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| JOE BIDEN AND REPRESENTATIVE JOHN LEWIS LEAD A GROUP ACROSS THE EDMUND PETTUS BRIDGE IN SELMA, ALABAMA, ON 3 MARCH 2013. |
President Joe Biden visited Selma, Alabama, on Sunday to commemorate the 58th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, regarded as one of the decisive moments in the U.S. civil rights movement.
Alabama state troopers attacked marchers and voting rights activists, led by the late John Lewis and Hosea Williams, as they tried to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965.
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During his speech in Selma, Biden renewed calls for Congress to pass the voting rights bill named after Lewis, weakened by a 2013 Supreme Court decision.
He said during his speech he "will not let the filibuster obstruct the sacred right to vote."
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 to outlaw discriminatory voting practices was introduced only a few days after the TV coverage of the brutal attack collectively shocked the nation.
Biden's speech commemorating "Bloody Sunday" at the Edmund Pettus Bridge was broadcasted live.
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On March 7, 1965, then-25-year-old activist John Lewis led over 600 marchers across the bridge as they began a march toward Montgomery to demand an end to discrimination in voter registration.
The bridge, completed in 1940, is named for Edmund Pettus, a Confederate general, U.S. senator, and Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan.
Syria has condemned the unannounced visit by U.S. Army Gen. Mark Milley to a U.S. base in the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) held area of the war-torn country.
Syria's foreign ministry noted that the visit violates Syria's sovereignty, territorial integrity, and unity.
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Gen. Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, met U.S. troops stationed in areas of war-torn Syria under the Kurdish-held northeast.
It was his first trip to the war-torn country since he assumed the chairmanship in 2019.
The visit followed U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz's (R-Fla.) introduction of legislation to end the U.S. occupation of Syria.
The Syrian government views the deployment of U.S. troops in SDF-held territory as "occupation."
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Al-Monitor wrote that Milley's visit to Syria reportedly signals the U.S. administration's commitment to keeping troops supporting the SDF.
Historian and TV presenter Simon Schama has urged Jews to speak out against Israel's government as protest grows over settler violence against Palestinians.
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| THE AFTERMATH OF AN ATTACK BY ISRAELI SETTLERS ON THE PALESTINIAN TOWN OF HAWARA IN THE WEST BANK IN FEBRUARY. |
Schama said Israel is in danger of becoming a "nationalist theocracy" with the far-right coalition government of Benjamin Netanyahu.
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There is reportedly a growing concern among Jews in the U.K. and the U.S. about Israeli democracy, violent attacks on Palestinians, and a police crackdown on Israeli protesters.
Israelis living in the U.K. plan to protest the right-wing Israeli government next Sunday, March 12.
Protests are also planned in other countries in solidarity with anti-government protests across Israel.
Under the banner "Defend Israel's democracy," the demonstrations are open to "all supporters of Israel and democracy," according to the organizers.
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Six European countries, including the U.K., urged the Israeli government to halt "the construction of more than 7,000 settlement building units across the occupied West Bank."
Astronomers have detected a dormant stellar-mass black hole a mere 1,600 light-years away from Earth, the closest yet found and the first in the Milky Way.
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| ASTRONOMERS USING THE INTERNATIONAL GEMINI OBSERVATORY DISCOVER THE CLOSEST-KNOWN BLACK HOLE TO EARTH, FIRST UNAMBIGUOUS DETECTION OF A DORMANT STELLAR-MASS BLACK HOLE IN THE MILKY WAY. CREDIT: INTERNATIONAL GEMINI OBSERVATORY |
This groundbreaking discovery offers an opportunity to advance our understanding of the evolution of binary systems.
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Black holes are defined as extremely dense pockets of matter.
This black hole is located in the constellation Ophiuchus, 1,600 light-years away, making it 3x times closer to Earth than the previous record holder.
It has 10x more mass than the sun.
U.S. National Science Foundation financially supported the research of uncovering this black hole.
The astronomers used the Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii to investigate a sunlike star that orbits the black hole at a similar distance to which the Earth orbits the sun.
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In 2016, scientists discovered gravitational waves from colliding black holes.
China's government continues to obstruct efforts to determine the origin of COVID-19, lawmakers said on Sunday.
The National Security Council reported that the U.S. government still had not reached a consensus on the cause of the pandemic.
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Last month, the Department of Energy concluded that a lab leak in China likely caused the pandemic.
The COVID-19 origin debate has political implications, with the latest reports pushing demands for China to be penalized for unleashing the virus.
According to Leana Wen, Baltimore's former health commissioner, "COVID-19 was not a bioweapon or something that China or scientists, or whatever politicians or political leaders, were trying to do."
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More than a million deaths in the U.S. have been related to the coronavirus, and the global total is almost 7 million.
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is suing Exxon Mobil after examining a Black employee's complaint that nooses had been found at a refinery complex in Louisiana.
The government seeks compensation for employee Milferd McGhee's "emotional pain and suffering, inconvenience and humiliation," NY Times reports.
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According to the lawsuit, Exxon created a hostile work environment by failing to control harassment.
McGhee filed a complaint against Exxon with the EEOC, who filed a suit in U.S. District Court in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
A noose is a symbol of violence, which is "inherently threatening and significantly alter the workplace environment for Black Americans," an EEOC lawyer said.
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The EEOC advances workplace opportunities by enforcing federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination.
