Podcasts about sudani

Makala haya yanaangazia taarifa mbalimbali ikiwemo, Baraza la Maaskofu wa Kanisa Katoliki nchini DRC wamtaka Rais Felix Tshisekedi kuwaamini viongozi wa dini kusaidia kuleta amani na utulivu Mashariki mwa nchi hiyo na pia serikali ya Uganda yawasilisha mswada tata bungeni kuruhusu kesi za kiraia kupelekwa kwenye Mahakama ya kijeshi. Taarifa zingine ambazo utaziskia ni uongozi wa kijeshi nchini Mali wasitisha sheria kuhusu vyama vya siasa nchini humo na Mazungumzo ya ana kwa ana kati ya wajumbe wa Ukraine na Urusi yamefanyika wiki hii nchini Uturuki kwa mara ya kwanza tangu mwaka 2022.

Viongozi wa dunia, wameendelea kutoa wito wa amani kwenye nchi  za Sudan Ukraine na Gaza hizo, ambako vita vimesababisha vifo vya maelfu ya raia na wengine kuwa wakimbizi. Hata hivyo licha ya wito huu, mapigano yameendelea kuripotiwa.

Viongozi wa dunia, wameendelea kutoa wito wa amani kwenye nchi  za Sudan Ukraine na Gaza hizo, ambako vita vimesababisha vifo vya maelfu ya raia na wengine kuwa wakimbizi. Hata hivyo licha ya wito huu, mapigano yameendelea kuripotiwa.

This week we're looking at movies tinged with green. The color may connote envy, luck, and eco-consciousness...but we both went literal and chose films with beautiful greenery. Sudani from Nigeria (2018) is a sweet slice of outsider life in Kerala, and Khoj (1989) has strange goings-on in the hills of Nepal. Subscribe to Filmi Ladies on Spotifyhttps://open.spotify.com/show/7Ib9C1X5ObvN18u9WR0TK9 or Apple Podcastshttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/filmi-ladies/id1642425062@filmiladies on Instagram Pitu is @pitusultan on InstagramBeth is @bethlovesbollywood on BlueskyEmail us at filmiladies at gmailSee our letterboxd for everything discussed on this podcast. https://boxd.it/qSpfyOur logo was designed by London-based artist Paula Ganoo @velcrothoughts on Instagram https://www.art2arts.co.uk/paula-vaughan

Makala hii imeamgazia kuuawa kwa mbunge wa Kasipul Charles Ong'ondo Were, kwa kupigwa risasi na watu waliokuwa kwa pikipiki katika barabara ya Ngong Jijini Nairobi, jumatano, kukamatwa kwa mlinzi wake kiongozi wa chama cha upinzani cha NUP nchini Uganda, nao wawakilishi wa DRC na Rwanda wanaokutana Washington Marekani kusaini mkataba kuelekea makubaliano ya amani ya mashariki mwa DRC, siasa za Tanzania na kushambuliwa kwa kasisi wa kikatoliki na matukio kadhaa ya juma hili kutokea duniani

Makala ya yaliyojiri wiki hii imeangazia mazishi ya kiongozi wa kanisa katoliki duniani Papa Francis, DRC na Rwanda zatia saini makubaliano kuhusu njia ya kupatikana amani ya mashariki mwa Congo, siasa za Tanzania kuelekea uchaguzi wa oktoba, ziara ya rais wa Kenya William Ruto huko China, hali ya vita ya Sudan, vita ya Ukraine na huko Gaza Israeli, ni miongoni mwa Habari kuu za dunia zilizojiri kwa juma hili.

Vita ya sudan Kuingia katika mwaka wa tatu wiki hii, Kenya yatangaza marufuku ya biashara ya figo baada ya ufichuzi, rais wa zamani wa DRC arejea nchini aliwasili mjini Goma huku Marekani ikiitaka nchi ya Rwanda kuondoa wanajeshi wake mashariki mwa nchi hiyo, tumeangazia siasa za Tanzania kuelekea uchaguzi wa Oktoba, kule Sahel na wito wa rais wa Ghana wiki hii akiwataka viongozi wa nchi hizo kuungana pamoja na pia mkutano wa Paris kuhusu hatima ya vita ya Ukraine

Matukio ya wiki: kukamatwa kwa mwenyekiti wa chama cha upinzani cha Chadema nchini Tanzania, Tundu Lisu, maadhimisho ya miaka 31 ya mauaji ya kimbari ya nchini Rwanda mwaka 1994, mafuriko jijini Kinshasa huko DRC, hali ya sudan Kusini kutokana na kukamatwa na kuzuiwa nyumbani kwa makamu wa kwanza wa rais Riek Machar, uchaguzi wa Gabon, na pia mzozo wa kibiashara kati ya Marekani na mataifa mengine ulimwenguni ni miongoni mwa Habari kuu za dunia zilizojiri kwa juma hili.

Miongoni mwa matukio makubwa ya juma hili ni pamoja na ziara ya rais wa Uganda Yoweri Museveni, iliyotangulizwa na ziara ya wajumbe wa Umoja wa Afrika, nchini Sudan Kusini baada ya makamu wa rais wa nchini hiyo kukamatwa na kuzuiwa nyumbani kwake, kule DRC waasi wa M23 wanaoungwa mkono na Rwanda waripotiwa kujiondoa katika mji wa Walikale mokowani Kivu kaskazini mashariki mwa DRC, tunaangazia Kenya, Uganda, nchi za Afrika mashariki na magharibi pia kwengineko duniani 

Ni juma ambalo limeshuhudia kukamatwa kwa makamu wa kwanza wa rais wa sudan Kusini Riek Machar na kuzuiwa nyumbani kwake, rais wa Burundi Evariste Ndayishimiye wiki hii aliishutumu Rwanda kwa kupanga kuishambulia nchi yake, waasi wa M23 kukutana na Kiongozi wa Qatar kule Doha,afisa wa polisi ya Kenya kule Haiti kutoweka, utawala wa kijeshi kule Niger kuzindua kipindi cha mpito cha miaka mitano, pia mashambulio ya Israeli kule Lebanon na mkutano wa Ulaya kuhusu Ukraine

Kuna idadi kubwa ya watu wanaoshindwa kupata maji salama kwa matumizi ya nyumbani ,hospitali na hata mashamba Uhaba wa maji unaorodheshwa kuwa sababu kubwa ya watu kukosa chakula, kujikimu katika nchi zinazoshuhudia migogoro.Katika nchi kama Sudan na DRC kuna ripoti za hospitali ,kambi za wakimbizi kukosa moja hivyo mashirika ya kimsaada yanapata changamoto kuwahudumia wakimbizi

Mazungumzo ya ana kwa ana kati ya DRC na waasi wa M23 wanaosaidiwa na Rwanda kuanza jumanne ya Marchi 18, SADC kusitisha operesheni zake mashariki mwa DRC, mapigano kule Sudan Kusini kati ya wanajeshi wa serikali na wapiganaji waliotiifu kwa makamu wa kwanza wa rais Riek Machar, juhudi za kikanda kuyahamasisha mataifa ya Mali, Burkina faso na Niger kurejea tena kama wanachama wa ECOWAS, na sitisho la mapigano kwa muda mfupi kati ya Urusi na Ukraine, ni miongoni mwa yaliyojiri wiki hii

Wiki hii kwenye habari za ulimwengu tunaangalia majibizano makali kati ya rais wa Marekani Donald Trump na mwenzake wa Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky katika Ikulu ya White House, pia tunaangalia mikakati inayowekwa kumaliza mgogoro wa DRC huku Rwanda ikisema haitishwi kutengwa na ulimwengu, Somalia na Ethiopia zarejesha uhusiano wa kidiplomasia, mkutano wa G20 ukikamilika kule Afrika Kusini bila mwafaka kufikiwa.

Wajumbe wa kisiasa kutoka kundi la RSF linaloongozwa na Jenerali Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo linalopigana na wanajeshi wa Sudan, walikutana jijini Nairobi na kutia saini mkataba wa uundwaji wa serikali mbadala kwenye maeneo wanayodhibiti. Nini hatima ya mzozo wa Sudan ?

Habari za wiki hii ni pamoja na hali kule nchini Mashariki mwa DRC, utata wa kidplomasia uanozingira Kenya na Sudan, tutaangazia pia kesi ya kiongozi wa upinzani nchini Uganda Kizza Besigye, lakini tutaangalia kipindi cha mpito nchini Niger. Tumedadisi pia hali kufikia sasa ya vita vya kule Gaza na misimamo ya viongozi mbalimbali wa ulimwengu.

Wanamgambo wa RSF wanaopigana na jeshi nchini Sudan na washirika wake wakiwemo wanasiasa wapo jijini Nairobi nchini Kenya, wanakojadiliana kuhusu uundwaji wa serikali mbadala wakati huu inapoendelea na vita.Unazungumzia vipi harakati hizi za RSF ?Unafikiri ni kwanini Kenya imewaruhusu wanamgambo hao kukutana katika nchi yake ?

Wanamgambo wa RSF wanaopigana na jeshi nchini Sudan na washirika wake wakiwemo wanasiasa wapo jijini Nairobi nchini Kenya, wanakojadiliana kuhusu uundwaji wa serikali mbadala wakati huu inapoendelea na vita.Unazungumzia vipi harakati hizi za RSF ?Unafikiri ni kwanini Kenya imewaruhusu wanamgambo hao kukutana katika nchi yake ?

Makala ya leo yanaangazia Kikao cha viongozi wa Afrika, kilichotamatika rasmi mwishoni mwa juma lililopita nchini Ethiopia, mzozo wa DRC na Sudan ukigubika mijadala yao.Hata hivyo vikao hivyo  vimekamilika  bila suluhu ya mizozo ya nchi zote mbili, ambapo vyongozi  waliishia kwa kutoa wito wa kusitisha mapigano. tulimuuliza msikilizaji iwapo anaridhika na matokeo ya kikao hicho na  anadhani nini cha zaidi viongozi hawa wangefanya kukomesha mizozo barani Afrika

Makala ya leo yanaangazia Kikao cha viongozi wa Afrika, kilichotamatika rasmi mwishoni mwa juma lililopita nchini Ethiopia, mzozo wa DRC na Sudan ukigubika mijadala yao.Hata hivyo vikao hivyo  vimekamilika  bila suluhu ya mizozo ya nchi zote mbili, ambapo vyongozi  waliishia kwa kutoa wito wa kusitisha mapigano. tulimuuliza msikilizaji iwapo anaridhika na matokeo ya kikao hicho na  anadhani nini cha zaidi viongozi hawa wangefanya kukomesha mizozo barani Afrika

Makala hii imeangazia mkutano wa viongozi wa Afrika mjini Addis Ababa Ethiopia ambapo wamemchagua kiongozi wa tume ya Umoja wa Afrika AU kati ya wagombea watatu, lakini pia mapigano yanayoendelea kati ya waasi wa M23 wanaoungwa mkono na Rwanda dhidi ya jeshi la serikali FARDC na ambao sasa wameudhibiti mji wa Bukavu huko Kivu kusini mashariki mwa DRC, mapigano ya nchini Sudan, siasa za Uganda na pia kwenye nchi za Afrika Magharibi. Lakini pia zoezi la ubadirishanaji wa mateka huko Gaza

Makala ya yaliyojiri wiki hii kwa sehemu kubwa imejikita katika kudadavua hali yausalama wa mashariki mwa Jamhuri ya kidemokrasia ya Congo ambako tangu mwanzo wa juma hili kulishuhudiwa mapigano makali kati ya jeshi la Nchi hiyo na waasi wa M23 wanaosaidiwa na Rwanda kwenye mji wa Goma, lakini pia siasa za mataifa ya Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania na maeneo mengine duniani

Makala hii imeangazia mapigano eneo la mashariki mwa DRC, mvutano wa kisiasa nchini Kenya pamoja na hali ya Sudan, kauli ya rais wa Ufaransa Emmanuel Macron kwamba mataifa ya Afrika hayana shukrani katika kuyataka majeshi ya Ufaransa kuondoka kwenye ardhi zao na mazishi ya aliyekuwa rais wa 39 wa Marekani Jimmy Carter wiki hii

Yeni dönemde Suriye tarafından nasıl bir yapının inşa edileceği ve bu yapının Irak'a yönelebilecek tehditleri ne ölçüde bertaraf edebileceği gibi konular Irak'ın Suriye politikasında başat konu başlıkları olarak öne çıkıyor.Yazan: Sercan ÇalışkanSeslendiren: Halil İbrahim Ciger

Makala hii imeangazia namna ambavyo nchi zetu zilivyoukaribisha mwaka wa 2025 kwa shamrashamra za kila aina huku wakisema kwaheri kwa mwaka 2024 ulioshuhudia michezo mikubwa zaidi ulimwenguni ya Olimpiki, vita ya Ukraine na kule Gaza, usalama mashariki mwa DRC, Sudan pamoja na kurejea madarakani kwa aliyekuwa rais wa Marekani, Donald Trump.

Makala imeangazia namna ambavyo polisi nchini Kenya walivyotawanya maandamano ya wanaharakati waliopinga ukatili dhidi ya wanawake na mauaji nchini humo. Rais wa DRC Felix Tshisekedi alilihutubia taifa mbele y amabunge yote mawili, na kuonyesha kwamba Rwanda inatatiza usalama wa mashariki, siasa za Tanzania, Sudani, na Francois Bayrou ateuliwa kuwa waziri mkuu mpya wa Ufaransa pia hali nchini Israeli.

Umoja wa mataifa umeorodhesha mwaka 2024 kama mwaka hatari zaidi kwa wafanyikazi wa mashirika ya kimsaada Katika takwimu za UN ,wafanyakazi zaidi ya 200 wamewauwa katika mzoz wa Gaza na wengine zaidi ya 20 katika mzozo wa Sudan

I mandati d'arresto della Corte penale internazionale, il lancio di un missile balistico intercontinentale da Mosca e i colloqui tra Putin e al-Sudani

Kwenye makala hayai tunajadili hatua ya Jumuiya ya IGAD kuripotiwa kupendekeza kutumwa kwa wanajeshi wa kulinda amani toka nchi za Afrika ambazo hazijajihusisha kwenye mzozo unaoendelea ili kusimamia mkataba wa usitishaji mapigano kati ya jeshi na wapiganaji wa RSF nchini #sudan. Unamtazamo gani kwa pendekezo hili? Haya hapa baadhi ya maoni yako.

Kwenye makala hayai tunajadili hatua ya Jumuiya ya IGAD kuripotiwa kupendekeza kutumwa kwa wanajeshi wa kulinda amani toka nchi za Afrika ambazo hazijajihusisha kwenye mzozo unaoendelea ili kusimamia mkataba wa usitishaji mapigano kati ya jeshi na wapiganaji wa RSF nchini #sudan. Unamtazamo gani kwa pendekezo hili? Haya hapa baadhi ya maoni yako.

Maaskofu wa kanisa katoliki nchini Kenya wameukosoa utawala wa Ruto, wataka kukomeshwa, utekaji nyara na ukiukaji wa haki za binadamu, wapinzani nchini DRC wajitokeza kupinga mpango wa kubadilisha katiba, Rwanda yafanikiwa katika mapambano yake dhidi ya ugoinjwa wa Murbag, kura ya maoni kuhusu katiba mpya kufanyika jumamosi nchini Gabon,Kamati maalum ya Umoja wa Mataifa  yaunga mkono ripoti kwamba Israel inatekeleza mauaji ya kimbari jijini Gaza

Mapendekezo ya taifa la Uingereza  yanataka  vita kusitishwa nchini Sudan na kuruhusiwa  misaada ya kibinadamu kuwafikia waathiriwa.

Mapendekezo ya taifa la Uingereza  yanataka  vita kusitishwa nchini Sudan na kuruhusiwa  misaada ya kibinadamu kuwafikia waathiriwa.

Donald Trump achaguliwa kuwa rais wa 47 wa Marekani, Ziara ya rais wa Kenya William Ruto huko Addis Ababa Ethiopia, na Sudan Kusini, na Raila Odinga kuzindua azma yake ya kuwania uenyekiti wa tume ya Umoja wa Afrika, kuelekea uchaguzi huo utakaofanyika Februari mwaka 2025. Mapigano makali kati ya waasi wa M23 na wazalendo mashariki mwa DRC, Umoja wa Mataifa wasema uamuzi wa kuahirishwa uchaguzi nchini Sudani Kusini haukubaliki, Duma Boko atawazwa rasmi kama rais mpya wa Botswana, Uhusiano wa Urusi na Marekani baada ya Trump kushinda uchaguzi

Kuapishwa kwa makamu mpya wa rais wa Kenya Profesa Kithure Kindiki, ziara ya rais wa DRC Félix Tshisekedi Kampala Uganda huku mapigano kati ya waasi wa M23 na wazalendo yakiripotiwa mashariki mwa nchi yake, mkutano wa Comesa watamatika Jijini Bujumbura Burundi, Umoja wa mataifa wasema hali ya kibinadamu nchini Sudan yatia wasiwasi, upinzani washinda uchaguzi mkuu Botswana, kampeni za lala salama Marekani, lakini pia kauli ya Korea Kaskazini kuwa itasimama na Urusi hadi ushindi wake huko Ukraine.

Kauli ya rais wa DRC kuhusu marekebisho ya katiba yazua hisia mseto, kesi ya naibu wa Rais wa Kenya aliyeenguliwa madarakani Rigathi Gachagua yaendelea, umoja wa Ulaya kuendeleza shinikizo ilizoiwekea Burundi mwaka 2015 hadi mwaka 2025. Ziara ya mkuu wa UNHCR Fillipo Grandi nchini Uganda, mgombea wa chama tawala kule Msumbiji awa mshindi wa uchaguzi mkuu, uchaguzi mkuu wa Marekani na mengineyo.

Kuondolewa madarakani kwa naibu wa rais wa Kenya Rigathi Gachagua na uteuzi wa profesa Kithure Kindiki, serikali ya Kinshasa yakaribisha makubaliano yaliyoafikiwa kati ya mawaziri wa mambo ya nje wa DRC na Rwanda kuhusu suala kulitokomeza kundi la FDLR na Rwanda kusema iko tayari kuwaondoa wanajeshi kwenye ardhi ya Congo, maandamano ya upinzani kule Msumbiji baada ya uchaguzi mkuu, kuuawa kwa kiongozi wa Hamas Yahya Sunwar, uchaguzi mkuu wa Marekani na mengineyo.

Today on the show, Fareed is joined live by an expert panel to discuss the events unfolding in the Middle East. Randa Slim, conflict resolution director at the Middle East Institute, and Richard Haass, president emeritus at the Council on Foreign Relations, speak about the escalation in the region. They discuss Israel's war in Lebanon as well as its potential response to Iran's missile strike.   Then, Ret. Admiral James Stavridis speaks with Fareed about the other major war that rages on – in Ukraine. They discuss the prospect of NATO membership for Ukraine, and whether there is hope for peace anytime soon.   Next, acclaimed author Malcolm Gladwell joins the show to talk about his new book, “Revenge of the Tipping Point,” in which he revisits his bestselling work from more than two decades ago.   Finally, Fareed sits down with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani to analyze his country's relationship with Iran, the progress his country has made over the course of the last two decades and the work still left to do.   GUESTS: Richard Haass (@RichardHaass), Randa Slim (@rmslim), James Stavridis (@stavridisj), Malcolm Gladwell (@Gladwell), Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (@mohamedshia) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We finally got some intro and outro BEATS! Really puts a bow on the thing eh? Abbas goes off about city hall weddings, comedians and moustaches, the Sudani head-bop, car advertisements in movies, and planning a US tour. catch me LIVE with new material TORONTO - May 3 Tell me what city to go to next! https://shorturl.at/cdJX4 Socials Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/abbaswahab_/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/AbbasWahab

Emma Tsurkov insists that the best way to get Iraq's Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani to make good on his pledges to secure her sister's freedom is for the United States to wield the threat of military sanctions.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Michigan isn't providing fair and equal health care services to all races, according to a new report from the nonprofit research firm The Commonwealth Fund. Plus, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani was in metro Detroit Thursday evening for a short visit. Do you have a community story we should tell? Let us know in an email at detroiteveningreport@wdet.org.

Israel's war cabinet met again today to weigh up a response to Iran's strike over the weekend. In Tehran, President Ebrahim Raisi warns even the smallest of actions would be met with a “severe, extensive and painful” response. The United States is urging caution and calm from both sides, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin telling his Israeli counterpart that the US goal is "regional stability". Joining the program to discuss is former US Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who served under Donald Trump and has since become one of his fiercest critics.  Also on today's show: Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani; Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Simon Harris; author Jonathan Vigliotti  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

*) Hamas says ending Israeli aggression on Gaza is priority The Palestinian resistance group Hamas' military wing has said that ending Israel's aggression on besieged Gaza is a priority, reiterating their rejection of any hostage exchange deal or negotiations without this condition being met. This was stated in a recorded speech by Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson for the Qassam Brigades, which was broadcast on Al Jazeera satellite channel. Forty-five Palestinians have been killed in attacks on several parts of the enclave early Friday and over 21,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's air and ground attacks on Gaza since October 7. *) Number of children killed in West Bank has reached unprecedented levels: UN The United Nations Children's Fund has said that the number of children killed in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem has reached unprecedented levels. UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa Adele Khodr noted that Israeli forces have killed 83 children in the past twelve weeks alone – more than double the number of children killed in all of 2022. Khodr added that the suffering of children in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, is part of the war on Gaza and must not fade into the background. *) Russia launches strikes across Ukrainian cities Russia has launched a wave of missile strikes across Ukrainian cities, including the capital, authorities said as they raised a nationwide air alert. The overnight attacks came days after Ukraine struck a Russian warship in the occupied Crimean port of Feodosia. Explosions were reported in Kiev and missiles struck at least five other Ukrainian cities, including Kharkiv in the northeast, Lviv in the country's west as well as Odessa in the south, the cities' mayors and police said. *) Iraq working to end US-led coalition's presence in the country: Premier Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al Sudani has said that the government is working towards ending the US-led coalition against the presence of Daesh in the country. Following a meeting with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who was on a formal visit to Iraq, al Sudani said at a joint press conference that the leaders are working to conclude the US-led mission. Al Sudani added that the Iraqi government is in the process of “rearranging the relationship” between security advisers and forces under capable Iraqi forces. *) SpaceX launches secretive US military spacecraft on research mission SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket blasted back into space on Thursday night to ferry the US military's secretive X-37B drone to a research mission. After weeks of delays, the rocket launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Pentagon has released little information about the space drone and its mission, only saying that the mission would entail "multiple cutting-edge experiments".

This is TRT World's Daily News Brief for Monday, December 18th. *) Israel kills 90 in refugee camp as its attacks continue in Gaza The Israeli army has launched deadly attacks across Gaza, hitting a refugee camp in the north, a hospital in the south and killing a teenage girl who had lost her leg in an earlier strike, according to Palestinian officials, media and eyewitnesses. Israeli strikes on the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza killed 90 Palestinians, Gaza's health ministry spokesman told Reuters. Another missile attack on a house belonging to the Shehab family killed 24 people, Hamas Aqsa radio said. “We believe the number of dead people under the rubble is huge but there is no way to remove the rubble and recover them because of the intensity of Israeli fire,” the spokesman said by telephone. *) Voters in Chile reject draft constitution, election officials say Chilean voters have rejected a proposed new constitution drafted by a conservative-led committee, election officials said, meaning the charter imposed during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet will remain in force. With 99 percent of referendum ballots counted, the “against” option prevailed with 55.75 percent of the vote, compared to 44.25 percent in favour, according to electoral service Servel just hours after voting ended around 6:00 pm on Sunday (2100 GMT). The latest version of a new proposed constitution was overseen by the far-right opposition Republican Party after voters roundly rejected a progressive draft in September 2022 that attempted to enshrine environmental protections and the right to elective abortion. *) Iraqis vote in first provincial elections for a decade Iraqis vote to choose their provincial councils, the first such election in a decade. Ballots will be held in 15 of Iraq's provinces but not in the other three which are Kurdish and operate under a separate autonomous system. The election is seen as a key test for the government of Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al Sudani. He rose to power just over a year ago on the back of a parliamentary coalition and has focused on developing public services and infrastructure ravaged by decades of conflict. *) Serbia President Vucic says his party won parliamentary polls Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic has said his party had won a commanding victory in parliamentary elections, extending the populist outfit's rule in the Balkan country amid accusations of foul play by the opposition. Official results were set to be announced late on Monday but the president appeared certain of his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS)'s performance, just hours after the polls closed on Sunday. Even though Vucic was not personally on the ballot in Sunday's parliamentary and local elections, the contest was largely seen as a referendum on his government. And finally… *) 14th TRT International Documentary Awards held in Istanbul The 14th TRT International Documentary Awards, organised by Türkiye's national broadcaster TRT, took place in Istanbul between December 14-17 with screenings of national and international documentaries and the participation of expert guests in the field. Throughout the four-day event, documentaries competing in various categories and special selection films were shown to audiences, contributing to enriching the documentary climate in Türkiye. “The Lens of Democracy” received the Best Film Award in the International Category, while “Flaneur” was chosen as the Best Film in the National Professional Category. Speaking at the ceremony, TRT General Manager Mehmet Zahid Sobaci said the event is the largest documentary film festival in Türkiye. He pointed out that it is impossible to think independently about the history and adventure of documentaries and documentary making in Türkiye without TRT “because TRT, since its establishment, has become the school of documentary making.” And that's your daily news brief from TRT World. For more, head to trtworld.com

This is the web version of Foreign Exchanges, but did you know you can get it delivered right to your inbox? Sign up today:TODAY IN HISTORYDecember 2, 1805: At the Battle of Austerlitz, Napoleon wins what was arguably his greatest victory against a larger joint Russian-Austrian army. The Allies suffered 36,000 dead/wounded/captured compared with only 9000 for the French. The French victory was so complete that not only did it end the War of the Third Coalition, it allowed Napoleon to create the Confederation of the Rhine among the German states that had become French clients. Emperor Francis II was then forced to dissolve the Holy Roman Empire, which had been in existence continuously since 962 and traced its origins back to Charlemagne's coronation as “emperor of the Romans” in 800.December 2, 1942: Enrico Fermi and his team create the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction at “Chicago Pile-1,” a rudimentary reactor built under the campus of the University of Chicago. This was the first milestone achievement for the Manhattan Project in its race to build a nuclear bomb before Nazi Germany.December 3, 1971: The Pakistani military undertakes preemptive airstrikes against several Indian military installations, beginning the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, itself the final phase of the Bangladesh Liberation War. India was preparing to enter the war on Bangladesh's side anyway, so when I say these strikes were “preemptive” I am not using that term in the phony, George W. Bush “hey they might attack us someday, you never know” sense of the term. The war, to put it mildly, was a complete disaster for the Pakistanis, who were forced to surrender a scant 13 days later and had to give up their claims on “East Pakistan” (Bangladesh) while suffering around a third of their military killed, wounded, or captured. In one of Henry Kissinger's more notorious acts, the Nixon administration opted to support Pakistan despite evidence of its armed forces committing major atrocities against Bangladeshi civilians.December 3, 1984: A Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India, spews toxic methyl isocyanate gas overnight, resulting in the deaths of between 3800 and 16,000 people and causing injury to at least 558,000 more. Union Carbide maintains that the leak was caused by deliberate sabotage, though Indian courts subsequently found several officials at the plant guilty of negligence. The “Bhopal Disaster” remains one of the worst industrial catastrophes in history and its adverse effects are still being felt by people in that region to the present day.MIDDLE EASTISRAEL-PALESTINEThe Israeli military (IDF) was advancing on the southern Gazan city of Khan Younis on Sunday, with Hamas officials and residents both reporting indications of nearby fighting and the IDF later confirming that it has sent ground forces into southern Gaza. The IDF has been ordering civilians to evacuate the eastern reaches of Khan Younis, and of course it's posted a helpful interactive map on its website that warns civilians of imminent danger provided those civilians have reliable internet access and haven't lost their special IDF secret decoder rings. Residents of Khan Younis will likely move further south to Rafah, though that city is also under heavy IDF bombardment so it's not really safe either. Israeli officials say the IDF struck more than 400 targets over the weekend, and the official Gazan death toll had risen at last check to 15,523. The real death toll may be substantially higher, given the likelihood of bodies that haven't yet been recovered and the closure of most of the hospitals that were handling casualties.Elsewhere:* Aid shipments into Gaza have resumed. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society says that 100 truckloads of aid entered the territory from Egypt on Saturday and I believe the aim was to bring in a similar number of trucks on Sunday though I have not seen any information yet as to whether that was accomplished.* The Biden administration may be “pressing” Israel and Hamas to resume negotiations, as White House spokes-ghoul John Kirby told NBC on Sunday, but there's no indication it's having any success. After the ceasefire collapsed on Friday the Israeli government recalled its Mossad negotiators from Qatar, and for Hamas's part the Islamist group's political wing has sworn off any future prisoner swaps “until the war ends.”* The administration is continuing to send large quantities of ordinance to the IDF, including massive “bunker buster” bombs. So any claim that it's really pushing the Israeli government to negotiate a ceasefire or even demonstrate greater discernment in its bombardments really doesn't hold up terribly well.* Israel Hayom is reporting that “key figures” in the US Congress have been shown the text of a “new initiative” that would condition future US aid to Egypt, Iraq, Turkey, and Yemen (all of which it identified as “Arab states,” which would be news to the Turks) on the willingness of governments in those four states to enable the ethnic cleansing of Gaza by taking in refugees. That same outlet has also reported (in Hebrew, so here's a summary from Ryan Grim) that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has asked Minister of Strategic Planning Ron Dermer to put together a plan to “thin the population in Gaza to a minimum,” which if nothing else is an incredible euphemism. The Biden administration has rejected any forced and/or permanent relocation of Gazan civilians, a point that Vice President Kamala Harris reiterated during her visit to the COP28 climate summit in Dubai over the weekend. But it perhaps could be sold on the idea of a “voluntary” (in quotes because in reality it would be anything but) evacuation that is characterized as temporary even if there's no real intention to ever let the evacuees return.* The Guardian says its reporting has confirmed the findings of that bombshell +972 Magazine piece from a few days ago, which reported that the IDF has been using an AI system called “Habsora” (“The Gospel”) to identify targets under a process that's been likened to a “mass assassination factory.” The system is producing targets faster than the IDF can attack them, including private homes where the likelihood of civilian casualties is high. Israeli officials are apparently insisting that the AI is programmed to minimize civilian risk, an assertion that cannot be squared with the high number of civilian casualties incurred so far in this conflict.* Israeli settler mobs attacked two West Bank villages in separate incidents on Saturday, killing at least one Palestinian in one of those attacks. The human rights organization Yesh Din says it's catalogued some 225 settler attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank since October 7, resulting in at least nine deaths.* On a somewhat related note, one of the people killed in last Thursday's shooting in East Jerusalem turns out to have been an Israeli civilian who shot and killed the two Hamas attackers and then was mistakenly gunned down by Israeli soldiers. Video footage apparently shows the man disarming, kneeling, and opening his shirt to demonstrate to the soldiers that he was not a threat, but one of them killed him anyway. The incident has raised issues regarding the trigger happiness of Israeli security forces and the wisdom of the Israeli government's armed vigilante program, which in addition to risking civilian Palestinian deaths also risks more “friendly fire” shootings like this one.* The Washington Post published a story this weekend about the hasty evacuation of al-Nasr Children's Hospital in northern Gaza last month. Without going into some of the grislier details, the staff was forced to evacuate by the IDF and left behind four premature infants who likely would not have survived relocation. They say Israeli officials told them the infants would be taken out in Red Cross ambulances but apparently they were left to die and, eventually, decompose. Reporters discovered their remains during the ceasefire. Israeli officials insist that they never ordered al-Nasr's evacuation and have questioned the veracity of the story, despite video evidence and a recording of a phone call that the IDF itself released in which an Israeli official appears to acknowledge the need to rescue patients from the facility. The Red Cross says it never agreed to assist the evacuation and that conditions in northern Gaza would have made it impossible for its personnel to get to al-Nasr to retrieve the infants.* I mention the al-Nasr story because it strikes me as especially galling. In general I'm trying not to focus heavily on individual atrocities or allegations of atrocities in compiling these newsletters—there would be no space for anything else otherwise. I hope readers don't mistake that for apathy about any of these stories, going back to and including the atrocities committed/allegedly committed by Gazan militants on October 7 (I know cases of sexual violence have been receiving heavy coverage of late). I feel my role here is to try to provide an overview and for me that means keeping some distance from specific events. I'm sure I don't do that consistently but it is my aim.SYRIAAccording to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, that Saturday morning Israeli missile attack in the vicinity of Damascus killed at least two of its personnel who were in Syria on an “advisory” mission. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the strikes killed two Syrians who were affiliated with Hezbollah as well as two foreigners, presumably these IRGC members, while wounding five other people.YEMENHouthi rebels in northern Yemen fired a barrage of missiles and drones at ships in the Red Sea on Sunday. The group damaged three commercial ships and also fired at least three drones at the US naval destroyer USS Carney, which shot the projectiles down. There's no indication of any casualties and two of the vessels reported only minor damage (I'm unsure as to the status of the third). I would not be surprising if the US military were to retaliate against the Houthis in the near future, and there is a genuine risk that this could lead to a full-blown resumption of the Yemen war—though of course that would require Saudi Arabia's involvement.IRAQIraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaʿ al-Sudani reportedly told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a phone conversation on Saturday that Baghdad does not appreciate the US military carrying out attacks on Iraqi soil. The US attacked two Iraqi militia-linked targets on November 22 (during this newsletter's holiday pause), “killing nine pro-Iran fighters” in retaliation for attacks against US personnel according to AFP. Those attacks tapered off during the Gaza ceasefire, but as we know that ceasefire is no longer operative.On Sunday, US forces carried out a drone strike on a militia target in Iraq's Kirkuk province, killing at least five people and wounding five more. There was initially no indication as to responsibility (though one didn't exactly have to be Sherlock Holmes to solve this caper), but the US military later confirmed that it was responsible and characterized the strike as preempting “an imminent threat.”ASIAPAKISTANUnspecified gunmen attacked a bus in northern Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan region late Saturday, killing at least nine people and injuring at least 26 others. The bus driver was among those killed, along with the driver of a truck with which the bus collided. There's been no claim of responsibility and the main body of the Pakistani Taliban has taken the rare step of denying any involvement.PHILIPPINESA bombing targeting a Catholic mass killed at least four people and left several others wounded on the campus of Mindanao State University in the southern Philippine city of Marawi on Sunday. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack via Telegram. The previous day, the Philippine military said its forces killed at least 11 jihadist militants in nearby Maguindanao province in an attack targeting “suspected leaders and armed followers of the Dawla Islamiyah [i.e. ‘Islamic State'] and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters” to borrow the AP's verbiage. I don't know whether Sunday's bombing was planned in advance or was intended as a direct retaliation for Saturday's incident.AFRICAGUINEA-BISSAUThe president of Guinea-Bissau, Umaro Sissoco Embaló, characterized Thursday night's gun battle between elements of the National Guard and his Presidential Palace Battalion as an “attempted coup” in comments to reporters on Saturday. Embaló had been out of the country attending the COP28 summit when the incident took place and said it had delayed his return to Bissau. National Guard commander Victor Tchongo is now in government custody, but Embaló appeared to suggest that there were other coup plotters behind Tchongo and said he would open an investigation into the incident on Monday. The National Guard is part of the Interior Ministry, which AFP says is “dominated” by the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAICG). That party, which won June's parliamentary election and now controls the government, is opposed to Embaló.BURKINA FASOThe military governments of Burkina Faso and Niger announced on Saturday that they are both withdrawing from the G5 Sahel regional counterinsurgency force. That group was formed in 2014 with the aim of pooling resources to battle the various jihadist groups that were threatening Sahelian governments. It began deploying joint forces a couple of years later, but as you might already have concluded it's had minimal impact on the region's jihadist crisis. Mali's ruling junta quit last year, so of the original five member states only Mauritania and Nigeria still remain.ETHIOPIAOfficials in Ethiopia's Oromian regional government have accused the rebel Oromo Liberation Army of killing at least 36 civilians in attacks on three villages that took place on November 24 and 27. The OLA apparently hasn't commented and there's no confirmation of the government claim, but the alleged attacks took place not long after another round of peace talks between the OLA and Ethiopian government broke down, so it's conceivable the group decided to lash out in that moment. The OLA was formed as the military wing of the Oromo Liberation Front in the 1970s but broke away from the group's political leadership when the latter reached a peace accord with the Ethiopian government in 2018. It frequently attacks non-Oromo communities in Oromia, though authorities have only said that the victims of these attacks were Orthodox Christians without reference to ethnicity.EUROPEUKRAINERussian military operations in eastern Ukraine may have hit a couple of speed bumps over the weekend. For one thing, reports that emerged on Friday suggesting that the Russians had seized the town of Maryinka, southwest of the city of Donetsk, appear to have been a bit premature. Ukrainian forces are reportedly still in control of some parts of the town, including a coking plant, though that may change in relatively short order of course. Elsewhere, the Ukrainian military claimed on Saturday that Russian attacks on the city of Avdiivka had completely ceased for a full day. That too could change in a hurry, and indeed may already have changed by the time you read this, but it suggests the Russians were at least regrouping after spending the previous several days in what seemed like intense fighting to try to take the city.The Ukrainian government says it's investigating a claim that Russian soldiers summarily executed two surrendering Ukrainian military personnel. Details are minimal but there's a video of this alleged incident circulating on social media. Needless to say, intentionally killing surrendering soldiers is a war crime.FRANCEA knife-wielding attacker killed one German tourist and wounded two other people near Paris's Eiffel Tower late Saturday. The attacker is a French national who was on a French government “watch list,” had apparently pledged allegiance to Islamic State, and was also “known for having psychiatric disorders” according to Reuters. He cited the conflict in Gaza, among other triggers, to police after his arrest.AMERICASBRAZILBrazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said on Sunday that he has no intention of bringing Brazil into full membership in the OPEC+ bloc and would stick to “observer” status only, one day after he somewhat incoherently told reporters that he wanted to join the group of major oil producing nations to try to encourage them to stop producing oil. OPEC+ extended a membership offer to Brazil on Thursday, which I gather has raised some eyebrows given Lula's stated commitment to combating climate change. Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, is continuing to pursue new oil exploration, also despite Lula's climate change position, though he says his aim is to invest oil profits in non-fossil fuel energy alternatives (and to encourage OPEC+ nations to do likewise). Oil remains the cause of, and solution to, all of humanity's problems.VENEZUELAVenezuelans, or at least the ones who participated, apparently voted overwhelmingly in Sunday's referendum to support their country's territorial claim on western Guyana's Essequibo region. Election officials said that the vote was 95 percent in favor for all of its five clauses—the most contentious of which was a question about whether or not to declare Essequibo a new Venezuelan state and extend citizenship to its residents—though there's not much insight as to turnout. There's no indication that the Venezuelan government is planning any imminent steps to try to actualize its claim on Essequibo but the referendum has nevertheless caused some consternation in Guyana and internationally.UNITED STATESFinally, HuffPost's Akbar Shahid Ahmed offers some welcome reassurance that the worst Middle East “expert” in Washington is still central to the Biden administration's regional policy:Four men in Washington shape America's policy in the Middle East. Three are obvious: President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan. The fourth is less well-known, despite his huge sway over the other three ― and despite his determination to keep championing policies that many see as fueling bloodshed in Gaza and beyond.His name is Brett McGurk. He's the White House coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, and he's one of the most powerful people in U.S. national security.McGurk crafts the options that Biden considers on issues from negotiations with Israel to weapon sales for Saudi Arabia. He controls whether global affairs experts within the government ― including more experienced staff at the Pentagon and the State Department ― can have any impact, and he decides which outside voices have access to White House decision-making conversations. His knack for increasing his influence is the envy of other Beltway operators. And he has a clear vision of how he thinks American interests should be advanced, regarding human rights concerns as secondary at best, according to current and former colleagues and close observers.Indeed, even though McGurk has spent nearly 20 years giving bad advice about the Middle East to a succession of US presidents—and even though his fixation on Saudi-Israeli normalization at Palestinian expense may have helped trigger the October 7 attacks—his influence today appears to be greater than it's ever been. I'm sure that makes all of us feel a little better.Thanks for reading! Foreign Exchanges is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.foreignexchanges.news/subscribe

This is the web version of Foreign Exchanges, but did you know you can get it delivered right to your inbox? Sign up today:Friends, for family reasons and also because of my own mental exhaustion I will be taking a longer than usual break from the newsletter for this year's Thanksgiving holiday. The newsletter will be going quiet following Thursday's roundup and will return to our regular schedule on Tuesday, November 28. As I've written before here I can always tell when it's time for me to take a bit of a break from the newsletter and the truth is we probably passed that point around three or four weeks ago so I'm running on fumes. Thanks for reading and for supporting this venture!TODAY IN HISTORYNovember 14, 1965: The Battle of Ia Drang, the first major engagement between the United States and the North Vietnamese Army, begins. It ended on November 18 with both sides claiming victory, though the NVA's ability to fight the much better armed US Army to a draw was a boost to their morale and probably the battle's most important effect.November 14, 2001: Fighters with the Northern Alliance rebel coalition enter and occupy the city of Kabul, marking the end of the US war in Afghanista—just kidding. I had you going there for a second, didn't I?INTERNATIONALWith deaths due to “extreme heat” projected to increase five-fold by 2050, according to The Lancet Countdown, you'll no doubt be pleasantly surprised to learn that an AP investigative report shows that the “green transition plans” being formulated by most major fossil fuel companies are not green, not transitional, and not even really plans. Without any serious government pressure to force them to invest in genuinely renewable technologies, these firms are able to do things like, say, classify natural gas development as a “green” investment. That's absurd, of course, but who's counting?The main problem with these plans has long been, and continues to be, the fact that fossil fuel companies exempt the products they sell when assessing their progress toward “net zero” carbon emissions. Firms only account for “Scope 1” emissions, which are their direct carbon outputs, and “Scope 2” emissions, the indirect output that results from their production process. The emissions that ensue when people burn the products they sell are considered “Scope 3” and energy firms disavow any responsibility for them. Like tobacco companies, they argue that what the customer does with their products is the customer's business, not theirs. Maybe people just want to buy a barrel of oil and place it in their foyer as a conversation piece or put it to some other use that doesn't emit carbon. Who's to say?MIDDLE EASTISRAEL-PALESTINEEarly Wednesday morning Israeli forces began what they called “a precise and targeted operation against Hamas in a specified area in the Shifa hospital” involving “medical teams and Arabic speakers, who have undergone specified training to prepare for this complex and sensitive environment, with the intent that no harm is caused to the civilians.” There are hundreds of patients and thousands of other people who have been trapped in the hospital by the IDF and the chances that “no harm” will come to any of them in the next several hours are probably slim. Israeli officials have been insisting that Hamas's lair is located underneath the hospital but at this point it's too soon to know if that's the target or if this is a more limited operation. This is a developing story so there's not much more I can say about it at this time.What I can say is that the Biden administration gave a green light to this operation earlier in the day, when White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that the administration has “independent intelligence” (which is code for “we didn't get this from the IDF”) that “Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad use some hospitals in the Gaza Strip — including Al-Shifa — and tunnels underneath them to conceal and to support their military operations and to hold hostages.” According to Kirby this intelligence shows that the militant groups have a “command and control” center in Shifa and “have stored weapons there.” Kirby insisted that that the administration was not endorsing an Israeli attack on the hospital, but anybody with ears to hear or eyes to read what he said should have no doubt as to what the intent was.I wrote everything below prior to news of the Israeli assault breaking so some of it might no longer be relevant but I think most of it still is:Gazan health authorities said on Tuesday that some 40 patients at Shifa—three of them babies—have died since that facility ran out of generator fuel on Saturday. Without electricity the hospital cannot maintain its incubator units and so there are now 36 newborns who are at critical risk. With the IDF surrounding the hospital it's also become impossible to transfer the dead to a cemetery, so personnel are planning to bury some 120 bodies in a mass grave on site. Gazan officials have proposed evacuating the facility under the auspices of the Red Cross/Red Crescent and sending its remaining patients to Egypt but there had been no movement on that front at time of writing. The Israeli government has apparently offered to send the hospitals more incubators, a fascinating attempt at a humanitarian gesture that would be completely pointless because the problem isn't the incubators, it's the electricity.In other news:* David Ignatius at The Washington Post reported (I use that term loosely) on Monday that “Israel and Hamas are close to a hostage deal.” With the caveat that if David Ignatius told me the sky was blue I'd glance out the window to double check, the terms he reported are that Hamas would release (or facilitate the release) of the women and children that it and other Gazan militant groups took hostage during their October 7 rampage through southern Israel. This would be done in stages and be matched by the release of Palestinian women and children being held by Israeli authorities. It would also involve a ceasefire of unspecified duration but “perhaps five days” according to Ignatius. The ceasefire could allow some time to address humanitarian issues in Gaza though I don't know what that would entail and whatever it was would almost certainly be inadequate.* Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen met with International Committee of the Red Cross President Mirjana Spoljaric Egger on Tuesday and later told reporters that the ICRC has had no access to the aforementioned hostages. It's highly unlikely that the Israelis would agree to anything involving hostages without at least proof of life, so this could be a big sticking point with respect to the potential prisoner deal outlined above. Families of the hostages, meanwhile, are marching from Tel Aviv to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem to pressure him to take some action to secure the hostages' release.* Israeli occupation forces killed at least eight Palestinians in the West Bank on Tuesday, seven of them in Tulkarm. The IDF carried out a drone strike in that city, an occurrence that's still relatively rare in the West Bank though it's certainly become more common over the past year and in particular the past month.* Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich issued a statement on Tuesday endorsing what he laughably termed the “voluntary emigration of Gaza Arabs to countries around the world.” I guess “leave or die” is a choice, right? A couple of Israeli politicians floated this idea on Monday in a Wall Street Journal editorial that was less a serious proposal than a written middle finger to Western critics of the Israeli military campaign. That piece didn't go into extensive detail about what a mass relocation would look like—again, it wasn't meant as a serious proposal—but Smotrich's intent is much easier to guess, and that's the permanent ethnic cleansing of Gaza and the relocation of its population as far away from Israel as possible. Smotrich, whose ministerial brief also includes running the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories office, isn't part of Netanyahu's “war cabinet” but that doesn't mean he's completely lacking in influence.* The US and UK governments on Tuesday announced new sanctions targeting Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad members along with a Lebanese entity that allegedly facilitates money transfers from Iran to Gazan militant groups. This is the third round of sanctions the Biden administration has imposed since October 7. Also on Tuesday, over 400 employees of the Biden administration sent a joint letter to their boss, Joe Biden, expressing opposition to the administration's approach to the Gaza conflict.YEMENHouthi rebels say they fired another barrage of missiles toward Israel on Tuesday. There's no confirmation of this, though the IDF did say that its air defenses downed a single missile near Eilat that we can probably assume was of Houthi provenance. The leader of Yemen's Houthi movement, Abdulmalik al-Houthi, delivered a speech on Tuesday pledging that his rebel fighters would continue attacking Israel. In particular, Houthi suggested that they could target Israeli commercial vessels in the Red Sea, which would certainly be an easier target for them than Israel itself.IRAQA Turkish drone strike killed two people, both allegedly members of the Sinjar Resistance Units militia, in northern Iraq's Nineveh province on Monday evening. The Sinjar militia was formed in 2014 with assistance from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and is still allied with that group, which makes its personnel potential targets for the Turkish military.Elsewhere, the Iraqi Federal Supreme Court removed two members of the Iraqi parliament on Tuesday, one of whom just happened to be speaker Mohammed al-Halbusi. It's not clear why, though another MP named Laith al-Dulaimi had reportedly sued Halbusi alleging that the speaker forged Dulaimi's name on a resignation letter. Dulaimi was, as it happens, the other MP who had his term ended by the court (I assume that's not a coincidence). The ruling created a potential political crisis for Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shiaʿ al-Sudani. As speaker, Halbusi was Iraq's leading Sunni Arab politician, and his support was important to Sudani's government. Three members of his Progress Party quit their cabinet posts after the court ruling and it remains to be seen how that will impact Sudani's position.ASIAAFGHANISTANAfghan Commerce Minister Haji Nooruddin Azizi apparently visited Pakistan this week, where—according to the Afghan government—he pressed Pakistani Foreign Minister Jalil Abbas Jilani on the issue of all those Afghan migrants the Pakistani government is presently deporting. Specifically it sounds like Azizi raised the issue of allowing deportees to at least take some of their money and/or possessions to Afghanistan with them. Deportees are currently arriving with nothing and are being housed in what are effectively refugee camps—leaving aside the incongruity of being a “refugee” in one's home country—on the Afghan side of the border.MYANMARReports on Monday only hinted at some new fighting in western Myanmar's Chin state, but as more details are emerging the situation there sounds pretty serious. According to the Chin National Front, rebel fighters had by the end of the day seized two Myanmar military outposts and were working to seize control of the Myanmar-Indian border. According to Indian media the fighting has sent some 2000 people streaming across that border to escape. In neighboring Rakhine state, the rebel Arakan Army has also been seizing military outposts and authorities have imposed a curfew in the state capital, Sittwe, as a result. Rebel factions across Myanmar have launched new offensives in recent weeks, starting with the “1027” (for October 27) operations by the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and the Ta'ang National Liberation Army in Shan state. Myanmar's ruling junta is clearly struggling to mount a response.CHINAJoe Biden told reporters on Tuesday that his main goal in meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in San Francisco this week is to restore “normal” communications between their governments. In particular this would involve a return to regular military-to-military contacts, something Beijing ended in the wake of former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan last year. Any prospect of resuming those contacts was complicated by the fact that former Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu was under US sanction. But as he's no longer defense minister that complication is no longer an issue.AFRICALIBERIALiberian voters turned out on Tuesday for the second round of that country's presidential election, pitting incumbent George Weah against Joseph Boakai. Both candidates finished with just under 44 percent of the vote in last month's first round. Such a close finish might augur poorly for the incumbent in a head to head matchup, though that's just one of many factors that could sway this vote in either direction. Polls have closed in that contest but I have yet to see anything by way of preliminary or partial results.MALIMali's ruling junta says its security forces have seized control over the northern town of Kidal after battling with rebels in that region for several days. The Malian military and mercenary auxiliaries marched on Kidal after United Nations peacekeepers vacated the region as part of their ongoing withdrawal from Mali. Kidal has been a rebel stronghold since the initial northern Mali uprising in 2012 and government control there has been nebulous at best since then. There's been no comment as far as I know from the rebels and it's unclear what their disposition is at this point.ETHIOPIAAccording to Addis Standard, Fano militia fighters attacked a predominantly Oromo community in Ethiopia's Amhara region last week, killing at least 25 people and displacing some 3000 into the Oromia region. The Fano militia is still battling the Ethiopian government but Amhara paramilitary groups have also made a pastime of preying on ethnic Oromo communities (likewise, Oromo militias have preyed on ethnic Amhara). In this case they apparently demanded grain from the community and attacked after residents refused to comply.On a more upbeat note, the US Agency for International Development is reportedly planning to resume food distribution across Ethiopia next month under a “one-year trial period.” The agency suspended its Ethiopian food program earlier this year amid allegations that the aid was being diverted. It resumed providing food aid to Ethiopian refugees last month and is now planning to spend the next year testing whether procedural changes adopted by aid groups and the Ethiopian government are enough to stop that alleged diversion. Solid data is hard to come by but it's possible that hundreds or thousands of Ethiopians have died because of the decision (which the UN World Food Program joined) to suspend food aid.DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGOThe death toll from Sunday's Allied Democratic Forces attack on a village in the eastern DRC's North Kivu province has risen to 33, according to provincial officials. ADF fighters are also believed to have been responsible for attacking a village in neighboring Ituri province on Tuesday, killing at least 11 people.EUROPERUSSIAVladimir Putin signed a new law on Tuesday that permits elections to be held even in parts of Russia that are under martial law. This apparently clears the way for the portions of Ukraine that Moscow claims to have annexed to participate in next year's presidential election. The effect will be to try to stitch those regions a little more tightly to Russia and complicate any possible return to Ukrainian authority.UKRAINEThe European Union promised back in March to supply the Ukrainian military with 1 million 155 mm artillery shells within 12 months. You'll never guess how that went. German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius told a meeting of EU defense ministers on Tuesday that the bloc isn't going to fulfill its commitment and even went so far as to criticize the fact that it was made in the first place. The will was apparently there, but EU member states still don't have the collective capacity to churn out that many shells that quickly. The effort has apparently sparked a boost in production capacity but not enough to meet the 12 month deadline.SWEDENSweden's NATO accession may be moving slightly forward, as the Turkish parliament's foreign affairs committee will take up the issue on Thursday. It's been about three weeks since Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan submitted Sweden's accession to parliament and it should be clear by now that the folks in Ankara are in no particular hurry to work their way through that process. There may be some impetus on the part of other NATO members to have the issue resolved in time for the alliance foreign ministers summit on November 28, but Erdoğan has proven himself to be fairly impervious to that sort of pressure in the past.AMERICASUNITED STATESFinally, TomDispatch's William Hartung wonders whether the “Arsenal of Democracy” really cares all that much about the “democracy” part:The list of major human rights abusers that receive U.S.-supplied weaponry is long and includes (but isn't faintly limited to) Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt, Turkey, Nigeria, and the Philippines. Such sales can have devastating human consequences. They also support regimes that all too often destabilize their regions and risk embroiling the United States directly in conflicts.U.S.-supplied arms also far too regularly fall into the hands of Washington's adversaries. As an example consider the way the UAE transferred small arms and armored vehicles produced by American weapons makers to extremist militias in Yemen, with no apparent consequences, even though such acts clearly violated American arms export laws. Sometimes, recipients of such weaponry even end up fighting each other, as when Turkey used U.S.-supplied F-16s in 2019 to bomb U.S.-backed Syrian forces involved in the fight against Islamic State terrorists.Such examples underscore the need to scrutinize U.S. arms exports far more carefully. Instead, the arms industry has promoted an increasingly “streamlined” process of approval of such weapons sales, campaigning for numerous measures that would make it even easier to arm foreign regimes regardless of their human-rights records or support for the interests Washington theoretically promotes. These have included an “Export Control Reform Initiative” heavily promoted by the industry during the Obama and Trump administrations that ended up ensuring a further relaxation of scrutiny over firearms exports. It has, in fact, eased the way for sales that, in the future, could put U.S.-produced weaponry in the hands of tyrants, terrorists, and criminal organizations.Now, the industry is promoting efforts to get weapons out the door ever more quickly through “reforms” to the Foreign Military Sales program in which the Pentagon essentially serves as an arms broker between those weapons corporations and foreign governments.Thanks for reading! 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"We obviously don't agree on everything." That understatement comes courtesy of the US secretary of state. Now that Antony Blinken's weekend shuttling from Jordan and the West Bank to Iraq and Turkey is over, we can ask: what was it all about? The trip that began with Blinken's fourth trip to Israel in as many weeks included a slow ratcheting up of Washington's calls for humanitarian pauses to spare civilian lives, but as Israeli troops surround Gaza City, protesters – like those outside Turkey's Incirlik NATO military base Sunday – clearly do not see results.What was the aim of Blinken's Turkey visit and why did the country's president make a point of travelling to the remote northeast of the country while the top US diplomat was in town?Not to be overlooked, Iraq's prime minister travelled to Tehran one day after Blinken paid a call on Mohammed Shia al-Sudani. With pro-Iran militias targeting US forces in Iraq and Syria, it's all a reminder that between Iran and its proxies on the one hand, and the US and Israel on the other, there is a wide range of stakeholders, all looking for a way to reverse a deadly spiral that risks drawing in the entire region.Produced by Alessandro Xenos, Rebecca Gnignati and Imen Mellaz.

Doug Wilson: Rated “R” Combat - Play 0:00-2:06 That was Pastor Doug Wilson at our most recent Fight Laugh Feast Conference on his talk, Rated “R” Combat. You guys know where you can find this talk right? That’s right, in our club portal! Our backstage content is for our Fight Laugh Feast Club members, so head on over to fightlaughfeast.com. Again, that’s fightlaughfeast.com… and your support means a lot to us. https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/26/politics/us-isis-leader-killed-somalia/index.html US military operation kills senior ISIS leader in Somalia CNN - A US military operation killed a senior ISIS leader and 10 members of the terror group in northern Somalia on Wednesday, two senior Biden administration officials said on Thursday. “From a mountainous cave complex in northern Somalia, Bilal al-Sudani is assessed to have supported ISIS’ expansion and activities across Africa and beyond the continent,” the first senior administration official said. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin confirmed that al-Sudani had been killed in a statement later on Thursday. “On January 25, on orders from the President, the U.S. military conducted an assault operation in northern Somalia that resulted in the death of a number of ISIS members, including Bilal-al-Sudani, an ISIS leader in Somalia and a key facilitator for ISIS’s global network. Al-Sudani was responsible for fostering the growing presence of ISIS in Africa and for funding the group’s operations worldwide, including in Afghanistan,” Austin said. “No civilians were harmed as a result of this operation. We are grateful to our extraordinary service members as well as our intelligence community and other interagency partners for their support to this successful counterterrorism operation,” Austin added. US forces, according to the official, were prepared to capture al-Sudani but the “hostile force’s response” ultimately resulted in his death. No US troops or civilians were killed, although one service member was injured during the operation after being bitten by an American military dog.The second official said that the US notified two counterterrorism partners, including the Somali government. It’s unusual for the US to carry out an operation against ISIS in Somalia, where military operations have typically focused on al-Shabaab fighters, the dominant terror group in Somalia. The strike comes after US forces killed two top ISIS leaders in an airstrike in Syria near the end of last year. The operation represents the continuation of the Biden administration’s strategy to counter terrorist threats through “over-the-horizon” operations like this, a shift in strategy the president made clear following the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Al-Sudani was sanctioned by the US treasury in 2012 for helping foreign fighters travel to an al-Shabaab training camp and facilitating financing, according to the first official. The operation, according to the first official, is expected to provide “valuable information” for the US intelligence community, although they declined to go into specifics. The operation was announced by US Africa Command (AFRICOM) on Thursday, which said only that the US military “conducted a successful counterterrorism operation in Somalia” and that “no civilians were injured or killed.” The second senior administration official said on Thursday that senior members of President Joe Biden’s national security team were first briefed on the intelligence that led to this operation a “number of months ago.” Biden authorized the operation earlier this week. The first official declined to provide details on the service members who were involved in the operation but emphasized their “exceptional preparation” for the mission. https://www.foxnews.com/media/biden-official-pushed-ban-gas-stoves-calls-anger-misdirected Biden official who pushed to ban gas stoves calls anger over it ‘misdirected’ U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr. pushed back against the firestorm his comments about banning gas stoves created, calling the anger "misdirected." "When you learn upsetting new information about something you’ve been around for a long time — maybe your whole life — you can never predict people’s reactions," he said. "And there is going to be justifiable anger, and sometimes it’s misdirected," he told The Washington Post. Trumka was appointed by President Biden in 2021 and is the son of labor union leader, Richard Trumka, the longtime president of AFL-CIO. The Biden official admitted to the paper that his work and experience as a father made him "paranoid" about every day hazards. "It’s very easy to see how everyday things can be hazardous," Trumka said to the outlet adding later, "I’m much more paranoid than the average person." But the Biden official hoped the national debate over gas stoves caused more people to be aware of how their indoor appliances could be causing health risks due to pollution. The Post noted that the Consumer Product Safety Commission is in "the very early stages" of determining regulations on new gas stoves, after "years of research" has found they emit nitrogen dioxide. But when asked by Fox News Digital, the government agency could not provide any specific studies that backed up these claims to justify a ban on these products. Bans against stoves have started at the local and state level. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul proposed abolishing the sale of gas-powered appliances and banning their installation in new buildings by 2025. Democrats and far-left environmental groups are pushing to regulate several other household appliances, from water heaters to furnaces, to washing machines to microwaves and shower heads in their quest to get Americans away from fossil fuels. "We’re actually going to do 100 rules this year alone on appliances," former top White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy said during a speech last May. "We are developing partnerships on how we work together for new building standards." But when news broke earlier this month that the Biden administration was considering a ban on gas stoves, it created a backlash from the public, restaurant owners and Republicans who slammed the move as an example of government overreach. https://thepostmillennial.com/katie-hobbs-to-bus-illegal-immigrants-out-of-arizona-wont-say-where-they-are-going?utm_campaign=64487 Katie Hobbs to bus illegal immigrants out of Arizona, won't say where they are going Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs is continuing her Republican predecessor Doug Ducey’s program to bus illegal migrants out of the state, but in a way that she says will be more "efficient and humane." Hobbs told The Arizona Republic on Tuesday that her administration would focus on ensuring that the program and associated costs were "efficient and humane." Ducey began busing the illegal migrants out of the state in May, and Hobbs has expanded the program to include an option of chartered air travel, according to an updated contract signed on January 14. Over 3,000 people were bused from the Yuma area to Washington DC during Ducey’s time in office, costing the state over $7 million. Last year, Republican lawmakers had earmarked $15 million for the program. Earlier this week, a Yuma official warned that the city is on the brink of collapse due to being overwhelmed by illegal migrants thanks to the Biden administration's failed immigration policies. The border has seen a historic crisis under President Joe Biden's presidency. Illegal border crossings in December reached their highest level of the Biden administration, topping 250,000 in the final month of 2022 continuing the pattern of breaking records every month. Hobbs told reporters last week regarding the bussing: "We need to look at that practice and make sure it’s effective, [that] it’s something that supports local communities. If we’re spending the money to bus people, why not just get them to their final destination?" Hobbs told The Arizona Republic that her actions would be different than the methods of Republican governors Greg Abbott, of Texas, and Ron DeSantis, of Florida, who both have transported migrants to Democratic-run cities to showcase the failure of Biden’s border policies. An updated contract removed the requirement that buses with illegal immigrants must be sent to Washington, DC. Last year, Washington, DC's Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser declared a public emergency related to the migrants being bussed to the US capital. Democratic New York Mayor Eric Adams declared that there is no more room for illegal immigrants in the city despite its status as a "sanctuary city" for migrants, and called on the federal government to solve the crisis. Hobbs added, "We're interested in focusing on the humanitarian aspects of this and just putting people on a bus as a political stunt and sending them to Martha's Vineyard or wherever they went is not providing any help or any solution to the actual issue." https://www.dailyfetched.com/cnns-primetime-viewership-plummets-to-just-444000-as-don-lemon-hits-record-low/ CNN’s Primetime Viewership Plummets to Just 444,000 as Don Lemon Hits Record Low And no, it wasn’t a slow new week. Between the classified documents scandal, Ukraine, and the roil over House committee seats, CNN had plenty to report on, or should we say ‘spin.’ Meanwhile, Fox News raked in an n average of 1.996 million primetime viewers during that week, five times more than CNN. MSNBC faired better than CNN, attracting nearly a million with 943,000 average primetime viewers. CNN barely cracked 400,000 with just 417,000 in total day viewers. Fox News more than tripled that with 1.387 million. MSNBC did better but still only averaged 629,000 total viewers throughout the day. In the 25-54 age demographic that sets advertiser rates, Fox News averaged 256,000 demo viewers, MSNBC averaged just 91,000, and CNN did just 93,000. Fox News averaged 176,000 demo viewers throughout the day and came in a distant second with 80,000, and MSNBC came in last with 69,000. For cable news, which set a baseline for success for 100,000 demo viewers, CNN and MSNBC are failing miserably. In all of cable, Fox News came in second behind ESPN in total primetime viewers, MSNBC third, and CNN eighteenth. Newly-installed Chris Licht was supposed to turn CNN back into a network viewers wanted to watch, but it doesn’t look like it’s working. In other words, CNN sucks. As previously reported, Lemon was demoted from his primetime show to save CNN’s failed morning show. With Lemon on board, New Day became CNN This Morning, and that became a catastrophe that averaged only 331,000 viewers. During that time, Fox News attracted 1.3 million and 180,000 demo viewers. Don Lemon sunk to only 65,000 demo viewers. CNN has been a national joke for quite a while, but now it’s official. https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/rick-moran/2023/01/26/biden-makes-first-move-toward-a-radical-national-rent-control-law-n1665210 Biden Makes First Move Toward a Radical National Rent Control Law Responding to a letter sent earlier this month by congressional radicals like Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez urging the president to take executive action to prevent evictions and lower rent prices, Joe Biden has initiated a series of actions that will eventually lead to a national rent control law. Since the beginning of the republic, laws governing rent and leases have been local matters. If a landlord is cheating renters, local and state governments have the authority and the tools to punish the landlord. And being much closer to the problems of renters and landlords than anyone in Washington, local and state governments have a much better handle on the local rental housing situation. But now, the federal government doesn’t believe that landlords should be compensated for owning rental property. They’re “gouging” renters. This is after more than two years of preventing landlords from evicting renters for non-payment of rent. And in a period of rapidly rising inflation, landlords are being accused of “profiteering” at the expense of renters. It’s a ridiculous charge given that 98 percent of all rental property owners, or 80 percent of all rental properties, are owned by small business entrepreneurs who own five units or fewer, according to a study in Business Wire. These rules, and any legislation supported by AOC, would destroy the rental housing market and make it much harder to find affordable housing. What small business owner wants to be beholden to Washington for their business? Rental housing will disappear — perhaps the intended purpose of the new rules. The narrative of corporate greed being responsible for rent increases is a far easier sell than small businesses struggling to keep their properties during an inflationary economy that Warren, AOC, and Biden are mostly responsible for. https://www.boundingintosports.com/2023/01/aaron-rodgers-blasts-woke-culture-and-torches-sports-media-for-being-sponsored-by-pfizer/ Aaron Rodgers Blasts “Woke Culture” And Torches Sports Media For Being Sponsored By Pfizer Rodgers comments on woke culture came after he was questioned about a number of sports media outlets claiming he will be traded in the offseason and that he is only playing in the NFL to just win another MVP. Aaron Rodgers Responds To Sports Media Who Criticised Him "Wanting Another MVP" | Pat McAfee Show Play 0:00-3:20

The US military says its special forces have killed senior Islamic State group commander Bilal al-Sudani and 10 associates in a raid in Somalia. The Biden administration has redeployed hundreds of US troops to Somalia, after his predecessor Donald Trump pulled them out. IS is a relatively small group in Somalia, with the al-Qaeda linked al-Shabab far more prominent. Plus, M23 rebels say they've taken over the key strategic town of Kitshanga in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, after three days of intense clashes. And there's concern for the fate of animals at a farm popular with tourists in The Gambia, after its owner was detained over allegedly planning a coup.