Mary Catherine Birgeneau Distinguished Chair in Educational Disparities, University of California, Berkeley


“For all the brave educators committed to teaching and leading for social justice, The Big Lie About Race in America’s Schools offers much-needed validation, encouragement, resources, and strategies to resist the efforts to silence them. It belongs in the hands of all those educators, parents, and policymakers concerned about the fate of American education and our democracy.”―Beverly Daniel Tatum, president emerita, Spelman College, and author of Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations About Race

“Legislative bans on teaching, learning, and diversity, equity, and inclusion programs are predicated on distortions about how race and racism have shaped public and private institutions. To counter these fallacies, Johnson and Harper have assembled an excellent collection of essays that help make sense of why these attacks on the freedom to learn or ensure multiracial inclusion and equity are occurring, and perhaps more importantly, what we can do about it. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in fostering democratic, open, and equitable K-12 and higher education that prepares students to repair our fractured multiracial democracy.”―Janelle Scott, Robert J. and Mary Catherine Birgeneau Distinguished Chair in Educational Disparities, University of California, Berkeley



ABOUT THE AUTHOR:


Royel M. Johnson is an associate professor and PhD program chair in the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California. He also serves as the director of the National Assessment of Collegiate Campus Climates at USC’s Race and Equity Center and is a faculty member in the Pullias Center for Higher Education. Shaun R. Harper is the Clifford and Betty Allen Chair in Urban Leadership, University Professor, and Provost Professor of Education, Business and Public Policy at the University of Southern California. He also is the founder and executive director of USC’s Race and Equity

 

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