#baghdad central

[whencyclopedia]

This map illustrates the Silk Road in the late 8th century, a vital network of trade and cultural exchange across Eurasia. In the east, the Tang Dynasty controlled much of the Silk Road, linking China to the trade networks of Central and South Asia. In the west, the Abbasid Caliphate, with Baghdad at its center, integrated Silk Road commerce into the broader Islamic economy, extending connections...

[divinum-pacis]

Iraqi Catholics light candles during the feast day of the Assumption of blessed Virgin Mary at Virgin Mary Church in central Baghdad, Iraq, Thursday, Aug. 15, 2024. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)

[xhxhxhx]

I'm trying to write these earlier in the day.

I used to put off writing until I finished the smaller, more tractable tasks I set for myself. But by the time I finished the little things, I had no energy for writing.

Now, though, I find I don't have the energy for the little things if I start writing too late in the day. If I start writing late enough, I don't have the energy to exercise.

It's 10:15 a.m. Let's see if I can't finish this with energy to spare.

I.

I write to you from San Francisco, a small town on the Pacific Coast of California, servicing a patchwork of commuter suburbs around what we call the "San Francisco Bay Area."

Back in the 1950s, they called the City "Baghdad by the Bay," after its profound ethnic and religious divides, low-intensity urban warfare, and decrepit public infrastructure.

It's awful. Even here in the Green Zone.

II.

Americans like to say that San Francisco has a "Mediterranean" climate. And it's true that it has a Köppen climate classification of Csb, which we call a "warm-summer Mediterranean climate."

Köppen is a three-tier classification scheme. It designates climates by three-letter labels, with each letter dividing the world into finer and finer categories.

The first Köppen letter divides the world into five parts, each designated by the first five letters of the alphabet: tropical A; arid B; temperate C; cold D; and polar E.

Four of the five letters separate the world into mutually-exclusive categories by mean temperatures in the hottest and coldest months, making for a neat algorithm.

If it's above 10ºC in the coldest month, it's tropical A, else:

If it's above 0ºC in the coldest month, it's temperate C, else:

If it's above 10ºC in the hottest month, it's cold D, else:

If it's below 10ºC in the hottest month, it's polar E.

Arid B is an irregularity. It's based on a precipitation threshold, not mean monthly temperatures. It's also hard to characterize in a single phrase, since it varies with the seasonality of the precipitation. It's higher if the precipitation comes in warm months.

But never mind that. It's not arid in San Francisco. That's part of the problem.

In San Francisco's Csb, C stands for temperate, s for dry summer, and b for warm summer.

Temperate means it averages above 10ºC in the hottest month and between 0ºC and 18ºC in its coldest; dry summer means it gets less than 40 mm of precipitation in its driest month; and warm summer means it averages below 22ºC in the hottest month, but above 10ºC for more than four months each year.

Now, is that Mediterranean? It's not obvious to me that it is. Let's go to the map.

III.

Here's beautiful California, in all its climatic variation, courtesy of our friends at the Köppen-Geiger Explorer:

Let's start in the Los Angeles basin, along the borderlands between the yellow and sienna towards the bottom of the map.

Los Angeles divides into three primary climate regions, which provide a useful key to the California experience.

The coast of western Los Angeles, from Santa Monica down to Palos Verdes, and continuing along the coast of Orange County to the south, is a cold, semi-arid steppe, or Bsk.

It's a climate it shares with Colorado Springs, the Texas panhandle, and a swathe of the Eurasian steppe lands, from Crimea to Volgograd to Inner Mongolia.

South and central Los Angeles, south of the 10, but extending northeast to a frontier in Culver City, Mid-Wilshire, and Koreatown, and south through Anaheim and Garden Grove to Irvine, is a hot, semi-arid steppe, or Bsh.

It's a climate it shares with Gaza, the West Bank of the Jordan, Mosul, the Zagros foothills of Khuzestan, Amritsar, and the northern, or Turkish, part of Cyprus.

North of that, extending from downtown across the mountains into the San Fernando Valley, and east across the river to El Monte, Pomona, and Rancho Cucamonga, is the last part of Los Angeles, the hot-summer Mediterranean, or Csa.

This climate, the climate of Glendale and Pasadena, of Burbank and Sherman Oaks, of Van Nuys, Encino, and Calabasas, is what I think of as the actual Mediterranean climate.

Because it's the climate of the actual Mediterranean.

It's a climate it shares with Athens and Rome, Syracuse and Tunis, Jerusalem and Jaffa, Florence and Naples, but not, significantly, a climate it shares with San Francisco.

Because it's too warm for the city by the Bay.

IV.

Now let's look north, to the Golden Gate.

Here you can see that the Bay Area is, as you might have guessed, a homogeneous and indistinct stain on the map of California.

Does it have semiarid steppe lands? No. Does it have hot summers? No. From the South Bay to the Valley, from the West Side to the East Side, everyone has the same climate, and nobody's very happy.

San Francisco shares a climate with Oakland which shares a climate with Mountain View which shares a climate with Sausalito which shares a climate with San Jose which shares a climate with Berkeley and Richmond. It's a climate that stretches, like an open sore, down to Santa Cruz and Monterey.

It's all the same fucking climate.

It's called, as you may recall, the warm-summer Mediterranean climate, or Csb. Not hot summer. Not the summer of Glendale or Pasadena. No. A warm summer.

How warm is a warm summer? Is that a Mediterranean kind of summer? Is that the kind of summer you get in the south of France or the Greek islands? Well, no.

You know who else has a warm summer?

Fucking Galicia, that's who. The Parnassus Mountains. Mount fucking Lebanon.

You know who else has this fucking climate?

The Pacific fucking Northwest. Because it's cold and wet there. Just like San Francisco.

VI.

San Francisco: It's cold and damp!

I fucking hate it.

[benkaden]

"Voici la rue Rashid à Bagdad. Remarques à gauche les cireurs de chaussures. Ça ne vous rappelle rien?"

Ansichtskarte / Vintage Postcard

515 The Central Bank of #Iraq and Rafidain Bank, Rasheed Street, Baghdad [Philip Hirst, 1957] La Banque Centrale d'Irak et la Banque Rafidain, Rue Rasheed, Baghdad Die Zentralbank von Irak und die Rafidain-Bank, Rasheed-Strasse, Baghdad البنك المركزي ومصرف الرافدين ، شارع الرشيد - بغداد ٥١٥

صورت و طبعت بموجب عقد وموافقة وزارة الثقافة والارشاد، تقليدها وطبعها ممنوعين

البصرة تلفون ٣٨١٩ - ٤٨٥٩

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Lorin Bell-Cross

The National Holocaust Museum (NHM) has been denied permission to run an exhibition in Westminster Hall on the grounds that it was too political.

In correspondence seen by the JC, authorities told NHM, who wished to set up the display for Holocaust Memorial Day, that “Westminster Hall is a politically neutral space and activity which could be perceived as campaigning/lobbying or trying to influence political opinions would not be permitted”.

They were instead offered to apply for a space in the Upper Waiting Hall, a much less central location in the Palace of Westminster.

The exhibition tells the story of the Jewish communities in Berlin, Baghdad, Kielce (Poland), Aden (Yemen) and southern Israel and the pogroms that led to their ethnic cleansing in 1938, 1941, 1946, 1947 and 2023 respectively.

Titlted The Vicious Circle organisers also have plans to for international showcases in Tallinn, Berlin and the European Parliament in Brussels.

However, despite the claims of political neutrality, the JC understands that the controversial Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) was allowed to display the Palestinian flag in Westminster Hall as they organised supportive activists to lobby MPs.

NHM Director Marc Cave told the JC: “On Holocaust Memorial Day, Britain’s remembrance of the only industrialised, multi-country genocide ever known was extremely moving. Its support for our community of Holocaust survivors was heart-warming.

"Why does our desire to highlight the delusion that drives all murder of Jews so unsettle the Westminster Hall committee? The Holocaust is not finished business. It has been reopened by haters welcomed into Parliament — a group who play their part in driving the next turn of the Vicious Circle against Jews.”

He added: “A Parliament which does not therefore welcome an exhibition which presents an alternative view, based on hard facts and zero ‘lobbying’ content — is not the democratic institution I believed it was.

"It is only fair that Westminster Hall accords us the same democratic opportunity it has granted to monomaniacs who absurdly pin all the world’s problems on 0.2 per cent of its population.”

However, Parliamentary authorities insisted that the signs which the PSC were allowed to display in Westminster Hall were temporary and solely for the purpose of directing guests during their mass lobby event.

A mass lobby is when a large number of people contact their MPs in advance and all arrange to meet with them at Parliament on the same day to discuss a particular cause.

Both the Trades Union Congress and The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association were also allowed to display signage for the purposes of directing activists during their mass lobbies of parliament, and authorities said that these weren’t comparable to an exhibition.

A parliamentary spokesperson told the JC: "Requests for exhibitions in Westminster Hall are taken on a case-by-case basis, and many requests are made throughout the year. These are completely different to mass lobbies – signage is considered on a case-by-case basis for the sole purposes of directing individuals during a mass lobby."

Meanwhile, ahead of Holocaust Memorial Day, an exhibition put on by the Holocaust Educational Trust was on display in another prominent location in Westminster.

Testimony 360: People and Places of the Holocaust, located in Portcullis House – the newer part of the parliamentary estate where many MPs have their offices and routinely meet guests – features cutting-edge AI and virtual reality technology that allows MPs and visitors to Westminster to ask questions to a digital version of Holocaust survivor Manfred Goldberg BEM, and virtually explore the sites from his testimony.

Speaker of the House of Commons Sir Lindsay Hoyle, who toured the exhibition with survivors featured in it, also hosted a Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony in Portcullis House.

Last year, Westminster Hall featured a Chanukah reception and speeches by representatives of all three major political parties and Jewish communal leaders.

Lord Mann, the government’s independent adviser on antisemitism, said that the occasion was the second time in the 800-year history of Westminster Hall that a Chanukah reception had been hosted there, and he confirmed it would now be “an annual event in Parliament”.

[nerdsbianhokie]

Reading the World

In 2023, I challenged myself to watch a movie from every country in the world during the year, which I more or less succeeded. At the start of 2024 I decided to read a book from every country in the world (without the time restraint) and got a map to track my progress along with a challenge on Story Graph.

List of countries and books below the cut

Current count: 59

Afghanistan:

Albania:

Algeria:

American Samoa: Where We Once Belonged by Sia Figiel

Andorra: Andorra: a play in twelve scenes by Max Frisch

Angola: The Whistler by Ondjaki

Anguilla:

Antigua and Barbuda:

Argentina: Our Share of the Night by Mariana Enríquez

Armenia:

Aruba:

Australia: Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia edited by Alexis West

Austria:

Azerbaijan:

Bahamas:

Bahrain:

Bangladesh:

Barbados:

Belarus:

Belgium:

Belize:

Benin:

Bermuda:

Bhutan: Folktales of Bhutan by Kunzang Choden

Bolivia:

Bosnia and Herzegovina:

Botswana:

Brazil: The Words That Remain by Stênio Gardel

British Virgin Islands:

Brunei:

Bulgaria:

Burkina Faso:

Burundi: Baho! by Roland Rugero

Cambodia: Ma and Me by Putsata Reang

Cameroon: The Impatient by Djaïli Amadou Amal

Canada: The Gift is in the making: Anishinaabeg Stories retold by Amanda Strong and Leanne Betasamosake Simpson

Canary Islands: Dogs of Summer by Andrea Abreu

Cape Verde:

Cayman Islands:

Central African Republic: Co-wives, Co-widows by Adrienne Yabouza

Chad:

Chile: The Twilight Zone by Nona Fernández

China: The Secret Talker by Geling Yan

Christmas Islands:

Cocos Islands:

Colombia:

Comoros:

Cook Islands:

Costa Rica:

Croatia:

Cuba: I Was Never the First Lady by Wendy Guerra

Curacao:

Cyprus:

Czech Republic:

Dem. Rep. of Congo:

Denmark: The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living by Meik Wiking

Djibouti:

Dominica:

Dominican Republic:

Ecuador:

Egypt:

El Salvador:

Equatorial Guinea:

Eritrea:

Estonia:

Eswatini:

Ethiopia:

Falkland Islands:

Faroe Islands:

Fiji:

Finland:

France: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

French Guiana:

French Polynesia:

Gabon:

Gambia:

Georgia:

Germany: At the Edge of the Night by Friedo Lampe

Ghana: Wife of the Gods by Kwei Quartey

Gibraltar:

Greece:

Greenland:

Grenada:

Guam:

Guatemala:

Guernsey:

Guinea:

Guinea-Bissau:

Guyana:

Haiti:

Honduras:

Hong Kong:

Hungary:

Iceland: The Night Guest by Hildur Knútsdóttir

India: Coming Out as Dalit: A Memoir Of Surviving India's Caste System by Yashica Dutt

Indonesia: Of Bees and Mist by Erick Setiawan

Iran: Darius the Great is Not Okay by Abid Khorram

Iraq: Frankenstein in Baghdad by Ahmed Saadawi

Ireland:

Isle of Man:

Israel:

Italy:

Ivory Coast:

Jamaica: When Life Gives You Mangos by Kereen Getten

Japan: The Lantern of Lost Memories by Sanaka Hiiragi

Jordan:

Kazakhstan:

Kenya:

Kiribati:

Kosovo:

Kuwait:

Kyrgyzstan:

Laos:

Latvia:

Lebanon: Beirut Hellfire Society by Rawi Hage

Lesotho:

Liberia:

Libya: Zodiac of Echoes by Khaled Mattawa

Liechtenstein:

Lithuania:

Luxembourg:

Macedonia:

Madagascar:

Malawi:

Malaysia:

Maldives:

Mali:

Malta:

Marshall Islands:

Mauritania:

Mauritius: The Last Brother by Nathacha Appanah

Mexico: Silver Nitrate by Silvia Morena-Garcia

Micronesia:

Moldova:

Monaco:

Mongolia:

Montenegro:

Montserrat:

Morocco:

Mozambique:

Myanmar: Smile as They Bow by Nu Nu Yi

Namibia:

Nauru:

Nepal:

Netherlands: We Had to Remove this Post by Hanna Bervoets

New Caledonia:

New Zealand: Tahuri by Ngahuia Te Awekotuku

Nicaragua:

Niger:

Nigeria: Buried Beneath the Baobab Tree by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani

Niue:

Norfolk Island:

North Korea: A Thousand Miles to Freedom: My Escape from North Korea by Eunsun Kim

Northern Mariana Islands:

Norway: Blind Goddess by Anne Holt

Oman:

Pakistan: Hijab Butch Blues by Lamya H

Palau:

Palestine: The Skin and Its Girl by Sarah Cypher

Panama:

Papua New Guinea:

Paraguay:

Peru:

Philippines:

Pitcairn Islands:

Poland: Return from the Stars by Stanisław Lem

Portugal: Pardalita by Joana Estrela

Puerto Rico: Velorio by Xavier Navarro Aquino

Qatar:

Rep. of the Congo:

Romania:

Russia:

Rwanda: Baking Cakes in Kigali by Gaile Parkin

Saint Barthelemy:

Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha:

Saint Kitts and Nevis:

Saint Lucia:

Saint Martin:

Saint Pierre and Miquelon:

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines:

Samoa: Where We Once Belonged by Sia Figiel

San Marino:

Sao Tome and Principe:

Saudi Arabia: Girls of Riyadh by Rajaa Alsanea

Senegal:

Serbia:

Seychelles:

Sierra Leone:

Singapore:

Sint Maarten:

Slovakia:

Slovenia:

Solomon Islands:

Somalia: Under the Shade of a Tree: Somali Women Speak edited by Rissa Mohabir

South Africa:

South Korea: The Old Woman with the Knife by Gu Byeong -Mo

South Sudan:

Spain: Mammoth by Eva Baltasar

Sri Lanka: The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

Sudan: The Translator: A Memoir by Daoud Hari

Suriname:

Sweden: Fire from the Sky by Moa Backe Åstot

Switzerland:

Syria: The Book Collectors: A Band of Syrian Rebels and the Stories That Carried Them Through a War by Delphine Minoui

Taiwan:

Tajikistan: The Sandalwood Box: Folk Tales from Tadzhikistan by Hans Baltzer

Tanzania:

Thailand:

Togo:

Tokelau:

Tonga:

Trinidad and Tobago:

Tunisia:

Turkey:

Turkmenistan:

Turks and Caicos Islands:

Tuvalu:

Uganda:

Ukraine:

United Arab Emirates:

United Kingdom: Poyums by Len Pennie

United States of America: Reclaiming Two-Spirits: Sexuality, Spiritual Renewal & Sovereignty in Native America by Gregory D. Smithers

United States Virgin Islands: No Gods, No Monsters by Cadwell Turnbull

Uruguay:

Uzbekistan:

Vanuatu: Sista, Stanap Strong : A Vanuatu Women's Anthology edited by Mikaela Nyman and Rebecca Tobo Olul-Hossen

Venezuela: Doña Barbara by Rómulo Gallegos

Vietnam:

Wallis and Futuna:

Western Sahara:

Yemen:

Zambia:

Zimbabwe: We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo

[project-zorthania]

*kicks down your door* Did you know they made Basim queer in AC Mirage? No, I'm not joking, hear me out for a sec-

As you may know, there are various side quests that you can complete in and around Baghdad as Basim.

One side quest in particular requires you to speak to a writer named Al-Jahiz who tasks Basim to locate and return 6 lost books to the House of Wisdom.

The final book located at the central palace "Al-Sikkit" is written by a historical poet named Abu Nuwas who was famously known for writing poetry exploring themes of homosexuality.

If you hover over the book in your inventory, Basim has this to say about its contents.

you're kidding me.

[rooksamoris]

I just read your thoughts about Scarabia and Leona's arc development in game, and I got very interested.

There's very little info on Arabian culture online, at least that I've seen, and also African. A thing that makes me very curious is about their mythologies, folklore, and also music. We know a lot about food, since it's something so universal, but the rest is hard to get info on, unless it gets popularized or romanticized by someone else.

The scarabia arc is one of my favorites for a reason, and that is because I'm very sympathetic with Jamil, and very sad how his and Kalim's story together got so "twisted" so fast (ehe). Honestly there are so many layers to it that it would take many many chapters, and events, to close the situation. But I think it's good they left the future open like that, since it's something that can't be fixed overnight.

And also, *gets down* PLS PLS PLS PLS 🙏 I love the fluffy fics, are you going to also add Bolllywood songs? They are so good seriously it's so dancing and fun! I love Jamil so much and I MELTED with the headcanon short fic where we are taking care of him. I wanna hold his precious handsome face and just kiss it all over! He is so cute I will go FERAL-

hey qamar 💕 this was a pleasure to read! honestly, i feel like both the scarabia and savannaclaw chapters were too short? of course, we were introduced to the themes and then the whole conflict—resolution mountain for stories, however i just feel like they could have done more with the both of them.

also, i think the reason why the southwest-asian and african themes aren’t covered is because the source material is literally disney films 💀 like we get a warning before rewatching aladdin since they just now realized it was kind of racist (still a major part of my childhood though 😭 “a whole new world” in arabic is delicious). based on how yana has written other characters that are meant to be from south asia, there’s a big chance it would have been disappointing anyways.

plus, with scarabia in particular, there’s too many cultures trying to be represented due to how colonizers deemed all of the countries to be the same thing in different fonts 💀 you’d never confuse a nepali with an omani, but winston churchill sure did not care.

the original aladdin movie was meant to take place in baghdad, a city in iraq, but due to political conflicts at the time (george bush a war criminal regardless of saddam hussein’s crimes. the usa literally gave saddam weapons to kill kurds and then turned around and invaded when he wasn’t convenient anymore 💀). baghdad became agrabah—but the culture is still an amalgamation of west asian, south asian, north african, and like eurasian/turkish culture. im sure they’ve got stuff from central asia too 😭

the issue with this is that from ethnic group to ethnic group/country to country, the culture varies a lot. yemenis and palestinians are both arabs, but our cultures are vastly different, with yemenis having more eastern african influences and palestinians having mediterranean influences. i personally headcanon the scarabia duo as arab, but honestly, they could be from anywhere. for all we know, kalim is afghan and jamil is tunisian—it’s all up in the air due to the original source material. but i digress!! i rambled a lot 😭

ON THE BOLLYWOOD NOTE! omg this brought so many good memories back. we used to watch bollywood films with shitty arabic dubs 🥹 i miss those days. i love that idea and ive always wanted to write bollywood inspired fics, like based on the crazy and unrealistic romantic moments in bollywood. it’s just so much fun lmao. honestly, i think that’s a great idea especially when so many bollywood songs just lead the listener through a story anyways. im so glad you enjoy my fics!!! that’s very sweet 💕 have a great day, qamar, and take care of yourself

[molkolsdal]

Cup with a Poem on Wine

Poet: Ibn Sukkara al-Hashimi

Attributed to Iran, second half 10th–11th century

Medium: Silver; fire-gilded, hammered, chased

Drink! For this day has a special boon, which if you had known about it / You would have hurried up with entertainment and hastened with rapture! // [Rosy cheeks, garden roses cut / Smiles are misty and the sun is veiled] // Don’t hold the cup back, but drink it diluted, until you die from it (dead) without reason.

"These sophisticated vessels, inscribed with verses inviting one to drink, echo the close connection between wine drinking and literature in upper-class social practice of the medieval Islamic period. Drinking parties of the cultured elite were accompanied by the recitation of poems, music, and, sometimes, dancing, a tradition carried on uninterrupted from the pre-Islamic period and practiced by the Seljuq sultans and their entourages, as well as by the urban elite. Although these activities were conceived of in the Seljuq period as predominantly leisurely, albeit recalling the intellectual and feasting abilities expected of the ruling classes, they can also be seen as the legacy of ceremonies associated with kingship and investiture in pre-Islamic Central Asia and Zoroastrian Iran.

The verses inscribed on the silver cup start with an exhortation to drink and end with an urging to surrender to the excesses of drunkenness. They are drawn from the diwan, or collection of poems, of Ibn Sukkara al-Hashimi, a satirical poet who lived in Baghdad in the second half of the tenth century (d. 995). He was an exponent of mujun, a genre of poetry developed in Basra and Baghdad at the end of the ninth century that celebrated a lustful and licentious way of life. The inscription is closely connected to the peculiar aesthetic of this earlier poetic genre, which was no longer practiced in the eleventh century but still well known, owing to the fact that it was included in a famous anthology compiled by al-Tha‘alibi (d. 1038)."

[axellaniez]

The Synagogue of Singapore: A Historical Overview

As someone with a rich Jewish heritage, the history of the Maghain Aboth Synagogue in Singapore holds a special place in my heart. This synagogue represents not only the perseverance and unity of the Jewish community but also my personal connection to a legacy that has endured for generations. It's a beacon of faith, culture, and history that resonates deeply with my sense of identity and belonging.

The Maghain Aboth Synagogue, located in Singapore, is the oldest Jewish synagogue in Southeast Asia. Established in 1878 by the Jewish community, primarily comprised of Sephardic Jews from Baghdad, it has served as a central place of worship and community for over a century.

The Jewish presence in Singapore dates back to the early 19th century, with traders and merchants arriving from regions such as India, Iraq, and Persia. As the community grew, the need for a dedicated place of worship became evident. The Maghain Aboth Synagogue was constructed on Waterloo Street, designed in a neoclassical style that blends with Singapore's diverse architectural landscape.

Over the years, the synagogue has witnessed significant events, including World War II, when it served as a refuge and community center during the Japanese occupation. Despite the challenges, it remained a steadfast symbol of the Jewish faith and resilience in Singapore.

In the 20th century, the synagogue underwent renovations to preserve its structure and accommodate the growing community. It continues to serve as the focal point for Jewish religious life in Singapore, hosting services, festivals, and cultural events.

Today, the Maghain Aboth Synagogue stands as a testament to the enduring legacy and contributions of the Jewish community in Singapore. It not only represents a place of worship but also a historical landmark reflecting the multicultural tapestry of the city-state.

Axel Laniez

[paschameleon]

After some research, I was able to find out where all of the princesses are from. Here are my notes…

Snow White: Snow White was first published in Germany by the Brothers Grimm, in 1812, in their book Grimm's Fairy Tales. Because of this I assume the Disney version is from Germany.

Cinderella: Cinderella takes place in France and it is based on the French fairy tale by Charles Perrault, it says so in the credits. More proof is that all of the women at the ball have French names and Cinderella’s house is referred to as Château which is a french word.

Aurora: The French symbol the Fleur-de-lys can be found everywhere in the castle and in the credits. Plus, the credits it says the movie is based on the Charles Perrault version of Sleeping Beauty.  

Ariel: Ariel is from Atlantica which is a kingdom that is located somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea. This is confirmed on Disney Wiki "Eric's Castle is located on the shore of a Mediterranean-like country". The official Disney Princess youtube channel has a video titled: Fun Facts About Ariel! How Many Do You Know? | Disney Princess, where it says that Ariel grew up in the Mediterranean and specifies that Eric’s caste is in Italy.  

Belle: The movie literally says that it is set in France.

Jasmine: Ron Clements and John Musker, the directors of the film said that the movie was originally intended to be set in Baghdad, Iraq. However, it was changed to the fictional city of Agrabah during production due to the Gulf War in the early 1990s. Here is part of the interview:  “We kept it Baghdad in our first treatment, and then the Gulf War happened […] This can't be in Baghdad. So, I took letters and did a jumbled anagram and came up with Agrabah, Musker told E! News." Agrabah is an adaptation of Baghdad.

Pocahontas: The movie starts off with “In sixteen hundred seven We sail the open sea For glory, God, and gold And the Virginia Company”.

Mulan: It says so in the movie that it is set in China.

Tiana: The movie says that it takes place in New Orleans.

Rapunzel: In the TV show a satellite shot can be seen showing that Corona is located in central France. Mont Saint-Michel and Rocamadour (France) where some of the inspirations behind the kingdom. The video A Tangled World: Creating the Look on the Walt Disney Animation Studios YouTube channel explains that the executive producer wanted to make Rapunzel’s tower look like “the most charming B and B in the south of France”.  

Merida: Scotland obvious clues in movie.

Moana: I guessed Samoa because she wears a Samoan-inspired ceremonial dress at one point in the movie. The song “We Know the Way” features more lyrics in Samoan than other Polynesian languages, and Motunui, the fictional island of the film, mostly drew inspiration from elements of the real-life island nations of Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga.

Anna and Elsa: Arendelle was based on multiple locations in Norway. The team behind Frozen visited Norway to gain inspiration, and you can see Nordic influence all throughout the movie.

Raya: It's difficult to figure out one specific country since Kumandra is based on multiple Southeast Asian countries.

[whencyclopedia]

Hausaland

Hausaland, sometimes referred to as the Hausa Kingdoms, was a group of small independent city-states in northern central Africa between the Niger River and Lake Chad which flourished from the 15th to 18th century CE. The origins of the Hausa are not known, but one hypothesis suggests they were a group of indigenous peoples joined by a common language - Hausa - while another theory explains their presence as a consequence of a migration of peoples from the southern Sahara Desert. The cities prospered thanks to local and interregional trade in such commodities as salt, precious metals, leather goods, and slaves. Islam was adopted by many of the rulers and elite of the city-states in the 14th and 15th century CE but was also one of the reasons for their loss of independence when the Muslim Fulani leader Usman dan Fodio (r. 1803-1815 CE) launched a holy war and conquered the region in the early 19th century CE.

Geography & Origins

The name Hausaland derives from the Hausa term Kasar hausa, meaning the 'country of the Hausa language', although the area also included other peoples such as the Tuareg, Fulbe, and Zabarma. The term 'Hausa' was in use only from the 16th century CE as the people called themselves according to which specific city-state or kingdom they belonged to.

Hausaland was located in the Sahel region between the Niger River and Lake Chad in north-central Africa in what is today northern Nigeria. The Sahel is the semi-arid strip of land running across Africa between the Sahara Desert in the north and the Savannah grassland to the south. Hausland, specifically, stretched from the Air mountains (north) to the Jos plateau (south) and from Borno (east) to the Niger Valley (west). This region saw the development of towns by the Hausa-speaking people from 1000 to 1300 CE.

The exact origins of the Hausa cities are not known, but theories include a migration of peoples from the southern Sahara who, abandoning their own lands following the increased desiccation of that area, established new settlements in what would become known as Hausaland. An alternative theory suggests that the Hausa people originally lived on the western shore of Lake Chad and when the lake shrank (as a consequence of the same climatic changes that affected the Sahara) they occupied this new and fertile land and then eventually spread to the immediate north and west. There is as yet, unfortunately, no archaeological evidence to support either of these two theories. As a consequence, there is a third hypothesis, which is that the Hausa had not migrated from anywhere but were indigenous to the region. Support for this theory lies in the fact that there is no tradition of migration in Hausa oral history.

There is, though, a foundation legend, known as the Bayajida or Daura legend, although this probably dates to the 16th century CE and reflects the increased influence of Islam in the region at that time. According to this tradition, Bayajida, a prince from Baghdad, arrived at the court of the ruler of the Kingdom of Kanem (or the Bornu Empire as it became by the 16th century CE). Receiving an unfavourable reception, Bayajida headed eastwards until he came upon the city of Daura. There, the queen and her kingdom were being terrorized by a great snake. Bayajida stepped in and killed the troublesome serpent and promptly married the queen. Together they had a son called Bawogari who then went on to have six sons of his own, each of which became the king of a Hausa city-state. Meanwhile, Bayajida had another son, this time with one of his concubines. This illegitimate son, called Karbogari, had seven sons, and these went on to rule seven other Hausa cities. This story neatly explains how the various cities were established but not, of course, just where Daura and its queen came from.

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[girlactionfigure]

🔘INNOCENT OUTREACH, SOLDIERS AND A HOSTAGE - Real time from Israel  

ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

( VIDEO - 60 Minutes on the Hezbollah Exploding Pagers - full episode. )

⭕HOUTHI BALLISTIC MISSILE fired at CENTRAL ISRAEL early morning.  Intercepted in space, but sent 50% of the Israeli population to bomb shelters in the middle of the night.

.. A woman was seriously injured when she was hit on the way to shelter. Hospitalized with a head injury.

.. Houthi political bureau member Hazam al-Assad after the missile launch from Yemen: "We will not stop until the aggression against the residents of Gaza stops.”

⚠️”INNOCENT” IRANIAN OUTREACH.. The Iranians are significantly increasing their activity on social media in Israel and are appealing to innocent citizens with various offers that may seem innocent and not suspicious at all. Beyond the security risk, this is contact with a hostile entity (and therefore illegal).

Any slightly strange online contact from a stranger - BLOCK with a click.  If you suspect something more serious, REPORT to police. We personally have had such contacts, and reported them.

▪️3 HERO SOLDIERS HAVE FALLEN.. in battle in Gaza.  The attacking force entered an alley in the Sheikh Zayed neighborhood - where the first IED exploded on the fighters. The three fighters fell from this IED, and another fighter was moderately wounded.

Ilay Gavriel Atedgi , 22, from Kiryat Motzkin

Netanel Pessach, 21 years old, from Elazar

Hillel Diener, 21 years old, from Talmon

May their families be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem, and may G-d avenge their blood!

▪️A HOSTAGE HAS PASSED.. Hana Katzir returned from captivity in serious medical condition. Her son Elad was murdered in captivity and his body was returned to Israel, and her husband was murdered on October 7.  She was returned in the first hostage swap.

May her family be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem, and may her memory be a blessing.

▪️JUSTICE SYSTEM.. It was decided to begin the process of impeaching the Attorney General to remove her from her position, first with a hearing at a government meeting.

▪️HEALTH - STRESS RELATED DISEASES.. Significant uptick in inflammatory bowel diseases, both in deterioration of those with it and new cases.  Believed to be related to stress and the war.  

🎯GAZA - Air Force  attacked and killed Sunday the terrorist, Tarut Muhammad Ahmed Al-Bik, who served as head of the security department in the general security apparatus of Hamas. Al-Bik was in a command and control complex established in the area that previously served as the "Musa Ibn Nasir" school in the Darg Tafah area.

🔹IRAQI JOURNALIST SAYS.. A journalist from Baghdad on the decision of pro-Iranian militias in Iraq to stop launching drones into Israel: The Israeli threat to attack and domestic pressures contributed to the decision.

⭕SAMARIA - The Tulkarm Battalion says: We attacked an Israeli military bulldozer at a checkpoint with a bomb and gunfire.

🎗️HOSTAGE DEAL NEWS.. Foreign sources: Israeli Agees to significantly reduce forces on the Philadelphi Egyptian-border axis. Prime Minister's Office response: ''We will not withdraw from the axis.’’ 

[mariacallous]

It’s telling that the first question I saw raised in the media after Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi was killed when his helicopter crashed in the country’s mountainous northeast on his return from Azerbaijan in May was whether the United States had a hand in it. In that same regard, among the questions raised concerning Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent travel to Pyongyang, apart from its impact on the simmering tensions across Asia, was what opportunities his willingness to venture farther from the Kremlin offers. Namely, should the United States and its allies seek to depose Putin by enabling a coup in his absence, or assassinating him during such travels? The answer lies in assessing the risk versus gain.

What would be gained by killing Putin? If the bar was juxtaposing the status quo with the consequences of Putin’s violent removal, would Russia’s threat to the United States and its allies be degraded? Would Russian troops withdraw from Ukraine and cease posing a threat to NATO allies in the Baltics and Eastern Europe? Or might Russian intentions become even more hostile and less predictable? Despite Putin’s obsession with intrigue, denial and deception, and smoke and mirrors, he’s fairly predictable. Indeed, the United States, with Britain leaning in the same direction, was the exception among its NATO allies, not to mention Ukraine itself, in forecasting with high confidence Putin’s plans to attack.

Would the United States do it? The record shows that the U.S. sanctioned violence in sponsoring the overthrow of democratically elected antagonist regimes in Iran in 1953 and Chile in 1973, while the Church committee investigations documented multiple CIA attempts to assassinate Cuba’s Fidel Castro.

More recently, the United States made no pretense in concealing its hand in killing Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force Commander Qassem Suleimani in January 2020, an action that historic precedent would suggest was an act of war. Since 9/11, U.S. counterterrorism strategy has in practice been predicated on assassination. The mantra “find, fix, finish” is the other euphemism for preemptively hunting down and killing terrorists abroad before they might strike the U.S. homeland.

Left: Iranians tear up a U.S. flag during a demonstration following the killing of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force Gen. Qassem Suleimani, in Tehran on Jan. 3, 2020. Atta Kenare/AFP via Getty Images   Right: The statue of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein is toppled at al-Fardous square in Baghdad, Iraq, on April 9, 2003. Wathiq Khuzaie /Getty Images

While these episodes collectively demonstrate the U.S. government’s willingness to undertake consequential, lethal actions in the name of national security, when separated from transnational terrorist targets, only the strike against Suleimani occurred while he was abroad. Operations to depose Mohammad Mosaddegh in Iran, Salvador Allende in Chile, and Castro in Cuba depended rather on internal elements to facilitate the plots.

Apart from these episodes and a possible hand in others,  U.S. governments have arguably favored the status quo of a predictable adversary. Regime change has not worked out well for U.S. interests. The overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq was no small factor in bringing about the Arab Spring, with effects that continue to reverberate across the Middle East as reflected by unresolved civil wars in Libya, Syria, and Yemen, as well as ongoing political instability in Egypt and Tunisia.

The U.S. occupation of Iraq also facilitated the rise of the Islamic State. And the Taliban ultimately outlasted the United States in Afghanistan by returning to power despite 20 years of American blood and treasure, and they now give sanctuary to insurgent groups threatening Pakistan, Iran, its Central Asian neighbors, and China.

The inclination to accept the known status quo is further strengthened when that country is armed with nuclear weapons. As regards Russia, even under the most ideal circumstances in which the U.S. government could remove Putin and conceal its hand in doing so, how confident is Washington that a stable and less hostile leadership would succeed him?

In Russia, like most autocracies, power rests with those who control the nation’s instruments of power—primarily the guns, but likewise the money, infrastructure, natural resources, connections, and knowledge of where the skeletons are to be found. That power is currently concentrated within a small circle of septuagenarians, almost all of whom have long ties to Putin, the Cold War-era KGB, and St. Petersburg. The Russian Armed Forces might have the numbers in terms of troops and tools, but under Putin, as it was in Soviet days, they are kept on a tight leash and closely monitored, with little discretionary authority for drawing weapons or coming out of their garrisons.

The three organizations most capable of moving on Putin and the Kremlin are the Federal Security Service, or FSB; the Rosgvardia, or National Guard; and the Presidential Security Service within the Federal Protective Service, or FSO. The FSB is Russia’s internal security and intelligence arm through which Putin governs given its relatively massive and ubiquitous presence across all the country’s institutions. The FSB enforces Putin’s rule, monitors dissent, intimidates, punishes, and liaises with organized crime. The Rosgvardia is Putin’s brute force. It was established in 2016 from among the interior ministry’s militias variously responsible for internal order and border security to be Putin’s long red line against protests, uprisings, and armed organized coup attempts.

Alexander Bortnikov leads the FSB, having succeeded Nikolai Patrushev, who followed Putin and has served since as one of his chief lieutenants. Until recently, Patrushev served as Russian Security Council chief and was most likely the Kremlin’s no. 2, and might still be, despite having been made a presidential advisor for shipping. Bortnikov, like Patrushev, shares Putin’s world view, paranoia for the West, political philosophy, and glorification of the old Soviet empire.

Bortnikov is considered by Kremlinologists to be Putin’s most relied-upon and trusted subordinate, and in turn, the individual best positioned to overthrow him, should he desire. While Bortnikov maintains a relatively low profile, limited glimpses suggest some degree of humility and contained ambition, although uncorroborated rumors suggest health issues. His deputy, Sergei Borisovich Korolev, some 10 years younger, is regarded as effective, similarly ruthless, but perhaps too ambitious and ostentatious in his relationships with Russian organized crime. It’s likely that Putin sees a bright future for Korolev but has enough reservation to justify more seasoning and evaluation before having him succeed Bortnikov.

The roughly 300,000-strong Rosgvardia is commanded by longtime former Putin bodyguard Viktor Zolotov. Likewise a part of Putin’s septuagenarian St. Petersburg crowd, with extensive past ties to organized crime, Zolotov emerged somewhat from the shadows following then-Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s June 2023 revolt. Zolotov claimed credit for protecting Moscow and mused publicly at how his organization would likely grow and secure more resources to facilitate its critical responsibilities.

Zolotov might not be as educated or sophisticated as Putin’s traditional siloviki associates, all former Cold War-era KGB veterans, but making his way up the ladder as he did from a St. Petersburg street thug, he’s not averse to using force to achieve his aims.

Little is publicly known concerning Zolotov’s politics apart from loyalty to his boss, but there’s no evidence he might offer a progressive alternative less hostile to the West. As Putin has done for all of those in his inner circle to secure their loyalty, Zolotov’s family members have been awarded land, gifts, and key posts. Patrushev’s son, for example, is now a deputy prime minister.

The FSO includes the Presidential Security Service, some 50,000 troops, and is responsible for Putin’s close physical protection. Little is known about its director, Dmitry Viktorovich Kochnev, now 60, whose mysterious official bio indicates that he was born in Moscow, served in the military from 1982 to 1984, and then went into “the security agencies of the USSR and the Russian Federation” from 1984 to 2002, after which time he was officially assigned to the FSO.

If Kochnev wanted Putin dead, he’s had plenty of time to pursue that goal, but he is unlikely to have the means and network to go further on his own in seizing power. Kochnev would still need the FSB and the Rosgvardia to accomplish the mission so would likely be an accomplice, but he would not be at the forefront of such a plot.

There are likewise a handful of others close to Putin who might influence his succession, or be the face of it, such as Igor Sechin, former deputy prime minister and current Rosneft CEO; former KGB Col. Gen. Sergei Ivanov, also a former defense minister and first deputy prime minister; and former KGB Col. Gen. Viktor Ivanov, who also had a stint as the Federal Narcotics Service director. All are known to be ideologically in line with the Russian leader and seek a restored empire unwilling to subscribe to a world order and rules created by the West that they believe aim to keep Moscow weak and subservient.

If Putin were assassinated abroad, regardless of the evidence, the old guard would likely accuse the United States and use it as a lightning rod to consolidate power and rally the public. And sharing Putin’s paranoia over the West’s existential threat, the risk is credible that they would retaliate militarily, directly, and with uncertain restraint. Believing themselves insecure, they would likewise crack down at home in an indiscriminately ruthless manner that might unleash long-contained revolutionary vigor among the population, which would throw a large, nuclear-armed power into chaos.

But could the United States do it if it wanted to? History shows that foreign leaders are not immune to assassination, as we were reminded when Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico survived being shot at close range by a disgruntled citizen in May. Unlike in the movies, however, assassinations are complicated, particularly against well-protected and deliberately unpredictable targets in foreign environments over which one has no control.

According to leaked documents and the account of Gleb Karakulov, a former engineer and FSO captain, Putin is paranoid concerning his safety and health. Karakulov’s observations, Putin’s limited travel, and his proclivity to cloister himself from direct contact with but a small number of insiders for his safety makes him a hard target. Scrupulous care for his movements includes the intense vetting, quarantining, and close monitoring of those involved with his transportation and his personal routine as well as in securing the cars, trains, and planes he uses. Who can forget the flurry of photos and memes surrounding the 15-foot-long table Putin used when conducting personal meetings during the COVID-19 pandemic?

For any such operation to succeed, close target reconnaissance and good intelligence are required to determine patterns and vulnerabilities on which to construct a plan. But while foreign head-of-state visits follow certain protocols and have predictable events, there are no long-term patterns within which to easily identify vulnerabilities. Other considerations include a means to infiltrate and exfiltrate the various members executing the operation as well as their tools. North Korea is not an easy place to visit let alone operate in for a foreign intelligence service to clandestinely steal secrets or conduct an observable action such as an assassination.

There are certainly additional risks when Putin or any foreign leader ventures beyond the layered, redundant, and tested security protocols enjoyed in their home cocoons. Visiting dignitaries must rely on the host government for a variety of resources and needs too numerous and costly to pack, and when doing so would offend the locals. And that extends to perimeter and route security, emergency medical support, and infrastructure integrity.

The threat to a foreign leader’s communications security, habits, health information, and that of their entourage is higher while in transit abroad—and therefore an attractive intelligence target. The multiple moving pieces and complicated logistics associated with such visits produce information that must be shared with the host governments and span agendas, itineraries, dietary requirements, flight and cargo manifests, communication frequencies, telephone numbers, email addresses, travelers’ biographic details, and weapons, to name a few.

In the era of ubiquitous technical surveillance, as the Israelis learned firsthand when Mossad agents assassinated Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in 2010, going undetected in any city is no small feat. Mabhouh’s killing was largely captured on CCTV. The Dubai investigation identified as many as 28 operatives who were involved, almost all of whom were revealed through technical means or the leads they generated.

Still, whoever assassinated Lebanese Hezbollah’s notorious international operations chief, Imad Mughniyah, in Damascus in February 2008 and al Qaeda deputy Abu Muhammad al-Masri in Tehran in 2020 managed to mount complex attacks in highly restrictive police states. Of course, neither moved about with a protective detail, let alone that which would surround a head of state.

Israel managed to assassinate Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, in November 2020 in Iran despite a protective detail—although it was an operation that might have been taken from a science fiction movie involving automated robotic machines guns controlled from afar.

Then again, even with the best-laid plans for protecting Putin, one weak link could be the Russian leader’s self-imposed vulnerability, depending on the aging and problematic Soviet-designed Ilyushin Il-96 series jets he uses, as he did in recent travels to North Korea and Vietnam. Even if Russia builds and updates the replacement parts, there is long-term structural fatigue and limitations when trying to reconfigure so old an airframe design.

While there’s arguably an element of Putin’s pride in wishing to use Russian equipment, I suspect his inclination is driven more by paranoia for what adversaries might implant on his transport that prevents him from adopting newer Western aircraft, as his country’s commercial airlines have.

There are also significant bureaucratic hurdles to lethal operations. For the moment, at least, the U.S. practice of covert action is dictated by the rule of law. These are primarily executive orders rather than public laws, like EO 12333, which ironically forbids assassination, and the various presidential memos issued by Barack Obama in 2013, Donald Trump in 2017, and Joe Biden in 2022 guiding the use of “direct action,” the euphemism for drone strikes and other kinetic operations, against terrorist targets outside of conflict zones. But while the United States killed Suleimani as a terrorist who fit these guidelines, killing foreign leaders based on credible intelligence reflecting their ongoing efforts to do harm to the United States would reasonably still meet the legal bar for preemptive self-defense.

When it comes to killing Putin or any prominent adversary, the biggest challenge is not necessarily if it can be done, but whether it should be done. Openly killing Suleimani posed risks, of course, but ultimately, Iran is not an existential threat. Its retaliation could have been more costly, had Tehran chosen escalation, but still manageable.

Russia, on the other hand, as Putin frequently reminds the West in his saber-rattling speeches threatening nuclear war, is another matter. What happens if you fail? As The Wire’s Omar Little said, paraphrasing Ralph Waldo Emerson, “When you come at the king, you best not miss.”

[divinum-pacis]

March 14, 2023: Followers of the Sabean Mandaean faith, a pre-Christian sect that follows the teachings of the Bible’s John the Baptist, perform rituals in the Tigris River during a celebration marking “Banja,” or Creation Feast, in central Baghdad, Iraq. Iraqi Sabaean Mandaeans view John the Baptist as their central prophet and submerge themselves in the Tigris during an annual five-day ritual.

(AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)

[athena5898]

WEST BANK (Quds) — The moment occupation forces stormed the Al-Jazeera office in central Ramallah and closed it under military order Journalist Ali Hashem reports that the occupation has ordered Al-Jazeera in Ramallah closed for 45 days.

Al-Jazeera journalists are now on the street, all their TV gear has been confiscated, they are not allowed to go get their cars from the parking [area].

It is 3:52am in Ramallah. The area is fully surrounded by “Israeli” forces.

The number of soldiers involved in this operation is quite high

Dima Khatib: Going after the journalists usually happens ahead of something big.

Remember they bombed the journalists on 8 April 2003 in Baghdad and the US troops entered Baghdad on 9 April.