In January, a post I saw on Twitter/X shocked me.

“URGENT: As of now, I have ZERO access to any money,” Hüseyin Dogru wrote. “I can’t provide food for my family, including two newborns, due to EU sanctions.”

Dogru is a journalist, a German citizen living in Berlin.

After reading his post, I sent him a private message offering to order groceries and have them sent to his home.

The reply shocked me even more. “Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to accept any financial or material support,” Dogru wrote.

Dogru is the first European Union citizen known to be living inside the EU to face extrajudicial sanctions imposed by Brussels – robbing him of fundamental civil and humanitarian rights.

He’s also the first person to be sanctioned specifically for his reporting related to Palestine.

“I’m not allowed to exist anymore, I’m not allowed to provide my children with the basic necessities,” he explained on The Electronic Intifada Podcast this week.

“I can’t pay my rent, I can’t pay my lawyers and yes – I’m not even allowed to accept any kind of food, water or medicine whatsoever from third parties.”

  • Hotznplotznbanned_from_community_badge
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    4 days ago

    Removed by mod

        • goferking (he/him)
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          3 days ago

          I hope they are being paid, but so many seem to do it for free simply for the love of the game

        • plyth@feddit.org
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          3 days ago

          Are they people? The last answer doesn’t make sense. He complains about a referenced article but I have copied his link and referenced wikipedia to the disadvantage of Russia.

          Which requires me to point out a problem with the moderation. I would prefer if Hotznplotzn could answer so that I can know how genuine the account is.

          Another issue is that removing the comments makes it impossible to share the conversation in a discussion about accounts, or to compare the comments.

          But I have no idea how to balance that with the desire to have a clean comment section.

          • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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            3 days ago

            I think they’re people, and I think there’s at least two of them. At least one is German, and they all seem to keep European hours. They never answer when directly questioned about it.

            • plyth@feddit.org
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              3 days ago

              A mod has removed the comment so I won’t quote everything.

              your comments and the linked article are disgusting and false to say the least.

              As I explained, that doesn’t make sense and as an emotional outburst it doesn’t match the tone of the other comments. I trust your judgement that they are humans but this doesn’t fit.

              • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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                2 days ago

                Just chiming in to add my observation that the set of accounts does only operate during European daytime. I haven’t spent enough time to dig into whether it’s only during working hours or beyond. :D