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Kneecap rapper in court on terror charge over Hezbollah flag

A member of the provocative Irish rap group Kneecap, charged with a terror offence for allegedly showing support for Hezbollah, was due to appear in a London court Wednesday.Liam O’Hanna, 27, known by his stage name Mo Chara, was charged in May after being accused of displaying a Hezbollah flag during a London concert last November. He will appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court. The Iran-backed Lebanese force Hezbollah and the Palestinian militant group Hamas are banned in the UK and it is an offence to show support for them.Kneecap, which has recently grabbed headlines for brazen statements denouncing the war in Gaza and against Israel, has denied the charge and called for fans to show up outside court and support the singer.”We deny this ‘offence’ and will vehemently defend ourselves. This is political policing. This is a carnival of distraction,” the Belfast band wrote on X last month.The raucous punk-rap group has also said the video which led to the charge was taken out of context.O’Hanna told the audience at South London’s Wide Awake Festival in May that the charge was an attempt to “silence us” after several of their performances were cancelled.A performance in Scotland was pulled over safety concerns, various shows in Germany were axed, and the UK government ministers had suggested Glastonbury should reconsider their appearance at the popular festival.Daring provocateurs to their fans, dangerous extremists to their detractors, the group rap in the Irish language as well as English.Formed in 2017, the group is no stranger to controversy. Their lyrics are filled with references to drugs, they have repeatedly clashed with the UK’s previous Conservative government and have vocally opposed British rule in Northern Ireland.Last year, the group was catapulted to international fame by a semi-fictional film based on them that scooped multiple awards including at the Sundance festival.- ‘Unfazed’ -O’Hanna, Liam Og O Hannaidh in Gaelic, was charged last month after London’s Metropolitan Police investigated a video from the festival in Kentish Town, north London, in November 2024.He is accused of displaying a flag “in such a way or in such circumstances as to arouse reasonable suspicion that he is a supporter of a proscribed organisation”, police said.Other videos circulating online appear to show a band member shouting “Up Hamas, up Hezbollah”. The group also apologised this year after a 2023 video emerged appearing to show one singer calling for the death of British Conservative MPs. Rich Peppiatt, who directed the film about Kneecap, told AFP this week the group was “unfazed” by the legal charge and controversies.”Even through all the controversy at the moment, they just shrug their shoulders and get on with it,” Peppiatt said.”They’ve always been controversial at a local level, and they’ve always bounced back from it,” he added.In its statement following the charge, the group said: “14,000 babies are about to die of starvation in Gaza, with food sent by the world sitting on the other side of a wall, and once again the British establishment is focused on us.””We are not the story. Genocide is,” it added.Israel has repeatedly denied that it is committing genocide in its offensive in Gaza, which it claims aims to wipe out Hamas.Prominent British musicians and groups including Paul Weller, Massive Attack, Brian Eno, Pulp and Primal Scream have defended the group and signed a letter denouncing a “concerted attempt to censor and de-platform Kneecap”.Campaign group “Love Music Hate Racism” called for supporters to “defend Mo Chara on 18 June outside Westminster Magistrates Court”.

Made in Vietnam: Hanoi cracks down on fake goods as US tariffs loom

Since the United States accused Vietnam of being a hub for counterfeit goods, Tran Le Chi has found it increasingly hard to track down her favourite fake Chanel T-shirts, Gucci sunglasses and Louis Vuitton handbags.As Vietnam’s government tries to head off President Donald Trump’s threatened 46 percent tariff, it has launched a crackdown on fake …

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‘What are these wars for?’: Arab town in Israel shattered by Iran strike

An Arab town in northern Israel paid a heavy price for the ongoing air war between Iran and Israel when a ballistic missile slammed into a home there, killing four people and upending life in the small community. Hundreds of sobbing residents crowded the narrow streets of Tamra on Tuesday to watch as the wooden coffins adorned with colourful wreaths were carried to the town’s cemetery.To some, the Iranian strike highlighted the unequal protections afforded Israel’s Arab minority, while to others, it merely underscored the cruel indifference of war.Raja Khatib has been left to pick up the pieces from an attack that killed his wife, two of his daughters and a sister in law.  “I wish to myself, if only the missile would have hit me as well. And I would be with them, and I wouldn’t be suffering anymore,” Khatib told AFP. “Learn from me: no more victims. Stop the war.”After five days of fighting, at least 24 people have been killed in Israel and hundreds more wounded by the repeated barrages launched from Iran. Israel’s sophisticated air defence systems have managed to intercept a majority of the missiles and drones targeting the country. But some have managed to slip through. With some projectiles roughly the size of a train carriage and carrying a payload that can weigh hundreds of kilograms, Iran’s ballistic missiles can be devastating upon impact. A single strike can destroy large swaths of a city block and rip gaping holes in an apartment building, while the shockwave can shatter windows and wreak havoc on the surrounding area.The level of destruction from the missiles has been unprecedented in Israel, even after 20 months of continuous war in the wake of the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks.  Along with Tamra, barrages have also hit residential areas in Tel Aviv, Bnei Brak, Petah Tikva and Haifa.- Discrimination – As the coffins made their way through Tamra on Tuesday, a group of women tended to a relative of the victims who had become faint with grief, dabbing cold water on her cheeks and forehead.At the cemetery, men embraced and young girls cried at the foot of the freshly dug graves.Iran has continued to fire daily salvos since Israel launched a surprise air campaign that it says is aimed at preventing the Islamic republic from acquiring nuclear weapons — an ambition Tehran denies.In Iran, Israel’s wide-ranging air strikes have killed at least 224 people, including military commanders, nuclear scientists and civilians.Despite mounting calls to de-escalate, neither side has backed off from the fighting.In Israel, frequent air raid alerts have kept residents close to bomb shelters, while streets across the country have largely emptied and shops shuttered. But some in the country’s Arab minority have said the government has done too little to protect them, pointing to unequal access to public shelters used to weather the barrages. Most of Israel’s Arab minority identify as Palestinians who remained in what is now Israel after its creation in 1948. They represent about 20 percent of the country’s population.The community frequently professes to face discrimination from Israel’s Jewish majority.”The state, unfortunately, still distinguishes between blood and blood,” Ayman Odeh, an Israeli parliamentarian of Palestinian descent, wrote on social media after touring Tamra earlier this week.”Tamra is not a village. It is a city without public shelters,” Odeh added, saying that this was the case for 60 percent of “local authorities” — the Israeli term for communities not officially registered as cities, many of which are majority Arab.But for residents like Khatib, the damage has already been done. “What are these wars for? Let’s make peace, for the sake of the two people,” he said.”I am a Muslim. This missile killed Muslims. Did it differentiate between Jews and Muslims? No, when it hits, it doesn’t distinguish between people.”