mmxxiv (12. 124)

As this calendar draws to a close and we look forward to 2025, we again take time to reflect on a selection of some of the things and events that took place during the past year. Thanks as always for visiting. We’ve made it through another wild year together.

january: The ruling Progressive Democratic Party secures the presidency in Taiwan, along with Bangladesh and the Marshall Island, kicking off the biggest year for elections.  The International Criminal Court rules that Israel must take all measures to curb genocidal conduct in Gaza but falls short of ordering the halt of the incursions.  Japan lands on the Moon.

february: Violent volcanic eruptions force evacuation in Iceland.  King Charles III announces he has cancer and will step away from public-facing duties for the present.  Ex-Fox News pundit Tucker Carlson interviews Vladimir Putin in Moscow. 

Special council investigating Joe Biden’s unauthorised retention of classified material from his vice-presidency opts not to press charges, citing the US president’s failing memory.  Long time host of NPR’s Morning Edition, Bob Edwards, has died, aged 76.  Israeli forces push further into Palestine, escalating raids in Rafah.  Jon Stewart returns as host of the Daily Show after a nine year hiatus.  Opposition leader and Putin critic Alexie Navalny found dead in remote arctic penal colony where he was detained for the past three years.  The Supreme Court of Alabama has declared frozen embryos legal persons and fearing for legal peril, university clinics in the state have suspended in-vitro fertilisation procedures in response to the ruling.  One hundred thousand protest votes of uncommitted for Joe Biden are cast against Joe Biden in the Michigan Democratic primarily over his support for Israel.  Veteran senator and Trumpism foil and sometimes enabler, Mitch McConnell, announces he will step down as leader of the Republican Party in November.  Dissident Nalvany is permitted a public funeral.

march: Fashion doyenne Iris Apfel passes away, aged 102.  One day ahead of the Super Tuesday primaries, the US Supreme Court ruled that no state can keep Trump off the ballot.  Over a hundred Palestinians are massacred by Israeli force as they rush a rare relief convoy entering the besieged city of al-Rashid.  Nikki Haley drops out of the race for the Republican party nomination for presidential candidate. 

Joe Biden delivers a wide-ranging, fiery and impassioned State of the Union address, remonstrating that one cannot just love their country when one’s side is winning.  Dragon Ball Z creator Akira Toriyama passed away, aged 68.  Facing an imminent ground incursion into Rafah, the Speaker of the US Senate called for Israeli elections and regime change, as America’s petition for an immediate ceasefire was vetoed in the UN by Russia and China.  Accused of monopolistic practises harmful to innovation and consumers in the “superior smart phone” market, the US department of justice files an antitrust lawsuit against Apple.  Wild media speculation left the royal family with little choice about coming forward with the Princess of Wales cancer diagnosis.  A terrorist attack at a music venue on the outskirts of Moscow kills dozens, burns down the concert hall.  A abstention by the US during a UN ceasefire vote allows the resolution to pass, triggering the ire of the Israeli government though the assault on Gaza continues unabated.

april: Seven humanitarian aid workers of World Central Kitchen were killed in an Israeli airstrike whilst travelling along a pre-authorised aid corridor to bring food to the starving outside of Deir al-Balah.   Israel

kills several top Iranian generals in a bombing of the country’s embassy in Damascus, Syria.  A powerful earthquake strikes Taiwan, displacing thousands.  Actor and comedian Joe Flaherty passes away, aged 82.  México severs diplomatic relations with Ecuador after raid on its embassy in Quito resulted in the apprehension of the former Ecuadorian president seeking asylum there.  OJ Simpson passes away, aged 76.  Iran launches a barrage of projectiles at Israel in retaliation for its attack on an embassy in Syria.  The historic Børsen of Copenhagen is severely damaged by fire.  Unprecedented flood inundates the Gulf of Arabia.  Israel strikes back against Iranian military installations.  In an extraordinary Saturday session, the US House after months of delay passes separate foreign aid packages for Taiwan, Israel and Ukraine.  The US Federal Communications Commission votes to restore net-neutrality.  Fresh from declaring being poor a crime, the US Supreme Court entertains Trump’s claim for presidential immunity.  The criminal trial against Trump stemming from a hush-money payment made to a porn-star begin in Manhattan. 

may: Protest rage on college campuses across the United States for the country’s materiel support for Israel and the universities’ financial ties in the ongoing assault on Palestine. 

Author Paul Auster passes away, aged 77.  A second whistleblower formerly employed by Boeing dies within the space of month.  Labour sees big gains in UK local elections.  Stormy Daniels gives testimony in the Trump trial.  US announces pauses in delivering Israel materiel aid after resolution for incursions into Rafah.  Legendary grindhouse director Roger Corman passes away, aged 98.  Author Alice Munroe passes away at 92.  The president of Slovakia narrowly survives an assassination attempt.  The president and foreign minister of Iran die in a helicopter crash near Azerbaijan.  The Internation Criminal Court of the Hague issues arrest warrants for Israeli leader Benjamin Netayahu and Hamas in Gaza head Yahya Sinwar.  China conducts provocative military drills around Taiwan, expressing dissatisfaction with the newly elected president.  Russian air assaults continue against Ukraine.  Ireland and Norway join Spain in recognising the state of Palestine, while Israel presses on with incursions into Rafah despite condemnation from the UN.

june: México elects its first woman president to continue the liberal and progressive policies of her predecessor.  

After the US authorises limited use of American munitions defensively on Russian territory, Putin suggests that Russia could arm countries looking to target the West.  The coalition governments of Olaf Scholtz and Emmanuel Macron face dissolution following significant gains by far-right parties in EU elections.  Charges stemming from not disclosing his drug addiction while purchasing a fire-arm, US president Joe Biden’s son Hunter is found guilty with no pardon in the offering.  Project scientist for the Voyager programme Edward C Stone passes away, aged 88.  At the height of the pandemic, the Pentagon rans a secret disinformation campaign in the Philippines to discourage people from taking the Chinese-developed vaccine.  Putin and Kim meet for a summit in North Korea.  Baseball great Willie Mays passes away, aged 93.  Veteran actor Donald Sutherland dies, aged 88. A disastrous debate performance against Trump causes some prominent Democrats to urge Biden to step down as the party’s candidate.

july: Labour wins in the UK General Election.  France’s second round of voting keeps the extreme right from power.  Iran elects progressive reformist Masoud Pezeshkian.  Actor Shelley Duvall passes away, aged 75.

Just ahead of the US Republican National Convention, an assassination attempt was made against presumptive party candidate Trump, who forty-eight hours later announces junior senator from the state of Ohio, JD Vance as his running-mate.  Ursula von der Leyen reelected as European Commission president.  Veteran actor Bob Newhart has died, aged 94.  A massive IT outage linked to Windows PCs disrupts banks, travel and media outlets globally. Israeli president Netanyahu addresses the US congress with thousands protesting his presence as the assault on Gaza continues.  Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed during a raid by the Israeli Defence Forces on his compound in Tehran.  Joe Biden calls for radical reform for the US supreme court, including term limits, an enforceable code of ethics and a constitutional amendment limiting broad immunity from prosecution for holders of the high office. 

august: a prisoner-exchange sees American journalists detained in Russia freed.  Anti-immigration riots spread violence in Sunderland over several days.  Trump agrees to debate Harris but only on his terms. 

Global stock markets had a case of the Mondays and sharply decline faced with a possible US recession and opposing currency policies.  Kalama Harris picks Minnesota congressman Tim Walz as her running-mate in the American presidential election.  Google found in violation of anti-trust laws for its monopolistic practises in advertising and creating a walled-garden.  During the first night of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Joe Biden formally and symbolically passes the torch to Harris and Walz in a moving speech capping a fifty-year political career.  Potential spoiler candidate independent RFK Jr drops out of the US presidential race and endorses Trump, who in exchange vows to declassify more files on the Kennedy assassination.  French authorities detain Telegram founder Pavel Durov at the ORLY departure lounge over lack of moderation on the platform abetting organised crime.

september: the Israeli public call for a nation-wide general strike after the bodies of six hostages held by Hamas are recovered over the government’s handling of the war that has lasted nearly a year with no signs of ending. 

Consummate, veteran actor James Earl Jones has passed away, aged 93.  Trump and Harris hold a televised debate, meeting one another face-to-face for the first time.   China raises its retirement age for the first time since the 1950s.  Catastrophic floods strike central Europe, with thousands displaced in Poland and Czechia.  After a series of deadly knife attacks, German reintroduces checks at all of its land borders.  A second assassination attempt on Trump is thwarted as he is golfing on one of his courses.  Israel planted explosive devices in thousands of pagers used by Hezbollah months ahead of a coordinated explosion that killed nine individuals and wounded hundreds.  Tens of thousands evacuate southern Lebanon as Israeli airstrikes intensify, killing over five hundred individuals.  The king of Thailand signs same-sex marriage bill into law, making the nation third in the Asian-Pacific region to recognise LGBTQ+ equality after Taiwan and Nepal. Veteran actor Maggie Smith passes away, aged 89.  New York City mayor Eric Adams indicted on fraud and corruption charges.  Continuing to bombard Beirut, Israeli Defence Forces have killed Hezbollah senior leader Hassan Nasrallah.  Singer-songwriter and actor Kris Kristofferson dead at 88.  Israel launches a limited ground offensive into southern Lebanon.  

october: Former American president Jimmy Carter turns 100.  US ports shut down as dockworkers go on strike. Tehran fires a barrage of hundreds of missiles into Israel.  The Europa Clipper is launched to study the Jovian satellite. 

As Palestinians continue to be displaced by violence in Gaza and the West Bank, Israel has expanded combat operations into Lebanon, Iran and Yemen.  Trump is interviewed by podcaster Joe Rogan. Israeli Defence Forces kill Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza, with Israel vowing to take Rafah.  Israel bombs weapons depots near Tehran as the forced depopulation of northern Gaza continues.  Moldova holds a referendum, narrowly deciding to pursue EU membership.  Parliamentary election results in Georgia are rejected by president Salome Zourabichvili, who calls for mass rally and investigation into voting irregularities that gave the pro-Russian Georgian Dream party a controlling majority.  North Korea deploys ten thousand soldiers to Russia to fight in western Ukraine.  Israel bans the UN agency for Palestinian refugees from operating in the occupied territory while bombing a five storey apartment complex in northern Gaza, killing scores.  Scores of people are killed as flooding ravages Valencia. 

november: Veteran entertainment producer Quincy Jones dead at 91.  Following a controversial outcome in Georgia, Moldova re-elects pro-Brussels government of Maia Sandu.  Elon Musk to spend election night with Trump watching returns—handing over executive control of X to the former president.  Donald Trump is re-elected as the president of the United States. 

The coalition government of Germany collapses.  Australia bans social media for youths under sixteen years of age.  Canada orders Tik-Tok to cease operations in the country but lets users keep the app and continue making content.  Already ravaged by successive hurricanes that has rendered the country’s electrical grid inoperable, an earthquake strikes Cuba.  Youtube celebrity Jake Paul fights Mike Tyson to an audience of sixty-million.  Russia launches a major attack on Ukrainian infrastructure, and Biden authorises the use of long-range missiles into Russian territory.  Pope Francis calls for investigations to determine whether Israeli forces are engaging in genocide in Palestine.  Thomas E Kurtz, co-inventor of BASIC, passes away, aged 96.  The International Criminal Court issues arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahyu, former defence minister Yoav Gallant and Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, possibly killed by an Israeli airstrike in July, for war crimes in the prosecution of the offensive in Palestine.  After thirty-five years with the show, Pamela Hayden announces her retirement from The Simpsons.  Israel and Hezbollah reach a truce to stop the war in Lebanon.   Trump announced a tranche of punitive tariffs for Canada, Mexico and China that will only punish US businesses and consumers, a possibly add to inflationary pressure at the supermarket, a major factor in re-electing Trump to office.  Syrian rebels take Aleppo as government forces retreat.  

december: Trump nominates Kash Patel to head FBI, prompting Biden to give his son a blanket pardon.  South Korea declares martial law.  The CEO of a major America health insurance provider is assassinated in broad daylight in New York City.  Romanian constitutional court annuls election after suspected Russian interference.  Syrian rebels capture Damascus as Bashar al-Assad reported flees the country.  Taking advantage of the power vacuum, Israel launches heavy airstrikes on Syrian defences and infrastructure.  The diet of South Korea votes to impeach the country’s president.  Tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain passes away, aged 73.  A day after being tried in absentia for the war crime of using chemical weapons, a top Russian general was assassinated by an exploding e-scooter in Moscow.  The Pelicott rape case concludes in France.  A vehicle-ramming attack strikes the Magdeburger Christmas Market.  Russia accidentally downs an Azerbaijani civilian airplane while repelling Ukrainian attacks.  Former US president Jimmy Carter passes away, aged 100. 

10x10 (12. 070)

willow: Google’s quantum computing labs unveil a new microchip that operates at amazing speeds by being in many states simultaneously  

skin-deep: a look at the tattoos of Defence Secretary nominee Pete Hegseth 

mind-machines: Arthur C Clark (previously) forecasts the rise of artificial intelligence in 1978 

yuletide classics: a treasury of ten great holiday action movies—see also  

saturday night bath in apple valley: Something Weird features the very best in exploitation film from the 1930s through the 1970s—via Obscure Media 

they see your photos: an app that assesses one’s images, opposite to a picture is worth one thousand words  

free syria awaits you: Hayat Tahrir al-Sham enters Damascus as Bashir al-Assad flees to Moscow and political prisoners are freed  

mocha mousse: a defence of Pantone’s colour for 2025—it’s first brown hue  

pratfall: the history of slipping on banana peels—see previously here and here  

undercoat: solar paint developed by Mercedes Benz could revolutionise EV charging

synchronoptica

one year ago: underappreciated cinematic masterworks (with synchronoptica), multifunction gadgets plus The Wicker Man (1973)

seven years ago: prospecting for bitcoin plus transparency in airfare

eight years ago: dinosaur plumage, no memory for sickness, Italy’s efforts to reduce government gridlock and promote efficiency plus assorted links to revisit

nine years ago: an extraordinary Jubilee Year, chain of command plus 3D face masking

ten years ago: lucky charms, visualising the passage of time plus a first, fatal shooting by police in Iceland

blue line, red line (11. 855)

In a statement delivered amid the sonic booms of Israeli fighter jets conducting mock air raids in the skies over Beirut and actual strikes on the southern border, Hizbollah secretary general Hassan Nasrallah addressed for the first time publicly the coordinated denotations of booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies Tuesday and Wednesday that killed three dozen supposed operatives and seriously maimed thousands as low-tech communication devices exploded in orchestra after receiving the trigger signal at the same time. Israeli intelligence manufactured and distributed the rigged handheld pagers through a series of Taiwanese and Hungarian shell companies beginning in 2022 once it surmised that Hizbollah were avoiding cell phones for fear that their messages could be intercepted, and whilst this surprise simultaneous assault is arguably more targeted and discriminating than the bloodshed in Gaza, the injuries sustained happened in public, in the markets and in traffic and not on individuals actively carrying out the business of the organisation, in violation of the on prohibition on landmines and similar traps, causing mass panic and overwhelming Lebanon’s and Syria’s emergency care infrastructure. Potentially six thousand of people could have been killed all at once in this unprecedent attack. Nasrallah called the sabotage an act of war, vowing to keep fighting until aggression in Palestine ends. Though not acting during the immediate chaos, Israel is committing to this “new phase” of the war in order to return settlers to the north of the country on the countries’ disputed border region and the occupied Golan Heights.

operation nickel grass (11. 050)

To replace materiel spent in the first four days of the conflict, the Soviet Union began an airlift on this day in 1973 of military equipment to Syria and Egypt that led a coalition of Arab states against Israel (to gain purchase on the eastern bank of the Suez Canal and regain the Sinai) in the Yom Kippur/Ramandan War. The US followed suit with a massive resupply of Israel two days later, and having discovered that Prime Minister Golda Meir had authorised the assembly of thirteen nuclear warheads aimed at targets in Egypt and Syria, a move that was made easily detectable so as to conduce American aid and avoid further escalation, wanting officially to minimise the appearance of involvement. Upon receiving intelligence of this development, US president Richard Nixon ordered the deployment of the Air Force to transport all munitions possible to Israel via the Azores and along a narrow airspace over the Mediterranean to comply with European countries that did not wish to be party to a proxy war between the US and the Soviet Union. Although resupply missions on both sides slowed significantly after the 24 October cease-fire resolution, OPEC leaders enacted an oil embargo against America and her allies.

synchronoptica

one year ago: AI movie posters plus conjuring Swedish nonsense words

two years ago:  assorted links to revisit plus Upstairs, Downstairs (1971)

three years ago: revolutionary China, happy birthday to the Candy Bomber, the moon Triton, the role of sharks in vaccines plus coin-op convenience

four years ago: Dunbar Number, guerilla advertising plus more on noise pollution

five years ago: more on Osaka’s Expo’70 plus a shopping cart that gauges one’s mood

 

sergius & bacchus (10. 202)

Among the most popular paired saints with a cult going back to the fifth century, the Syrian Roman soldiers were, according to their hagiography, favoured officers in the army of Galerius (successor to Emperor Diocletian, toning down his persecutions but still strongly opposed to Christianity) until their secret adherence was exposed, they are venerated on this day in the Western Church to mark their martyrdom and the hands of their superiors, tortured (Bacchus went first and his ghost returned to encourage his compatriot to be steadfast and not disavow his faith) and beheaded. Tradition emphasises their closeness and inseparability, which has caused the couple to be embraced by the Catholic gay community—most accepting that their relationship had a romantic element to it and points to the rite, suggestive of a form of same-sex union, called ἀδελφοποίησις (adelphopoiesis, fraternisation or brother-making). Their patronage includes Arabs, Syria and army soldiers and their home church built in Constantinople—now known as the Little Hagia Sophia Mosque—is the among the city’s most splendid examples of Byzantine architecture, second only to its namesake.

embargo

On this day in 1973, OPEC (then OAPEC, the Organisation of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries despite Venezuela being a charter member) ministers came to a consensus to use their cartel powers to influence the West’s materiel and monetary support for Israel during the Yom Kippur War when the country made incursions into Syria and Egypt, advancing towards the economic and strategically important Suez Canal (see previously) and retaliated against Canada, Japan, the Netherlands, the UK and the US by a crippling quadrupling of prices, a shock to markets that precipitated the 1973 Oil Crisis.

Geopolitical antecedents factoring into this stand-off included the decrease in American petroleum production post-war and the rise of OPEC, the decision to float world currencies—unpegging them from the price of gold—with the US unilateral withdrawal from the Bretton Woods Accord in 1971 and subsequent recession, plus the never neglected opportunity for proxy warfare between the US and its allies and the Soviet Union on a new frontier. Because the embargo, which lasted until March 1974, failed to change the West’s stance on the Arab-Israeli conflict, history judges it as ineffective despite the long-term effect it had on international economics and gradually over the ensuing decades pushed the US towards more domestic exploration of fossil fuels and towards energy independence and globally pressured reforms for financial institutions to control for inflation.  Intermediate effects included fuel rationing, a slow-down in factory-orders, a shift in preference for smaller automobiles and a pivot towards China for manufacturing. 

mandatory syria

Negotiated and ratified in secret in May of the same year, the Manchester Guardian published an invective report detailing the memorandum of understanding between Britain and French ambassadors Mark Sykes and François Georges-Picot (see previously here and here) on this day in 1917 regarding the partition of a soon to be defeated Ottoman Empire days after it was presented to the Bolshevik government of Russia, whom first exposed it to the public, the arrangement contingent on its assent. With parallels to the present and storied abandonment of the Kurds, the terms of the treaty amplified and circulated to the British readership, the government was embarrassment by its betrayal to the Arabs, whom had been promised an independent homeland in the Levant (which was not on the map) in exchange for their revolt that destabilised the Empire and precipitated a victory for the Triple Entente. The consequences of this line in the sand are still informing and shaping geopolitics more than a century later.

i, in my great and unmatched wisdom

With no advance warning to Kurdish fighters or coalition partners, Trump announced the abrupt withdrawal of US troops from the Turkish-Syria border region.
This abandonment after five years of cooperation with Kurdish forces, whom have borne the brunt of defeating the Islamic State during Syria’s civil war though characterised as terrorists by Turkey, has prompted the Pentagon to deliver a stern warning to Turkey not to invade. Though Trump in principle agrees with the assessment that there should be no military incursion that would further destabilise Syria, pledging to economically destroy Turkey should it do so, removing soldiers from the cross-fire has essentially given Erdoğan a pass to carry on as he sees fit.

we have defeated isis in syria, my only reason for being there during the trump presidency

To the consternation and concern of US military top brass that have been pushing for a continued troop presence for stabilisation, rebuilding and not to afford the Cosplay Caliphate another chance to regain a purchase, Trump announced his intentions to redeploy all soldiers from Syria, some two thousand individuals.
While the majority of the territory once held by the terrorist group in a sliver of what it once was, the situation is still precarious and the likelihood of a revanchment seems in the realm of possibilities. Aside from the suffering of the Syrian population that might be forestalled, geopolitically Trump’s announcement—which he perhaps offers as a human-shield to deflect the ratcheting up of the Special Counsel Investigation into the campaign and administration’s ties to Russia and easing sanctions in exchange for real estate development opportunities but only serves to reaffirm the relationship—is a huge concession to Putin and Russian interests in the country and ensures that the rebellion will be quashed. Also by withdrawing from their base near the Turkish border, the US is abandoning its at least nominal ally in the Kurds and inadvertently (given the diplomatic tensions and trade disputes) by affording the Erdoğan government the chance to further marginalise this group.

apoplectic

A Syrian artist and activist, known only as Saint Hoax, debuts his latest performance piece called MonuMental—an inflatable tank with the bust of Donald Trump crowning the turret—is menacingly marauding through the streets of Beirut. Part of an overarching theme exploring how celebrity is a crisis of character, Saint Hoax hopes to reveal the underlying pathos that contrasts public façades. Learn more at Hyperallergic at the link above.