Jewish group asks Florida grocers to stop selling Ben & Jerry’s products
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The Jewish Federation of Broward County has called on all supermarket chains doing business in South Florida to discontinue carrying Ben & Jerry’s products in reaction to the ice cream company’s decision to halt sales in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Mark S. Freedman, the Federation’s interim president and chief executive officer, said, “Local South Florida supermarkets, small and large, are the main vehicle for sending a strong message to Ben & Jerry’s and its parent company, Unilever, that its selective boycott of Israel is unwarranted and unwise.”
“We encourage everyone in the supply chain – distributors, retailers and consumers – to refrain from doing business with Ben & Jerry’s,” Freedman continued. “By impacting its bottom line, we hope to apply enough pressure on Unilever to reverse its policy..”
However, Donna Nevel of Miami Beach, a member of Jewish Voice for Peace’s South Florida chapter, slammed the Federation for calling on supermarkets to discontinue Ben & Jerry’s products.
“Years of organizing for justice and liberation resulted in Ben and Jerry’s recognizing that their commitment to racial justice needed to include a commitment to justice for the Palestinian people,” Nevel said.
—South Florida Sun Sentinel
Man indicted in triple homicide at Georgia golf course
ATLANTA — The aspiring rapper accused of killing three people at a Cobb County golf course has been indicted on 15 criminal counts, according to the district attorney’s office.
Bryan Anthony Rhoden was arrested July 8 in DeKalb County and charged with murder in the deaths at Pinetree Country Club, near Kennesaw. Rhoden, 23, of Atlanta, was charged with three counts of murder, three counts of aggravated assault and two counts of kidnapping, according to Cobb police.
On Thursday, a Cobb grand jury indicted Rhoden on three counts of malice murder, five counts of felony murder, three counts of aggravated assault, two counts of kidnapping with bodily injury, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and tampering with evidence, the indictment states.
Pinetree’s director of golf Gene Siller, 46, had gone to the course’s 10th hole on July 3 to find out why a Dodge Ram pickup truck was parked above a sand trap, said golfers who were there that day. Police say he “happened upon a crime” involving Rhoden and the two other victims who had been bound and gagged with tape before being placed in the bed of the white pickup.
The vehicle was registered to one of the victims, Paul Pierson, 76, of Topeka, Kansas, whose body was discovered alongside 46-year-old Henry Valdez of Anaheim, California.
Police have not disclosed a motive for the killings or any information about a possible prior relationship between Rhoden and the victims from out of state. A friend of Valdez’s told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the three men knew each other through the cannabis trade.
—The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Frustration mounts as Texas Democrats fail to secure Biden meeting
WASHINGTON — The quorum-busting Democrats in Washington have gained meetings with several high-profile party leaders in their quest for federal action on voting rights, including House Majority Whip James Clyburn, Vice President Kamala Harris and several Democratic senators.
But they still await the biggest get of all: President Joe Biden. And on Thursday, they expressed frustration over the White House's apparent lack of interest in scheduling a meeting with members of the Texas group.
During a Zoom conversation with U.S. Rep Lloyd Doggett of Austin, state Rep. Richard Peña Raymond of Laredo vented about the holdup.
“He won’t meet with us on Zoom like this, and I’m trying to be tactful, but I don’t know how else to say it, man. I’m just pissed off at this point. He doesn’t give us the respect the way you have,” Raymond told Doggett.
And in a subsequent Zoom meeting with Beto O'Rourke, in which the former Democratic congressman and presidential candidate announced a $600,000 donation to help pay for the Washington sojourn, O'Rourke encouraged them to ramp up pressure on the White House.
"I feel very strongly about this. I think you need to center and focus all of your effort on the president," O'Rourke said.
Biden has been vocal about the need to protect voting rights against legislation that has passed or is being considered in Republican-led legislatures across the country.
—Austin American-Statesman
NYC mayor vows to implement ‘more mandates’ on COVID-19 shots
NEW YORK — The gloves are coming off in Mayor Bill de Blasio’s fight for more coronavirus vaccinations.
The mayor pledged Friday to roll out more vaccine mandates in the city, charging that a “purely voluntary system” isn’t cutting it any longer while entertaining the idea of requiring proof of immunization for most social activities.
Fresh off of issuing a vaccine-or-testing mandate for the city’s public health care workers, de Blasio signaled in his weekly appearance on WNYC that it’s only a matter of time before he implements similar requirements for other groups of municipal employees.
“We have reached the limits of a purely voluntary system,” he said. “It’s time for more mandates, different kinds, different places.”
Though the legality of such a move is unclear, de Blasio suggested he’s even open to following the lead of the French government, which recently instated a “COVID pass” system, under which people must show proof of vaccination to enter bars, restaurants, shopping malls and most other public spaces.
“I’m not always the biggest Macron fan, but in this case, I think that’s a direction we need to seriously consider,” de Blasio said, referring to French President Emanuel Macron.
On Wednesday, de Blasio issued an order requiring employees of the city’s public hospital and health systems to either show proof of vaccination or submit to weekly coronavirus tests amid revelations that only about 60% of those workers have gotten their shots.
—New York Daily News
