The residents of dozens of public housing towers in the southern Australian city of Melbourne heard the state government was planning to demolish their homes on the news.
“Everyone found out from the TV, from the news, with the rest of Victoria,” Sara*, a resident of the first group of towers to be knocked down, told Al Jazeera.
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The government says the renewal will boost “social housing by at least 10 percent”, a modest increase in a city where there is already a huge gap in affordable housing.
According to Australian census data, the percentage of Australian households who rent their home from a state or territory housing authority dropped from 6 percent in 1999-2000 to 3 percent in 2019-2020.
In the state of Victoria, the share of housing classified as public or community housing, is just 2.8 percent.
By comparison, in Paris and Vienna, the share of public housing has increased since the 1990s, with about 25 percent of the population of both cities now living in socially-rented housing.
In Al Jazeera
Francesca Albanese says Israel has violated three of the five acts listed under the UN Genocide Convention Including: Killing members of a specific group, causing serious bodily or mental harm, and deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole and in part. She also found that genocidal acts were approved and given effect after statements of genocidal intent by senior Israeli military and government officials. These acts, Albanese argues, are part of a 'settler-colonial process of erasure' - which has been underway for more than 70 years. She recommends - among other things - an immediate arms embargo on Israel. And for member states to support South Africa in its attempt to prosecute Israel at the International Court of Justice.
The growth of Israeli settlements amounts to the transfer by Israel of its own civilian population into occupied territories, which is a war crime, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said on Friday.
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“Settler violence and settlement-related violations have reached shocking new levels, and risk eliminating any practical possibility of establishing a viable Palestinian state,” Turk said in a statement that accompanied a 16-page report about the growth in illegal Israeli housing units.
The report, based on the UN’s own monitoring as well as other sources, documented 24,300 new Israeli housing units in the occupied West Bank during a one-year period through to the end of October, which it said was the highest since monitoring began in 2017.
It also said there had been a dramatic increase in the intensity, severity and regularity of both Israeli settler and state violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, particularly since Hamas’s October 7 attacks on southern Israel, which triggered the current war in the Gaza Strip.
Since then, more than 400 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces or by settlers, the report said.
For months, Israeli soldiers in Gaza have been documenting their own war crimes against Palestinians and sharing them on social media.
The Listening Post collected and reviewed hundreds of items. We asked three experts on human rights and torture to examine the material.
Glasgow, Scotland – The atmosphere at Celtic Park on European nights needs few added extras, the electricity in the air on such occasions is enough to light up the Glasgow skyline several times over.
But as 60,000 Celtic fans flocked to the famous arena last Wednesday evening for the Champions League tie against Atletico Madrid, it was not just anticipation for the game powering the pre-match energy.
As kickoff neared, the stadium transformed into a sea of Palestinian flags, every stand awash with the colours of Palestine in a show of solidarity with those in Gaza under Israeli assault.
A few days before, when Celtic fans displayed Palestinian flags at a domestic away fixture, television networks were accused of purposefully avoiding the display. They had no such option this time. The display was beamed around the world, and quickly shared millions of times on social media.
More children have now been killed in Gaza in the last three weeks than the total killed in conflicts around the world in every year since 2019, the nongovernmental organisation Save the Children has said.
Figures released by the NGO on Sunday, referencing Palestinian health authorities, show that at least 3,324 children have been killed in Gaza since October 7, while 36 have died in the West Bank.
According to reports from the UN Secretary-General on children and armed conflict, a total of 2,985 children were killed across 24 countries in 2022, 2,515 in 2021, and 2,674 in 2020 across 22 countries, Save the Children said.
“One child’s death is one too many, but these are grave violations of epic proportions,” said Jason Lee, Save the Children’s country director for the occupied Palestinian territory. “A ceasefire is the only way to ensure their safety. The international community must put people before politics – every day spent debating is leaving children killed and injured. Children must be protected at all times, especially when they are seeking safety in schools and hospitals.”