**Best news of the week**
On Friday, the Mississippi Abortion Clinic Shutdown Law was blocked by the federal courts, which means that they can't stop places like Planned Parenthood from operating within State borders. While it is a victory, it is by no means the end of the fight, as the lawmakers who created the bills will probably work to find new ways to de-fund clinics and impose bills to make it harder for them to stay open.
Read the story here at Jackson Free Press.
Tuesday:
Remember a few weeks ago when a Muslim group helped raise funds for a Jewish Cemetery that had been vandalized? Well, this week, a Jewish Group started an online fundraiser to replace the damaged Qur'ans of a local Mosque. It seems these two groups aren't the ones we need to be worried about being violent to others.
You can see their fundraiser here, but I was unable to find any big mentions of the fundraising in the news.
In Washington DC, local government works to take climate change action, despite their new resident (who has spent less time there than elsewhere so far in his presidency).
You can read the news story here at Reuters.
Wednesday:
Kenya bans plastic bags, one of many African nations to ban the product.
See the news story at the Washington Post.
Though the protesters at Standing Rock have been forcibly removed from the site, the protest goes on. This week, they took it to Washington DC, where they set up at TeePee city in the shadow of the Washington Monument.
Here are some photos from the Native Nations Rise protest there.
Though Republicans all seem to disbelieve Climate Change, seventeen Republican congress members submitted a resolution stating that "human activities" have affected the global climate, and to request mitigation efforts in Climate Change.
Read the story here at Newsweek.
Thursday:
A Transgender birth records bill passes the Oregon State House. It would privatize the process, making it unnecessary to have courts involved. The bill now heads to their senate.
Read the story here.
A New Zealand river has been given rights as human being, meaning any damage done to the river can now be easily and legally prosecuted.
Read the story at the Guardian.
Friday:
The new owner of Vancouver Hotel says "Seniors can stay."
Read the story at the CBC.
Feel free to link anyone you'd like to this. And if you have any Good News links in the coming week that you'd like to share, feel free to send them my way. I can definitely use more.
American Immigrant Highlights: Syria
Syrians have many different ethnicities, including Areans, Armenians, Assyrians, Jews, Kurds, Turkmens, and Circassians. We believe that the first immigrants from the area began to arrive in 1880. The earliest immigrants settled mostly in the east, notably in New York City, Boston, and Detroit. Like the Japanese, they were affected heavily by the Immigration Act of 1924, which restricted immigration from any country to a maximum of 2% of the number from that country already living in the US at that time. The Immigration Act of 1965 abolished those quotas, and many Syrian Immigrants came to this country after that. Almost 65,000 Syrians immigrated to the US between 1961 and 2000. Most Syrian immigrants were Christian before 1960, though a few were Jewish. After 1965 is when the Syrian Muslim community began to rise. According to the 2000 Census, there were 142,897 Americans of Syrian ancestry, which equals about 12% of the Arab population in the US.
Most of the early Syrian Americans were street sellers, trading mostly in clothing. Because of this, they travelled with new groups to new areas of the continent to trade their wares. Most were quite successful, and many became importers and wholesalers, who then sold their goods to those who were still selling on the streets. By 1908, there were 3000 Syrian owned businesses in the US. Soon they began to move into other fields, medicine, law, and engineering to name a few. They worked also in the growing auto industry, causing a large Syrian areas in Michigan. They eventually moved into banking and computer science as well.
Syrians popularized many middle-eastern foods here in the US, some samplings of which include Pita bread, hummus, baba ghanoush, tabbouleh, and many others. They are also well known for their cheese. And of course, they are one of many communities that are well known for their baklava.
Notable Syrian Americans:
- Paula Abdul, Grammy winning singer and Emmy winning choreographer, judge on American Idol
- F Murray Abraham, Oscar winning actor
- Tige Andrews, Actor known for the Mod Squad
- Paul Anka, Singer
- Rosemary Barkett, first woman to serve on the Florida Supreme Court, and first woman Chief Justice of the same
- Mitch Daniels, Governer of Indiana from 2005-2013, current president of Purdue University
- Hala Gorani, news anchor and correspondent for CNN
- Teri Hatcher, Actress
- Robert M Isaac Mayor of Colorado Springs, CO from 1979 to 1997
- Steve Jobs, co founder and former CEO of Apple
- Paul Orfalea, founder of Kinkos
- Brandon Saad, hockey player for the Columbus Blue Jackets, Calder Memorial Trophy finalist, and Stanley Cup Champion
- Louay M Safi, Human Rights activist, chairman of the Syrian American Congress
- Jerry Seinfeld, comedian, actor, and writer
- Diana al-Hadid, sculptor
- Sam Yagan, tech entrepreneur, co founder of SparkNotes, eDonkey, OkCupid and others
- Wentworth Miller, actor known for Prison Break and other roles
This is by no means a complete list. For more interesting Syrian Americans, look at this list on Wikipedia.
Sources
Syrian Americans
Immigration act of 1924
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