Woke up to a dozen messages of friends in Beirut saying Israel bombed

The Tasnim and Fars news agencies are confirming the death of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. 🔴 LIVE updates: aje.news/9i4fmn

If you missed it when it aired on the weekend, this is my TV production debut, for @aljazeera.com's The Listening Post. We investigated Israeli gov efforts to whitewash genocide in Gaza for African audiences, using journalists & Christian influencers. Fellow "journos" were held to account.

THREAD: A first for me: I've co-produced an episode of Al Jazeera's The Listening Post, and it airs tomorrow! Outrage over genocide in Gaza has led to Israel losing the streets & the campuses of the western world. So, Israel has recently decided to try selling its narrative...to Africans.

I cover the Horn. Reporting on 🇵🇸🇮🇱 is generally not part of my mandate. But the beats have aligned. Six months of work later, this weekend I'll have an investigation go live & it addresses Israel's genocide in Gaza and the African continent. Coming to @aljazeera.com, hope you'll tune in. 🇰🇪🇿🇦🇪🇹

This is *so* important.

Wrote for @theglobeandmail.com: I spent months hearing from African survivors of Myanmar scam camps, where trafficking victims are forced to run scams targeting westerners. Chinese criminals & at least one pro-junta militia cooperate to dish out horrific abuse against migrants to ensure compliance.

My latest: Without anti-authoritarianism, 'anti-imperialism' is just conservatism with left-wing aesthetics www.hauntologies.net/p/iranian-pr...

On the rank tankie-ism that @timnitgebru.bsky.social and @zekuzelalem.bsky.social have been calling out on the American anti-imperialist "left", with regard to Iran, Tigray, Bosnia, and so many others. bsky.app/profile/timn...

The government knew the news of Li's death would lead to an uproar. So they did one of the most shameful things ever. They would not announce his death. They pretended he was still alive. State media statements that Li had passed away were wiped. But this photo was posted. And then we all knew.

it's so annoying how much American websites assume any traffic from Africa is fraud 😭 once my apartment building blocked all traffic from the page where I'd pay rent like wtf

With the industry in the hands of wealthy moguls and governments who don't share the interests or the same passion for the craft as chronically underpaid muckrakers, journalism was always doomed. It's at the mercy of people who we are mandated to hold to account, a terrible setup from the get go.

I will never cancel R Kelly. He devoted decades of his life to producing great music. His impact on that front is immeasurable. /s

Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed answered questions in parliament today. Loosely addressing recent clashes & his gov's fallout with neighbouring Eritrea. When asked what was behind the feud with Eritrea, he stated that things began to unravel when Eritrean soldiers massacred civilians during the Tigray war.

Demonstrations were held in parts of Ethiopia yesterday, not far from where clashes between Ethiopian forces & Tigrayan rebels went on for 5 days. Protesters called for an end to fighting & for the rebels to vacate the area. Following calls from the international community, fighting has halted.

Weekly-ish reminder that an easy way to support my work is through ko-fi.com/eliaayoub I know these are difficult times, so no worry if you can't

At this time of uncertainty in the Horn of Africa, I really didn't think the Epstein files would trend in the region, but they are. Ethiopia's Minister of Education was the subject of emails exchanged in 2009 between Epstein & Henry Jarecki, wealthy entrepreneur dogged by allegations of SA as well.

Three days into conflict in Tigray, the warring factions are either silent, or issuing vague statements. Following a call for restraint by the African Union, the chairman of the TPLF, under whose command Tigrayan rebels are fighting, responded expressing a willingness to engage in dialogue.

51 year old heir apparent, famous for drunken twitter escapades & resulting diplomatic incidents, is head of Uganda's national army, appointed by his father who has ruled the country since 1986. Get to know General Muhoozi Kainerugaba better! The BBC have profiled the eccentric nepo baby today.

UPDATE: as fighting breaks out in Tigray, and drone strikes are reported...Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has state media cameras on him, while he walks the streets of Jijiga in Eastern Ethiopia, accompanied by the Presidents of neighbouring Somalia and Djibouti. No mention of the fighting in the north.

UPDATE: according to reports from Tigray regional state television, drone strikes targeted trucks in two north-east Tigray towns at 4AM local time. A driver was killed, another is injured. These would be the first civilian casualties of drone strikes in Tigray, since the Tigray war ended in 2022.

3.5 years after a ceasefire ended a brutal Ethiopian civil war that killed hundreds of thousands in two years...Ethiopian forces and Tigrayan rebels clashed on Thursday, marking the most serious fighting since the war ended. Ethiopian Airlines has suspended all flights to Tigray.

"The Hamas led Health Ministry." Beyond casting doubt on well corroborated reports of mass slaughter, the expression doubled as justification for killings of health workers, implying that they were all an extension of the armed wing. Some of our colleagues in the field have a lot to answer for.

I downloaded the Upscrolled app. Just saw that the official accounts of the founder & even the app itself follow Greyzone "journalists" infamous for war crimes denialism everywhere that isn't Gaza. Hard pass. Another app that tells me African lives don't matter. That's just Meta with a 🇵🇸 flag.

I’m ok. I’m a survivor so this small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work. I don’t let bullies win. Grateful to my incredible constituents who rallied behind me. Minnesota strong.

Thailand-Cambodia ceasefire 'gradually' being implemented, says China reut.rs/49lcSJB

This article was published a whole three weeks before US forces invaded Venezuela and abducted the country's leader. Some legacy that FIFA Peace Prize is going to have. Giving the Nobel Peace Prize a run for its money.

🇻🇪 Si l’arrestation du président vénézuélien Nicolás Maduro, samedi 3 janvier, a été rapide, le pays, sous le choc, semble hésiter entre le silence et la peur des lendemains incertains.

China urges US to ‘stop toppling’ Venezuelan government, release Maduro https://aje.io/y1mso8

The great isolationist ‘America First’ GOP President Donald Trump has in less than a year in office declared himself the ‘owner’ of Gaza and the ‘ruler’ of Venezuela.

There has been genocide in each year of the 2020ies so far, what a cursed decade. A decade we kicked off with a deadly pandemic, lest we forget. Here's to bucking the trend in 26. Wishing you a happy new year friends.

THREAD: on Friday, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Israel would recognize Somaliland, an autonomous breakaway republic in northern Somalia, as an independent state. This makes Israel the first state to officially recognize Somaliland, since it's 1991 declaration of independence.

Merry Christmas friends. Remember those struggling to celebrate, reeling from the trauma of war, displacement and the targeted bombings of churches. From the Middle East Eye, 25/12/25.

Hundreds of Colombian ex-soldiers have been drawn to Sudan with the promise of a big payday. What many found instead was death in a faraway war. An AFP investigation has uncovered how Colombian mercenaries ended up on the other side of the world. u.afp.com/S8Tt

Tech bros don’t actually understand the sci-fi they claim to love. Thank you Al Jazeera English for having me on.

As the year wraps up, & the breakout of conflict in the Horn of Africa looks increasingly inevitable in 2026, this indepth probe by @clairelwilmot.bsky.social into illegal gold mining from Tigray to the UAE mostly by the way of Eritrea...is a good 101er for how factions are likely to arm themselves.

Tomorrow is the awards ceremony of the #RoryPeckAwards! The best in global freelance journalism will be recognized at the BFI Southbank in London. It was unforgettable last year! Show up, support the best of our craft in 2025. A livestream link will be available here: rorypecktrust.org/awards/

🏆 Join us, & the great and the good from the news & media industry on Nov 26 @BFI Southbank when we celebrate the finalists + announce the winners of the 2025 #RoryPeckAwards. Hosted by Isa Soares CNN. Tickets🔗 buff.ly/pedyTxo Show your support for our finalists & freelance journalists globally.

Genocide resumes, reads this weekend's cover of @thecontinent.org, as El Fasher falls to the Rapid Support Forces after a year long siege. Gruesome images of their killing spree that is estimated to have killed thousands, make the rounds. What Sudanese activists warned would happen is playing out.

THREAD: this investigation took up over half my year, but it's here in @thecontinent.org: A Djiboutian drone strike in January was depicted as a army operation targeting rebels. It was actually a massacre of civilians. The bloodshed & coverup implicating Ethiopia, Djibouti, France & Turkiye. #OSINT

Kenya will host an Africa–France summit next year, agreed to by Presidents Ruto and Macron on the UN sidelines this week. As the Western African rejection of their former colonial power appears increasingly permanent, France races to make geopolitical/strategic gains in East Africa.

“drones manufactured by the Chinese tech giant DJI have been used to attack hospitals and civilian shelters and to surveil Palestinian prisoners being forced to act as human shields”. DJI stopped sales to Russia & Ukraine, but did not stop selling to Israel www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/5/...

70+ worshippers at the Al-Safiya Mosque in El Fasher were killed in an RSF drone strike today, Friday, when Jumah services means mosques are full. The UAE, which backs the RSF despite it being accused of genocide, continues to face no scrutiny from its western security partners, including the US.

After 14 years, the construction of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), a massive hydroelectric power dam on the Nile River, is complete. The dam was officially inaugurated. It is a huge achievement for Ethiopia, with hopes that the power generated can reduce poverty & power shortages.

Sigh. Orgs/individuals responsible for supporting genocides, tyrants & downplaying human suffering in Syria, Bosnia, Ethiopia & elsewhere continue to be given prominent leadership/organizer roles in Palestinian solidarity movements across North America. Solidarity shouldn't enable erasure.

It has been 3 years since our vocational school offering free education for MDW and refugees returnees in Ethiopia was launched. On Saturday, the latest group of 226 students graduated, completing courses in clothes design, sewing or hairstyling. The courses being free isn’t the point…

Keep their voices alive.

Saudi Arabia just executed Jalal al-Labbad for crimes during the Arab Spring, when he was 15. His brother Fadel was executed in 2019. His brother Mohammed waits on death row. MBS is using anti-terror laws to silence dissent: www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/0...

Al-Sharif killed in what appears to be a targeted Israeli attack on tent housing journalists outside al-Shifa hospital.

"Ethiopia’s Tigray war, which lasted from 2020 to 2022, is one of the most criminally under-covered conflicts in modern history" “It is a really horrific and extreme form of sexual violence, and one that deserves the world’s attention.”🧵