Pól Ó Gráda

San aibítir arabach!

Very interesting! That's the first time I've heard of tontines apart from in relation to my grandfather who apparently attended regular meetings of the tontine society he was a member of in the Dublin suburbs (and as the article suggests it was essentially a burial insurance club in his case).

خا مبيو شانس اگ نا باطيو ضا شكريفمش سن ابتر عربه!

Pakistan, Sudan, Bangladesh Today's three stories you should know

Today in Proximities:

- UN says over 6,000 slaughtered in three days by RSF in Sudan
- Pakistan's jailed Imran Khan has "lost 85% of sight in one eye"
- Tarique Rahman to be new Bangladesh prime minister

As always, you can read it in under two mins.

www.proximities.news/p/pakistan-s...

There were certainly some fancy looking bottles in Athens airport duty free last week, though not at Midleton prices. And for the Syrian/Lebanese equivalent (araq) it's certainly available at a wide range of price points

Raqqah Dispatch Notes and photographs from a recent trip to the city

I visited Raqqah for four days last week... wrote up some notes on the current situation, DAANES rule, events of Jan 17/18, the new administration, and more...

akmckeever.substack.com/p/raqqah-dis...

Israel used weapons in Gaza that made thousands of Palestinians evaporate US-made thermal weapons burning at 3,500C caused 2,842 people to "evaporate" in Gaza, Al Jazeera investigation finds.

“US-supplied thermal and thermobaric munitions burning at 3,500C/6332F have left no trace of nearly 3,000 Palestinians.”

www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

Donate to Support for Washington Post international employees, organized by Michelle Lee Among the hundreds of journalists laid off by The Washington Post on … Michelle Lee needs your support for Support for Washington Post international employees

Former Washington Post journalists have launched a GoFundMe to help repatriate fired staff members who are effectively stranded in foreign countries.

One of the richest men in the world fired them from the paper and didn’t even pay to ensure they got home.

Abolish the billionaire class:

Traidisiún atá ann lampaí ildaite a lasadh um Ramadán ach níl fhios agam an bhfuil aon scéal taobh thiar de.

Stainníní ar mhargadh El Sayyida Zeinab i gCaireo agus na mílte lampaí ildaite ar díol acu roimh thús mhí Ramadán

Tá Ramadán ar na bacáin agus má tá lampa Ramadán uait níl áit ar bith níos fearr lena cheannach ná margadh El Sayyida Zeinab

Pendant qu'on scrute le coup de grâce mis au Washington Post, ici en France l'AFP s'apprête à diviser par trois le nombre de postes expatriés de sa rédaction. Comprendre : supprimer les correspondances locales, mettre sur le carreau les journalistes qui connaissent leurs terrains respectifs.

Fire all the good journalists, double down on the dumbest take havers. Can’t go wrong.

Pinned lizzie johnson @lizziejohnsonnn · Aug 19, 2021 Almost three years ago, my editor called me early one November morning. A wildfire had sparked near a town called Paradise, he said. Could I go? (1/13) 0:02 / 0:10 lizzie johnson @lizziejohnsonnn · 47m I was just laid off by The Washington Post in the middle of a warzone. I have no words. I'm devastated. Quote lizzie johnson @lizziejohnsonnn · Jan 25 Waking up without power, heat, or running water. (Again.) But the work here in Kyiv continues. Warming up in the car, writing in pencil — pen ink freezes — by headlamp.

A publisher who lays off a reporter whose pen is freezing because she's covering a frigid war zone while dodging missiles is not an editor you want to work for, in a more perfect world

Tá súil agam gur 'páistín' a bhí i gceist. Mo thrua an té a bheadh ag foghlaim na Gaeilge ar líne...

Sin an straitéis neamhfhógartha le blianta feasta, is dócha.

Another day in the archive, reading the diaries of a 19th-century doctor at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London. This Irish migrant's story was, I thought, heartbreaking:

May 30 1877,

"Yesterday I was called into a ward to interpret for an old man who had been knocked down by an omnibus. ...

1/2

The main thing Elon Musk took from us when he bought Twitter was destroying the only customer service platform that corporations will actually answer you on

How Syria's Sharaa captured Kurdish-held areas while keeping the US onside The Syrian government's rapid takeover of territory long held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces took shape in a string of high-stakes meetings in Damascus, Paris and Iraq earlier this month,...

How al-Sharaa captured SDF areas while keeping the US onside

@reuters.com account of the Syrian government’s diplomatic groundwork for expanding control in northeast Syria.
www.reuters.com/world/middle...

One key point I took from Monroe’s book is that outcomes that look like policy failure might not actually be failures if real goal isn’t the stated goal: reforms crafted to ensure regime survival succeed if regime survives regardless of economic indicators - cf my book with @stevenhyde.bsky.social

Ní chuirfeadh sé iontas ar bith orm dá mbeadh baint ag an aighneas Sádach-Imearátach le géilleadh tobann na bhfórsaí Cúirdíneacha sa tSír

SDF is in the process of losing all of Deir ez-Zour, seemingly withdrawing from large portions (if not all) of the river bank in the face of large tribal insurgency, with reports now of the Syrian army crossing the river to fill the vacuum. reported number of key mil/pol defections in DeZ and Raqqa

Tweet exchange in which a photo of Anne Hathaway is posted by @TheRoyalSerf, to which user @VvSchweetz24 replies "@grok...do your thing. @Grok replies: Anne Hathaway isn't Jewish; she was raised Catholic but left the church. She married Adam Shulman (who is Jewish) in 2012 and celebrates Jewish holidays with their kids. SHe's played Jewish roles, like in "Armageddon Time."

pretty sure he meant the other thing, grok, but very cool that those are your two things

wikipedia turns 25 today! the last unenshittified major website! backbone of online info! triumph of humanity! powered by urge of unpaid randos to correct each other! somehow mostly reliable! "good thing wikipedia works in practice, because it sure doesn't work in theory" - old wiki adage

What I want to know is when this alarming situation came to an end.

How the UAE’s Decade-Long Project in Yemen Ended in 48 Hours Saudi Arabia has swiftly consolidated power in southern Yemen over the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council.

Adding to that list with an update covering recent days

www.dropsitenews.com/p/yemen-uae-...

The political leadership of the UAE-backed STC has announced the dissolution of itself. In a statement they distanced themselves from recent STC military actions.
The organisation and its military force, which held the greatest amount of Yemen's territory two weeks ago, now no longer exists.

Blianta ó shin ag teacht amach ó chuan Ros a Mhíl d'fhiafraigh mé den bhean óg a bhí ag stiúradh an tráchta 'is this the way to Indreabhán' agus dúirt sise 'Do you mean Inverin?'

I know there’s a lot going on in the world right now. But this spectacular fallout between Saudi and UAE is going to reshape the region and impact events beyond.
It’s hard to overstate the Saudi anger at the UAE that’s expressed by revealing step-by-step details + officer names in the UAE operation

This is a humiliating blow for the STC. But, this is inevitable when you’re a proxy force and your one and only backer leaves you high and dry.

It’s also a clear illustration of the stark contrast with the Houthis and how they are not a proxy of Iran.

🇩🇿 vs 🇪🇬 has got to be one of the most inexplicably brutal. Saw a doctor who had a surgery near Mountjoy Sq a good few years ago and he was telling me how his Algerian and Egyptian patients would be glaring at each other in the waiting room.