Lower degrees of separation from right-wing militant extremist groups. Also tends to be the sorts of folk who vehemently deny structural racism exists and the irony is entirely lost on them.
In a world where several thousand people have just been killed by an internationally funded terrorist group, I think scrutiny on groups which are (a) armed and (b) make political statements is probably justified. And the argument that "Al-Quds Weekend Rifle Club and Prayer Group" isn't allowed while a comparable Christian one is is pure unconstitutional religious discrimination.
>>In a world where several thousand people have just been killed by an internationally funded terrorist group,
Actions that have been widely celebrate by the political segment of the population that often aligns with the gun control movement.
Actions that could have been curbed if the people that were attacked where allowed to defend themselves in stead of reliance on state protection that never came, and Israel is now rolling back many of their gun control provisions rightly so...
>>I think scrutiny on groups which are (a) armed and (b) make political statements is probably justified.
I think scrutiny on groups which are armed and make clear threats of violence are justified. "political" statements is a bridge to far from me, that applies to all religions.
If you are in the US, express the desire to violently "decolonize" the US or chant "from the river to the sea" then maybe you should be investigated. If you are in the US and express the desire lynch a racial group then maybe you should be investigated.
The problem here is in the US today only one of those groups is actually being investigate. The other are free the vandalize monuments, and storm the capital with out punishment of any type where by if the other group even happens to stroll near a government building they put in prison for years.
How about some equality under the law for a change? People claim they want that but in reality they dont
> If you are in the US, express the desire to violently "decolonize" the US or chant "from the river to the sea" then maybe you should be investigated.
The original founding document of Netanyahu’s Likud party:
The moral equivalency you are attempting to draw between those 2 statements is both ignorant and asinine.
When the terrorist organizations chant "From the river to the sea" they are clearly calling for the forced removal (at best) of all Jews from the land.
A political party that calls for "Israeli sovereignty between the Sea and the Jordan" it is clearly a rejection of the "2 state solution" but that is not a call for the removal of an ethnic population from the region. One critical difference here is you can disagree with that political party, vote them out of that government even, and express full support for a 2 state solution with out being raped, or killed. Somehow I doubt Hamas would allow that.
Israeli a western democracy has an actual framework of secular law and a history of respecting the rights of people including Arabs, Gays, Women ect
Hamas is a terrorist organization that has a history of authoritarian control, rape, murder, and no framework for respecting any individual rights at all, you bow to the most draconian interpretation of Islamic law or you die.
People generally don't even understand what the term "free Palestine" means, even without the "From the river to the sea" part. It's not a call for an independent Palestinian state. It's a call for a Palestinian state where Israel stands.
And we all know how that would end for just about all non-Arab Israelis.
> When the terrorist organizations chant "From the river to the sea" they are clearly calling for the forced removal (at best) of all Jews from the land.
Hamas members chanting "from the river to the sea" most certainly have genocidal intent, yes. Saying "from the river to the sea" alone - as the Likud document pretty clearly shows - doesn't make you a Hamas member nor a terrorist. There are a lot of attempts to conflate "Palestinian === Hamas", but that's sleight of hand.
I'm all for wiping out Hamas. I'm quite dubious about the possibility of doing so via armed conflict.
> A political party that calls for "Israeli sovereignty between the Sea and the Jordan" it is clearly a rejection of the "2 state solution" but that is not a call for the removal of an ethnic population from the region.
Maybe, but it's certainly a call for an un-free Palestine.
"Free Palestine",as with other short slogans (see: BLM, Defund), encompasses a range of opinions. Both genocide and the two-state solution fall squarely within it.
>>There are a lot of attempts to conflate "Palestinian === Hamas"
if they did not want to be conflated than perhaps they should have accepted one of the 5 2 state solutions proposed by mutiple parties over the decades.
Contrary to your claims I do not believe Palestinian's desire a 2 state solution in any form, instead they rejected every attempt by the UN, Britain, even the Saudi's then elected Hamas to be their official government when Israel pulled out of Gaza and allowed them to self govern...
Sorry if I press F for Doubt that they want a peaceful co-existence with Israel
It is also telling that no other Muslim nation will accept Palestinian refugees, Not Jordan, not Egypt, not even Iran...
>>Maybe, but it's certainly a call for an un-free Palestine.
Correct, it is signalling that after decades of attempted compromise that maybe a 2 state solution is not really possible. This is setting aside the fact that in reality there was already a 2 state solution where by British Mandate "Palestine" was split in 2, Jordan and Israel. However in the old adage of given in inch take a mile more was demanded...
All offers for peace have been rejected by Palestine not Israel..
Even right now, a cease fire can be easily achieved if Hamas Surrenders Unconditionally, and Free's all hostages... Hell I bet a 2 state solution would even be on the table even after all of that
I bet it would Palestine not Israel that would reject said 2 state solution.
> Contrary to your claims I do not believe Palestinian's desire a 2 state solution in any form, instead they rejected every attempt by the UN, Britain, even the Saudi's then elected Hamas to be their official government when Israel pulled out of Gaza and allowed them to self govern...
"The Palestinian Authority led by Yasser Arafat immediately embraced the initiative. His successor Mahmoud Abbas also supported the plan and officially asked U.S. President Barack Obama to adopt it as part of his Middle East policy. Islamist political party Hamas, the elected government of the Gaza Strip, was deeply divided, with most factions rejecting the plan. The Israeli government under Ariel Sharon rejected the initiative as a "non-starter" because it required Israel to withdraw to pre-June 1967 borders. In 2015, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed tentative support for the Initiative, but in 2018, he rejected it as a basis for future negotiations with the Palestinians."
> if they did not want to be conflated than perhaps they should have accepted one of the 5 2 state solutions proposed by mutiple parties over the decades.
2002 above was the last concrete proposal. Half of Gaza is under 18; they've never even had the opportunity to do so.
> In a world where several thousand people have just been killed by an internationally funded terrorist group, I think scrutiny on groups which are (a) armed and (b) make political statements is probably justified.
At least in the UK, NatWest debanked Neil Farage's account for his political views. Even its CEO resigned over her lying.
"19 Republican states accuse JPMorgan of closing bank accounts and discriminating against customers due to their religious or political beliefs" [1][3]. Of course, this site is not favorable to conservatives and their views. Some left activists' accounts are closed as well [2].
> At least in the UK, NatWest debanked Neil Farage's account for his political views. Even its CEO resigned over her lying.
No, a subsidiary of NatWest closed Farage's account when he no longer met the investment thresholds for the account he held. The CEO resigned for telling a journalist the above.
They resigned for telling a journalist that because it was a lie.
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/britains-bbc-...
Britain's BBC has apologised to Nigel Farage over a story it ran on the closure of his accounts at NatWest's (NWG.L) private bank Coutts, which the former Brexit Party leader had said was the result of his political views.
The BBC had previously reported Farage falling below the financial threshold required to be a customer at Coutts - whose website advises its clients should be able to borrow or invest at least 1 million pounds ($1.28 million) with the bank or hold 3 million pounds in savings - was the reason for the closure.But an internal review of the bank account obtained by Farage showed the private bank's wealth reputational risk committee had said his values did not align with the bank's own.
"We acknowledge that the information we reported - that Coutts' decision on Mr Farage's account did not involve considerations about his political views - turned out not to be accurate and have apologised to Mr Farage," the BBC said in the corrections and clarifications section of its website.
You've made a jump from the article - it doesn't say it was a lie, it says that it wasn't accurate to say that Coutts decision didn't involve considerations about his political views. They're not the same thing.
No outlets have retracted the claim that he didn't meet the wealth criteria, and nobody has claimed that Coutts lied about him meeting the threshold. In fact, every outlet that I checked today stil claims he didn't meet the wealth criteria, and that the CEO resigned because she discussed details of a client's account with a journalist, e.g. [0]
No fan of Farage, but then why was most of the document the bank produced about what he did as a politician? Farage also claims he never met these supposed thresholds.
Combination of reputational damage[0] and him being a PEP.
I believe the account closure was a business decision, but they definitely had no reason to be public about it. One good thing came out of the debacle, though: it put the spotlight on UK retail banking regulations and how they are allowed to treat customers in the first place.
Financial institutions don't like small-time PEPs. They don't net the banks anywhere near the money dictators and kleptocrats do, but are just as likely to engage in ongoing bribery due to their position in society.
0: Farage had apparently been very vocal about having an account with Coutts, and waving that thing around as a sign of ... something. For the bank, that was negative brand value.
> In financial regulation, a politically exposed person (PEP) is one who has been entrusted with a prominent public function. A PEP generally presents a higher risk for potential involvement in bribery and corruption by virtue of their position and the influence they may hold. The terms "politically exposed person" and senior foreign political figure are often used interchangeably, particularly in international forums.
Negative brand value is no reason to debank someone, half musicians that do drugs would give their bank a bad name. There must be a legal basis to debank someone.
I don't like Farage's opinions, and being a PEP only means "more eyes on you", doesn't mean "kick them out".
1) Now, if Coutts dropped the ball on something, shame on them. A good lawyer can get some good ££££ for damaging the client's business/etc.
2) If Farage didn't mean a minimum-net-worth.. that's another story.
Farage didn't meet their net worth requirement, which is why his account was closed. A bit like any retail banking product - e.g. HSBC advance, there can be some slack in how strictly the rules are allied. Coutts decided that since he no longer met their net worth requirements, they didn't want to continue to serve him. They may have decided to continue serving other clients whos circumstances changed though for their own reasons.
If farage had met the requirements, none of this would have happened.
That's not what that says. The quote from coutts is even in the HN comment -
> We acknowledge that the information we reported - that Coutts' decision on Mr Farage's account did not involve considerations about his political views - turned out not to be accurate and have apologised to Mr Farage
That does not say that he did meet the net worth requirements. See [0], and read the article. No outlet has retracted the claim that he didn't meet the wealth requirements which is why his account was flagged for review.
I'm a immediate relative of a PEP. And banks treat those just like they treat PEPs.
I've banked in 4 different countries with about 10 banks total, disclosed to them the fact that I'm a PEP or an immediate relative of one, and it has never, ever caused any issue.
The fact that someone with a political opinion had their account closed is not evidence that Chase is monitoring all their customers' political activity and systematically closing accounts for political activity Chase doesn't like.
The same way that Chase closing a restaurant's account is not evidence that Chase is tasting the food in every restaurant and systematically closing accounts for restaurants that cook food that Chase doesn't like.
Good that you trust Chase and other banks with the lame 'evidence' that they provide such as: "Financial institutions have an obligation to know our customers and monitor transactions that flow through our customers' accounts. After careful consideration, we decided to close your account because of unexpected activity on these or another Chase account."
Based on that standard template, I won't trust big banks, because, hiding behind BSA, banks can use the blanket statement "because of unexpected activity". Now you ask me to trust Banks, because they can't show that evidence to me.
None of this is about whether I trust Chase or not.
It's about the big claim that Chase monitors the political activity of their customers and systematically closes the accounts of people with opinions Chase doesn't like.
There's precisely zero evidence that they do this.
Even if one blindly accepts your citations from "The 700 Club" and some random post from "Nitter" as authoritative, even they provide zero evidence for that claim.
Big claims require compelling evidence, and you haven't provided any.
Risk avoidance. Extremists (!) are more likely to have dubios donors. And even if they're "normal" political figures or activists, their behaviour in public might damage the bank.
This being said this approach is a pretty wild one still, since people NEED banks, and there should be long duration till the expiration (except in cases of fraud, money laundering, ..)
Natwest's initial response was what you said: his accounts fell below a certain threshold after he paid off his mortgage. Then Farage sought info from Natwest using "subject access request". In those documents, it is "found that an internal committee had deemed his views did not align with the bank's own. This formed part of the basis for cutting him, the document showed, alongside commercial considerations." [1]
You are incorrect. Natwest was forced to release internal documents about the debanking of Nigel Farage under an FOI request and it is clear from the evidence that he was debanked because of his politics.
"Farage used a subject access request to discover that, despite initial denials by NatWest subsidiary Coutts, his political views had played a part in the closure of his account."
Even if Farange was targeted for his political beliefs, that is independent of whether Chase monitors customers political activites. Farange's politics were a matter of celebrity.
Eh. I can only assume parent is referring to negative media search most financial institutions do as part of their 'know your customer' barrage of acronyms. From that perspective, anything you do that ends up on the internet and is part of a cause, could be considered political and banks do do periodic re-assessments of risk.
This is a big claim. It should have big evidence to back it up.