Rape on the Reservation

Rape on the Reservation // Current

According to national statistics, one in three Native American women will be raped in their lifetimes. Vanguard correspondent Mariana Van Zeller travels to Rosebud reservation in South Dakota to investigate the alarmingly high incidence of rape and sexual assaults.

She learns that rape and violence against women have become frighteningly commonplace and recently escalated to the brutal murder of a high school student named Marquita, whose naked, battered body was discovered in an abandoned house on the reservation. Candid interviews with her family members, classmates and police reveal many of the disturbing social attitudes and behaviors that lead up to her death.

On the reservation, victims of rape are often blamed and even intimidated from pressing charges by members of the community, including their own families. Mariana meets Donna, a rape victim who, fearing for her life, flees her home on the reservation. Through their stories as well as emotionally charged scenes with both Indian rape survivors and past sex offenders, "Rape on the Reservation" exposes a culture of impunity as well as raises questions about what can be done to stem the epidemic of rape on America's Indian reservations.

The Flotilla Raid Was Not “Bungled.” The IDF Detailed Its Violent Strategy In Advance.

Tel Aviv-Israel Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his senior ministers have attempted to blame army commanders for “the bungled raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla,” according to the UK’s Daily Telegraph. The AP reported that “Israel’s bloody, bungled takeover of a Gaza-bound Turkish aid vessel is complicating US-led Mideast peace efforts.” And according to Reuters, “Israeli military admits errors in bungled boarding.”

But was the raid really bungled? Did the Israeli military command and Netanyahu government have no clear strategy going in? Or was the violence they meted out against the flotilla activists deliberate and methodically planned?

Statements by senior Israeli military commanders made in the Hebrew media days before the massacre revealed that the raid was planned over a week in advance by the Israeli military and was personally approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister of Defense Ehud Barak. The elite Israeli commando unit known as Unit 13 was tasked with carrying out the mission and its role was known by the Israeli public well before the raid took place. Details of the plan show that the use of deadly force was authorized and calculated. The massacre of activists should not have been unexpected.

Gulf oil disaster propels tribes into crisis | Mother Earth Journal

HOUMA, La. – The worst oil leak in U.S. history has grown to 19 million gallons since BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded April 20.

And the oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico is wreaking havoc with tribal lives in Louisiana.

“The smell of the oil is really bad, people describe it as smelling like you were in an engine room,” Brenda Dardar Robichaux, Principal Chief of the United Houma Nation said May 26 of the potentially toxic vapors.

The Environmental Protection Agency can’t send a representative to their tribal community for five days. “They told us to keep the children inside. In essence our children are in house arrest, their health is at risk.”

EPA air monitoring of the coastline through May 23 found normal ozone and particulate air quality levels but observed odor-causing pollutants associated with petroleum products at low levels, prompting the agency to warn, “Some of these chemicals may cause short-lived effects like headache, eye, nose and throat irritation, or nausea. People may be able to smell some of these chemicals at levels well below those that would cause short-term health problems.”