By Karin Friedemann, TMO

28 year old Malcolm Shabazz, the grandson and only male descendant of Malcolm X, who reportedly embraced Shia Islam recently and was becoming known as a political activist engaged with and serving to unite many different causes and communities, was murdered in Mexico on May 9, 2013.

“As the son of Qubilah Shabazz, Malcolm Shabazz was apparently in the process of putting his life on a positive and productive path, attending the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and writing his memoirs. But now the family has to deal with yet another devastating setback,” writes Herb Boyd in the Daily Beast.

Shabazz had made recent headlines in March 2013 when he was arrested after applying for a visa to travel to Iran to be a participant of the International Fajr Film Festival, in order to give a lecture addressing the issues of Hollywood and violence; in particular he was to address the use of film to promote modern violence & terrorism, and provoking clashes between religions & populations. He had already been featured from January 15th through 18th, 2013 as a featured interviewee for the Press TV documentary “The Façade of the American Dream.”

Soon after his arrest, he appeared live on Iran’s Press TV reporting from New York under a headline reading, “They drew guns on my mother and me.” He also issued a public statement to former US Representative and presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney that she posted on her Facebook page:

“Given the storm of lies, and half-truths that come with being associated with being the descendant of El Hajj Malik el Shabazz, also known as Minister Malcolm X, any and everything that I do; great or small, good or not so good, real or imagined is subject to controversy. However, in this missive I will take this opportunity to properly & fully disclose what transpired. In the beginning of 2012 I had been informed that I was under investigation by the F.B.I.’s Counter Terrorism Task Force Unit located in Goshen, N.Y.”

Shabazz goes on to describe various incidents of police harassment that had transpired recently, including the questioning of his neighbors. “They seek to neutralize my networking abilities… The formula for a public assassination is: the character assassination before the physical assassination; so one has to be made killable before the eyes of the public in order for their eventual murder to then deemed justifiable,” he wrote to McKinney last March. He also had this to say:

“I was not arrested by federal agents. I was taken in by a squad from the City of Middletown, N.Y.’s Police Department. I was not being held in an “undisclosed location” so to speak. I was actually being held in the Orange County Jail in Goshen, N.Y. However, from the time that I was booked at the precinct, to standing before a Judge the next day who told me to come back in 7 more, to being processed at the Orange County Jail and up until 7 days later I was not permitted to make any calls to notify anyone of my status; as though I had just been kidnapped from of the street.”

Dave Zirin writes in the Nation: “Malcolm Shabazz had everything going for him. He was 28 years old, handsome as hell and a remarkably charismatic public speaker. He was an activist, an organizer and a proud father… He wanted to wield Malcolm’s memory to fight for a better world.”

Malcolm Shabazz was the guest of a Mexican labor organizer, Miguel Suarez, who had recently been deported from the US, when he was reportedly thrown off the roof of the Palace Bar in Mexico while resisting robbery at 3am. Speculation abounds, about whether this Suarez, who was allegedly affiliated with narcotics trafficking, had lured him into a trap, or if he was just a new friend with a very stupid idea of fun.

Herb Boyd writes in the Daily Beast: “With the confirmation of Malcolm Lateef Shabazz’s death, it marks the third generation in which the family has lost a member violently. Malcolm X’s father, Earl Little, was killed by the Black Legion or the Ku Klux Klan in 1931. As Malcolm X recalled in his autobiography, “Negroes in Lansing have always whispered that he was attacked, and then laid across some tracks for a streetcar to run over him. His body was cut almost in half.” Three of his father’s brothers were also killed by white men in Georgia, which prompted his father to leave the state. Malcolm Sr. was shot by assassins on February 21, 1965, as he prepared to address an audience at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights. Along with the tragic deaths in the family’s patrilineal line, Betty Shabazz was killed in 1997 by a fire in which her grandson, Malcolm Shabazz, was accused and convicted of setting.”

His grandmother, Betty Shabazz, widow of Malcolm X, was killed in a fire he started 11 years ago. He was 12 years old. He had been shuttled in and out of correctional institutions until his release from Attica Prison in February 2007. Malcolm Shabazz at age 24 declared to media that he was on a mission: to clear his name, stay out of jail and rise from the ashes of his past. In an extensive interview with NewsOne in 2004, Shabazz explained the terrible event that led to his imprisonment as a youth.

“I didn’t mean for my grandmother to get hurt. I wasn’t thinking anything like that would happen. [I thought] she would go to the fire escape [but] she walked through the fire to get to me. I didn’t think she would walk through a fire for me.”

The death of Malcolm Shabazz at 28 makes him the youngest in the family to have his life end so violently. His grandfather was 39, still in the prime of his life, and on the road to even greater success after meaningful contacts with world leaders in Africa and the Middle East.

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Question: Is it true that potatoes are fattening and should be avoided?

Answer: I’m not surprised that potatoes have a very bad rep in this country. The majority of potatoes are eaten either as French fries deep fried in hydrogenated oils, or deep fried as a crunchy potato chip covered in salt and artificial flavoring.

An actual potato is a vegetable, which unsurprisingly has many benefits. An average potato has about 28% Vitamin C, Vitamin B6, and 26% Potassium. Vitamin B6 contributes to building new cells, emphasizing brain cells. It also has 15% fiber which could contribute to satiety after eating them. Potatoes are also known to provide athletic endurance and helps breakdown glycogen.

An average potato has between 150-160 calories which when eaten with steamed vegetables and Organic Greek Yogurt or sour cream sided with a fresh salad could make a filling and nutritious meal.
Basically potatoes- again when not deep fried and coated in chemicals- could be a good edition to a healthy lifestyle. Try baking your potatoes and topping them with organic Greek yogurt, or steamed broccoli.

If you are a fan of mashed potatoes skip the restaurant version, which is dumped with butter and sodium, and make your own at home.

One thing I do want to note though, if you are a person with any time of arthritis or joint disease, do keep in mind that potatoes fall into the nightshade vegetables. These vegetables are known to increase inflammation in the body so you are better off avoiding them.

Eating the skin on the potato means getting the fiber and other nutrients, but if you do eat the skin opt for organic potatoes or scrub your potatoes with a vegetable scrub.

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In the late 1960s, research in touchscreen technology  began. Samuel Hurst first developed the touch sensor in 1971. In 1972, an assisted learning center came out as a part of the Programmed Logic for Automated Teaching Operations (PLATO) project, and touchscreen technology was introduced; this was the first computer-assisted instruction system. The HP-150, the first touchscreen computer, reached stores in 1983.

There are three types of touchscreen systems. The first is a resistive system, based on using two metallic layers. When the screen is pressed, a closed circuit is formed. The computer determines whether a touch was made and reacts accordingly. The resistive system is the most widely used system in touchscreen technology due to its simple structure and lower production cost.

The capacitive system uses a “charged” screen: When a user applies pressure to the screen, a charge is transmitted to his body. The transmission of this charge allows the computer to recognize the touch and compute the command.

The surface acoustic wave system uses sound waves to determine whether the screen has been touched. Transducers, reflectors and sensors are used in the surface acoustic wave system. The transducers determine whether or not a wave was disturbed to “figure

Touchscreens are fast and easy to use, as there’s no text interface: All the user has to do is point at what he wants. Without a mouse and keyboard, touchpads are smaller and more compact. Today’s touchscreens are protected from electrical surges and changes in temperature. Touchscreens are easy to clean because of their slick, smooth surface.

With a touchscreen, it’s nearly impossible to tell where the keys are, so you have to look at the screen to make a command. Pressing a button on a touchscreen is a lot different from pressing a regular button on an electronic device: When a user pushes a regular button, she knows she’s pressed it. With a touchscreen, it’s hard to tell whether or not the button was pressed (unless the action is accompanied by a sound). Positioning is not always precise on a touchscreen; often, fingers are too large and may press more than one button at a time. Touchscreens often get dirty due to fingerprints, so they require constant cleaning.

Touchscreen technology has been evolving since its introduction in the late 1960s. Today, touchscreen technology can be found virtually everywhere in America, including in ATMs, cellular phones , PDAs, retail and grocery stores, and airports.

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KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, whose poor showing in a general election earlier this month has left him vulnerable to the conservative wing of his party, announced a cabinet on Wednesday that was packed with the traditionalists.

The 57-member cabinet was also strikingly short of representatives from the Chinese minority.

Najib’s coalition recorded its worst ever result in the May 5 election, and lost the popular vote for the first time. Its majority in parliament was reduced, throwing an economic reform program into doubt.

Although Najib included some younger elements from his Barisan Nasional coalition and a non-partisan banker and an anti-corruption activist in the cabinet line-up, most of the key posts were retained by established leaders of his United Malays National Organization (UMNO).

Muhyiddin Yassin remained deputy prime minister while Zahid Hamidi was named home (interior) minister, swapping portfolios with Najib’s cousin Hishammuddin Hussein, who is the new defense minister.

The main Chinese party allied with the ruling coalition declined to take up cabinet posts after a dismal showing in the election, and of the two Chinese in the cabinet, one is non-partisan, while the other, a deputy minister, is from a regional party. The previous cabinet had six full ministers from the minority group.

“He has tried to appease the conservatives but he is also reaching out with a reformist message to appeal to the younger generation of voters,” said Oh Ei Sun, senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University (NTU).

Najib blamed the poor showing on a “Chinese tsunami,” a remark that stirred up tensions between the majority ethnic Malays represented by UMNO and Chinese, who overwhelmingly voted for a three-party opposition alliance.

Critics have said the coalition was also abandoned by urban voters on complaints of rising corruption and ballooning living costs, despite a series of cash handouts.

Malays make up about 60 percent of the 28 million people, while Chinese comprise more than 25 percent. The country also has a significant minority of ethnic Indians.

UMNO, which dominates Barisan, now faces a leadership election in October or November that is likely to be fought between traditional and reformist wings. Najib may have to step down, ruling party sources have told Reuters.

“DISLOYALTY”

Conservatives have blamed ethnic polarization and Chinese “disloyalty” for the election result while reformists have urged Najib to expand steps to make UMNO more inclusive beyond its base of poor, rural Malays.

Malaysia’s former and longest-serving prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, a powerful figure in UMNO, was quoted by local media as saying “ungrateful Chinese” and “greedy Malays” were to blame for the result.

Many members of the cabinet are seen as Mahathir loyalists, while his son has been named the chief minister of Kedah state, a powerful regional post. The state of Johor, near Singapore, also has a chief minister linked to Mahathir.

“Divisions have opened up in Malaysian society,” Najib said. “Now it is time for all of us, in government and beyond, to put the bitterness behind us, and work towards national reconciliation.”

In a gesture to concerns over corruption, Najib handed a post in his department to Transparency International (Malaysia) President Paul Low, one of the two Chinese ministers.

In a nod to corporate expertise, he also appointed Wahid Omar, chief executive officer of Malaysia’s largest bank Maybank, to the post of economic planning minister.

Wahid joins former Malaysia Airlines CEO Idris Jala, who was retained to continue the country’s $444 billion economic transformation program that was launched in 2009.

UMNO youth leader Khairy Jamaluddin, a reformist, was appointed as Youth and Sports Minister.

“Najib has made a gesture, he appointed Khairy and it is known that Mahathir doesn’t like him. So Najib is stepping a little out of Mahathir’s shadow,” said Oh, the senior fellow at NTU.

(Editing by Stuart Grudgings and Raju Gopalakrishnan)

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RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) – Palestinians clashed with Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday during demonstrations to mark 65 years since what they call the Nakba (Catastrophe) when the creation of Israel’s caused many to lose their homes and become refugees.

A shell fired from Gaza, which is ruled by the Islamist movement Hamas, exploded in an open area of Israel but caused no injuries, according to an Israeli military spokesman. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is to return to the region on Tuesday in another bid to revive peace talks frozen since 2010.

But a resolution remains elusive and many Palestinians want refugees and their descendants to return to lands now in Israel – an idea Israel rejects, saying it would spell the end of the Jewish state.
Protesters skirmished with Israeli forces outside a refugee camp near the West Bank city of Hebron and at a prison near Ramallah. Several Palestinians were injured.
Israeli police in Jerusalem scuffled with Palestinian protesters, tossing stun grenades and making several arrests.

Thousands also rallied in the main square of Ramallah, the Palestinians’ de facto capital while Jerusalem remains under Israeli control, holding up placards with the names of villages depopulated in 1948 and old keys, symbols of lost homes.

“For the sake of my future and to return to my family’s land, I don’t want any more useless negotiations but the path of resistance and the rifle,” said Ahmed al-Bedu, a gangly 15-year-old Palestinian who holds Jordanian citizenship.

Israel declared independence on May 14, 1948 on the eve of the end of British rule over Palestine, and neighboring Arab armies invaded in a sharp escalation of fighting already raging between Jews and local Arabs. Five months earlier, the United Nations had adopted a plan to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab states, a blueprint rejected by Arabs.

Many Arab residents fled or were expelled by force from their homes and prevented from returning. Only Jordan, which now has a peace treaty with Israel, gave the refugees citizenship.

According to official Palestinian figures published this week, 5.3 million Palestinians – almost half of their total number in the world – are registered by the United Nations as refugees in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza.

Many of them live in the concrete warrens of overcrowded camps, with poor access to employment and basic services.

Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Western-backed Palestinian Authority and himself a refugee from a town now in northern Israel, stoked Palestinian outrage last year by telling an Israeli news channel he did not seek to return home.

Saeb Erekat, Abbas’s top negotiator with Israel, said on Wednesday that sectarian conflicts in Syria and Iraq endangered Palestinians there and that Israel’s “refusal to assume responsibility for the refugee question” and to agree on a “just solution” for them was harming prospects for peace.

The Palestinian Authority seeks an independent state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip with East Jerusalem as its capital – all lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war. Israel deems Jerusalem its “eternal and indivisible” capital.

Hamas rejects Israel’s existence and refuses to renounce violence against it, saying a return of refugees can be attained only through armed force.

“Any initiatives and solutions that do not secure the return of our full rights will be rejected by our people. Our holy land is not for sale or bargain,” the group said in a statement.

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We are deeply saddened by the passing of Sanabel Abubaker, daughter of Shukri Abubaker of the HLF5. Her courage in the face of tremendous difficulties was remarkable, and the light she brought to the world will be missed. May Allah comfort her family and friends.

To Allah we belong, and to him we return.

We were blessed that Sanabel was able to speak at our 2011 gala in Dallas, just a day after being released from the hospital. We were going to let her skip her appearance, but she refused to allow anything to deter her. She gave a heartfelt account of what it was like to struggle with her health as she also wrestled with the heartache of her father being locked away with severe communications restrictions in prison. It is a touching speech.

–Khalil Meek, Executive Director, Muslim Legal Fund

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KHARTOUM, May 15 (Reuters) – In a cramped government office in Khartoum, engineer Ahmed Taha and dozens of other Sudanese, lured by local newspaper adverts for jobs in the Gulf, sit waiting to get a permit to leave the country and work abroad.

“I’ve had enough of Sudan and will go to Saudi Arabia,” said Taha. “I am so tired of this country, the (economic) crisis, the corruption.”

Taha, who has been working in an office accounts department for two years because he could not find a professional post, has just been hired as an engineer by a construction firm in Saudi Arabia – a move that will increase his salary sevenfold to 2,500 Saudi riyals ($670) a month.

“I also want to find my wife a job as a teacher in Saudi Arabia because she makes only 600 (Sudanese) pounds ($95) a month here. We cannot live on our salaries.”

Like thousands of other Sudanese, Taha is escaping a country gripped by economic crisis since losing 75 percent of its oil production, its lifeline, when South Sudan seceded in July 2011.

Analysts estimate unemployment is running at between 20 and 30 percent, although there is no official data.

Annual inflation topped 41 percent in April and the Sudanese pound has more than halved in value against the dollar since South Sudan’s independence, making life unbearable for many.

Nearly 95,000 Sudanese, from labourers to teachers, nurses and engineers, left the country last year compared to only 10,032 in 2008, according to official data. Some analysts say the number is even higher because travel movements are hard to monitor.

Net migration contrasts with some other African countries, including South Sudan, that are seeing skilled professionals return home as the continent’s economic development and increasing foreign investment create career opportunities.

For Sudan, struggling with a high budget deficit and a shortage of foreign currency needed to pay for imports, migration has economic benefits.

The World Bank estimates migrant workers remitted $1.13 billion to Sudan last year, up from $442 million in 2011. That helped to offset the country’s goods and services trade deficit, estimated at $6.7 billion by the International Monetary Fund.

The exodus of workers should also help reduce unemployment. A prolonged “brain drain” of professionals, however, would put further pressure on the country’s deteriorating public services, adding to the country’s economic problems.

“We are suffering under the economic hardship,” said Omar El Fadli, who left Sudan in 1974 to study in Britain and then worked in France and the United States before coming back in 2005 to buy a restaurant in central Khartoum.

“To be honest with you we have been trying to sell (the restaurant) for over two years … It’s not profitable anymore.”

At the visa office in Khartoum, women in dark blue robes, representatives from government-approved employment agencies, are on hand to help applicants fill in the required paperwork.

“We sort out the paperwork for doctors going to the Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia which is requesting a large number of Sudanese doctors to work there,” says Hamda Kassem, one of the employment agency staff.

While the Sudanese government allows labour agencies to arrange work contracts for doctors heading to the Gulf, a government-commissioned study published in January also expressed concern about the exodus of healthcare professionals.

DOCTORS LEAVING

More than 6,000 Sudanese doctors left for Saudi Arabia alone between 2009 and 2012, according to the government study, commissioned to assess the reasons for migration. Around another 1,000 doctors have gone to Libya since the ousting of ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, it says.

That is leaving health services in Sudan vulnerable as countries in the Gulf and elsewhere snap up the country’s leading specialists. Newspaper reports of patients dying in Sudan hospitals after being misdiagnosed by ill-qualified doctors are not uncommon.

“There is a very bad effect on medical services,” the government study says. “The emigration to Saudi Arabia will result in the loss of specialists which will be felt directly … in the provinces.”

Sudanese medical colleges pump out up to 4,000 doctors annually but some colleges use textbooks that are more than 10 years old and have no surgical equipment.

The study forecasts that emigration from Sudan will continue to increase in the next few years due to economic, social, security and political reasons.

Sudan has for been plagued by insurgencies. Long confined to remote regions such as Darfur, rebels struck a central region last month, triggering fears they might attack Khartoum again like in 2008.

Few Western engineering firms operate in Sudan due to a U.S. embargo in place since 1997, making the country reliant on mostly Chinese companies to build infrastructure and they tend to import their own workers.

Sudanese government efforts to combat unemployment by hiring more young people for public sector jobs and starting infrastructure projects have been hampered by the budget crisis.

Young people complain that corruption also makes it hard to find work – jobs in the public sector, the biggest employer, often go to people with the right connections, known as wasta, they say.

“You cannot find a job without wasta,” said Hisham Hassan, who graduated in civil engineering from the Sudanese university of Atbara in 2008 but has yet to find work.

“I can’t afford to get married or anything,” he said after receiving his exit permit at the visa office.

He has landed a job at a Saudi builder paying him a monthly salary of 3,000 riyals – in Qassim, one of the most conservative regions of Saudi Arabia. “It will be fine. I have no choice anyway,” he said.

Concerns about personal freedom in Sudan are also encouraging emigration. Security agents have cracked down hard on small street protests organized mainly by students dreaming of an “Arab spring”. Divisions in the weak opposition and the army’s support for President Omar Hassan al-Bashir mean Sudan has avoided the uprisings seen in Egypt or Tunisia.

SUDANESE SKILLS

Sudanese professionals have a tradition of going overseas to gain experience and make money. In the 1960s and 70s, they flocked to the Gulf as those economies took off.

Opportunities dried up after the 1991 Gulf war when President Bashir failed to back the U.N.-led military operation to end Saddam Hussein’s occupation of Kuwait. In retaliation, Gulf countries deported thousands of Sudanese once Kuwait was liberated.

With governments in the Gulf spending billions of dollars on roads, schools and universities again, Sudanese are back in demand although prospects in Saudi are dampened by a crackdown on illegal workers and policies to replace foreigners with locals.

Sudanese are also looking further afield. At the Goethe Institute in Khartoum, run by the German government, there’s a waiting list of up to three months to enrol in German classes.

Ahmed Shamun is making a living from the rise in migration. Having worked in Abu Dhabi as an English translator for 13 years, he returned in 1993 and now runs an employment agency in Khartoum, fixing up Sudanese with jobs in the Gulf. Yet, he still laments the trend.

“It’s not just doctors or engineers leaving, most of them are workers,” he said, sitting in his small office next to a travel agent selling air tickets to Saudi Arabia.

“I don’t like it but what else can young people do? There are no jobs here.”

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CAIRO (Reuters) – Senior Egyptian judges halted talks with President Mohamed Mursi on judicial reforms on Wednesday after parliament decided to discuss the proposed laws despite presidential promises to seek consensus first.

Islamist lawmakers allied to Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood are pushing a bill that would force out more than 3,000 judges by lowering the retirement age.

The Brotherhood accuses many judges of being remnants of the era of deposed President Hosni Mubarak, saying they have sought to obstruct elections, legislation and attempts to bring corrupt former officials to justice.

The judicial reform bill has also angered liberal, leftist and ultra-conservative Islamist opposition groups which accuse the Brotherhood of trying to control state institutions rather than pressing genuine reforms. The Brotherhood denies this.

Under pressure over the bill last month, Mursi invited senior jurists to hold a “justice conference” to discuss the reforms. He said he would personally adopt the proposals that came out of the meeting.

But the Supreme Judicial Council said it was halting preparations for the conference after the Shura Council, the Islamist-dominated upper house that claims legislative power, said it would resume discussions of the law on May 25.

“We’ve stopped work on the conference until the presidency clarifies its position on this issue,” senior judge Abdel Rahman Behloul told Reuters by phone.

“There are bodies in dispute. The vision of the president is different from the vision of the Shura Council. So what will happen?”

A spokesman for the presidency was not immediately available to comment on the judges’ decision.

The row has widened Egypt’s political rifts, adding to the turbulence that has hammered the economy since Mubarak’s overthrow in a popular uprising in February 2011.

Cairo negotiating with the International Monetary Fund for a $4.8 billion loan conditioned on economic reforms which the IMF says should be backed by a broad political consensus.

Abdullah Fathi, deputy head of the Judges Club, said parliament’s decision to resume the discussions was “a farce and a joke”, the state news agency MENA reported.

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Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim al-Khalifa was named Asian Football Confederation’s new president, replacing Mohamed Bin Hammam of Qatar. The Bahraini won 33 of the 46 votes in Malaysia to finish ahead of Yousuf Al Serkal of the United Arab Emirates and Worawi Makudi of Thailand. In the process, Sheikh Salman also claimed a vacant seat on FIFA’s executive committee. Al-Khalifa currently is a FIFA 2014 World Cup committee member, and most recently served as General Secretary of the Supreme Council of Youth and Sports, as well as serving as the Bahrain Olympic Committee vice-president. He has been involved in football administration since the late 1990’s.

The 47-year-old al-Khalifa saw off the challenge of Qatar’s 2022 World Cup organizing chief Hassan Al Thawadi. Most involved in the process had to see the need to distance themselves from the turmoil that came from Qatari Bin Hammam’s term. Bin Hammam was banned for life by FIFA in 2011 amid allegations of trying to buy votes. The former FIFA presidential candidate eventually retired from football last July after having his suspension annulled. Al-Khalifa takes over the last 20 months of Bin Hammam’s term as AFC president, with the next election in January 2015. “We need complete reforms,” al-Khalifa said. “What we need is an AFC where decision makers are accountable.”

Before voting began, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said Asian football still had to work to heal its divisions and rebuild its reputation. “I would identify this restart as an intermediary restart,” he said. “Because then the right start will be in two years in 2015 and now you will have two more years to put your house in such an order.” The 2022 World Cup is still scheduled to take place in Qatar despite the controversies.

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