Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Ilya Maximov
[Regnum] The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has confirmed that the El Niño current has officially entered the "very strong" category, which unofficially qualifies it as a "super" current.
This refers to a natural climate cycle that occurs every three to eight years and typically lasts nine to 12 months. It begins when the trade winds, the constant year-round winds that typically blow in tropical latitudes from the subtropics toward the equator, weaken, and the warm water that normally accumulates off the coast of Southeast Asia begins to shift eastward toward South America.
This changes the atmospheric circulation for thousands of kilometers around: where it usually rains, drought sets in, and where it is usually dry, downpours begin.
The key RONI index, which measures sea surface temperature deviations in the central Pacific Ocean from normal, reached +2.0°C. This is the highest category established by forecasters. From this point on, the event ceased to be simply a climate phenomenon and became one of the main factors determining weather in many regions of our planet until at least the beginning of 2027.
For the first time in its history, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has issued a forecast that leaves no room for interpretation: the probability that El Niño will persist until February 2027 is estimated at almost 100%.
The peak of the phenomenon is expected in late 2026, according to a joint report by the United Nations and WMO.
"El Niño is growing before our eyes," said UN Secretary-General António Guterres. " The science leaves no doubt: the planet is in uncharted waters, and these waters are warming."
WMO chief Celeste Saulo added: "El Niño means 'little boy' in Spanish, but it has the potential to deal a huge blow to communities and economies around the world."
The strength of an event is measured by several indices, and when sea surface temperatures exceed normal by more than two degrees Celsius for an extended period of time, typically more than three months, the event is classified as "very strong."
The current El Niño began in June 2026 and has been strengthening at a remarkable rate since then. From May to July, the average weekly deviation from normal in the Niño 3.4 zone, which is considered indicative and used by scientists as a "thermometer" to track the anomaly, was around +1.5°C. In July, it reached +2.0°C, and by mid-August, +2.6°C.
Now, the average temperature for several months has already exceeded +2.0 °C, and this ordinary phenomenon has rightfully received the prefix “super”.
Even more alarming is that in some areas, deep-sea temperatures exceeded normal by more than eight degrees Celsius. This means El Niño has significant fuel reserves and is not stopping there.
Forecasts indicate that by November the deviation could reach four degrees – a level that, according to paleoclimate research, has not been seen for at least a thousand years, American climate scientist Zeke Hausfather told The Guardian.
"What we see in 2027 will be a foretaste of what the 'new normal' will be in 2035. We will witness phenomena never seen before in our history – such as temperature records, droughts, and extreme heat," he also told The New York Times.
For comparison, the 1982–1983 El Niño, once considered the strongest, showed a deviation of about +2.5°C. The 1997–1998 event showed a deviation of +2.4°C, and the 2015–2016 event showed a deviation of approximately +3.0°C. The current event is already exceeding the values of most of its predecessors, and its peak is still ahead.
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates that there is a 75% chance that this event will be the strongest since 1950.
The WMO, in turn, emphasizes that this is the first time an event of this magnitude has been measured using the RONI index, which subtracts background ocean warming caused by climate change. In other words, even after adjusting for global warming, the scale of the event remains exceptional.
"If this trajectory continues, it could be stronger than anything we've seen since we began monitoring it. That is, literally off the charts," Celeste Saulo said at a press conference in Geneva.
Professor Adam Scaife, head of long-range forecasting at the Met Office, told Sky News he had never seen such an intense El Niño in his forecasts and warned that if the predictions are correct, 2026 will surpass anything the world has experienced in decades.
"This affects us all, regardless of whether you live in a rich region of the planet in a very modern megacity or in a poor country in the countryside," says Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
The consequences are already being felt around the world. Massive forest fires that began in the summer are raging in Indonesia. In India, the monsoon was the weakest in twenty years, with precipitation from early June to early September 15% below normal.
The picture is different in South America, where El Niño is bringing heavy rainfall. Flooding is expected in Peru and Ecuador, and in Central America, in the so-called "dry corridor," widespread crop failures are already being reported.
In East Africa, the likelihood of wetter-than-normal conditions in southern Ethiopia, central and southern Somalia, and northeastern Kenya is estimated at 90%—these rains account for up to 70% of annual precipitation, making the risk of flooding particularly high there.
In South Africa, by contrast, a drought is expected that could leave more than twenty million people at risk of acute hunger.
Scientists are particularly concerned about the Amazon. A super El Niño is predicted to cause a drought there that could be the most devastating on record.
In North America, California is bracing for potential flooding and massive rainfall. Some experts are warning of a megastorm scenario, with damages reaching nearly a trillion dollars.
In the northern United States and Canada, winter is expected to be warmer and less snowy.
However, the phenomenon has virtually no impact on the weather in Russia, as its center is located very far away. Russian climatologists and meteorologists believe that if the current situation does have any impact on our country, it will be very indirect and likely not widespread.
Meanwhile, the economic consequences of this phenomenon are felt no less acutely than the weather effects in many parts of the world. Four crops—wheat, rice, corn, and soybeans—provide more than 60% of the world's calorie intake, and all are sensitive to El Niño.
Drought in Australia, India, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Brazil is reducing rice and corn harvests, while heat waves in Canada and China are affecting wheat. Given that the food market is already experiencing a grain shortage due to the summer drought in Europe, the blockade of Ukrainian seaports, and the situation in the Strait of Hormuz, mass famine in some regions of the world is practically inevitable.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) warns that an additional 49 to 50 million people could face acute hunger by the end of 2027, with the total number of hungry people rising from 225 to 274 million.
"El Niño is a huge threat to food security for millions of people who are already vulnerable," Carl Skau, acting executive director of the WFP, told Al Jazeera.
The drought is also affecting the energy sector. In Colombia, where approximately 65% of electricity is generated by hydroelectric power plants, declining water levels have already led to higher prices and the threat of power outages.
The phenomenon also halts the rise of cold waters off the coast of Peru, depriving plankton of nutrients and forcing fish stocks to migrate. This impacts fisheries from California to Chile and from Papua New Guinea to Micronesia.
History already knows the consequences of strong El Niños. The 1982–1983 event caught the world by surprise: it was the most destructive to date, and it was after this event that the modern monitoring system was created. In 1997–1998, the world experienced an even more powerful blow, which caused an estimated $5.7 trillion in damage.
The 2015–2016 El Niño affected over sixty million people: Ethiopia experienced its worst drought in fifty years, the UK experienced record floods, and the Amazon saw massive tree dieback. The 2023–2024 El Niño event also affected over sixty million people, leaving over twenty million people in southern Africa on the brink of acute famine.
A study covering the period since 1950 found that more than 20% of civil conflicts were linked in some way to El Niño, which exacerbates social tensions and competition for resources.
For example, droughts caused by it led to violent clashes over resources between nomadic Arab tribes in the north and sedentary farmers in the south in Sudan, triggering a decades-long civil war. On the Indonesian islands, the phenomenon caused a catastrophic drought, which resulted in mass unrest and interethnic clashes.
El Niño's effects are also linked to unrest and civil conflict in Peru, Angola, El Salvador, Uganda, Myanmar, and the Philippines.
This year, according to preliminary estimates from Verisk Maplecroft, a company specializing in risk assessment, severe weather events could trigger internal conflicts in India, Indonesia, and the Philippines.
However, it's important to understand that the strength of a phenomenon doesn't always equal the magnitude of its impact in any given region. The WMO repeatedly emphasizes that other factors also influence weather. Therefore, even a very strong event can manifest itself differently in different countries and at different times of the year.
But the overall picture remains alarming: the likelihood that 2027 will be the hottest year on record due to the effects of El Niño is estimated to be very high.
"It's a kind of foretaste of the future," Andrew Dessler, a professor at Texas A&M University, told AFP
Posted by: Bobby ||
09/19/2026 8:04 Comments ||
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#3
We have had 4 Super El Niño events in the last 75 years. With the 1877–1878 El Niño event killing an estimated 50 Million.
However, the El Niño cycle impacts given areas differently. Some with actually see increased rainfall and flooding like my Southern States. Which are in bad need of ground water to feed the 100+ data center cooling systems, going online soon.
#6
the majoritarian view is the incipient El Nino has severely repressed hurricane development in the North Atlantic and increased it in the Northeast Pacific.
of course it could also be due to the Gulf of Mexico being renamed or to the bad season of the NY Mets or to bacteria in lettuce
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
09/19/2026 20:57 Comments ||
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From a week ago. Many more supporting tweets at the link, but I think these are the critical points.
[HotAir] In Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of... , one of the countries that borders the other waterway chokehold in the region, the al-Mandeb Strait leading to the Red Sea, the Iran's Houthi sock puppets ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him... s were surrounded by multiple armed forces in the center of the country, but exploited a weakness in the Saudi Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start... n line to the southwest, and made a run for it through the mountains until they reached flat terrain on the coast of the Strait. The Houthis made short work of Mokha, and even took a couple of the channel islands in the Strait itself.
CNN ...formerly the Cable News Network, now who know what it might stand for... 's Nic Robertson was downright giddy with excitement to report on how brazen the Houthi maneuver was, and how this meant so much more trouble now for Donald Trump ...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons... and the Americans.
🇾🇪 The fall of Mocha is beginning to look less like an overwhelming Houthi victory, and more like an extraordinary collapse of the forces that were supposed to stop them. CNN has reconstructed what happened: When the Houthis entered Mocha on Thursday, some Saudi-backed Yemeni…
… some Saudi-backed Yemeni battalions were operating at only around 20% of their strength on paper. The rest? "Ghost names" on military payrolls, soldiers who effectively existed on paper while salaries continued to be collected.
Then came the air-support failure. Yemeni commanders desperately requested air cover as waves of Houthi fighters advanced toward the strategic Red Sea port. One senior Yemeni source says CENTCOM told him the United States was watching the battle closely and that Saudi air support was coming. It never came.
According to CNN's sources, Saudi Arabia conducted not a single airstrike that day despite receiving minute-by-minute updates.
Mocha fell within hours. Perim Island, sitting directly inside Bab el-Mandeb, fell the following day.
CNN's Nic Robertson had visited Perim shortly before it fell.
And here's what makes this even more extraordinary: CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper was in Saudi Arabia for coordination meetings on Thursday. More than 100 U.S. military advisers had already been deployed to the kingdom to provide intelligence and targeting support, as part of a newly established joint command.
Yet the system failed at the moment it mattered. One regional source described it to CNN as a "Saudi-American f**k up of epic proportions."
Another problem runs deeper: there is no unified command among Yemen's anti-Houthi forces, and while all of this was happening, MBS called Trump twice, ultimately asking the United States to strike the Houthis directly. Trump refused.
The result: In roughly 36 hours, a force riddled with ghost soldiers, fractured command structures and absent air support lost Mocha and then Perim, allowing an Iran-backed movement to establish itself directly inside one of the world's most important maritime chokepoints.
We'll come back to what's going on with each of those fronts in due course, but in order to understand how and why we got there, we have to update on the increasingly deteriorating conditions inside Iran due to Operation Epic Fury, then Operation Economic Fury, and most recently, Operation Economic Outcast, the layering on of increased sanctions on the Iran regime's ability to use its neighbors for backchannel access to the financial system.
Israel's Channel 14 reported from sources inside the regime that Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the blusterous blowhard serving as Iran's Parliament Speaker, was caught admitting to others inside the government that the regime won't be able to stand this economic pressure much longer. Here's Dror Balazada:
Ghalibaf admits: Regime on brink of collapse
Exclusive quotes obtained by Channel 14 Senior Iran Analyst Dror Balazada reveal that Iranian Parliament Speaker Ghalibaf admitted in closed-door talks that U.S. sanctions are working and war damage appears nearly irreparable.… pic.twitter.com/KKMftzEp0L
Iran's currency continues to devalue, and inflation continues to climb higher than oil prices. One account puts the annualized inflation rate at 144 percent.
How are Iranians surviving? The same way the regime is — by putting everything on credit. As long as everyone just borrows from everyone else but no money actually changes hands, it'll work for a while until the food runs out and the banks collapse.
Now let's say you have a car that runs, and you actually have gas. Now all you need is...a road that won't consume your car and the precious little gas you do have.
Water levels are so low in other regions of Iran that the regime has literally drawn all the water out of some of the rivers, which didn't give the fish that remained much of a chance.
For several IRGC and Basij forces, it's getting too hard to get by and still support the regime.
President Trump had no problem admitting last week to disabling or sinking close to 10 Iranian oil tankers loitering in the Gulf because of the blockade in response to Iranian strikes on commercial traffic going through Hormuz. But there was another tanker late last week that got struck.
An Iranian cargo ship took a projectile off Qeshm Island early Sunday. One crew member dead, four wounded, ship on fire, crew evacuated.
Nobody's claimed it. Tehran's blaming a "terrorist enemy." CENTCOM hasn't said a word.
Was it struck by our Navy? Not even President Trump will 'fess up' to this one.
That's not exactly a Shermanesque no, is it? So what's the big deal about this particular ship? It was around Qeshm Island, which is basically Iran's equivalent of a safe harbor. We're technically not supposed to be able to operate that close to the Iranian shore on the water. Air strikes? Sure. Navy? This is an interesting attention-getter by the President.
Many in the American media invested in Trump failure with regards to the Iran war are maintaining the illusion that Iran hasn't really lost anything as far as their military industrial complex, and that they are rebuilding much quicker than ever and will be good as new, free to fulfill a life of religious fulfillment soon enough, to quote Leslie Nielsen's Dr. Rumack in Airplane!
Before the Americans and Israelis opened up on Iran with Operation Epic Fury on the last day of February, Iran was a supplier of Shahed-136 drones to Russia for their war with Ukraine. Now? Iran is begging Russia to supply them with Geran-2's, which is Russia's knock-off clone of the Shahed. Why? Iran no longer has the capacity or money to build them on their own, and they're begging Russia to help.
As for Saudi Arabia, it's been a mixed bag this week. We'll get to their poor performance holding up their part of the containment ring around the Houthis and IRGC advisors in Yemen in a bit, but as far as the pipeline goes, I think there's a bit of a misdirect going on. There are lots of media and speculators invested in Trump's defeat saying the pipeline is all but destroyed, the pumping stations will take between six weeks to six months, with others claiming a years-long delay, and without enough reserves in Yanbu, in a couple weeks, there will be an oil flow disruption that will cause prices to skyrocket.
I'm not buying into the panic. First, the blockade is still in place. Ships are methodically moving through the Strait of Hormuz. Three ships a day more than what currently travels makes up for the seven million barrels going through the pipeline. That's if the oil has to temporarily move entirely via tanker again.
According to satellite imagery after the attack, it looks like there's a bypass section of pipeline just about in place.
New satellite imagery shows the aftermath of the recent drone attack on Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline, which caused major damage to a pumping station.
Yes, the pumping stations will take weeks to rebuild, but portable pumps can be brought in in the interim. The flow rate will not be the same as before, but oil will still flow. And at the mouth of the pipeline, in Dammam, friction modifiers, which are essentially a polymer mixed in with the crude to help it flow easier through the pipeline, will help compensate for the lack of full pumping capacity at the bypass site.
My hunch is that the pipeline will be flowing, even if at reduced capacity, very soon, with full capacity returning sooner than we think.
As for the Houthi adventure, early in the week, the last remaining functional Iranian terror proxy group, and their IRGC advisors, were getting their heads handed to them by the Yemeni armed forces.
🚨 Iranian IRGC personnel are reportedly being killed alongside the Houthis as Yemeni government forces continue advancing in the strategically critical Al-Jawf front.
Houthis had no air power, and were essentially surrounded.
But then, the Saudis' contingent failed to hold their southwest line, and the Houthis made a run for it. Before the Yemeni forces could react, Mokha and a couple islands had fallen, and everyone already against the war with Iran started the 'all is lost' routine. They assumed that the al-Mandeb Strait had essentially fallen, and that no oil would move at all, and Iran finally had the upper hand.
This obviously was not a great development, but I did not believe for a second that it was the strategic victory for the Houthis, and by extension, Iran, as was reported. Why?
The conditions around Sana'a, where Yemeni forces were systematically taking over former Houthi territory and wiping them out had not changed one bit. Yes, some of the Houthis were temporarily out of harm's way. But where did that leave them? Their backs to the sea, mountains in front of them, and flat terrain that offer very little places to hide. They still have no air power, limited munitions, even though they picked up some of the U.S.-made vehicles the Saudis left behind, but no reinforcements, and no one in Iran coming with the cavalry. It seemed to me all weekend that they were sitting ducks in a defenseless position. Turns out my hunch was right.
Not 24 hours passed before U.S. advisors from Centcom were in Saudi Arabia encouraging, chastising, and providing targeting.
CNN REPORTS THAT 100–200 U.S. MILITARY ADVISERS ARE NOW IN SAUDI ARABIA PROVIDING REAL-TIME INTELLIGENCE, TARGETING AND GEOSPATIAL SUPPORT AGAINST THE HOUTHIS, MARKING A SIGNIFICANT ESCALATION IN U.S. INVOLVEMENT.
While Saudi forces were regrouping and standing up, the Yemeni forces also reoriented, and resumed the fight against the Houthis now that they were in the 'Kill Box' along the coast.
During Desert Storm, the various Allied air force chiefs met every day to review the previous days' missions. One morning, it was brough to CENTAF's attention that some Saudi Tornado crews were salvoing their bombs short of the targets, and then turning around and going home to report their targets hit.
CENTAF tried being delicate about the matter, not wanting to flatly accuse the Saudis of cowardice. The Saudi AF rep nodded, smiled, and said it would be taken care of, and of course nothing happened.
This went on for a few days until CENTAF came up with an idea. They printed out the usual morning briefings, but the one for Saudi had something extra: a statement explaining every single incident observed above, with a promise to forward the next one to CENTCOM (Gen. Schwartzkopf).
According to CENTAF, the Saudi general turned white, then green, and sweating profusely...while no one else said a word. At the end of the briefing, the Saudi general blew through the door as quickly as he could. From that day forward, every single Saudi mission pressed on to their targets, through to the end of the war.
They are, sadly, cowards with exquisite toys. The only truly competent KSA forces are the National Guard - not an NG in the sense we have one, but a couple of brigades whose sole purpose is to protect the House of Al-Saud. Their leadership is frequently hereditary; the first SNG commanders were drawn from the forces that the al-Sauds conquered the kingdom with.
[PJMedia] Hey, this is a relief: the Moslem grooming gangs that raped and assaulted over 250,000 British girls actually have nothing to do with Islam. So all you "Islamophobes" need to sit down and shut up, because at last we have an Islamic voice speaking out loud and clear against these gangs, and not just any Moslem voice, either, but a leading Islamic scholar. There are still a few problems with this rosy scenario, but don’t worry: we’re really on our way now to our glorious multicultural future.
Geo News reported Sunday that "religious scholar Pir Muhammad Hassan Haseeb-ur-Rehman has condemned grooming gangs by the likes of Rochdale rapist Shabir Ahmed, saying those involved in such crimes have no connection with Islam and must face the strongest punishment available under the law."
Pir Hassan is touring Britannia, "where he addressed nearly 50 packed gatherings, the prominent holy man said Moslems must be among the first to condemn and report anyone involved in grooming, sexual exploitation, drugs, criminality or extremism, irrespective of the offender’s religion, ethnicity or family background."
That sounds great, and Pir Hassan Haseeb-ur-Rehman is not just some random Moslem believer. He is "associated with Eidgah Sharif in Rawalpindi, one of Pakistain’s prominent Sufi religious centres, and is widely known for addressing religious and spiritual gatherings in Pakistain and overseas. The centre has tens of thousands of followers in the UK."
Pir Hassan was unequivocal about the rape gangs, saying: "First and foremost, Moslems need to condemn grooming gangs. We strongly condemn them. They have absolutely no connection with the teachings of Islam." He added "that anyone involved in sexually exploiting children must be opposed and punished, regardless of whether they happen to be Moslem, Pak or from any other background."
This sounds great, and the holy man wasn’t finished. He continued: "If people from within our own community are involved in wrongdoing, they must be opposed. Remaining silent in the face of wrongdoing is, in effect, becoming complicit in it." He also said that "grooming and sexual abuse were ’against Islam, against humanity and against the law,’ stressing that Islamic teachings provided absolutely no justification for the exploitation or abuse of children."
Most of those involved in these gangs are Moslems, and so Pir Hassan said: "Grooming gangs, drug pushers, criminals and bandidosforces of Evil who happen to be Moslem have brought disrepute upon Moslems and our community. There is no doubt that Moslems enjoy freedom of religion here. Moslems should respond to those freedoms by becoming responsible, peaceful and law-abiding citizens. When this country has given you freedom of religion and made the necessities of a good life available to you, Moslems should reciprocate by living as good, peaceful and responsible citizens." Can’t argue with that.
Maybe Pir Muhammad Hassan Haseeb-ur-Rehman is right about this. But if he is, he should kindly explain why so many Moslems seem to have exactly the opposite idea. In La Belle France, a Moslem quoted Qur’an while raping his victim. A survivor of a Moslem rape gang in the UK has said that her rapists would quote the Qur’an to her, and believed their actions justified by Islam. Thus it came as no surprise when Moslemmigrants colonists in La Belle France raped a girl and videoed the rape while praising Allah and invoking the Qur’an. In India, a Moslem gave a Qur’an and a prayer rug to the woman he was holding captive and repeatedly raping.
[FOX] Reindustrialization is alive in America. Yet the recent backlash on artificial intelligence (AI) data centers reveals we have not learned from our offshoring mistakes: creating dependencies that will not be easily reversed.
Whether or not AI data centers are built in America, AI is here to stay. Either we choose to shape the trajectory of AI technology by embracing the AI data center buildout or cede this advantage to other nations that are eager to lead the AI race. China, for example, announced nearly $300 billion in data center investment through 2030, not including private sector spending. India is offering a 20-year tax holiday for foreign cloud operators and the Republic of Korea is offering regulatory relief. Meanwhile, many Americans are calling for moratoriums.
The national security consequences of who hosts AI data centers go beyond competition with China. If we do not build AI data centers in the United States, we risk everything that is inside the data centers: the data, compute and intellectual property (IP) that drive innovation, protect privacy and enable sovereignty. We will also forfeit our ability to set the security standards for this critical infrastructure.
#2
Why not just force them to be self-sufficient with their own wind and solar power.
Also make them sell the excess power generated back into the grid. Share with the little people.
Posted by: Bobby ||
09/19/2026 8:51 Comments ||
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#3
/\ that’s one of the goals. Imagine the corruption and loss of the people’s political power if the tech corp tracking and exploiting your data controlled your cities resources, especially electricity.
[Breitbart] The poverty rate for children and Hispanics just hit record lows, while median household incomes have hit a record high.
Listen, I know everyone’s bummed over gas prices, and for good reason. Yesterday, I paid $4.19 per gallon. Ouch. Driving past a gas station sign is like looking at a weather barometer for our national economy. Worse, it’s also a barometer for the likely outcome of the midterm elections. And that’s a shame for any number of reasons.
The first is that as much as it sucks, we are all paying a necessary price to ensure that the theocratic death cult that runs Iran does not get its hands on a nuclear bomb.
Secondly, the debate around gas prices should be focused on the real problem — American refining capacity, or criminal lack thereof. Our pathetic refining capacity is where the bottleneck raising prices is coming from. Hell, America is exporting oil. The real problem is that Democrats and environmental extremists have so terrorized the oil industry that no one can open up a new refinery in America. And everyone is afraid to open up a new and much-needed refinery with Trump in charge because they know Democrats will someday recapture power and make them close it. This reality forces us to count on refineries outside America. Iran knows this, and that’s why Iran is targeting refineries.
If America had a reasonable refining capability, Iran would have no leverage over us at all. Thanks again, Democrats!
Now we come to the good — no, great news, about the economy… Poverty rates, including for child poverty and Hispanic poverty, have just hit the lowest numbers on record. Meanwhile, median household income AFTER inflation has hit a record high:
“The official poverty rate for children fell to a historic low of 13.4 percent in 2025,” reports the U.S. Census Bureau. “Between 2024 and 2025, the official poverty rate for Hispanic individuals decreased to a historic low of 13.9 percent.”
Thanks, Capitalism.
What’s more, unless you’re a crazy person or an addict living on the streets, no one in America is truly poor anymore. Let’s get real… Look at the state of American “poverty” today. Instead of a hunger problem, the poor have an obesity problem. The poor also have a place to live, central heat, a $1400 phone, the internet, free health care, plasma TVs, a Blu-ray player, a video game console, a microwave oven, and, most likely, some form of air conditioning.
Long ago, American capitalism had already defeated poverty. The modern-day poverty rate is just a number. It’s a useful number, but thanks to America, poverty ain’t what it used to be, and that’s a lovely thing.
Y’all were quiet at $5.02 a gallon and 9.1% inflation. Now gas is $4.06 and inflation is 3.4% and suddenly it’s a crisis. The numbers didn’t change sides. You did. pic.twitter.com/t6GrskAh0B
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Leonid Tsukanov
Every democracy has the silly as well as the sublime. Mr. Tsukanov is interested in some of Israel’s.
[Regnum] The Israeli election race is gradually entering its decisive phase. Parties vying for seats in the Knesset (parliament) have completed compiling their final lists and submitting them to the Election Commission. These lists include many dubious individuals, either with a history of controversial decisions or a reputation for being eccentric.
It's not just political extras with no prospect of winning seats who are banking on shock value, but also heavyweight politicians, which in some places turns one of the most difficult campaigns for the Jewish state into a farce. However, even the prime minister, apparently, is not averse to directing part of this spectacle—especially when it helps distract the electorate from pressing issues.
THE KING, THE MESSIAH, AND THE PIRATE
The parade of political showmen running for the 2026 Knesset is led by the flamboyant businessman Eitan Shvili. He enters big-time politics under the nickname "King Sharshar" and strives to do everything to live up to the caricatured image of a medieval king: he wears a luxurious ermine robe and a crown made of precious metals and Swarovski crystals, distributes generous gifts to "grateful subjects," and bestows "signs of royal favor" on IDF veterans in the form of gold amulets bearing his monogram.
The "king's" party, however, is small—only 12 people. The second position is held by "queen" Tamar Shvili. The rest of the party is unremarkable: the vast majority had not previously participated in political games (with the exception of lawyer Ilan Elmakeys, who previously ran for mayor of Yerucham), and they came to the elections as a "royal entourage."
However, such trivialities don't prevent King Sharshar from looking forward with optimism. Having barely submitted his documents, he has already declared himself the future prime minister, who will lead Israel into an "era of prosperity." Moreover, the "king-prime minister" has generously agreed not to expel current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from politics, but to grant him the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs—in recognition of his past services to the country.
Yeshua Ben-David of the Garden of Eden party goes even further. In his official campaign, he calls himself a "spiritual descendant" of the Davidic kings and declares his readiness to accept a "messianic mission," including becoming high priest in the future rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem.
If his family name is not a derivation of Cohen, he can’t be high priest. If his family name is not a derivation of Levi, he can’t be a Temple priest at all — the thing is hereditary within the tribe of Levi and the subtribe of Cohen, direct descendants of Moses’ brother Aaron. As for King David, his descendants were taken into exile by Babylon in 586 BC, and continued to rule the Jewish exiles there at least through the 13th century — under the Parthians, the Sassanids, and the Abbasids he was called the exilarch, a system that lasted until the Mongol conquest. Careful records of the lines of descent were kept the entire time. Why on earth would anyone want a “spiritual descendant” of King David when there are hundreds or thousands of the real thing lying about?
Incidentally, he is willing to combine this latter position with both the post of prime minister and finance minister.
The Garden of Eden party, however, currently has an even more modest list than King Sharshar's party—Ben-David is the only one listed. However, the future "prime minister-high priest" intends to use the current elections to promote his alliance and attract both supporters and voters for the next cycle.
At the same time, he is trying to establish contacts with other small conservative parties (the Eternal Alliance for the Redemption of Israel, the Bible Bloc), but their candidates prefer to avoid the self-proclaimed “messiah”.
The Jews have had a number of false messiahs over the millennia. It never goes well.
The Israel Pirate Party, whose election platform is built on the principles of universal freedom and equality, has also become the butt of jokes. Its representatives promise voters freedom of information, copyright reform, and expanded digital liberties, while party leader Ohad Shem-Tov threatens to change the structure of the government if he comes to power, assuming the position of captain (instead of prime minister). The Pirates prefer not to focus on Netanyahu's future, but hint that there is "hardly room" for him on their ship.
REAL TROUBLEMAKERS
Israelis are looking with a hint of amusement at the outrageous candidates from the parties that have dominated Israeli news in recent days. Everyone understands that the vast majority of them will be unable to overcome the electoral threshold (3.25%) and pose any real competition to the serious parties.
However, at the tip of the political iceberg there remain many political showmen who are preparing to compete with both the ruling bloc and the opposition.
One of them is far-right activist Moshe Feiglin, number two on Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich's "Religious Zionism" list. Feiglin has become known for his attacks on nearly all opponents of the ultra-Orthodox—Palestinians, their Arab neighbors, and Israeli liberals—and has also become one of the leading media defenders of the rights of conservative Jewish believers. He is running in the current elections under the slogan of expanding Israel's "living space," including in the West Bank.
According to the latest polls, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's party (Otzma Yehudit) also crosses the electoral threshold by a wide margin. The controversial politician views the current elections as a chance to strengthen his position in the Knesset and, through this, finally realize his plans.
For example, building a special prison for Palestinians, surrounded by a crocodile-infested moat, or completely "developing" the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon with the help of loyal settlers, despite the "fears of some leaders." He reminds his supporters of these plans at almost every rally.
However, due to a significant surge in his negative ratings following his spat with Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir has found it difficult to wield his fists alone. Therefore, he's dragging the Prime Minister's former protégé, Tally Gottlieb, as his second choice. She's known as the Knesset's chief troublemaker and schemer, but has managed to retain the trust of a portion of the electorate and become, in their eyes, a "defender of conservative interests."
She promised to "expose the conspiracy of the intelligence services" that was concealing the truth about Hamas from the authorities. Furthermore, it was Gottlieb who petitioned the Israeli Central Election Commission to disqualify the pan-Arab party Ra'am
…the political party of the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement, the Muslim Brotherhood in Israel. The militant wing is the Northern Branch, outlawed by the Israeli government in 2015 because it was too violent, which hasn’t much slowed them down. The Northern Branch is based in Umm al Fahm in the Galilee, headed by Sheikh Raed Salah, the so-called Sheikh of Al Aqsa because he incited so many riots in the vicinity of the Temple Mount. His role is to cycle in and out of prison for it. Between the Northern Branch’s violent plots and the Southern Branch’s politics and social welfare work, something like 20% of Israel’s Arabs are connected to Israel’s Muslim Brotherhood at least a little, with the intent that they become ever more drawn into an increasingly Moslem-oriented life…
from the current elections due to its support for the "terrorist underground" in Palestine, and accused one of its leaders, Mansour Abbas, of "working for his handlers from the Shin Bet" (Israeli security service).
Not likely, but possible, I suppose. For years there was the Green Prince — Mosab Hassan Yousef, eldest son of Hamas co-founder Hassan Yousef — who really did spy for Israel for a decade before getting out of Gaza and later moving to America, where he speaks in defense of Israel and against the threat of Hamas and the Palestinians.
Meanwhile, Ben-Gvir's right-hand man, Hanamel Dorfman, previously positioned by Israeli hawks as a younger and more energetic alternative to the minister, only ended up sixth on the list and, over time, lost much of his outrageous image. Over the past few months, he has remained largely in the shadow of Ben-Gvir and Gottlieb.
SUBTLE PLAY
The far-right bloc's sudden surge in activity has alarmed the opposition. Ben-Gvir and Smotrich's supporters secured several Knesset seats in the previous elections with similar promises.
With Israeli society becoming increasingly polarized by the end of 2026, concerns have arisen that populism and promises of “retribution for enemies” will outweigh socio-economic programs.
Consequently, the Central Election Commission was bombarded with demands to disqualify the far-right lists from the elections for repeated violations of the laws of the Jewish state. Ben-Gvir was particularly targeted in this regard—his opponents counted over a hundred counts in his portfolio, each of which alone could have served as grounds for disqualification—from public justification of genocide to vote-buying, blackmail, and threats of physical violence.
However, despite this, both the odious minister and his associates are still listed as candidates. And they are preparing a counterclaim against the opposition, repeating the same accusations.
At first glance, it seems as if Netanyahu's party is watching events largely from the sidelines, not reacting to the attacks of minor extras or the ambiguous statements of its partners in the government camp.
However, a closer look reveals that the prime minister is using political freak shows as a platform to strengthen his own party's position, primarily through positive contrast.
For the 2026 elections, the Likud parliamentary list is made up of roughly equal numbers of military and civilian figures, each assigned a specific focus. Compared to the political showmen, these candidates appear more boring, but more reliable, to the mass voter.
Thanks to such subtle play, the Israeli prime minister managed not only to strengthen the party on the eve of the elections, but also, judging by public opinion polls, to add a couple of extra mandates to it.
Moreover, Netanyahu-loyal bloggers and public figures regularly publicly play into the hands of either the Ben-Gvir camp or the collective liberal opposition, thus creating a vicious circle. While battling among themselves, the opponents completely forget about Netanyahu.
Thanks to this, he can work on increasing his ratings without fear of receiving an unexpected blow from one of the heavyweights.
Follow up to two stories from yesterday, here and here.
[Jpost] When a film accuses Israel of calculated mass killing, wins the Venice Special Jury Prize, and receives a nearly 25-minute standing ovation, we should examine not only the screen, but who produced it, which investigations it relies on, and who funded the organizations behind them.
In other words: follow the money.
NAZA, directed by Israelis Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, is listed by the Venice Biennale as a production of The Guardian and JW Films. The festival synopsis says the film reveals systems behind what it calls Israel’s "calculated mass killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza."
The filmmakers state that many revelations were first published by The Guardian with +972 Magazine and Local Call.
The film relies on 24 anonymous Israeli military and intelligence personnel whose identities are concealed, faces obscured, and voices altered. Viewers cannot independently determine their positions, what they witnessed, or whether they were positioned to know the strategic decisions they describe.
The IDF categorically rejected the allegations, saying it could not verify the identities, roles, or relevant knowledge of the anonymous sources and disputing claims about how targeting decisions are made.
But the journalistic ecosystem behind the film also deserves scrutiny.
+972 Magazine is published by the nonprofit 972 Advancement of Citizen Journalism. The same nonprofit co-publishes the Hebrew-language Local Call (Sicha Mekomit), with Just Vision. Both publicly describe this partnership.
Now follow the financial trail.
According to +972’s donor disclosures, Local Call received Open Society Foundations grants every year from 2018 through 2024, totaling $562,900.
Open Society Foundations were founded by George Soros, who, according to the organization, has given them more than $32 billion of his personal fortune since 1984.
The documented chain is real, but must be described precisely: Soros founded and financed Open Society; Open Society granted hundreds of thousands of dollars to Local Call; and NAZA, according to its directors, draws partly on investigations published by Local Call, +972 Magazine, and The Guardian.
That does not prove Soros, Open Society Foundations, or another donor directly financed NAZA. I have seen no evidence of such a link. Nor does funding itself prove journalism false.
But funding and institutional context are not irrelevant.
Open Society has also taken clear public positions on the Israel-Hamas War. On November 1, 2023, it unequivocally condemned Hamas’s October 7 attack, calling its cruelty heartbreaking and inexcusable.
In the same statement, however, it said Israel’s campaign was becoming "increasingly indiscriminate" and argued that restrictions on electricity, water, fuel and food, together with bombing, were likely to be judged as collective punishment.
What is war but a collective punishment of the society that lost it? Perhaps the Gazans should not have let their elected government, Hamas, start a war they could not possibly win.
In December 2023, Open Society published a fact sheet saying it supports human-rights organizations documenting what it describes as Israeli abuses and advocating accountability, alongside policy and civil-society groups.
It reported providing $14.3 million in 2023 to groups working on Israel and Palestine, excluding an additional $3.3 million emergency commitment after October 7. The Foundations also say they do not support Hamas and their grantees are committed to nonviolence.
On May 20, 2024, Open Society welcomed the ICC prosecutor’s decision to seek arrest warrants for senior Israeli and Hamas leaders, calling it an important first step toward accountability.
These are Open Society’s own published positions. They do not establish that the Foundations dictated the editorial line of Local Call, +972, or NAZA, but they are relevant context when audiences assess reporting that later becomes the basis of a major international documentary.
Follow the testimony. Follow the credits. And follow the money.
Then ask what has been pushed to the margins: October 7, 2023.
Hamas and other armed groups invaded Israel, murdered about 1,200 people, and abducted around 250. Families were slaughtered in their homes. Young people at the Nova festival were hunted down.
A UN mission led by Pramila Patten later found reasonable grounds to believe rape and gang rape occurred during the October 7 attacks in several locations, and "clear and convincing information" that hostages were subjected to rape, sexualized torture, and other forms of sexual violence.
Yet the horror that began this war is pushed to the margins while Israel’s military response is placed under a microscope.
Civilian deaths in Gaza are tragic. Every innocent child who dies is a catastrophe, and Israel must investigate suspected violations.
But there is a fundamental moral and legal distinction between deliberately murdering civilians and attacking a military target while facing a foreseeable risk of civilian casualties. Assessing possible civilian harm before an attack is not, by itself, proof of an intention to murder civilians.
In my view, NAZA takes an extraordinarily complicated battlefield and compresses it into a devastatingly simple accusation: civilians died, therefore Israel intended to kill them.
🚨 IDF MOVES TO RELEASE OCT. 7 ATROCITY FILM AMID ‘NAZA’ FALLOUT
The IDF is advancing plans to publicly release its 47-minute compilation of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre footage, according to Channel 12.
Netanyahu and the defense establishment reportedly back the move as Israel pushes back against the “NAZA” documentary’s allegations over AI-assisted strikes in Gaza.
The IDF says it “categorically rejects” the documentary’s allegations and stresses strike decisions are made “by human personnel only… and not by artificial intelligence.”
The Oct. 7 compilation has until now only been screened behind closed doors.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
This refers to a natural climate cycle that occurs every three to eight years and typically lasts nine to 12 months. It begins when the trade winds, the constant year-round winds that typically blow in tropical latitudes from the subtropics toward the equator, weaken, and the warm water that normally accumulates off the coast of Southeast Asia begins to shift eastward toward South America.
...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
