#a device detonated at a funeral

[zigcarnivorous]

Holy fuck the beast exploded more devices TODAY. THE PAGERS WERE YESTERDAY!!

TWO DAYS IN A ROW OF DEADLY EXPLOSIONS OF TAMPERED DEVICES PERPETRATED BY ISRAEL

https://www.palestinechronicle.com/new-explosions-rock-southern-beirut-multiple-lebanese-regions-amid-major-terror-attack-breaking/

By Palestine Chronicle Staff  

SEPTEMBER 18TH 2024

Explosions were heard in the southern suburbs of Beirut and several Lebanese regions, just a day after attacks targeted thousands of Lebanese citizens through wireless communication devices. 

According to the Lebanese news network Al-Mayadeen, the recent explosions focused on wireless communication equipment across various areas of Lebanon.

Reuters news agency reported, citing both a security source and an eyewitness, that the devices involved in Wednesday’s explosions were portable radios, unlike the pagers that were attacked the previous day. 

Al-Mayadeen reported that the devices, apparently ICOM V82s, detonated, and “due to the devices containing highly flammable lithium batteries, the explosions were severe.”

“The explosions caused massive fires in cars, motorcycles, apartments, and stores all over Lebanon,” the report added.

According to initial estimates reported by Al-Mayadeen were killed and dozens injured in the new attack.

The US-based news website Axios, citing two informed sources, said that this is “a second wave of an intelligence operation that started on Tuesday”.

“The walkie-talkies were booby-trapped in advance by Israeli intelligence services and then delivered to Hezbollah as part of the militia’s emergency communications system, which was supposed to be used during a war with Israel, the sources said,” according to Axios.

Media reports indicated that these new explosions coincided with the funeral of the son of a Hezbollah parliamentarian. It was noted that some of the affected radios were located in residential homes.

In response, the Lebanese Army Command issued a warning, advising people to avoid gathering in areas impacted by the security incidents to allow medical teams to reach the wounded.

Resistance Continues

During the funeral of several individuals killed in the explosions, Sayyed Hashem Safieddine, head of Hezbollah’s Executive Council, reaffirmed that the group’s resilience remains unshaken. 

He stated that Hezbollah’s adversaries fail to understand the depth of the resistance, which is rooted in a culture of sacrifice and perseverance. 

He emphasized that the fight would continue, with the wounded returning to the battlefield once recovered.

Major Attack

Thousands of Lebanese citizens were injured on Tuesday when their portable pager communication devices unexpectedly detonated. 

The explosions, which occurred across several areas including South Lebanon, and the Bekaa Valley, killed at least 12 people, including two children. 

The Lebanese Health Ministry stated on Wednesday that between 2,750 and 2,800 wounded people arrived at hospitals within half an hour. 

The number of serious injuries reached about 300 while 460 surgeries have been performed so far, mostly on the eyes and face.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

[muslims-matters]

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he okayed a deadly September attack involving exploding communications devices in Lebanon, the first time Israel has admitted involvement.

Hezbollah had previously blamed its arch-foe for the blasts that dealt a major blow to the group, and vowed revenge.

"Netanyahu confirmed on Sunday that he greenlighted the pager attacks in Lebanon," his spokesman Omer Dostri told AFP of the attacks.

Hand-held devices reportedly used by Hezbollah members detonated two days in a row in supermarkets, on streets, and at funerals in mid-September. The blasts killed nearly 40 people and injured close to 3,000, just before Israel ramped up its military campaign in Lebanon.

Attacks have intensified since late September, when Israel escalated its air offensive against Lebanon and later sent ground troops to invade the south of the country.

[skjam]

Pulp Fanfic Crossover Fodder: Dr. Goldfoot

Note: This is primarily based on Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine (1965).

Little is known of the background of Dr. Goldfoot. This includes not knowing his full name, if that even is his birth name, and where if anywhere he got his doctorate. He claimed descent from a pirate, a member of the Inquisition, and Attila the Hun's mentor in violence.

As of 1965, he appeared to be physically in his fifties, and had resided for some years in San Francisco operating a private cemetery and funeral home as a front for his other activities. It was in this year that he invented his best-known device, the Bikini Machine. The Bikini Machine created humanoid female-shaped robots with fairly complex programming, allowing them a limited ability to pass as human women. Each came with a gold-fabric bikini; it's not clear if they had actual female anatomy underneath that cloth.

Dr. Goldfoot supplemented the basic programming by downloading data from computer tapes directly to their memory banks. This was used primarily for giving them the ability to speak knowledgably about their targets' areas of interest.

The plan was to have these "girlbots" marry wealthy men, strip them of their assets, and transfer the wealth to Dr. Goldfoot. His goals beyond that are unclear.

Due to poor instructions by Dr. Goldfoot's henchman Igor. girlbot #12 "Diane" mistook Secret Intelligence Command (SIC) agent Craig Gamble for her target, millionaire Todd Armstrong. Craig, a nitwit only employed by SIC because his uncle Donald J. Pevney was the San Francisco office chief, only understood that the bizarre-acting woman he'd instantly fallen in love with had suddenly abandoned him (when Dr. Goldfoot corrected her commands) but this was enough to put him on the case.

Diane "met cute" with Todd and quickly persuaded him to marry her. At no time was the marriage consummated, but it's not clear if this was due to incapacity on #12's part or a part of a strategy to string Todd along until she possessed all his assets. Eventually, Craig and Todd teamed up to "rescue" Diane from Dr. Goldfoot, despite the fact she'd already been reprogrammed to forget she ever met them.

After a number of hijinks and a chase through San Francisco, Dr. Goldfoot and Igor were seemingly killed by naval bombardment. In reality, they survived, and the two men and Diane replaced the flight crew on a passenger jet to France.

By 1966, Dr. Goldfoot had become separated from Igor and Diane (the latter of whom may have married the German man she was flirting with on the plane) and was operating out of Italy. (Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs) He'd accepted Chinese funding to rebuild his Bikini Machine. This new version created "girlbombs" that could impersonate specific people and explode on command.

This time, the plan was to disrupt NATO war games by assassinating the various generals involved. The plan was thwarted by another SIC agent, Bill Dexter, and two Italian doormen named Franco and Ciccio. Dr. Goldfoot then attempted to detonate a nuclear bomb in Moscow to start World War Three, but this also failed and he was believed killed in the explosion. In fact, he survived, but no further activity of his has been recorded.

By the 1990s, Dr. Goldfoot's girlbot technology had been acquired by Virtucorp, the front organization for Dr. Evil, and somewhat improved. (See Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery.)

Girlbots are very sturdy, able to take a collision with a small automobile without being moved or taking noticeable damage. They can be pierced by small arms fire, but unless vital areas are specifically targeted, this does not impair their function in any way. They're also far stronger than they appear. (Fortunately, most of Dr. Goldfoot's girlbots were not programmed to use violence.) They have radio receivers which allow them to receive commands directly from a console Dr. Goldfoot also invented.

The first batch of girlbots, including #12, were mostly able to impersonate human women, but came off as eccentric. They relied on their good looks and aggressive courting tactics to distract targets from realizing there was anything odd.

In addition to the Bikini Machine, Dr. Goldfoot's technology included: opera glasses that sprouted poison spikes (never used on camera), laser lipstick, the ability to remotely control motorcars, and either remote viewing or multiple miniature cameras placed throughout San Francisco. The latter two were incorporated into the same console he used to communicate with the girlbots. He had some way of reviving the (recently?) dead, but the only person he is known to have used it on was Igor.

Dr, Goldfoot bore a strong resemblance to the actor Vincent Price. He always wore gold-fabric slippers, and it was implied at one point that his actual feet were also golden in color. He was fey in his mannerisms, although he did seem to appreciate the aesthetics of his Bikini Machine creations. He put little value on human life, and was fully willing for his girlbots to eliminate competition the hard way.

The mad scientist's grasp of geopolitics may have been a little shaky. He sent a girlbot with the appearance of a black woman to marry a person who would have been a white man in South Africa at the height of apartheid.

Crossover potential: A rather silly mad scientist who specializes in creating femi-form robots can have many uses, as long as the story is okay with that kind of humor. Assuming nothing else happens to him, Dr. Goldfoot would die of old age in the early 1990s.

Notably, Dr. Goldfoot's headquarters was not destroyed in the movie, so the U.S. government was presumably able to access his technology and study it. ("Top men.") Also, several girlbots were already out on assignment at the time of his defeat, and are presumably loose ends.

SIC is one of the many splinter intelligence agencies the fictional U.S. government sponsored during this time period to increase plausible deniability. The budget was apparently tiny, with the San Francisco office being headquarters in a two-room office, Craig and his uncle being the only two operatives, and Craig not having access to any spy gadgets or even a gun. (His salary was also miniscule--he considered a cheese sandwich at the cafeteria a suitable date meal.)

The fictional agency your main characters belong to may have absorbed SIC and its records if the story is set post-1966.

Have fun!

@krinsbez

[partisan-by-default]

Hezbollah hand-held radios detonate across Lebanon, sources say

BEIRUT, Sept 18 (Reuters) - Hand-held radios used by Hezbollah detonated on Wednesday across Lebanon's south and in Beirut's southern suburbs, a security source and a witness said, further stoking tensions with Israel a day after similar explosions launched via the group's pagers.

Three people were killed in Lebanon's Bekaa region, the state news agency reported, and dozens of people were wounded in the latest device blast.

At least one of the blasts took place near a funeral organized by Iran-backed Hezbollah for those killed the previous day when thousands of pagers used by the group exploded across the country and wounded many of the group's fighters.

The group, which was thrown briefly into disarray by the pager attacks, said on Wednesday it had attacked Israeli artillery positions with rockets, the first strike at its arch-foe since blasts wounded thousands of its members in Lebanon and raised the prospect of a wider Middle East war.

The hand-held radios were purchased by Hezbollah five months ago, around the same time that the pagers were bought, said a security source.

Israel's spy agency Mossad, which has a long history of sophisticated operations on foreign soil, planted explosives inside pagers imported by Hezbollah months before Tuesday's detonations, a senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters.

The death toll from Tuesday's blasts rose to 12, including two children, Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said on Wednesday. Tuesday's attack wounded nearly 3,000 people, including many of the militant group's fighters and Iran's envoy to Beirut.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk called for an independent investigation into the events surrounding exploding pagers.

A Taiwanese pager maker denied that it had produced the pager devices which exploded in an audacious attack that raised the prospect of a full-scale war between the Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel.

[warningsine]

At least 18 people were killed and 19 seriously wounded in suicide attacks targeting a wedding, a hospital and a funeral in northeastern Nigeria on Saturday, authorities said.

The region has been scarred by more than a decade of violence by jihadist group Boko Haram, which did not immediately claim responsibility for the string of attacks.

In one of three blasts on Saturday in the town of Gwoza, a woman with a baby strapped to her back detonated explosives in the middle of a wedding ceremony, according to a state police spokesman.

"At about 1545 (1445 GMT) a woman carrying a baby on her back detonated an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) she had on her at a crowded motor park," Borno State police spokesman Nahum Kenneth Daso said.

Women suicide bombers also targeted a hospital in the same town, which lies across the border from Cameroon. Another attack was later carried out at the funeral for victims of the wedding blast, authorities said.

At least 18 people were killed and 42 others injured in the spate of attacks, according to the Borno State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA).

"So far, 18 deaths comprising children, men, females and pregnant women" have been reported, agency head Barkindo Saidu said in a report seen by AFP.

Nineteen "seriously injured" people were taken to the regional capital Maiduguri, while 23 others were awaiting evacuation, Saidu said in the report.

A member of a militia assisting the military in Gwoza said two colleagues and a soldier were also killed in a separate attack on a security post, though authorities did not immediately confirm this toll.

Although Boko Haram has lost ground in recent years, jihadists continue to attack rural communities in Nigeria on a regular basis.

Over the course of the insurgency, Boko Haram has repeatedly deployed young women and girls to carry out suicide attacks. 

The group seized Gwoza in 2014 when its militants took over swathes of territory in northern Borno.

The town was taken back by the Nigerian military with help from Chadian forces in 2015 but the group has continued to launch attacks from mountains near the town.

Boko Haram has carried out raids, killing men and kidnapping women who venture outside the town in search of firewood and acacia fruits.

The violence has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced around two million in Nigeria's northeast.

The conflict has spread to neighbouring Niger, Cameroon and Chad, prompting the formation of a regional military coalition to fight the militants.

(AFP)

[houseofpurplestars]

⚡️| 🌍 BIG SUMMARY of all resistance operations today, December 18, against (US)-israeli forces

— 🇾🇪 Yemeni Armed Forces:

🔻Carried out a military operation against 2 ships associated with israel. The first ship, "SWAN ATLANTIC," loaded with oil, and the other, "MSC Clara," carrying containers, were targeted by 2 naval drones.

— 🇵🇸 Al-Qassam Brigades:

🔻Shelled military infiltrating forces north of Khan Yunis with mortars.

🔻Hit a military truck carrying IOF soldiers with an anti-personnel explosive, east of Khan Yunis.

🔻(Partially) destroyed 2 Merkava tanks in Khan Yunis & Beit Lahia

🔻Destroyed a military jeep with a Kornet anti-tank missile (ATGM), north of Gaza (+ video)

🔻Targeted a truck carrying a large number of IOF soldiers in Beit Lahia with a "TBG" explosive, followed by firing at them with machine guns.

🔻Successfully detonated an anti-personnel "television" explosive device targeting a Zionist infantry force, afterwards engaged with them from point-blank range and leaving all of its members either dead or wounded.

🔻Destroyed a Zionist APC & a military D9-bulldozer in Beit Lahia, additionally, it was followed by detonating multiple anti-personnel explosives targeting the soldiers who tried to rescue the wounded.

🔻Targeted an IOF force inside a building in the Maghraqa area, central Gaza, with a "TBG" explosive and an "RPG" rocket.

— 🇵🇸 Al-Quds Brigades:

🔻Seized a Zionist reconnaissance quadcopter drone "EVO Max 4T" from IOF soldiers, east of Khan Yunis.

🔻Shelled at a military vehicle positioned near "Qalbat Al-Nahda," east of Rafah, with heavy-caliber mortars.

🔻Shelled military gatherings in Juhar Al-Dik with heavy-caliber mortars.

🔻Sniped 2 Zionist soldiers in the Shujaiya neighborhood east of Gaza City.

— 🇵🇸 Martyr Omar Al-Qassem forces:

🔻Heavy artillery targeting military vehicles east of Rafah.

— 🇵🇸 Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades:

🔻Shelled military gatherings in the axes of Gaza City with heavy-caliber mortars.

— 🇵🇸 Mujahideen Brigades:

🔻Clashed with IOF soldiers using various weapons in the Shuja’iya axis.

— 🇵🇸 Al-Nasser Salah al-Din Brigades:

🔻A group of elite fighters clashed at point-blank range with an infantry force near Kamal Adwan Hospital, killing & wounding them, and after enemy aircraft intervened, 2 of the resistance fighters were martyred.

— 🟡 Hezbollah:

🔻Targeted a group of IOF soldiers & military vehicles near the Hamra site with appropriate weapons.

🔻Targeted 2 Iron Dome batteries, north of Kabri with artillery shells, achieving precise hits.

🔻Launched a rocket barrage at the occupied Al-Khalsa (Kiryat Shmona) in response to israel’s targeting of the funeral ceremonies in Aita al-Shaab.

— 🇸🇾 Syria

🔻 Launched 4 rockets towards the occupied Golan Heights.

This list did not include rockets fired from Gaza towards settlements.

@FotrosResistance

[the-firebird69]

CAPTAIN AMERICA: Brave New World Trailer (2025) Red Hulk | 4K UHD

They say that the Red Hulk is Harrison Ford and as soon as fat as hell fat nodules everywhere still taking the medicine loading up on it and he's going to be toast so he of course is one of the hulks and husband Zeus is thinking this is interesting and it is probably a causation of them sending the trikes and things when they are riddled or green Hulk or warrior Hulk and the thing is that they don't stay in there and they put the Hulk back in and they get beat up but the point is that they do that and they send it on down and it's motivation for them to come here and to use force and be stealth about it and try and activate it while they're here and wants those caverns are gone and the caverns in Mexico they can't really count on devices being detonated it's going to be over and there's probably a month or two left at the most so we think that they say they're gone actually have a funeral and they're not in their bodies and try and grab him there but it's possibly Todd who has to move because of Mac proper and they're waiting on them with everything and the storms are not helping and people went into the ship in their professionals and he's always been a little bit sharper than others but this is what's happening and it is why they would be sending stuff that and they want him to move they're having a hard times here and I figured it's much harder than they thought but that's comes after we think the Hulk configuration or really it's a formula

Hera

Olympus true too

It's very sharp of them to think of it and it is probably what it is they're all getting very sick their bodies are collapsing and failing they see these massive massive men and they stay that way for the most part and it kind of heals them and then they want to take over more power and they want to be incognito and they also want to be themselves and they know how to do all that so they're going ahead with it and they're going to start trying for each other and so forth so she's been and Trump we're going to keep doing it and they want to be the ones who send the trike the pair and they will be ironically so they might not be in other bodies and that time it's more game and just there is a plethora of it that it runs pretty much in a linear fashion and people are surprised but not always but usually so they're going to arrange for their own boys to have a problem but they're not their own boys one of them is close and the other is that this guy Dave he does all the time and they have to hold them out and they're going to use Tommy f against Todd and the probably Mac and Mac would be helping the orchestrate this

Hera

Sweet long-winded for a couple kids business yes it isn't it it really is but we're not telling them and they're trying to figure it out cuz it's so goddamn annoying

That guy today is fine we're going to get him fired it's a good idea the hell out of there you can't feel normal person you're nuts don't spit in there with the f****** touch it

Trying to imply his sick you stupid little idiot you got caught now people going to beat you up to death good

Mac Daddy actually run the place and I don't want you around I'm sick of trump to you and I need you out this is going to do it you can hurt those too and they hurt you back

I guess I got out of control but everyone's doing the spitting telling me off a lot of them it's kind of ruining my day it says with Spence we are spent and we're going to make mistakes so he's just going to have a stupid he wants and the joker is one of them the movie Arkham asylum with bat man is another one there's something about that building he says it's not from Auschwitz from Australia or something he thinks and with his friend was there his grandma and he pulled them out a lot of them and decimated them so the Russians are going to get drawn in and now that makes sense but it wasn't the Russian story it was not them and he hates this mental health stuff that people keep talking about

Seanskee

Oh it's not you everything's okay he's happy with it it says I don't want the goddamn trikes you stupid idiots it's actually truly doesn't ride motorcycles and he doesn't want to try it's even worse he says you don't have to concentrate this drive right into a building like Tommy f and for Christ's sake what you doing

Todd

I was in a trance I couldn't remember what the hell is doing and he says he's experienced it and it can be an emitter it's not really a chance and I know that for crazy and it kind of blocks your brain from moving or something I'm kind of experienced it it locks you into sophisticated to do it at that angle but really when you see the film the film has him in it and up at the whole way and you seen it centered and it's probably the person filming and I did figure that out this is an amazing person so we even survive this but really I somehow orchestrate this to happen it doesn't buy them and it's like really hung up on that cuz he doesn't have money so is that money at all and we're not really doing a great job in this regional City should for some reason he should but triked is not a great idea these things are terrible. It only ride a motorcycle short distance but people ride these trikes all over the place they're much safer but not for him he's also it would be for a while but he always wipes out eventually. It's going to happen with a funeral and he gets it now he's trying to understand it I'm making the deal happen and back then it could be the other way too but this way it's the other way usually it's opposite is not true it has to do with the message. If I got the money from him for those it would be a mac message and we probably interpret it it would be giving life if I'm doing it this way they're saying it's the offset taking it but I'm actually doing that they make it seem harmless and I'm not really going to have a ton of the work these guys are up for it and it's because their kids took them when they passed and Cherry should say he has not Jerry has not and he was not the one it was Uncle Joe. And that's what happened so we see the effect we understand that we're sick it's not that bad yet he says you're kidding that's a lot it's actually true that's a lot it's not really that bad but they rate of infection is not but the status of its location is really horrendous and it makes it very difficult to get out and it says and they might find a clothing brand in and fix it and that's how you fix it and you use power too. What's up Gaga in the bus just going to beat up and older kids happening to us and he was saying you you'll be young and stuff because you be doing things correctly to a portion of degrees he doesn't know what all this stuff with this motorcycle too but we'll do but it's kind of shake It up with time Todd has to move in Todd has to safely but that's why he's going to take a break and Dave too you won't let this guy do anything and really it's the one from Dave and that's why it's really more about the trike it's more lenient than Trump and Trump is going to make it happen to some kids to his own kid in Trump has to step off because he'll try to have him driving around oh I get it he says on the dealer and he says why didn't you step in and you'd see mine and she says I'm going to be there at the funeral and he says how are you going to do that and what was your character of the idiot that's threw me down the stairs and no that's what Trump's kids Alicia. And they'd be showing up and you would inherit stuff because they don't have anyone to give it to and that's what they would say it's not true or friends of yours and it's true

Hera

Olympus

Used to hang out with the two yeah I know it's hot a lot you hung out with Todd a lot and your friends with Dave before he says thank you very much it's like this show the old timers use and watch this is your life it's kind of funny talking to him it says now the other one is Lori which is really and I say this she's really me Rosemarie is her character. But she's stepped out and horrifically and we're all in trouble so yeah I plan on doing all this stuff

Rosemarie and I'm not Sherry I would be Emily blunt

Olympus

[allthenewzworld]

Explosions went off in Beirut and multiple parts of Lebanon in an apparent second wave of detonations of electronic devices, Hezbollah officials and state media said.

Walkie-talkies and even solar equipment were reportedly being targeted a day after hundreds of pagers blew up. At least nine people were killed and 300 were wounded in today's attacks, the Health Ministry said.

Several blasts were heard at the funeral in Beirut for three Hezbollah members and a child killed by exploding pagers the day before, according to Associated Press journalists at the scene.

An AP photographer in the southern coastal city of Sidon saw a car and a mobile phone shop damaged after devices exploded inside of them.by Hussein Malla

This is a developing story. See the latest updates at the link in our bio.

[cantsayidont]

A second wave of device explosions on 18 September 2024 injured at least 450 more people and killed at least 14 (the AP is saying at least 20); the pager explosions on 17 September injured almost 3,000 and have now killed 12.

AL JAZEERA notes:

Some observers have wondered if Wednesday’s blasts were similar to what happened with the pagers. With those, the supply chain might have been infiltrated and the devices loaded with 1 to 3 grammes (0.04 to 0.11oz) of a powerful explosive. It seems that at least some Hezbollah members believe the explosions are linked to batteries. Several of them quickly took the batteries out of their radios and tossed them away after one exploded during a funeral in a southern suburb of Beirut, according to the Reuters news agency. Pagers use radio transmission and reception as does, of course, a radio. Most of the impacted devices appeared to be communication systems, but there were also some reports of other devices exploding, like solar panels.

Based on the reports from Tuesday, I'm guessing the methodology was the same in both attacks: Mossad operatives managing to gain physical access to an array of devices being shipped into Lebanon and booby-trapping their batteries with small amounts of high explosive that could somehow be detonated remotely. The reports yesterday suggested the explosive used may have been PETN (pentaerythritol tetranitrate), which is heat-sensitive; I assume forensics will eventually have more conclusive results.

It doesn't appear Israel has taken credit for the attack, but they're almost certainly responsible. This kind of indiscriminate attack is very definitely a war crime, a violation of international law.

[head-post]

Exploding Lebanese devices: first pagers, now walkie-talkies and radios

Recent pager blasts across Lebanon passed the explosive baton to other devices, including hand-held radios and walkie-talkies, according to The Independent.

More explosions sounded in Beirut and other Lebanese cities on Wednesday, one of them near a funeral organised by Iran-backed Hezbollah for those killed by pager bombings the day before.

US officials familiar with the case said Israel decided to detonate the pagers used by the militant group Hezbollah earlier than planned out of concern that the operation would be uncovered.

Meanwhile, a Lebanese security source claimed that the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad planted explosives in thousands of devices months before they detonated. The same source said that the pagers, allegedly manufactured by a Hungarian company licensed to use the Taiwanese Gold Apollo brand, had been modified “at the production level.”

Wider threat

The simultaneous explosion of pagers and subsequent blasts of other devices could signal a serious threat to security in Lebanon.

From a technical point of view, the operation is not complicated. The power capacity of any battery could cause a rapid fire or explosion. The complexity lay in transmitting the right command to the devices.

The threat that downloading a command that looks like a software update could blow up any hardware, even Bluetooth headphones, is no longer an intelligence agency fantasy. In theory, a similar trick could be performed on an electrical vehicle, a walkie-talkie, or any other device with a battery and the ability to exchange radio signals.

The incident in Lebanon opened a new window of opportunity for hostilities and political terror. Meanwhile, the threat highlighted the need for import substitution to enhance personal security and minimise the risk of repeat bombings among both military and civilians.

Under such a scenario, even procuring components from other countries may become unsafe. Lebanon used Gold AP-900 pagers made in Taiwan. However, if the devices are manufactured domestically, the risk of explosion is minimised.

There are many corporations and groups capable of hiring specialists for this kind of mass terrorist attack. Most likely, even the organiser of the pager explosion did not consider the collateral damage.

The pager could easily have fallen into the hands of a child, or the detonation could have occurred when the person was in a crowded place. The incident in Lebanon is a reminder of the principles of humanity even in times of war between states.

Read more HERE

[isfeed]

At Least 18 People Killed in Multiple Suicide Bombings in Nigeria

Officials said that three female attackers had detonated explosive devices at a wedding and at a funeral in a city once ruled by Boko Haram. So far, no group has claimed responsibility. Source: New York Times At Least 18 People Killed in Multiple Suicide Bombings in Nigeria

[businesspr]

At Least 18 People Killed in Multiple Suicide Bombings in Nigeria

Officials said that three female attackers had detonated explosive devices at a wedding and at a funeral in a city once ruled by Boko Haram. So far, no group has claimed responsibility. source https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/30/world/africa/suicide-bombings-nigeria.html

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 4.17 (after 1950)

1951 – The Peak District becomes the United Kingdom's first National Park. 1961 – Bay of Pigs Invasion: A group of Cuban exiles financed and trained by the CIA lands at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro. 1969 – Sirhan Sirhan is convicted of assassinating Robert F. Kennedy. 1969 – Communist Party of Czechoslovakia chairman Alexander Dubček is deposed. 1970 – Apollo program: The damaged Apollo 13 spacecraft returns to Earth safely. 1971 – The Provisional Government of Bangladesh is formed. 1975 – The Cambodian Civil War ends. The Khmer Rouge captures the capital Phnom Penh and Cambodian government forces surrender. 1978 – Mir Akbar Khyber is assassinated, provoking the Saur Revolution in Afghanistan. 1982 – Constitution Act, 1982 Patriation of the Canadian constitution in Ottawa by Proclamation of Elizabeth II, Queen of Canada. 1986 – An alleged state of war lasting 335 years between the Netherlands and the Isles of Scilly declared peace bringing an end to any hypothetical war that may have been legally considered to exist. 1992 – The Katina P is deliberately run aground off Maputo, Mozambique, and 60,000 tons of crude oil spill into the ocean. 2003 – Anneli Jäätteenmäki takes office as the first female prime minister of Finland. 2006 – A Palestinian suicide bomber detonates an explosive device in a Tel Aviv restaurant, killing 11 people and injuring 70. 2013 – An explosion at a fertilizer plant in the city of West, Texas, kills 15 people and injures 160 others. 2014 – NASA's Kepler space telescope confirms the discovery of the first Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of another star. 2021 – The funeral of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, takes place at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.

[blueboxphenomenon]

The Shoreditch Incident

Sunday November 24th, 1963 and the London borough of Hackney is released from military cordon after clean-up crews worked the night hiding the evidence of what happened the previous day. By the time the news media gets access, the president of the United States of America has been assassinated, providing the perfect front-cover news story to bury what happened in London on that Saturday morning. Now, we have acquired top secret documents pertaining to the events of "the Shoreditch Incident."

On November 23rd, explosions rang out across Totter's Lane and Coal Hill Road in Shoreditch, London. Six soldiers were killed. The soldiers were granted military funerals, though one was given a more hushed-up burial a few days later. The newspapers would have you believe that these six military professionals were the victims of an unexploded bomb, however there do not appear to be any reports of a UXB made on that day. Coal Hill School, at the center of the activity, issued a letter to concerned parents regarding a gas leak that ignited. Was it a bomb, or a gas leak? Why were the military called to Shoreditch?

A terrorist attack by Russia?

Declassified documents now available thanks to the Freedom of Information Act show that the government were on high alert in 1963 due to multiple intelligence leaks to an alleged Russian spy ring operating out of London, with one particular police station a frequent target. Local cabbie William Pike was discovered to be transporting Russian documents on the morning of the 23rd of November and was arrested accordingly. Police also apprehended and questioned a potential ally of Pike's who was carrying an unusual communications device. The two, however, escaped custody and the unnamed girl who assisted him seemingly disappeared into thin air.

So were the explosions caused by a Russian bomb, deployed by communist spies operating out of London under the government's very noses? Did the government cover up the incident with tales of a gas leak to hide their own incompetence, or supress public fears of further attacks? Well... Pike went on to prove his innocence, and while the documents he was accused of transporting in his taxi self-destructed, the explosion was not big enough to take out six members of the British military. Indeed, the explosive barely scorched the table in the police cell where it was detonated.

A gas leak?

The letter issued by the school board brings to light further details. Not only were six soldiers killed during the incident, but so were a headteacher at the school, and a caretaker (Coal Hill is no stranger to such tragedies, as in that same year two teachers went missing, a female student vanished, and another female student was killed having been shot with silver bullets).

The media and the school board seem to be implying that the damage to the school on Coal Hill Road and the military maneuvers in Totters Lane were separate incidents. How likely is it that explosions in both locations happened at the same time due to different causes? An unexploded bomb, and a gas leak?

The key to all of this comes in identifying the military arm dispatched to Totters Lane. One would expect the Search Regiment Royal Logistic Corps for such a task. However, it was ICMG that were operating in Shoreditch on the 23rd of November, 1963.

At the time, ICMG operated in secret. However thanks to the accounts and memoirs of Group Captain Gilmore, the Freedom of Information Act, and 'the Zen Military' by Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart, we now know just what the ICMG was all about. And unsurprisingly for this blog, it's aliens.

Operating under Department C19, the Intrusion Counter-Measures Group (ICMG) was established in the early 60's in response to alien incursions, as a pre-cursor to UNIT. There had been multiple reports - covered up, of course - of alien incursions on Earth and the Shoreditch Incident would go on to cement in the minds of the British government that it was imperative to protect the UK not just from alien attack but from the fear of knowing the truth: that there are alien beings out there far more capable than our planet's military forces, that can easily come and go as they wish. This is the military branch that was called to Shoreditch.

So was it an alien bomb?

Readers, it was not even a bomb. Every facet of the reports - save the deaths - was fabricated. In truth, the explosions at both Coal Hill school and Totter's Lane were caused by alien invaders engaged in civil war, using Earth as their battleground.

On the 3rd of December, Military scientific advisor Rachel Jensen filed official reports regarding the xenomorphs seen in Shoreditch the previous November. She describes amoeboid creatures of around twelve inches in diameter possessed of vestigial limbs, operating inside of metallic casings. While the sample obtained from Totter's Lane appeared to have "substantial brain activity," she posited that the example extracted from Coal Hill was of superior breed. The second sample possessed genetically engineered enhancements, including a chitinous claw and operational appendages. The document includes a witness sketch of one of the creatures as seen with its casing, which is fitted with a large weapon.

The real story...

In autumn of 1963, the ICMG were on high alert due to an unusual spike in mysterious incidents in London. Many witnessed lights in the sky, unusual weather activity, reports of werewolves culminating in the paranoid murder of a Coal Hill student, a Satanic cult in Wycombe, witnesses claiming to see a man mutate into a horrible monster in a pub, and a series of mysterious disappearances in Shoreditch. It was as if a storm were brewing, and it came to a head on the 23rd of November.

Group Captain Gilmore was assigned a team to monitor Shoreditch, particularly the areas surrounding Coal Hill. He was assisted by Cambridge-educated chief scientific advisor Rachel Jensen, physicist Allison Williams of the British Rocket Group, Sergeant Mike Smith, and a team of hand-picked soldiers including Gary Jonathan Finch. Gary's son Clive Finch would go on to found the "Who Is Doctor Who?" website which drew attention to the mysterious traveller who appears frequently at incidents such as these.

Rachel Jensen and Allison Williams detected unusual magnetic activity - a pulse, artificial in origin - coming from Coal Hill Secondary School and I. M. Foreman's scrap yard on Totter's Lane. This lead the ICMG to an encounter with one of the metal-encased aliens. A firefight broke out at the scrap yard, resulting in the deaths of two of Gilmore's men. Once it became apparent the creatures were susceptible to ATRs, the tables were turned and the creature was killed. This would become Jensen's first sample of the alien lifeforms, extracted from the remains of the tank-like shell.

Two mysterious entities joined the ICMG around this time. One, a girl we can now identify as Dorothy 'Ace' McShane, founder of A Charitable Earth. The other, a man who answered only to the title "the Doctor."

The area was evacuated to protect civilians, with the cover of an unexploded bomb. A media blackout was called and cover stories disseminated.

As events unfolded over the course of three days, a second faction of the shelled aliens arrived both via the school's basement and through the landing of a shuttlecraft in the schoolyard. The two factions went to war, tearing up a small corner of Shoreditch while the ICMG intervened. Coal Hill would provide Jensen with her second sample of alien life, the augmented amoeboid. The ICMG and Coal Hill staff suffered fatalities as a result of the conflict, though thankfully the alien invaders were wiped out before the conflict could escalate any further.

Why these creatures chose Shoreditch for their battle is rumoured to be down to an artifact hidden in the area. Some say it was the mysterious Doctor who hid it there, bringing alien war to Earth and putting us on the interplanetary map as a target for alien invaders. However, these rumours come from Sergeant Mike Smith, who it came to light was a Nazi sympathiser liaising with local fascist organiser George Ratcliffe, who in turn was in service to one faction of the alien invaders. Both were killed during the incident, with Smith being denied a military funeral due to his fascist beliefs.

What ever the truth, Coal Hill School has remained the center of unusual activity in Shoreditch for many years, with reports of strange events surrounding the school continuing well into 2016...

[gothamsfinestdummy]

Anybody remember Batman: Duty? That two-parter from Legends of the Dark Knight?

‘Cause it’s friggin awesome.

The comic centers around the fact that (oh no!) Batman isn’t present to protect Gotham City at the moment, so it is up to Gordon to deal with Joker’s BS now.

Honestly my favorite part of the comic is Joker himself and his “oh Romeo, where art thou?” attitude. Some of it is funny and other parts made me think “dang he’s got it bad.”

(It also incorporates J’s belief that everyone except for he and Batman isn’t real. Which I think is super interesting. This was also explored in Joker’s Apprentice)

Here are some highlights:

Joker: “No one can stop me. No one! Except, of course, for the Batman. And he’s… he’s… Oh, say it again. Say it again.”

(Saying this^ as he’s hugging himself lmao)

Joker, looking up at the sky through a window: “It’s all so out of sync… I don’t know what’s wrong. Where are you, Batman? I’ve done my part. You can’t say I haven’t. You can’t!

“I’ve blown things up, I’ve killed policemen, dropped buildings on them… You should have been here by now.

“There is no reality in this world except for you and me. You’ll come—You have to come. Those are the rules. Please come, Batman. Please?”

He’s so dramatic. We love him.

Joker: “With no Batman… Who needs this dump?”

Joker: “Well, Frenchie… You want revenge, and that’s fine. But me, I just wanna dance with my man. I simply can’t understand why he’s not here.”

HOW. HOW DID THAT NOT GET CENSORED.

Anyways.

Joker, posing dramatically with his hand above his eyes: “Batman! Where are you? I set it all up so beautifully. It’s all so perfect… so classic! So epic! This was supposed to be the moment of our deaths.

“I know you’re out there somewhere, but you’re supposed to be here… now… with me! Don’t you love me anymore?”

I do declare, that is GAY.

And this is where I lost my MIND. Both from Joker’s commentary and the situation itself. Gordon is about to confront Joker but he IGNORES HIM and keeps up with his “oh Romeo, where art thou Romeo?” pleading.

Like, this:

Gordon: “All right, Joker… it’s all over.”

Joker: “Oh, Batman…”

Gordon: “Put the device down—now!

Joker: “Not even the charm of a goodbye kiss?”

IM GOING TO SLAM MY HEAD INTO THE TABLE. This line right here absolutely slayed me, may I request an open-casket funeral?

Joker: “No apologies? No explanations?”

Gordon: “On the deck—put it down!”

Joker, finally turning to face Gordon: “Just a brutish lackey dispatched to deliver your message of rejection?”

This isn’t really Batjokes, just Joker being an ass to Jim (it’s kinda funny too, I’m so sorry):

Joker: “You…? A mere dream? You think to contest with me? ME?! I don’t bother with my lessers—Errand boy!”

That line is SO funny to me, I lost my mind reading that.

But anyway, Gordon beats up J like a boss and grabs the detonator, preventing the explosion, but takes a pretty hard fall. Joker escapes and that’s the end.

But yeah this comic was WILD. Had a fun time reading it.