Killer ordered out of Canada

VANCOUVER -- An admitted killer linked to the notorious Mara Salvatrucha gang is scheduled to be deported to his native El Salvador next week, an Immigration and Refugee Board hearing announced yesterday. Board adjudicator Otto Nupponen said Jose Francisco Cardoza Quinteros has lost his latest attempt to remain in Canada. The assessment determines whether it is too dangerous for refugees to be returned to their home country. The decision clears the way for Quinteros' deportation Thursday.
Read more [Times Colonist News Feed]

Government of Canada announces funding to Sheridan College to provide language training to newcomers

Read more [Canada Government News Feed]

House Committee to Probe Into Detainee Deaths; Black Voters Could Change Politics in the South

Tribe Leaders and Sheriff to Meet After Reservation Shootout
Riverside County sheriff's officials escorted by federal mediators will meet with tribal Chairman Robert Salgado at the tribe's country club to try and reduce tensions between local law enforcement and the Soboba Indians after they killed two suspects in an hourlong gunbattle and locked down the reservation. San Jose Mercury News.

Black Turnout Changes Southern Politics
"The sharp surge in black turnout that Senator Barack Obama has helped to generate in recent primaries and Congressional races could signal a threat this fall to the longtime Republican dominance of the South, according to politicians and voting experts." New York Times.

California Needs Immigrants of All Skill Levels
"Two of California's most immigrant-dependent industries - agriculture and Silicon Valley - are pushing narrow measures through Congress in an effort to employ foreign workers at opposite ends of the labor market, people who pick vegetables and the postgraduate engineers and scientists of Silicon Valley." San Francisco Chronicle.

House Committee to Investigate Detainee Deaths
After the Washington Post series on the neglectful detention of immigrants, John Conyers and other lawmakers are requesting documents on the detainees deaths for further review. Congress Daily.

Gays and Lesbians Celebrate Court Decision
"Gay and lesbian couples in San Francisco rejoiced on Thursday over a State Supreme Court decision affirming their right to marry even as political leaders on both sides of the issue girded for an extended fight over the ruling in the courts and at the ballot box." New York Times.

Detained Iowa Workers Transferred to Jails
"Most of the 389 immigrant workers caught in the nation's largest single-site immigration raid moved out of a makeshift detention center Thursday and into one of nearly a dozen jails scattered throughout Iowa." Des Moines Register.

Blog for Palestine Day

Blogger za3tar has organized Blog About Palestine Day on May 15, the anniversary of the Nakba and Israel's 60th anniversary celebrations. Bloggers around the world were invited to blog for Palestine, as noted by Global Voices here. Many bloggers chose to participate in the event; here is a selection.

za3tar, the organizer of the event, blogged about being Palestinian, sharing a story of his family and concluding:

For us Palestinians, only two things remained true during the past 60 years; First, life for ordinary people only gets worst every year. Second, from the minute you are born in Palestine, you are immediately a suspect, and you are continuously treated so for as long as you live. No one in the world can condone mass punishment of civilians, but punishing suspects is not a big deal.

We must be suspects, otherwise what explains 60 years of Israel’s direct violation of numerous UN resolutions without any consequences. We must be suspects, otherwise what explains our denial of basic human rights. For me and my family, the only crime that we are suspect of, is simply existing!

These stories are not unusual for Palestinians. As a matter of fact, i come from a blissed family, my parents were able provide us with food and shelter, and none of my relatives was killed. Unfortunately however, the stories of average Palestinians are much grimmer still.

Rebellious Arab Girl, a Canadian resident, also blogged about being Palestinian:

What do I represent?
I represent my self, a Palestenian with hot blood through my veins and a voice to speak about my existence. I am Palestenian. I will always be one. I was born as one, and will die as one.

It has been 60 years since my home was taken away, isn’t that too much?

I may be one person. I am not a celebrity or someone who is famous and well known. However, I have the right to speak out when I say, “we had enough!”

Vivirlatino blogged about the Palestinian population in Chile:

Last month about 40 Palestinian families, refugees from Iraq, were welcomed into Chile.

“We hope that suffering will be a thing of the past, and Chile the source of your new happiness,” Deputy Interior Minister Felipe Harboe said as he welcomed the 16 adults and 23 children who had spent months stranded at a desert camp on the Iraqi-Syrian border.

The rest of about 117 refugees from this specific camp arrived in the Santiago neighborhoods of La Calera y San Felipe this week. They were welcomed with flags, dancing, and music.

While these homes in Chile, which come with the support of the Chilean government and all of it's resources (including a monthly stipend and counseling services), do not replace or erase the need of Palestinians to have a home in their homeland, the right to return, historically it makes sense. So many people left Chile after the 1973 U.S. backed military coup. So many lives lost and disappeared through state sanctioned violence. The links are there. The connection is there.

And Far Away blogged about the changing face of both Palestine and Israel, sharing fascinating photographs:

It’s been 60 years since the Palestinian Nakbeh. That means around four generations of Palestinians.

Of course, in these past 60 years, life for Palestinians for those still living in Palestine and the ones living in exodus have changed drastically. Thanks to ethnic cleansing, injustice, barricading, lack-of-educational means, poverty, bad health care, constant pressure, among other racist and unjustifiable actions, life has changed.

Life for “Israelis” has also changed.

The wheels have turned…

Bruised Earth wondered about the false hope being given to Palestinians…

So on this day of of the Nakba, the catastrophe, all this site can ask and ‘hope’ to encourage is the ongoing search for the truth. Hope more people can wade through the politics and media that filter what we all need to know; what we all must confront. Everyone must find that for themselves.

…and encouraged readers to seek the truth from outside sources:

Read other Web sites - beyond Fox, CNN, BBC, and Reuters. Forget about the 30 minute news updates - and instead piece together 30 minutes of real news from other sources every day.

Read the facts. Find more facts. Find more truth.

Syrian blogger Maysaloon discussed the Nakba:

In many ways, how we choose to commemorate May the 15th says a lot about us in the Arab world. Those of us who remember it as something from the past and, to put it biblically, with much “wailing and gnashing of teeth”, miss the point. The Nakba did not happen and end in 1948, it has continued to this present day. You can see the Nakba in Gaza, in the refugee camps and, dare I say it, it has expanded to Iraq. However, from the Nakba we also saw the birth of resistance. From the heroism and selflessness of al Husseini and the resistance in 1948, to the battle of Karameh in ‘68, Beirut in ‘82, Iraq today and the South of Lebanon in 2006. The struggle against occupation continues, as it does against those who collaborate. May 15th reminds us of the tragedy which befell a people, our people but also strengthens our resolve to resist and to push on. Am I the last person to talk about resistance from the comfort of my home, in a country which was Israel's midwife? Perhaps, but just as a first person is necessary in a set, so is the last, and it is belonging to the set and playing your role in anyway possible which is what counts. The only thing, the easiest thing, for us to do is to forget, to count ourselves defeated or irrelevant. Each of us has a moral duty to resist zionism, empire and neo-colonialism in all aspects of our lives and it will be a poor excuse to say, one day, that you were only being realistic. The enemies of Palestine know that every person they kill or bomb they drop only creates more determination to fight them, that their time is running out. Sixty years on, the dream of ending Israel is that little bit closer. Sixty years on, the struggle continues.

Finally, My Home Away From Home, who lives in Canada, shared her desire to go to Palestine, the country of her ancestors:

Palestine…it is my home that I have never set foot in, it is the land I love without boundaries.

My heart cries for Palestine, I want to touch its soil even once in my life. My heart and soul are always with Palestine, it is a part of my prayer ritual. I pray that one day we get our freedom we get our right to return. I pray for the gruesome murders and unfairness to stop, for children to start living like they are supposed to without fear, for mothers to be able to sleep the night without worrying that tomorrow or the day after she may lose some or all of her children. I pray for families to live together all in one place without a brother, a son an uncle in the isreali prisons for life. I pray that children can go to school or out to play and come back home safely. I pray that wives and husbands are not widowed too soon, and children are not orphaned when they are still young. I pray for people to live in peace and harmony and for all of us Palestinians born all over the world to reunite and meet in our homeland, a land who’s love was born in our heart…

Hate Aimed at Latinos, Not Immigrants

Latinos condemn the hypocrisy of a society that is addicted to illegal immigrant labor but looks for others to blame for the addiction.
Read more [AlterNet.org]

Immigrants' Journey: The Hanlon family

Family is such an important part of who we are. As my husband and I have just become grandparents and watch another generation take root in the Vancouver area, it makes it a good time to reflect on who we are and where we come from. Our roots both stem from the British Isles but since I know more about mine, that is what I will talk about.
Read more [The Vancouver Sun (West Coast News)]

Government of Canada announces funding to Sheridan College to provide enhanced language training to newcomers

Read more [Canada Government News Feed]

USA: Immigrants Drugged Without Reason When Deported

Read more [Infoshop News2]

Transnational Realities

The xenophobic paranoia that demonizes undocumented immigrants as sub-human criminals and alien invaders who are somehow fulfilling a lifelong dream to flaunt American border laws out of disrespect, or as part of some strategic re-conquest of the west, so dominates U.S. media, it defies belief.

The benefit -- to what passes for immigration discourse in the States -- of listening to the voices at this historic Mexico City conference of transnational migrant remitters, their families, and their advocates, will be profound when the American public opens its heart to the idea of sharing a common humanity with people of other cultures and nations, desperate with no other options to survive.

During a participatory session entitled “Transnational Realities: A Critical Review of Impacts of Remittances on Families,” I was struck by the personal stories from various migrants and their family members that highlighted the human themes of love, fear, guilt, hope, courage, sacrifice, cultural identity, generational conflict, and the difficulties of living up to sometimes unrealistic expectations and pressures from those left behind. There was an honest complexity that participants agreed needed more airing even in migrants’ home countries.

The psychological trauma of leaving your family behind in order to have any hope of providing them with a better life. The obliviousness of some pre-teen migrants to the hardships and exploitation that await them in the United States. A desire to shield family members during brief phone conversations from the harsh reality of irregular meals and mounting expenses. The parental desire to make up for lost time spent with children by purchasing material gifts. The emotional devastation of losing a child to the deadly border.

The truth is -- as Artemio Guerra of New York’s Fifth Avenue Committee put it so succinctly at the opening plenary – for so many who experience it, migration is not an easy, flippant decision and life. Rather, it is traumatically difficult

“When you leave.
When you cross.
When you get there.”

Immigrants are not callous, selfish criminals, America. Ironically enough, when you open your ears and minds to their voices and stories, it won’t be traumatically difficult for you to understand.

Inglewood Police Kill Unarmed Black Teen; New Jersey Jail Pays for Renovations With Imported Inmates

Imported Inmates from Philly to Pay for New Jersey Jail Renovations
Despite deplorable conditions, the Passaic County Jail in Paterson, New Jersey is negotiating to house 300 federal inmates from Philadelphia. The prison, known for its controversial record that includes losing a contract to house detained immigrants because of abuse allegations, would get $5 million in revenues for the inmates. Newsday.

Italian Police Increase Immigrant Raids
Immigrants suspected of living in Italy illegally are being arrested during raids across the country. Targeting immigrant housing camps, mmigrants from Romania, Albania, Greece, China and Morocco, were among those arrested. BBC.

Another Sean Bell in Inglewood?
Another unarmed Black man, 19 year-old Michael Byoune, was shot and killed by an Inglewood Police Department (IPD) officer in the early morning hours this week for what appears to be his innocent attempt to flee from gunfire. New America Media.

Human Rights Group Delays Madonna's Malawian Adoption
A Malawian human rights group presented arguments on “shortcomings” in the southern African nation’s adoption laws, so Madonna won’t know until next week whether David Banda iwill become a permanent member of her family. MSNBC.

60 Years of Palestinian Dispossession . . . No Reason to Celebrate "Israel at 60"!

"Even after fifty years of living the Palestinian exile I still find myself astonished at the lengths to which official Israel and its supporters will go to suppress the fact that a half century has gone by without Israeli restitution, recognition, or acknowledgment of Palestinian human rights and without, as the facts undoubtedly show, connecting that suspension of rights to Israel's official policies. . . . the Palestinian Nakba is characterized as a semi-fictional event . . . caused by no one in particular."
Edward Said, commenting on the "Israel at 50"
celebrations in the US in 1998

The creation of the state of Israel almost 60 years ago dispossessed and uprooted hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes and lands. With their peaceful lives ruined, society fragmented, possessions pillaged and hope for freedom and nationhood dashed, Palestinian refugees held on to their dream of return, and Palestinians everywhere nourished their aspiration for freedom, dignified living, and becoming whole again.

read more

Now Teachers are the New Immigration Agents?

H/T ImmigrationProf

After scaring parents and students, alike, in Oakland after word spread of raids on schools, Mary Ann Zehr of Education Week looks at the recent Postville, Iowa raids and asks about the role that educators should play in immigration enforcement.

I was curious if there was a connection between the subpoena and the immigration raid. In other words, did any information provided by school district officials, when they complied with the subpoena, get into the hands of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents? And is this another incident where educators have been dragged into an area of federal law that is murky? What steps should school officials take in such situations to ensure that undocumented students get the free public education in this country guaranteed by the 1982 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Plyler v. Doe? (I've written about this issue in a Sept. 12, 2007, article for Education Week, "With Immigrants, Districts Balance Safety, Legalities.")

Read the rest of the article here.

Some Immigrants Sedated for Deportation; Karen Bass to Lead California Assembly

Families Prepare for the Worst After Iowa Raids
"Iowa workers without legal documentation went into hiding Monday and rushed to fill out paperwork for the care of their children and property in anticipation of being arrested, lawyers and immigration rights workers said." Des Moines Register.

Karen Bass Sworn in to Lead California Assembly
"Democrat Karen Bass has been sworn in as speaker of the California Assembly, the first African American woman to hold that position since the Legislature was created 159 years ago." USA Today.

Surge in Violence on California Reservation
"A man and woman opened fire on guards at an entrance to an American Indian reservation and fled into its hilly interior, where they were killed in a gun battle with sheriff's deputies and a police commando team, authorities said Tuesday. It was the second deadly gunfight involving deputies on the reservation in five days." MSNBC.

Study: Today's Immigrants Adapt Faster
"Immigrants of the past quarter-century have been assimilating in the United States at a notably faster rate than did previous generations, according to a study released Tuesday." Chicago Tribune.

Careless Detention: Some Immigrants are Drugged During Deportation
"The U.S. government has injected hundreds of foreigners it has deported with dangerous psychotropic drugs against their will to keep them sedated during the trip back to their home country, according to medical records, internal documents and interviews with people who have been drugged." Washington Post.

$1 million to sell new immigration law

OTTAWA -- Immigration Minister Diane Finley says the government is smart to spend more than $1 million on an ad campaign in the ethnic press to sell the Conservative government's controversial changes to immigration legislation. "It's important to recognize that many of the immigrants in this country rely on ethnic media as their main source of news," Finley told a Commons committee Tuesday, adding that the campaign was done in more than 20 languages. Finley said government has spent $1,076,000 so far on print and radio ads describing the legislation in the ethnic media, compared to only $28,000 spent in the mainstream media. Finley was appearing before the Citizenship and Immigration committee to answer questions about the legislation, which will allow the minister to-fast track certain categories of applicants for permanent residence in Canada. She rejected widespread criticism the legislation will allow the minister to "cherry-pick" future immigrants, and said the decision on which category of immigrants gets faster acceptance will be decided in consultation with provinces and territories, as well as business and other stakeholder groups.
Read more [Vancouver Sun (News)]

300 Arrested in Raid on Immigrant Workers; China's Worst Earthquake in Three Decades

ICE Raids Iowa Meat Plant, Arrests More Than 300 Workers
On Monday, immigration agents raided the country's largest kosher meat plant in its largest sweep to date. Planned for months, the raid on Postville, Iowa workers led to more than 300 arrests. New York Times.

Black Smokers At More Risk Without Menthol Regulation
Because menthol cigarettes, a more common choice for Black smokers, account for a quarter of the $70 billion cigarette market, any legislation to regulate the tobacco will not included metholated brands in order to receive support from tobacco lobby group Phillip Morris USA. New York Times.

Earthquake in China Kills Thousands
"Rescue workers were digging through flattened homes and schools Tuesday in a desperate search for victims of China's worst earthquake in three decades. Authorities said nearly 12,000 people were killed and more than 18,000 are missing." MSNBC.

Careless Detention
Day 3 of a special Washington Post multimedia feature tells the story of Amina Mudey, a mentally ill detainee. There are also reports that some neglected immigrants have committed suicide because of substandard care. Washington Post.

Headlines for May 13, 2008

• Over 12,000 Killed in Chinese Earthquake
• Clinton Expected to Win in WV; Obama Looks to November
• McCain Outlines Plans to Address Global Warming
• Former Republican Bob Barr to Run as Libertarian
• Up to 700 Arrested in Immigration Raid in Iowa
• Report: 83 Immigrants Have Died in US Custody
• Bush Vows to Help Arm Lebanese Army
• Bush Accuses Iran of Arming Militias in Iran
• US Admits Some "Iranian-Supplied" Arms Aren't from Iran
• Iran to Sue US and UK for Backing Group Behind Mosque Bombing
• Ban Ki-moon Presses Burmese Junta to Accept Aid
• Inglewood, California Police Shoot Dead Unarmed Teenager
• Rep. John Conyers Holds Forum in NYC on Sean Bell Case
• South African Apartheid Suit to Proceed
• Nawaz Sharif's Party Pulls Out of Coalition Government
• Pentagon Drops Charges Against Alleged 20th Hijacker

Sikhs applaud promise of true apology

The federal government is set to apologize for preventing 376 Indian immigrants aboard the Komagata Maru steamship from landing in Vancouver 94 years ago.
Read more [The Province]

Web Guide

10 A.M.: Statistics Canada releases analysis on immigrants and the labour market.
Read more [Vancouver Sun (News)]

Amid trade talks, MPs visit Colombia's refugees

A group of Canadian MPs travelled to one of the hemisphere's most volatile countries on Monday as Ottawa prepares to finalize a free trade deal with Colombia.
Read more [CBC - Top Stories]

Inaccurate pensioner e-mail sparks controversy

A public school division senior administrator should be sanctioned for distributing "crap" that denigrates refugees, says Manitoba Interfaith Immigration Council executive director Marty Dolin. Dolin said that an e-mail distributed recently on school division e-mail by Richard Bidzinski, the secretary-treasurer of Turtle River School Division, has been circulating for at least three years.
Read more [Winnipeg Free Press]

US Government Takes Immigrants' Taxes, But Immigrants Won't Receive Rebates

Immigrant families contribute millions to the economy and have been some of the worst affected by this economic recession. Even though the US government makes sure to collect taxes from immigrants, whole families are ineligible to receive the tax rebates.

The National Alliance of Latin American and Caribbean Communities (NALACC), the leading network of Latin American immigrant-led organizations in the United States, called the exclusion hypocritical, unfair, and counterproductive.

“Different levels of government have no problem collecting taxes from everyone. However, our government denies tax-paying immigrant workers who lack immigration status their fair share of tax rebates, and by doing so limiting the expected outcome of the economic stimulus checks,” continued Mr. Chacon. According to economists, undocumented immigrants contributed $428 billion dollars to the nation's $13.6 trillion gross domestic product in 2006 alone. Contributions from sales taxes, property taxes and excise taxes (such as the gas tax) paid by undocumented workers, are significant, they also add.

These are examples of how this policy affects real-life families: 1) a head of household in Rancho Cordova, CA, filed jointly with his wife, but because she is in the process of becoming a permanent resident she does not have a SS number. They will not receive the stimulus check; 2) a U.S.-born citizen in Chicago, IL, filed jointly with her fiancé hoping to receive at least $600, but she too will not receive a check; 3) a permanent resident living in Compton, CA, filed his return, did not include his wife, but he included a child who does not have a valid SS number. Instead of the $900 he expected to receive, he will receive nothing.

Angela Sanbrano, NALACC president, added: “It is a false assumption that undocumented immigrants do not pay taxes. In California, the tenth largest economy in the world, immigrants pay approximately $4.5 billion in state taxes each year; their federal tax contribution is more than $30 billion annually. If the Bush Administration’s real objective is to stimulate the economy, not returning a well-deserved entitlement to immigrants misses a great opportunity to do so.”

Ottawa promises apology for Komagata Maru incident

After more than nine decades, the federal government is set to apologize for preventing a shipload of would-be Indian immigrants from landing in Vancouver.
Read more [CBC - BC]

Leading Canadian public servant dies

OTTAWA -- Arthur Kroeger, one of Canada's leading public servants of the last half-century, died Friday after battling cancer. He was 75. Kroeger was deputy minister of numerous federal departments in a distinguished career spanning 34 years, serving in the departments of External Affairs, Transport, Indian Affairs, the Treasury Board, among others. From 1993 to 2002, he was also the chancellor of Carleton University, where the college of public affairs is named after him. Kroeger was born in rural Alberta in 1932, the son of Russian Mennonite immigrants. The hardships he faced during the Great Depression of the 1930s helped shaped his strong ethical character. After excelling in school and attending Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, Kroeger entered the public service with the department of External (now Foreign) Affairs in 1958.
Read more [Vancouver Sun (News)]

Apology on the way for Indo-Canadians

The Canadian government will formally apologize in the coming days for sending away 376 Indian immigrants aboard the Komagata Maru when it attempted to land in Vancouver 94 years ago.
Read more [The Vancouver Sun (West Coast News)]

'This regime is good at killing people, not helping them'

Cyclone refugees face second battle for survival
Read more [The Guardian (International + UK)]