Search Results for: death penalty

“It a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” —   Macbeth  When asked to imagine the stereotypes associated with Texas, one might conjure images of barbecue, big trucks, and cowboys. But perhaps a more apt image would be that of injustice undergirding execution. As it all too frequently has in the [...]

Julian Assange is among the most polarizing public figures of the 21st century thus far. In the nearly two decades since he established WikiLeaks, a website that gained infamy in the aughts for its release of millions of classified documents and related analyses, Assange has galvanized free speech advocates, incensed national security stalwarts, and fostered [...]

A death row inmate in Alabama filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the constitutionality of nitrogen gas executions. He argued that the first person in the nation put to death by this method experienced violent convulsions for several minutes in “a human experiment that officials botched miserably.” Bernard E. Harcourt, counsel for death row [...]

Zimbabwean Vice President Constantino Chiwenga warned young people in the country on Thursday that the government will block all higher education scholarships from LGBTQ+ advocacy organizations. In his statement, Chimwenga denounced LGBTQ+ organizations’ scholarships as “unlawful” and a move by “foreign interests” to recruit less privileged students into “lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual activities.” He went [...]

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) of India announced on Monday that the Emir of the State of Qatar decided to release eight Indian Navy veterans working for the Doha-based Dahra Global company, who were detained in Qatar due to their connection in an alleged espionage case in 2022. The MEA statement reads: The Government [...]

Alabama’s experimental use of gas to torture to death Kenneth Smith on January 25th — like all executions by lethal injection — has perpetuated a horrific Nazi legacy in the United States and is a traumatizing affront to many in the Jewish community. The fact that this torment was blindly carried out just ahead of [...]

Zimbabwe’s cabinet agreed on proposed legislation Tuesday which will abolish capital punishment, 19 years after the last state execution took place. The decision came following months of debate in parliament, and the country will instead impose life imprisonment sentences for aggravated murders. The Zimbabwean cabinet passed a private member’s bill which was introduced at the [...]

Iran executed four individuals it claims were associated with an Israeli intelligence operation backed by Israel’s Mossad Agency. Iran charged the four individuals with orchestrating a bomb attack on a factory in the city of Isfahan, known for manufacturing weapons and equipment for Iran’s Ministry of Defence. The plot was intended to take place during [...]

A bipartisan group of Tennessee state legislators unveiled a proposed state constitutional amendment on Friday to grant judges more discretion to detain individuals without bail before trial for specific violent criminal charges. Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R-District 25) made the announcement at Memphis City Hall, flanked by Memphis’ Mayor Paul Young (D), Senate Majority [...]

I am an ordained Jewish cantor, a former Jewish prison chaplain, a third-generation Holocaust survivor, and co-founder of L’chaim! Jews Against the Death Penalty. I write these words on the eve of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and on the morning after Alabama executed Kenneth Eugene Smith with nitrogen gas — the first execution of this [...]