tom westland

The reverse is also true. Literary intellectualism is lousy with beautiful writers who don’t really understand the issues they’re writing about

this reminds me

Seven Palestinians die of starvation in Gaza as Israel kills 38 aid seekers A 17-year-old was among seven people who starved to death in Gaza as Israeli forces shot dead dozens more aid seekers.

A 17-year-old was among seven people who starved to death in Gaza as Israeli forces shot dead dozens more aid seekers.

ISRAEL DETAINED AND then deported an American nurse who tried to save the life of Awdah Hathaleen, a Palestinian activist who worked on the Oscar-winning documentary film “No Other Land.” After Israeli settler Yinon Levi allegedly shot and killed Hathaleen on Monday in Umm al-Khair, a village in the occupied West Bank, the critical care nurse gave Hathaleen four rounds of CPR. She cradled his head in her hands, checking his pulse and whispering “You’re OK,” as he bled out, the nurse told The Intercept. The medical worker asked not to be named because they fear for their safety. Hathaleen was then taken away in an ambulance, where he died before reaching the hospital.

Israel just detained and then deported an American nurse for trying to save a Palestinian life.

theintercept.com/2025/08/01/a...

Qui sont les « familles fondatrices » de Bamako au Mali ? - Afrique, mémoires d'un continent La mémoire du continent vous emmène à Bamako, la capitale malienne. La tradition orale et de nombreux écrits anciens attribuent la fondation de cette cité, ville-carrefour, à trois familles : les Niaré,…

@bokarsangare.bsky.social has published a book on Bamako's founding families a while ago. He made a podcast about it a couple of days ago

thinking about the kakapo cum drones

High tariffs on tropical commodity exporters and the president firing the head of a statistical agency for reporting unfavourable numbers: the US is now a banana republic without any bananas

Never knew I was supposed to need the advocacy of a political party to get laid but I guess I’m just built different

Come for the extremely good analysis of the vibes of the present, stay for the appendix where Liam,
freed from the strictures of Woke, reveals the one true ranking of the races.

In particular, we document a historical reversal: maize used to be relatively cheap by world standards in East Africa, and is now relatively expensive. We argue that the underlying political economy of urbanising agrarian economies combined with major commodity price shocks, explains this reversal.

New working paper from me & some colleagues on East Africa's maize markets from c. 1900 to today, based on a major data collection effort to fill in the long-run history of food prices in one of the world's poorest regions: www.aehnetwork.org/working-pape...

Trump is basically drunk driving through the whole global economy.

Sudan gripped by deadly crisis as hunger, disease and heat intensify The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) raised the alarm on Wednesday over the rising toll of hunger, disease and displacement in various conflict-ridden parts of Sudan.

Starvation is also being used as a weapon of war in Sudan. Famine and death is on the rise and largely absent from the media.

news.un.org/en/story/202...

Not sure if folks are at the NBER SI tomorrow, but if so, I'm presenting a brand new paper with a super sharp Ph.D. coauthor tomorrow in the Forecasting and Empirical Methods session at 10:30!

Welcome feedback!!

conference.nber.org/conf_papers/...

every research is painstaking research if you don't want to be doing it

whats the deal with these guys why are they doing this. is nothing else happening in england right now

Is the opening chapter of Zola’s La curée the first literary depiction of a traffic jam

95% of Australian conservatives are permanently trying and failing to get a Monday morning filler slot at CPAC

'A Cruel and Transparent Farce': Israeli Attacks Kill 62 in Gaza Amid 'Tactical Pause' | Common Dreams ​"There is nothing humane or tactical about letting a trickle of aid in after a man-made famine has started while continuing to bomb starving men, women, and children, even in so-called safe zones," o...

'A Cruel and Transparent Farce': Israeli Attacks Kill 62 in Gaza Amid 'Tactical Pause' www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-pa...

"It is in one's best interest to believe in Galactus, even if one is not entirely convinced of Galactus's existence."
-- Pedro Pascal's Wager

‘On the days he and his brother cannot find food, the children eat a tablespoon of salt and fill their bellies with water.’

When you read 1984 it feels incredibly on the nose and heavy handed, but watching the Trump cult do this for Maxwell does actually feel like the scene where a chap has to declare mid-speech that an agent of Goldstein has swapped out all the posters cos we've actually always been at war with Eurasia!

Elsewhere in the interview, Dr Maynard claimed Israeli soldiers are shooting civilians at aid points "almost like a game of target practice". The IDF said it "categorically rejected" claims of "intentional harm to civilians, particularly in the manner described". Dr Maynard claimed he has operated on boys as young as 11 who had been "shot at food distribution points" run by the US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. "They had gone to get food for their starving families and they were shot," he said. "I operated on one 12-year-old boy who died on the operating table because his injuries were so severe."

A British surgeon returned from Gaza says Israeli soldiers were shooting at aid-seekers “almost like a game of target practice".

He also said formula doctors had packed to bring with them was the only item confiscated by Israeli authorities before entry.

Formula.

news.sky.com/story/almost...

Rising number of doctors among hundreds of medical staff detained in Gaza, say rights groups Detention of Dr Marwan al-Hams by Israeli undercover unit on Monday takes number of doctors being held to 28, says Healthcare Workers Watch

"Twenty-eight doctors from Gaza are being held inside Israeli prisons, eight of whom are senior consultants in surgery, orthopaedics, intensive care, cardiology and paediatrics"

Israel starves children while kidnapping doctors www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Kinda struggling with words. How can a human being justify a policy of mass murder and mass starvation in Gaza? This is unbearable.

ALEX DE WAAL: So, let me say that I've been working on this field of famine, food crisis and humanitarian action for more than 40 years, and there is no case, over those four decades, of such minutely engineered, closely monitored, precisely designed mass starvation of a population as is happening in Gaza today.

Few if any experts know more about the deliberate use of starvation as a war crime than Alex de Waal. If he says it's happening, it's so.

It is very late to get off the bus supporting this war effort, but it is not too late. Have a think; are you really going to be the last person you know making excuses, as the situation gets worse and worse? If not, why not get ahead of the curve and stop now?

WHO says residence and main warehouse in Gaza hit by Israeli forces Staff quarters attacked three times and four people detained, three temporarily, as IDF tanks enter Deir al-Balah

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said the Israeli military attacked its staff residence and main warehouse in Deir al-Balah on Monday, compromising its operations in Gaza

Israel pounds Gaza as Palestinians mourn 92 people killed at aid sites Killings come as UN warns that the hunger crisis in Gaza has reached ‘a new level of desperation’.

Killings come as UN warns that the hunger crisis in Gaza has reached ‘a new level of desperation’.

Map of countries where the DHS was the only source of maternal mortality data

In February, the US gov shut down the Demographic & Health Surveys.

It was the only data source on maternal & child health, births, household structure in many countries – making it crucial for research.

In a new article I explain why it should be rescued.
ourworldindata.org/demographic-...