Marwa Fatafta’s Twitter mentions were flooded. As violence escalated in Israel–Palestine earlier this month, Fatafta, who is Palestinian and works as a policy analyst for an online think tank focusing on Palestinian human rights in Berlin, had been posting pictures and stories about families killed in the Gaza Strip to her 14,000 followers. In response,
Month: May 2021
Reuters The government has advised people not to travel into and out of areas hardest hit by the Indian variant of Covid-19 unless necessary, it has emerged. Health officials said it was spreading fastest in Bolton, Blackburn, Kirklees, Bedford, Burnley, Leicester, Hounslow and North Tyneside. Bolton in Greater Manchester recorded 451 cases per 100,000 people
On Monday, a team of officers from the Special Cell, an elite branch of the police in charge of investigating terrorism and organized crime in New Delhi, descended on Twitter’s offices in the city to “serve a notice” to the head of Twitter in India. Police also attempted to enter a Twitter office in Gurugram,
Amir Levy / Getty Images The car of the man who was attacked and injured in Bat Yam, Israel As an uneasy ceasefire takes hold in Israel–Palestine, digital terror is not slowing down. Online hate, harassment, and coordination of physical violence have sprouted across social media channels. One Israeli group that combats disinformation and hate
The father of a journalist who was arrested after his flight was diverted to Belarus has told the BBC he fears his son may be tortured. Roman Protasevich, 26, was on a flight from Greece which was rerouted to Minsk on Sunday over a supposed bomb threat. Western countries accused Belarus of “hijacking” the Ryanair
By the time Christopher Ahn signed on to the mission inside North Korea’s embassy in Madrid, the plan was already finalized. Other people had mapped out how to restrain the staff, how to hoover up any useful intel materials, and most important, how to make it look like the diplomat they were grabbing was being
Western countries have expressed outrage at the forced diversion of a plane carrying a Belarusian activist on an internal EU flight on Sunday. EU leaders are due to discuss their response to what the union’s executive called a “hijacking” and the US state department said was “a shocking act”. Belarus forced the plane, which was
@emergenzavvf At least eight people have died after a cable car fell on a mountain near Lake Maggiore in northern Italy on Sunday. The accident happened on a service transporting passengers from the resort town of Stresa up the nearby Mottarone mountain in the region of Piedmont. An image posted on social media by emergency
The government in the Democratic Republic of Congo has launched an evacuation plan for the eastern city of Goma after a large volcano erupted. Fountains of high lava burst from the Mount Nyiragongo into the night sky forming a thick orange cloud over Goma, which has a population of two million. Thousands of panic-stricken residents
Reuters The Pfizer and AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccines are highly effective against the variant identified in India after two doses, a study has found. Two jabs of either vaccine give a similar level of protection against symptomatic disease from the Indian variant as they do for the Kent one. However, both vaccines were only 33% effective
Reuters People aged 32 and 33 in England are now being invited to book their first dose of the coronavirus vaccine. The NHS said booking will open to that age group – around one million people – at 07:00 BST on Saturday. Text message invitations will be sent out to 33-year-olds on Saturday and also
Chris Jackson / Chris Jackson / Getty Images Members of the royal family pictured on the balcony at Buckingham Palace on July 10, 2018 Prince Harry told Oprah Winfrey that his family refused to help with the barrage of media and social media abuse directed at his wife, Meghan Markle. “I thought my family would
The BBC should take “every possible step” to ensure that nothing like its deceit of the Princess of Wales to secure an interview ever happens again, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said. The PM said he was “very concerned” after an inquiry found Martin Bashir faked documents for his 1995 interview. The Duke of Cambridge
Tim Graham / Corbis via Getty Images An independent inquiry has found that the BBC “fell short of its high standards of integrity and transparency” and reporter Martin Bashir acted in a “deceitful” manner to secure his explosive 1995 interview with Princess Diana. The famous Panorama interview was the first time a member of the
Princes William and Harry have condemned the BBC and the media culture after an independent inquiry concluded Thursday that former BBC reporter Martin Bashir had used “deceitful” means to secure his explosive 1995 interview with their late mother, Princess Diana. The same inquiry also found that the BBC “fell short of its high standards of
The “deceitful” way the BBC secured an interview with Diana, Princess of Wales, “substantially influenced” its content, Prince William has said. “It brings indescribable sadness to know that the BBC’s failures contributed significantly to her fear, paranoia and isolation,” he said. “She was failed not just by a rogue reporter but by leaders at the