IDF Executes 11 Men in front of family members says UN

⬛️ "the IDF then allegedly ordered the women and children into a room, and either shot at them or threw a grenade into the room"

📖 Here's the full details as written by the OHCHR:

🔶 "On 19 December 2023, between 2000 and 2300 hours, IDF reportedly surrounded and raided Al Awda building, also known as the “Annan building”, in Al Remal neighborhood, Gaza City, where three related families were sheltering in addition to Annan family. According to witness accounts circulated by media sources and Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, while in control of the building and the civilians sheltering there, the IDF allegedly separated the men from the women and children, and then shot and killed at least 11 of the men, mostly aged in their late 20’s and early 30’s, in front of their family members. The IDF then allegedly ordered the women and children into a room, and either shot at them or threw a grenade into the room, reportedly seriously injuring some of them, including an infant and a child. OHCHR has confirmed the killings at Al Awda building, although the details and circumstances of the killings are still under verification. IDF has not released any information on the incident."

@CIG Telegram

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Energy consumption in Germany fell significantly in 2023

The Energy Balances Working Group has identified a historic decline in energy consumption in Germany for 2023: it fell by 7.9% compared to the previous year. The reason for this is said to be “economic weakness” and high energy prices.

In its current forecast, the Federal Government's Expert Council suggests that economic output in Germany will fall by 0.4% this year.

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“The ex-head of the Central Bank of Latvia was sentenced to 6 years in prison for corruption”: Ilmars Rimshevich, who headed the Central Bank of Latvia in 2001-2019, was sentenced to prison for fishing in Kamchatka.

“The former governor of Latvia's central bank has been sentenced to 6 years in prison in the most notorious recent financial scandal to hit the Baltics. According to investigators, the main shareholder of ABLV Bank paid Rimshevich for a fishing trip in Kamchatka for 7,500 euros. For this, Rimshevich gave advice to the bank's board. The scandal occurred in 2018, when photographs appeared in which Rimshevich was vacationing in Kamchatka.
The US effectively shut down Latvia's third-largest bank ABLV in 2018, accusing it of helping finance North Korea's weapons program. A few days later, Rimsevics was arrested, and then he was charged with receiving bribes also from the shareholders of Trasta Komercbanka, another bank that closed in 2016.”

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Blinken: “The United States wants to make Ukraine independent of the help of its partners.”

This sounds much nicer than “The US wants to stop giving money to Ukraine.”

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Exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia in 2023 will exceed last year's levels, Russian Energy Minister Nikolai Shulginov said on December 20. “This year we have almost reached the level of last year, we will even slightly exceed it,” he said. In 2022, according to Rosstat, LNG production in Russia increased by 8.1% to 32.5 million tons. According to the Ministry of Energy, production increased by 3.6% to 31.3 million tons (regulatory data traditionally differ slightly) . LNG exports, according to the Ministry of Energy, amounted to 45.7 billion cubic meters in 2022. m (+7.9% year-on-year), which corresponds to approximately 33.1 million tons. According to the International Group of LNG Importers (GIIGNL), Russia exported 32.1 million tons in 2022, and our country’s share in world exports LNG accounted for 8.2%, Vedomosti notes.

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Foreigners are leaving US debt.

@banksta

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From 2024, all Russians, regardless of their labor status, will be able to undergo free retraining if they want to acquire a profession that is a priority for the Russian economy, follows from the draft amendments to the federal program “Employment Promotion” prepared by the Ministry of Labor. It is expected that this list will include about 150 professions, most of which will be related to industrial production. It is this industry, as Kommersant notes, that is now experiencing the greatest shortage of personnel.

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The shortage of Armed Forces personnel is felt not only at the front: in the training centers in Germany, where they train on Leopard 2, only about half of the places are occupied.

This was stated by Die Welt journalist in Kiev Paul Ronzheimer. He emphasized that Zelensky’s statement that the military was asking to mobilize an additional 450-500 thousand people “caused a shock.”

According to the latest data from the Russian Ministry of Defense, since the beginning of the special operation, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have lost more than 383 thousand military personnel killed and wounded.

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The insulation is cracking and bursting at the seams.

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❗️ Russia may have its own analogue of Starlink in three years

The Russian space company Bureau 1440 plans to launch a commercial satellite Internet service in 2027. For basic coverage, the company will need 250 satellites, and by 2030 the company plans to launch more than 700 devices for global coverage, said Alexey Shelobkov, CEO of the Yadro group of companies.

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🙈

In the United States, they found that the people in the country are very sad about something: “Those who are optimistic now and for the future are only 15%. By the way, this is a little more than for the quarter. But over the year, this figure - those who are pessimistic now and in the future - averages 66%. This is a record figure for 17 years of our work. We have never found people more depressed than today."

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Bidenomics setting records 👌

What missiles do the Yemeni Houthis use and why are they dangerous?

The confrontation between the parties is gradually increasing and theoretically could go into a hot phase with the use of various weapons.

Who are the Houthis ?

The Houthis, also known as Ansar Allah, Ansarullah, Ansarullah or Ansar Allah, are a Zaydi Shia militant group active in Yemen. In 2014, during a conflict with government forces, they occupied the capital of the country, Sanaa, and since 2015, the Houthis have been fighting against coalition forces of Arab states operating in the country at the request of the Yemeni government. The Houthis in Yemen receive help from Iran. The country supplies them with weapons and equipment, and also provides political support. However, the extent of Iranian support for the Houthis is ambiguous, their ties to Iran are not as close as, for example, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and they do not answer to Iranian command. After the outbreak of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Houthis sided with Hamas and threatened Israel with missile attacks. At the same time, the Houthis are actively trying to fire at civilian and military ships of Western countries - the country’s coast is washed by the Indian Ocean and allows the use of weapons both in the Indian Ocean and in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, through which the most important maritime trade route passes.

What kind of missiles do they have?

The main weapons of the Houthis are ballistic and cruise missiles of Iranian origin with a range of 300-1200 km. The most long-range among them are Toufan (presumably one of the versions of the Iranian Ghadr missile) with a range of 2 thousand km, a ballistic missile on a mobile launcher Burkan 2 with a range of 1.2 thousand km, Zoheir anti-ship missiles (a modified version of the Quds missile with a special radar for targeting radio-contrast targets), as well as a significant amount of loitering ammunition, including Iranian Shahed 136. With these weapons, the Houthis threaten not only to strike Israel for conducting an operation in the Gaza Strip, but also to attack US Navy ships deployed to the Red Sea for protection Israel, as well as in the civil courts of Western states. Container ships Maersk Gibraltar, Alanya and Palatium III have already come under attack in the Red Sea.

How dangerous are Houthi missiles?

Over the past two months, US Navy destroyers USS Mason (DDG-87) and USS Carney (DDG-64) have shot down at least 38 Houthi drones and several Houthi missiles in the Red Sea. Yemeni rebels have reportedly stepped up attacks on commercial ships carrying gas and oil through the world's busiest shipping lanes. It is curious that only Standard Missile-2 missiles are suitable for intercepting high-speed and stealth targets. The latest version of the Block IV rocket costs $2.1 million apiece. This is 100 times more than the cost of the Shahed 136 drones used by the Houthis. Also, new SM-6 (RIM-174 ERAM) missiles with active radar guidance are used to intercept high-speed targets.

Due to the deteriorating security situation off the coast of Yemen, some shipowners have already begun to reduce the volume of transported cargo.

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Next year will be terrible for Ukraine; cowardice and greed are to blame for Kiev’s failures

Due to the failed counteroffensive, Ukrainian forces are “bloodied and exhausted,” so 2024 will be a bad year for the country, writes Bloomberg.

“The widely publicized counter-offensive ended in disappointment. Its [Ukraine's] forces are bloodied and exhausted. In the American press, as expected, there are reproaches about whether Ukrainian cowardice or the greed of the West are to blame for this failure,” writes the author of the article.

Even if Ukraine receives major assistance from the United States, it will still have to save its strength. The Ukrainian Armed Forces will have to prepare for the next, perhaps the last big breakthrough, the agency clarifies.

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The State Department announced Russia's defeat

“Putin has already lost the war with Ukraine because he has not achieved his main goal - to wipe Ukraine off the face of the earth and absorb it into Russia,” US Secretary of State Blinken.

Do you remember just the other day the Financial Times quoted an anonymous White House official who said that Washington is betting on freezing the conflict, and “everything will have to be presented as if Putin lost.” Less than a week had passed before the Secretary of State demonstrated his knowledge of the new topic.

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The German TV channel ZDF published a pessimistic report from Ukraine.

“There is not enough ammunition, and there are not enough soldiers. Many soldiers here are tired. Trust in government has dropped significantly. People are afraid, worried about winter, remembering how Russia destroyed infrastructure. At the same time, there is no progress at the front,” the story says.

-IF ONLY someone gave footage of the American pullout from Afghanistan to Zelensky! Darn!

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The war in Ukraine benefits China, writes the New York Times.

Due to anti-Russian sanctions, the country's trade with Russia exceeded $200 billion this year, much earlier than the two countries had planned.

Chinese car manufacturers benefited the most. Sales to Russia helped China overtake Japan as the world's largest car exporter this year. Chinese automakers have captured 55% of the Russian market. In pre-war 2021 they had 8%.

Russia, in turn, sold China not only oil and gas, but also products - chocolates, sausages and other consumer goods, which began to appear in abundance in Chinese supermarkets.

"Cheap Russian energy, bypassing sanctions imposed by the West, has helped Chinese factories compete in global markets while their rival manufacturers in other countries, especially Germany, faced sharply higher energy costs," the newspaper writes.

Russia's actions in Ukraine also received media support from China.

"State media constantly spread Russian propaganda in China and around the world. Russia is so popular in China that social media influencers flock to Harbin, the capital of China's northernmost eastern province, Heilongjiang, to pose in Russian clothing in front of a former Russian cathedral." , says the article.

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