Rafqa Touma

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Rafqa Touma

Federico Canas Velasco catches a bus to the University of Sydney campus in the hour before his lectures begin for the day. First is French, then global studies. The 22-year-old is in his fourth year of uni, and his weeks are busy. Half his days are spent working a bar job, and the others between classes. He is an outgoing, positive guy – friends, and sports such swimming and football, occupy any spare time.

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Rafqa Touma

Lawyers for an Australian dentistry student who lost her eye after being struck by shrapnel in the occupied West Bank say they doubt Israel is investigating the matter despite the foreign minister, Penny Wong, demanding a comprehensive probe. Palestinian-Australian student Ranem Abu-Izneid, 20, was sheltering with her friend on 15 November 2024 at Al-Quds University in Abu Dis, east of Jerusalem, when she says a bullet fired by Israeli forces penetrated the window. She later lost her right eye.

3 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Rafqa Touma

Chris Csabs started going through so-called “conversion practices” at 16 years old. “I was extremely distressed about being gay, and I went … to ask for help,” he said. He was then moved interstate to participate in a conversion course, exorcisms and counselling. But the damage inflictedhad started well before that. “What makes a 16-year-old seek that out?” Csabs said.

3 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Rafqa Touma

Passengers held on to handrails after a door stayed open on a driverless Metro racing underneath Sydney, with a transport union later calling for the system to be shut down until safety measures were put in place. A “door fault” was identified on a train travelling between Chatswood and Crows Nest stations at about 8.01am on Wednesday, the Metro Trains Sydney chief executive, Daniel Williams, said in a statement.

4 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Rafqa Touma

An Indigenous man who was riding an e-bike in Sydney has been killed when a police car attempted to pull him over. A so-called “single unit” acting sergeant attempted to pull over the 48-year-old man on Allen Street in Waterloo at about 3am on Friday, the New South Wales police assistant commissioner Peter McKenna told reporters. “At some point, the police vehicle and the e-bike [were] involved in a collision,” McKenna said. The man was treated by NSW Ambulance paramedics but died at the scene.