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A European alt-right group is taking to the Mediterranean Sea in a bid to stop illegal migrants crossing from Libya a move NGOs fear could starta dangerous game of cat and mouse with humanitarian rescue teams.

The mission, known as Defend Europe, is the project of the Identitarians, a right-wing pan-European movement opposed to immigration particularly Muslim immigration on the continent. Founded in France in 2002, the youth-dominated Identitarians have developed a reputation as the hipsters of the far right, noted for their slick social media campaigns and attention-grabbing political stunts, such as occupying a French mosque.

For their latest campaign, the group has crowd-funded more than $100,000 to chartera 40-meter ship, the C-Star, to take direct action against humanitarian NGOs operating search-and-rescue missions for migrants in the Mediterranean.

The Identitarians blame the rescue boats for encouraging the rising numbers of illegal migrants arriving from Libya into Italy, which has overtaken Greece as the main arrival point into Europe. So far tis year more than85,000 illegal migrants, the majority from sub-Saharan Africa, have arrived on Italys shores 20 percent more than the same period in 2016.

About 40 percent of arrivals are brought to Italy through search-and-rescue missions run by humanitarian organizations. This has prompted accusations particularly in Italy, carrying the burden of the migration wave that the NGOs are creating a pull factor by effectively offering a ferry service to Europe once the smugglers boats founder.

Italian prosecutors have opened investigations into whether there is cooperation between NGOs and human traffickers, and Rome has just drafted a code of conduct for charities operating in the Mediterranean, banning them from contacting smugglers by phone or firing flares, which mightfunction as a signal to the smugglers.

Humanitarian organizations reject such allegations, insisting they are doing vital work to save lives on a stretch of sea that has become one of the worlds biggest unmarked graves. More than 5,000 people died attempting to cross the Mediterranean last year, and more than 2,150 have perished so far in 2017.

Defend Europe says its mission is to document the activities of the NGOs, expose any collusion with the traffickers, and intervene if they act illegally. Eleonora Cassella, a member of Defend Europe based at the missions headquarters in Catania, Italy, told VICE News that the crew would try to gather evidence to prove their suspicions that NGOs collude with the human traffickers.

The more people try to go, more boats from Europe come to take the people, so even more people try to get to sea because they know that even with small boats, theyll come to help them, she said.

During the groups fundraising efforts, Defend Europe pledged to block the rescue boats something they attempted during an earlier mission in May, when a group of flag-waving activists in a dinghy tried to harass a much larger rescue boat leaving Catania for Libya. But the group has now walked back its vow to block the boats, saying that although it would tail the vessels, it wont try to interfere with their activities.

For now, we want to understand how they do it, how they talk with human traffickers, how they react when they see human smugglers, said Cassella.

But humanitarian organizations operating in the Mediterranean remain concerned about their mission. Activities of far-right groups planning to disrupt search and rescue operations aimed at saving lives are deeply concerning, a spokeswoman for Save the Children, which has rescued nearly 4,000 people in the Mediterranean this year, told VICE News.

Without NGOs and other search and rescue actors, many more lives, like the men, women and children we have rescued, would be lost. These activists wish to disrupt efforts to bring these people to safety.

She said her organization was not a ferry service. We do not communicate with traffickers or people smugglers. We work under the coordination of the Italian Coast Guard and respond to distress calls only if instructed by them, she said. She also said it wasnt true that the activities of the NGOs created a pull factor. When you cut the rescue ships, the death toll spikes, but people keep coming.

Nick Lowles, chief executive of the British anti-racism group Hope Not Hate, said Defend Europe posed a serious risk to life on the high seas. The group represented an increasingly international threat, he explained, drawing support from far-right activists and networks around the world.

Although the mission comprises only a couple of dozen activists, Defend Europe has managed to generate a lot of attention and raise substantial funds through its social media campaigns. When its initial crowdfunding attempt on PayPal was thwarted after protests from NGOs, it simply relaunched the campaign on another platform and swiftly exceeded its goals.

The group has drawn international attention from conservative media, with Canadian alt-right blogger Lauren Southern and right-wing British journalist Katie Hopkins joining the mission in Catania. These rescue boats are as easy to hail as an Uber after a big night out in Birmingham, Hopkins tweeted Wednesday.

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A ferry service - VICE News

A group of self-describednational socialists in Nova Scotia has posted personalinformation about people who haveshown interest in protests calling for the removal of an Edward Cornwallis statue in Halifax, labelling them as "potentially dangerous."

Cornwalliswas a governor of Nova Scotia. In 1749, he issued a so-called scalping proclamationoffering a cash bounty to anyone who killed a Mi'kmaqperson.

On Saturday,a large crowdprotestedaround the statue and demandedthe likenessof Halifax's controversialfounder be removed from adowntown park.

Demonstatorshad earlier threatened onFacebookto remove the statue but relented when municipal crews covered the monument in black cloth for the duration of the event.

An anonymous Twitter user affiliated with Cape Breton Alt Right published a list online last Thursday, releasing the names, photos and other identifying detailsof 28 people interested in the removal of the statue in a process known on the internetas "doxing."

The list, latershared and discussed on Facebook, also includedcategories like:

The final "notes" column identifiessome people as being "mentally ill andunstable," "extremely militant and dangerous,"having histories of being "drunk and disorderly"and being on police watch lists.

The list included a 'notes' column, labelling some people as violent or mentally ill. (Twitter)

Adam Lemoine ofNorth Sydneywas doxed as having affiliations with Antifa, a far-left, anti-fascist organization. Hesaidhewas "blown away" when he found out, as he hasnever evenbeen to a protest.

"The only information they had correct was my name and my hometown," said Lemoine, who caught wind of the list after it was posted on Facebook.

"They have me playing an instrument I didn't play, in a band that no longer exists."

Lemoine saidhe clicked "interested" on a Facebook event for a protest last Saturday at the Cornwallis statue to get updates on what happened.

He believes the Twitter user who posted the list saw that, put his name into a search engine and listed whatthey found.

Activists protest at the base of the Edward Cornwallis statue last weekend after Halifax staff covered it with a black sheet. (Darren Calabrese/Canadian Press)

Lemoine said that when he asked the Cape Breton Alt Rightgroup to remove his name from the list, it responded by saying even if he could prove his details were wrong, the rest of the information would stay.

The group continues to maintain anonymity andrefused to be interviewed by the CBC over the phone or inperson on the grounds that it would be "inappropriate."

In anemailedstatement, however, the groupsaid ithasreceiveddeath threats almost daily since the list was posted.

The statement goes on to compare the actions of Cornwallis demonstrators to the destruction of historical sites in Palmyra by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria,and indicates the list was compiled over the course of about two months "in the interest of public safety."

"The community at large has a right to know the identities of those around them who may pose a threat to their immediate safety and a threat to their property," saidthe two-page statement, signed onlyby "leadership."

Tanner Leudy, a student at Cape Breton University, sharedthe same event page for the Cornwallis protest on Facebook though he knew he couldn't attend.

Leudysaidhe hadnever even heard ofAntifabeforethe list linkedhim to the organizationand he's worried about how beingassociated with such a groupcould affect the futureofthose who've been doxed.

"I've never done anything to warrant [the inclusion]," said Leudy. "Being labelled as a dangerous protester, even if it's not true, isn't something that employers will want in their workplace."

Anthony Leudy says he shared a Facebook event and then was wrongfully labelled 'potentially dangerous' by an anonymous Twitter user. (Twitter)

The group maintainsall of theinformationwas gathered within the public domain, referencing social media and news interviews, but DavidFraser, an internet privacy lawyer in Halifax, saidit's thelanguage of the list's "notes" columnthat may push legal boundaries.

Information compiledfrom social media platforms is fair game when it comes to doxing, saidFraser.

However, he added that legal proceedings on doxing, as rare as they are,require that what hasbeen published is explored as much as whyit hasbeen published.

"To be defamatory, all something has to do is to harm your reputation in the eyes of a reasonable person,"saidFraser.

"It would seem to me that [the notes]at the end of the listwould be, on its face,defamatoryandthe onus would shift to the person who said themto justify them as being true."

FrasersaidtheHalifax Proud Boys provide a good example of doxing.

He saidtheywere "implicitlydoxed" by volunteering theirpersonal information when showing up at an Indigenous rallyon Canada DayinCornwallisPark.They were recordedand the videos eventually made it to their workplace, resulting in their reprimand.

But, Frasersaid, it's part of the "rough and tumble"of freely expressed politics.

CBC News reached out to the Cape Breton Regional Police, the Halifax Regional Police and the RCMP.They say no investigation is ongoing because no one has come forward with a complaint.

El Jones says the doxing proves the extremity of the racism surrounding the Edward Cornwallis statue issue. (Twitter)

El Jones, Halifax's former poet laureate and a well-known, outspoken activist,saidshe isnotsurprised sheended up on the list.

"You hope that this is just some form of extreme reaction that's perhaps just intended to intimidate people," said Jones.

"[But] you have totake seriously the intent behind it, which is an attempt to harm."

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Alt-right group posts names, photos of 'potentially dangerous' Cornwallis protesters - CBC.ca

Thursday, July 20, 2017 at 8:32 a.m.

Bad hombre

Eric Hood / OC Weekly

With street battles against antifa quickly becoming a thing of the past, the Alt-Right is trying to stay relevant by organizing boring speaking events like every other political group; only they've encountered a little trouble along the way. In late May, "The Summer of Conservatism" event slated to take place July 9 at eSports Arena in downtown SanTana got cancelled and Old World German Restaurant in Huntington Beach scrapped an August gathering in the works billed as a "Celebration of Western Culture." Both venues faced a chorus of criticism from activists before canning the events.

But the Alt-Right is returning in OC after the brief retreat. "The Summer of Conservatism" found a new venue at the Embassy Suites in Garden Grove, with the Irvine-based Make Cali Great nonprofit revealing the location just days before, citing an internal email from an eSports Arena worker saying their owners received personal threats from activists. (The Weekly asked eSports Arena multiple times to substantiate the claim, but they declined). The sparsely attended event, with rows of empty seats, featured speakers like conservative media personality Larry Elder, Kyle Chapman (aka Based Stickman), Maxine Waters congressional challenger Omar Navarro and Huntington Beach Assemblyman (and gubernatorial candidate next year) Travis Allen.

Speaking of Surf City, the "Celebration of Western Culture" event is back on at Old World, too, only under a different name. After a number of conflicting online postings, Old World threw a "non-management employee" under the bus for making unauthorized comments in a statement on their Facebook page and opened their doors to the Alt-Right once more. So much for anyone who thought Old World turned over a whole new leaf from its days of hosting Holocaust deniers and allowing a neo-Nazi club to celebrate Hitler's birthday with a party!

This time around, a slew of modern-day "No MA'AM" speakers are lined up for "Make Men Great Again" on August 5 at the HB establishment (and not Al Bundy's garage). Joe Biggs (who's made nice with InfoWars again), Libertarian pagan Augustus Sol Invictus, Kyle Chapman, livestreamer Irma Hinojosa and former Villa Park councilwoman/current Bircher/forever Islamophobe Deborah Pauly are all scheduled to make appearances for the "celebration of masculinity." And then there's Lake Forest's Juan Cadavid, better known in Alt-Right circles as "Johnny Benitez," but who's gone under multiple aliases like Joey Cadavid, Sterling Abrade(s), and Dorian Navidson when involved with left-wing groups in the past. (The Weekly has since learned of two other Facebook pages still up under the names "Sterling Cadavid" and "Joey Benitez").

Juanny Cadavitez?

Illustration by Bob Aul

The curious Colombian-American is also set to speak at the event he helped organize. But for all the machismo he now boasts, Cadavid played the part of an ardent feminist trying to organize exploited women spa workers just this February. Under his "Sterling Abrade" alias, Cadavid sent an email to a local progressive activist back then wanting to raise awareness about the troubles of his industry with not-so-nice comments about Trump.

"The same principal with which Donald Trump used to cheat small businesses he knew could not afford to take him to court is used against the women of the spa industry," Cadavid wrote in the Feb. 2 email shared with the Weekly. "With an attempt to pass a national anti worker bill that would destroy California's worker protections and the election of a president who has no respect for women, it is especially important to stand up for women being oppressed in the spa industry."

Cadavid detailed wage theft and workplace grievancesincluding the practice of shifting around clients who sexually harass massage therapists rather than outright banning them. (Quick aside: Cadavid blamed the Weekly's expos for being fired because we mentioned his occupation, though he freely made the disclosure to the San Francisco Chronicle before making the claim on Facebook). A month after the email, Cadavid attended the Huntington Beach MAGA march in launching his Alt-Right Johnny Benitez persona. Accordingly, it's not bad bosses, but foreigners "overtaking" the spa industry that rubs Cadavid the wrong way nowadayseven though he's says online that he wasn't born in the U.S. himself.

Other all-too-sudden political flip-flops detailed by the Weekly created a cloud of suspicion in Alt-Right ranks that's followed Cadavid every step of the way since while trying to make a name for himself. He quit the Proud Boys, a self-described "Alt-Lite" fraternity, amid questions about his political leanings that reached all the way up to founder Gavin McInnes (one of the founders of VICE) himself. "Yeah, this Johnny Benitez thing is not working out," McInnes wrote on Facebook. "I don't know if you're a spy or if you're just a little too enthusiastic but you're not in charge, I am." Chapman later stepped in and tasked Cadavid with forming the Alt-Knights of Orange County.

Last time around, the Weeklyleft Cadavid's political motivations up for question. Whatever the case may be,text messages sent from "Sterling Abrade" in April to a left-wing activist after the Huntington Beach march professed one motive behind his pro-Trump persona. "I want to climb the social ranks and push a hard right conservative agenda and create a rift between libertarians and conservatives and split up the base," reads one text shared with the Weekly. "Also it's fun."

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OC Alt-Right Returns: HB Event Pledges to "Make Men Great Again" - OC Weekly

The name of William Woodward (Hootie) Johnson, who died last week at 86, is not likely to be widely familiar. He was the scion of a South Carolina banking dynasty, and something of a civil-rights pioneer in his home state: Recruiter of African-Americans in the family firms and local politics; supporter of integration in South Carolina's schools and colleges; the first white Southerner to serve on the board of directors of the Urban League. He was also an avid golfer, and chairman of the Augusta National club, home of the Masters tournament, between 1998 and 2006.

It was that last association that transformed Johnson into an involuntary recruit in the culture warsand revealed the potentially corrosive, and corrupting, power of the press.

In 2002, a left-wing gadfly and publicist named Martha Burk, head of the National Council of Women's Organizations, wrote a letter to Johnson, noting the fact that the famously exclusive and expensive Augusta National had no female members. Burk, of course, did not write to Johnson to inform him of a fact he already knew. Her letter, which was simultaneously delivered to the media, contained an ill-disguised threat: "We urge you to review your policies and practices in this regard," she said, "and open your membership to women now, so that this is not an issue when the [Masters] tournament is staged next year."

If Johnson had been, say, the president of Yale, and not chairman of Augusta National, he would have moved swiftly to appease Burk and prevent what any public-relations counselor would have warned to be bad publicity. But Johnson's response was complicated by the fact that the New York Times, edited at the time by Howell Raines, took up Burk's cause as its own.Therein lies a lesson, and the reason why Hootie Johnson's gothic family nickname briefly became a household term.

Howell Raines was, and remains, a left-wing southerner with something of a reputation as a newsroom zealot and bully. In his brief, volatile reign as the Times's executive editor (2001-03)he was brought down by misconduct in the Jayson Blair scandalhis politics and temperament inspired a special vehemence about certain genteel institutions in the South: Augusta National and Southern Living magazine, among others. He was also famous for employing a sports analogy"flooding the zone"to describe his professional instinct to harass targets, splash stories, and hector readers.

Prompted by his ideological comrade-in-arms, Martha Burk, Raines proceeded to flood the zone around Augusta National. In the next few months, the New York Times published literally dozens of stories on the subject (many on the newspaper's front page) and deployed his newsroom consigliere, the late Gerald M. Boyd, to scratch publication of dissenting arguments from Times sports columnists.

For his part, Johnson proved equal to the challenge. He answered Burk's extortionate terms with a polite, but pointed, message. He understood, of course, that Burk would "attempt to depict the members of our club as insensitive bigots and coerce the sponsors of the Masters to disassociate themselves under threatreal or impliedof boycotts and other economic pressures." But he also reminded her, and Raines, of the right of free association in America, and the perils of a powerful, and capriciously politicized, media.

Johnson assumed that the Masters' corporate sponsors would surrender to the threat of political pressure and unwelcome coverage but he also knew that Augusta National's affluent membership was uniquely prepared, and largely disposed, to resist coercion: "There may well come a day when women will be invited to join our membership," he wrote, "but that timetable will be ours and not at the point of a bayonet."

In the meantime, the Times-abetted spectacle played itself out. For a couple of pleasant seasons, the Masters was broadcast on television without commercials, as Augusta National opted to dispense with ads rather than put sponsors in a difficult position. The Times endeavored regularly to paint Johnson as an unreconstructed bigot, and when Burk arrived in Augusta in 2003 to stage a public demonstration, the protesters were heavily outnumbered by reporters. That was the same year Raines lost his job, and the Times dropped the story, moving on to other crusades.

All of which leads to two instructive postscripts. Five years ago, with Hootie Johnson as sponsor, Augusta National welcomed its first female members, one of whom is former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. And last week, Johnson died. It is worth noting that his New York Times obituary"Hootie Johnson, 86; Fought Admission of Women at Masters Site"was not just churlish in tone (see above headline) but devoid of any mention of the Times's leading role in the farce.

And of course the Times gave Burk the last word on Johnson: "'I think history will remember him as the Lester Maddox of golf,' referring to the segregationist governor of Georgia who refused to serve blacks in restaurants." In truth, of course, in the civil rights-era South, Hootie Johnson was the exact opposite of Lester Maddoxas Burk and the Times well know, just as the Times failed to mention the party affiliation of the "segregationist governor."

Philip Terzian is a senior editor of The Weekly Standard.

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Remembering Hootie Johnson, Survivor of the Culture Wars - The Weekly Standard

Eleven-year-old Lizzie Goldberg-Jones is a big fan of watching SpongeBob. Shes also a good kid. So because her little brother Petey loves watching Dusty, a giant, purple, animated dustball that airs on public television, she cheerfully enters a contest to have her family featured on Dustys award-winning television program.

TV matters. It matters to everyone, Lizzie says in her video entry, which wins the prize.

But when Lizzie and Petey turn out to have two proud, married daddies, Dusty and his creators find themselves in hot water with the White House, where the newly-appointed Presidents Special Counsel on Children and Child Welfare wants to yank the programs federal funding and stop the episode from airing.

At the Marthas Vineyard Playhouse through July 29, Cusi Crams political comedy Dusty and the Big Bad World is a fast-paced and funny take on the culture wars of the last Republican administration, sparing neither the right nor the left as both sides struggle over Dustys survival.

Kevin Cirone and Zada Clarke. MJ Bruder Munafo

Entering to the strains of Hail to the Chief, Charlotte Booker plays incoming special counsel Marianne, so in love with her new job that she rapturously sniffs a box of pencils as she plans to make public television more public by defunding shows like Dusty that give air time to gay families.

Ms. Booker, who originated the role in its 2008 world premiere, plays Marianne with vigor and self-confidence.

The people have spoken again, and here we are, she trills to her assistant Karen, played with hilarious awkwardness by Zada Clarke.

Wobbling anxiously in her office pumps and trying not to look at the large portrait of George W. Bush on the wall, Karen is wary of her new boss. Still, deeply grateful to have any kind of job, she gradually allows Marianne to befriend her. But when she gets wind of Mariannes intention to give Dusty the sack, Karen rebels and starts digging into her bosss past, sharing the dirt Deep Throat-style with Dustys writer Nathan (Kevin Cirone), whos already up to his eyeballs in paranoia.

Caught between the panicking Nathan and threats from the head of the Public Broadcasting System who happens to be a sorority sister of Mariannes is Dustys producer Jessica, powerfully played by Victoria Adams-Zischke.

At first, unable to believe that a show with seven Emmys and a Peabody could be canceled over a single episode, Jessica comes to realize that there is nothing you do with great love that wont at some point punch you in the stomach.

Charlotte Booker (left) originated the role of Marianne in 2008 production. MJ Bruder Munafo

And then theres young Lizzie, arguably the most level-headed of the lot, who joins forces with Nathan to invade Mariannes office and demand that Dusty be spared.

I have no idea how they got in here, Karen gasps to her boss. One of my dads founded ACT UP, thats how, Lizzie retorts.

But while Dustys defenders think they have Marianne cornered, shes still got some tricks in her political playbook.

Playhouse artistic and executive director MJ Bruder Munafo directs the excellent cast, which includes two local actors sharing the role of Lizzie. Nina Moore and Kaya Seiman, both of Oak Bluffs, are alternating performances in what Ms. Bruder Munafo said is a common practice with child actors on Broadway, but a first for a playhouse production.

Lisa Pegnatos elegantly simple set encapsulates the two worlds that clash in Ms. Crams play. To the audiences left are the offices where Jessica and Nathan labor in adjoining cubicles at WGBH in Boston. On the right of course is Mariannes office with its view of the Capitol. Center stage is the Union Station coffee shop where Karen and Nathan plot to bring the special counsel down.

Island musician and educator Brian Weiland wrote the Dusty theme song, with words by Ms. Bruder Munafo. The play has two acts with a 15-minute intermission and a total running time of about two hours. The show continues through July 29.

For tickets and information, visit mvplayhouse.org.

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Dusty and the Big Bad World Adds Levity to the Culture Wars - The Vineyard Gazette - Martha's Vineyard News