there's this comment on hexbear where this person said they will vote for biden because "it's funny", and that comment has been living rent-free in my head ever since i saw it

Sebastián Piñera, former president of Chile, dies in helicopter crash, says newspaper

The accident happened in Lago Ranco, in central Chile. Chile's former president Sebastián Piñera, 74, died in a helicopter crash in the country on Tuesday (6), according to the newspaper "La Tercera".

According to the newspaper's website, government sources said that four people were on the helicopter, and three were found by emergency teams. When rescuers arrived, the aircraft was already submerged.

The information was also published by Spain's "ABC" and Argentina's "Clarín" newspapers. The accident happened in Lago Ranco, in central Chile.

What happens if Hamas were to surrender?

I remember reading on Electronic Intifada recently that the Israelis had development plans for northern Gaza. Will they push the Palestinians further south or into the Sinai?

It seems their current plan is to starve out the Palestinians in Gaza to force them to leave to Egypt, Turkey, and Jordan. Is that what Israel's plan is? Is that what that recent rally in Jerusalem was about?

continues to deliberately target journalists homes and their families.

https://aje.io/sffhkg?update=2683816

https://www.instagram.com/hassanasalih/reel/C3AipU9tzpy/

Israeli shelling causes multiday fire in Khan Younis residential building

Palestinian journalist Hassan Islah has shared video on his Instagram account showing a residential building in the city’s Al-Amal neighbourhood on fire and still full of people.

Islah said Israeli forces targeted the building, where the families of two of his journalist colleagues live, with several artillery shells on Monday, causing a section to catch on fire. It continues to burn.

Al Jazeera’s fact-checking unit has verified this video.

The Israeli occupation army has shot several artillery shells at the building of the family of two journalist colleagues: Sami Abu Gholwa and Yaqoub Abu Gholwa, and the fires are still burning since yesterday near one of the evacuation centres in al-Amal neighbourhood in Khan Younis.

be farmer

be fertilizing the garden

why eu mad at me, we are no jungle

(they are still preparing paris' soil for olympic harvest)

Defense Sec. Austin hospitalized again. Now with bladder "issue".

Hope it hurts.

Bukele Proclaims Himself Re-Elected as Salvadoran President

Although the Supreme Electoral Tribunal has not yet provided official data, he claimed to have won with over 85 percent of the votes.

On Sunday night, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele declared himself the winner of the elections with over 85 percent of the votes.

Thousands of citizens gathered in front of the National Palace with the New Ideas Party's flags and shirts to celebrate the start of the new 5-year presidential term.

"Thank you, El Salvador. Today, El Salvador has broken all records of any democracy in the world's history," Bukele said at the beginning of his victory speech, while his supporters chanted his name and blew trumpets.

Although the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) has not yet provided official data, he claimed to have won with over 85 percent of the votes. The New Ideas leader also stated that his party secured at least 58 legislators.

58 out of 60?

"Bukele, the evangelical dictator and human rights violator, clings to power in El Salvador for 5 more years. But we leave the sanctions of the European Union and the United States for Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, since perhaps 'he is a son of a bitch, but he is our son of a bitch',"

This situation turns El Salvador into a "single-party country in a democratic system," with a "shattered" opposition, Bukele said, pointing out that El Salvador went from being the world's most insecure country in 2015 to the safest nation in the Western Hemisphere in 2024.

"For this reason, the people spoke in the most decisive way at the polls," the Salvadoran president said, criticizing journalists, NGOs, and international institutions.

Critics of the Bukele regime, however, pointed out that his reelection happened by undermining the rule of law, as the Constitution prohibits two consecutive terms to prevent any president from disrupting democratic alternation. "The coolest dictator in the whole world," as Bukele defined himself, disagrees.

Over the past two years, he has governed by imposing a state of exception, allowing him to reduce the homicide rate to 2.4 people per 100,000 inhabitants. More than 75,000 people were detained under this regime for their alleged links to gangs and organized crime.

Human rights defenders denounced that thousands of them were innocent and arrested to meet certain detainee quotas, allowing the Bukele regime to showcase efficiency in its fight against insecurity.

"Human rights violations have been constant during the Bukele administration. We can only expect it to continue growing because everything indicates that he will continue with these public policies. The dictatorship is going to be fully legalized," explained Rina Montti, from the humanitarian organization Cristosal.

Zionist speaking heads praising Israel for bombing Rafah massacring civilians, many of them children, as a mere diversion to get two hostages back. This is being framed as a righteous act.

CW giant ass crater is all that's left.

One Palestinian was martyred, and others are wounded, after the IOF bombed them while they were collecting firewood from agricultural land in Rafah near the Palestinian-Egyptian border.

Due to displacement, over 1.4 million Palestinians, 60% of the Gaza Strip's population, are currently in Rafah.

Interesting take about Andropov:

Today is 40 years since the death of Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov. The General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR was seriously ill for a long time and died in the ward of the Central Clinical Hospital on February 9, 1984. He was only 69.

Andropov remained at the top of power for just over a year, and in people’s memory he remained, rather, as the chairman of the KGB, the chief security officer, under whom the police detained people for absenteeism at work. Police violence in bathhouses, and cinemas, in pubs, in parks, and on the streets (“Why aren’t you at work?”) was the last and unsuccessful attempt to discipline the Soviet system.

But Andropov was not only a security officer. He was both a liberal and a marketist. Of course, he kept these beliefs secret, but History has received a lot of evidence of his true credo. Probably, Andropov was the founder of the phenomenon that became famous in the 2000s - liberal-chekism. He wanted to be friends with the West, not to be at enmity. He wanted to reformat the Union. For example, abolish national regions and replace them with states. Assistant Secretary General for Economics Arkady Ivanovich Volsky spoke about this. Almost all of Andropov's reforms remained unimplemented. Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin tried to implement some of his ideas, including the abolition of national regions of the Russian Federation. In general, the current president has a lot in common with Andropov. But this is a separate topic.

In light of current events, we can recall that Andropov became the head of the country by chance. Brezhnev's successor was to be the then leader of Ukraine, Vladimir Vasilyevich Shcherbitsky. In 1982, the Kiev elite had already moved to Moscow. For example, the Ukrainian security officer Vitaly Fedorchuk became the head of the KGB of the USSR. But Brezhnev died suddenly, and Andropov seized power. Not for long. After 15 months, Yuri Vladimirovich himself passed away.

I need to learn more about this part of the Soviet history. It seems that the earliest generation of liberal reformist gang (Chubais/Gaidar/Aven/Berezovsky) was formed under the auspices of Andropov as the chief of the KGB, and through the establishment of institutions like the Institute for Systems Analysis (VNIISI) and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), served as breeding grounds for neoliberal reformers in the Soviet Union that immediately preceded Gorbachev’s liberalization.