Robert Bor – ÏӨ

Thank you. Over time, more and more people will feel safe to admit they fell for Russian propaganda.

Having seen the infamous 47-minute compilation of the 7 Oct atrocities with my own eyes (not publicly available), I can attest that the Silenced No More report, which is freely available online, is even worse. It's just words on a page, but it leaves enough to the imagination to be even more horrific than the video. At least for me. In the 47-minute compilation, there is some evidence of sexual sadism, but not much. Probably for two reasons: proud though Hamas was of massacring Jews, they were less keen on broadcasting scenes of sexual depravity. And the Israeli government likely declined to include the most horrific footage out of respect for the victims. The report is exhaustively documented, horror story after horror story. I've read it only once, and I won't do so again. Especially the sections about the Nova festival are extremely disturbing. So I asked Claude to summarize the documented patterns in the report: - Rape and gang rape, with victims passed between attackers in sequence, witnesses describing laughter throughout - Targeted gunshots to groin, abdomen, buttocks and face; genital mutilation of both women and men - Rape followed by execution—victims shot or stabbed immediately afterward, some shot in the head during the assault - Rape continuing after victims were dead - Sexual mutilation—breasts severed, genitals cut off or shot - Burning, including deliberate burning of the groin; bodies set alight with accelerants - - Hands bound behind backs; bodies tied to trees and poles along the road - Sharp objects inserted into victims' genitals - Women raped in view of their desperate partners, who were then killed - Male victims gang-raped, beaten, and threatened with castration - Dismemberment and decapitation These findings of systematic sexual violence and torture are corroborated by the UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict (2024) and the UN Commission of Inquiry (2024). Just one quote from a survivor: "I heard one rape where they were passing her around. She was probably injured, judging by her screams—screams you have never heard anywhere. It's between silence and screams, between pain and wanting to die. These are screams... it's something I have never heard in my life, and I have no way to explain to you what it sounds like. But it's screams. It's screams. It was simply horrific. And after one finished, he told another to go up 'Ta'al' [in Arabic], like to the next one. And apparently there was a round... And after they finished, they shot her." She continued: "You hear the screams, and then you hear silence. You hear a bang—and silence. And then there's a kind of calm. And then you say: okay, it's over at least. She's done with it. And like that with each person they abused—you heard. The moment they were killed, I said, 'Oh my God, finally, it's over.'" You privileged Westerners have no idea how you would react if this happened to you and your loved ones—if a group committed these atrocities, vowed to repeat them again and again, and openly declared that it would not stop until your country no longer existed. You have no idea. civilc.org/silenced-no-more

Long story short, what I believe Ukraine is doing now and what implications hitting, let’s say, half of these facilities would have. (Note that ONLY TWO of these warehouses are not within reach for Ukrainian drones). With the crisis of offline retail sales that happened in the last two years in Russia, online shopping became the key way for the locals in some regions to purchase goods besides groceries. Wildberries is Russia’s dominant online marketplace (often called the “Russian Amazon”), processing millions of orders daily and supporting a large share of the country’s rapidly growing e-commerce sector (which reached around 8.5% of GDP recently, with strong double-digit growth). Burning the warehouses would halt fulfillment for a huge volume of goods (fashion, electronics, household items, etc.). This could cause immediate revenue losses in billions of rubles, ripple effects to millions of consumers, and a temporary shift to physical retail or competitors like Ozon – though the latter couldn’t fully absorb the capacity overnight. And I guess, Ozon might be next. If revenue is lost - taxes are lost. Another side of the story is labor market. Wildberries employs tens of thousands directly (with large warehouses like Elektrostal staffing thousands) and supports far more indirectly through its ecosystem. In a country with already tight labor markets in some regions, this would add localized unemployment pressure and reduce consumer spending power, creating secondary drags on retail and services. And finally, wartime logistics. Wildberries’ extensive warehouse and distribution network serves as a critical dual-use logistics backbone in Russia. While primarily a civilian e-commerce platform, it handles vast volumes of goods – including electronics, fiber-optic cables for FPV drones, body armor and other items that can support military efforts. Halving capacity would create bottlenecks in moving these items to manufacturers, volunteers, or frontline units. This could slow drone production/assembly, repair of equipment, and ad-hoc procurement that bypasses official military channels. Of course, not all military supplies go through Wildberries. The Russian army has its own official supply systems, and other online platforms like Ozon. Plus, Russia’s war-focused economy and income from oil and gas provide some protection. (Though, Ukraine takes care of it, too). However, repeated attacks or major damage like this would make logistics less efficient, increase costs, and force changes that could weaken the military’s ability to stay supplied over time.

In mijn stadje Annecy is sinds maart een klein wonder gebeurd, nadat de groene burgemeester door de kiezer naar huis werd gestuurd. De verloedering is een halt toegeroepen. De lokale bidonville (de afgelopen jaren was er een echte sloppenwijk met golfplaten-hutjes ontstaan op loopafstand van het centrum) is afgebroken en de toegangsweg geblokkeerd. Het zwerfafval is opgeruimd. De stad oogt weer schoon. De groepen drugsgebruikende en dealende illegale immigranten die zich ’s avonds in het park en langs de rivieroever ophielden, zijn verdwenen. Mensen kunnen weer normaal en veilig over straat. En misschien wel het mooiste detail: de fonteinen van Annecy werken weer. Jarenlang stonden ze droog, omdat de groene burgemeester meende dat dit nodig was om de planeet te redden. Dat in een stad met een gigantische waterbron onder het meer, en bovendien een van de natste regio’s van Frankrijk. De les voor Nederland, en zeker voor Amsterdam, lijkt me duidelijk.

Herhaling voor alle roeptoeters die beweren dat het schrappen van het meest extreme scenario het succes van de 'maatregelen' bewijst. VS Energieminister Wright: "de 10 biljoen dollar, wereldwijd geïnvesteerd in 'duurzame' elektrificatie, de slechtste investering in de menselijke geschiedenis."

Dit is zó huge. Hallucinant. Krankzinnig. 😳 Het IPCC erkent wat al tijdlang rondging: Het hoogste rampscenario, 8.5, strookt niet (meer) met werkelijkheid. ⚠️ WAT EEN GEVOLGEN heeft dit. 📢 🚨 HAAST ALLES WAT U LAS OVER KLIMAATTOEKOMST, KLOPT NIET. 🚨

🧵 @BureauBeke . Nooit van gehoord? Toch bepalen hun rapporten al 30 jaar mee hoe Nederland naar asiel, COA-incidenten en "omwonenden van AZC's" kijkt. 454 publicaties. Grotendeels betaald met publiek geld. Tijd voor een draadje.

Because we get asked a lot. The Technological Republic, in brief. 1. Silicon Valley owes a moral debt to the country that made its rise possible. The engineering elite of Silicon Valley has an affirmative obligation to participate in the defense of the nation. 2. We must rebel against the tyranny of the apps. Is the iPhone our greatest creative if not crowning achievement as a civilization? The object has changed our lives, but it may also now be limiting and constraining our sense of the possible. 3. Free email is not enough. The decadence of a culture or civilization, and indeed its ruling class, will be forgiven only if that culture is capable of delivering economic growth and security for the public. 4. The limits of soft power, of soaring rhetoric alone, have been exposed. The ability of free and democratic societies to prevail requires something more than moral appeal. It requires hard power, and hard power in this century will be built on software. 5. The question is not whether A.I. weapons will be built; it is who will build them and for what purpose. Our adversaries will not pause to indulge in theatrical debates about the merits of developing technologies with critical military and national security applications. They will proceed. 6. National service should be a universal duty. We should, as a society, seriously consider moving away from an all-volunteer force and only fight the next war if everyone shares in the risk and the cost. 7. If a U.S. Marine asks for a better rifle, we should build it; and the same goes for software. We should as a country be capable of continuing a debate about the appropriateness of military action abroad while remaining unflinching in our commitment to those we have asked to step into harm’s way. 8. Public servants need not be our priests. Any business that compensated its employees in the way that the federal government compensates public servants would struggle to survive. 9. We should show far more grace towards those who have subjected themselves to public life. The eradication of any space for forgiveness—a jettisoning of any tolerance for the complexities and contradictions of the human psyche—may leave us with a cast of characters at the helm we will grow to regret. 10. The psychologization of modern politics is leading us astray. Those who look to the political arena to nourish their soul and sense of self, who rely too heavily on their internal life finding expression in people they may never meet, will be left disappointed. 11. Our society has grown too eager to hasten, and is often gleeful at, the demise of its enemies. The vanquishing of an opponent is a moment to pause, not rejoice. 12. The atomic age is ending. One age of deterrence, the atomic age, is ending, and a new era of deterrence built on A.I. is set to begin. 13. No other country in the history of the world has advanced progressive values more than this one. The United States is far from perfect. But it is easy to forget how much more opportunity exists in this country for those who are not hereditary elites than in any other nation on the planet. 14. American power has made possible an extraordinarily long peace. Too many have forgotten or perhaps take for granted that nearly a century of some version of peace has prevailed in the world without a great power military conflict. At least three generations — billions of people and their children and now grandchildren — have never known a world war. 15. The postwar neutering of Germany and Japan must be undone. The defanging of Germany was an overcorrection for which Europe is now paying a heavy price. A similar and highly theatrical commitment to Japanese pacifism will, if maintained, also threaten to shift the balance of power in Asia. 16. We should applaud those who attempt to build where the market has failed to act. The culture almost snickers at Musk’s interest in grand narrative, as if billionaires ought to simply stay in their lane of enriching themselves . . . . Any curiosity or genuine interest in the value of what he has created is essentially dismissed, or perhaps lurks from beneath a thinly veiled scorn. 17. Silicon Valley must play a role in addressing violent crime. Many politicians across the United States have essentially shrugged when it comes to violent crime, abandoning any serious efforts to address the problem or take on any risk with their constituencies or donors in coming up with solutions and experiments in what should be a desperate bid to save lives. 18. The ruthless exposure of the private lives of public figures drives far too much talent away from government service. The public arena—and the shallow and petty assaults against those who dare to do something other than enrich themselves—has become so unforgiving that the republic is left with a significant roster of ineffectual, empty vessels whose ambition one would forgive if there were any genuine belief structure lurking within. 19. The caution in public life that we unwittingly encourage is corrosive. Those who say nothing wrong often say nothing much at all. 20. The pervasive intolerance of religious belief in certain circles must be resisted. The elite’s intolerance of religious belief is perhaps one of the most telling signs that its political project constitutes a less open intellectual movement than many within it would claim. 21. Some cultures have produced vital advances; others remain dysfunctional and regressive. All cultures are now equal. Criticism and value judgments are forbidden. Yet this new dogma glosses over the fact that certain cultures and indeed subcultures . . . have produced wonders. Others have proven middling, and worse, regressive and harmful. 22. We must resist the shallow temptation of a vacant and hollow pluralism. We, in America and more broadly the West, have for the past half century resisted defining national cultures in the name of inclusivity. But inclusion into what? Excerpts from the #1 New York Times Bestseller The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West, by Alexander C. Karp & Nicholas W. Zamiska techrepublicbook.com

Zodra Oekraïne de oorlog heeft gewonnen, schiet hun prestige en zelfbeeld omhoog. De EU en NAVO hunkeren beiden naar een land met ervaring in conventionele oorlogsvoering. Mark my words, Oekraïne wordt een regionale macht die economisch een renaissance gaan meemaken.

U.S. 🇺🇸 measures under Trump against Russia - attacked Venezuela 🇻🇪 (Russian ally) - attacked Iran 🇮🇷 (Russian ally) - is threatening Cuba 🇨🇺 (Russian ally) - sanctioned importers of Russian oil (🇮🇳) - Stopped Russian oil tankers - Gave Ukraine 🇺🇦 target files for Russian refineries U.S. 🇺🇸 measures under Trump against Europe - rhetoric - tariffs You don’t have to like Trump, but he is not a Russian asset - and he isn’t a real enemy of Europe neither, but an critical ally. Besides all his words he damaged Russia more than every other U.S. president since Ronald Reagan. Look at what he does, not what he says.

To those speaking of iran's infrastructure being destroyed as a consequence of this war: Let’s talk about your staggering hypocrisy. When they set the Rasht market ablaze with our people trapped inside, your heart didn't bleed. You felt absolutely nothing for the innocent lives burning to ash. But now that a bridge in Karaj gets blown to pieces, suddenly you want to weep over "Iranian infrastructure"? Let me tell you exactly what kind of bridge this was. It was never meant for us. Not a single civilian has ever set foot on it. It wasn't even open to the public. It was a phantom structure, built for one reason and one reason only: to connect two IRGC military bases and serve as a direct, covert artery to an underground missile city. It was carved right behind the Azimiyeh mountains, stretching west toward Radar Mountain. God only knows what dark, malignant operations these terrorists are hiding in the tunnels beneath that rock. In short: it was a pure military asset for an occupying terror syndicate. So yes, when I saw the sky light up with that explosion, I cheered. I watched their concrete shatter, and I smiled. Because it meant only one thing: another massive, crippling blow to the terror machine of the Islamic Republic that holds my country hostage. You can mourn the rubble of their military bases all you want. When this occupation is finally eradicated, we will build our own bridges.

Iran was trying to use the North Korean model to get a nuke: create sufficient conventional deterrence so you won’t be challenged in acquiring one (it’s called the Seoul Hostage Problem). This has been explained over and over since day one. Everyone claiming shifting goalposts or no imminent threat has been lying. The reason North Korea was allowed to get nukes is because Seoul (and its 10 million inhabitants) is within artillery and rocket range of North Korea. During the 1994 nuclear crisis, the Clinton administration seriously considered airstrikes on North Korea’s Yongbyon reactor but backed off precisely because of the artillery threat to Seoul. Iran was trying to accomplish the same by stockpiling missiles and drones which would have had the same deterrent effect. The proof is what Iran has been doing in the past month: attacking all its neighbors in order to pressure the US to stop attacking it Beyond this, they were building medium-range ballistic missiles that could reach Paris and London, meaning all of Europe could be held hostage as they built a nuclear bomb. The reason Iran has not built a nuclear weapon until now is not because it couldn’t, but because it knew it would be attacked and denied this capability. So by allowing them to continue developing this conventional deterrence, you would be allowing Iran to get a nuclear weapon. And unlike North Korea, Iran is led by an eschatological death cult Reagan saw nuclear mutually assured destruction (MAD) as both morally bankrupt (because of the innocent-body-count problem) and dangerously fragile because it assumed flawless rationality between adversaries…this means it only takes one irrational actor to destroy the world. Working backwards from the conclusion that Iran’s Islamist regime must never have a nuclear weapon, it was necessary for the US to attack Iran to deny it the conventional capacity to hold the entire eastern hemisphere hostage. Every European leader knows this and behind the scenes praises the US for this action. But they are cowards, held hostage by their own internal Muslim populations, and so adopt these ridiculous public positions. This was never about Israel. And if your argument is that Iran should be allowed to get a nuclear weapon then you are a fool and a traitor to western civilization…you’re a useful idiot

POTUS announces a 5 day ceasefire against Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure. Looks like a deal is close.

🚨 Mark Rutte, head of NATO, refuses attack Trump or Israel and steps up ! “The good news is 22 countries, most NATO, are coming to answer the President's call in the Strait of Hormuz

🚨 Victor Davis Hanson: THE SIGNALS ARE ALL POINTING THE SAME DIRECTION No U.S. analyst knows better how to cut through the fog of war than Stanford University Prof. @VDHanson. In the clip below, Hanson, who’s studied how wars end for 50 years, says the tide has turned in America’s favor against Iran. Forget the rancid propaganda flowing from all quarters related to the Iran conflict and how it is going - Hanson says look at how everyone else is behaving. Hanson’s Key Points: • Europeans: They never touch a conflict until they smell victory. Early on? Crickets. Now they’re quietly moving assets and offering support. Pure calculation — they’ve read the battlefield and decided which side wins. • Gulf petro-states: Saudis, Emiratis, Qataris survive by reading the room perfectly. They’re expelling Iranian attachés, silently intercepting Iranian missiles over their capitals, and the UAE just reaffirmed its $1.4 trillion investment commitment to the U.S. mid-war. These are not gestures — they’re bets. And they’re all-in on America. • Al Jazeera: The Qatari state network that usually bashes U.S. actions (and hosts Hamas offices) is now calling America’s bombing campaign “brilliant” and “underestimated.” When the outlet that hosts both the biggest U.S. air base and Hamas praises U.S. effectiveness, the message is unmistakable: they think we’re winning. • Military reality: A-10 Warthogs and Apache gunships are now flying strike missions inside Iranian airspace at will. These slow, low-flying platforms only appear when enemy air defenses are effectively gone. Confirms what’s really happening on the ground. Iran’s only play left is rope-a-dope: drag it out, hope U.S. public opinion flips, pray midterms pressure Trump to quit. VDH’s verdict: If Trump sees it through — and he will — the regime falls. Not in years. Pretty soon. Bottom line: Watch what people do, not what they say. Every player with skin in the game is betting on America. The signals don’t lie. #Iran #Europe #Warthogs #Trump @AlJazeera