1 day agoFrom jihad to healthcare: the friend of Bin Laden who claimed to cure HIVAt the height of the AIDS epidemic millions of people, especially in the world’s poorest countries, faced illness and death without access to proper treatment — and desperation opened the door for charlatans raising false hopes with quack cures. Among them was Abd al-Majeed al-Zindani, one of Yemen’s most controversial…Osama Bin Laden8 min readOsama Bin Laden8 min read
Oct 24Gaza hospital explosion: the unanswered questionsAn accident involving a Palestinian rocket is the most likely scenario but exactly what happened is still far from clear. — When an explosion caused mass casualties at al-Ahli hospital in Gaza last week it was scarcely surprising that Palestinians — along with many others — assumed Israel was responsible. Israel had already phoned the hospital more than once to demand its evacuation, and a strike the previous Saturday, reportedly by…Gaza8 min readGaza8 min read
Oct 17Mishap or sabotage? Another pipeline mystery in the BalticIn the early hours of October 8 a mysterious event in the Baltic Sea ruptured an underwater gas pipeline. Coming just a year after saboteurs blew up three of the four Nord Stream pipes under the Baltic it’s not surprising there is speculation about the latest incident. The pipe damaged…Nord Stream4 min readNord Stream4 min read
Oct 13From blockchain to Gaza: Elon Musk’s protégé and his odd aversion to hyperlinksFor several days now, one of Elon Musk’s favourite customers on X/Twitter has been posting updates about Israel-Gaza every few minutes. …Twitter6 min readTwitter6 min read
Sep 26How Seymour Hersh accidentally debunked his own reporting about chemical weapons in SyriaOne of the most horrific moments of the Syrian conflict came in August 2013 when rockets laden with the nerve agent sarin hit Ghouta, a rebel-held area on the outskirts of Damascus. Hundreds of people died and thousands more were injured. It was the deadliest chemical attack anywhere in the…Syria9 min readSyria9 min read
Sep 6Egypt-Zambia gold scam: the plot thickensEleven people appeared in a Zambian court last week following the discovery of $5.7 million in cash, 602 bars of fake gold, five pistols and 126 rounds of ammunition aboard a private jet that landed at Lusaka airport on a flight from Egypt. Oddly, though, there was no mention of…Gold5 min readGold5 min read
Aug 24‘King Shad’ and the miracle-working prophet: a new twist in the Zambia-Egypt gold affairOne of four Zambians arrested last week after police found $5.7m in cash and 127kg of fake gold aboard a private jet at Lusaka airport had been jailed in South Africa in 2017 over a previous gold transaction that went wrong, it has emerged. In this earlier deal the arrested…Egypt2 min readEgypt2 min read
Aug 23Egyptians arrested in Zambia may have been seeking shady gold dealMore information is gradually emerging about the mysterious private jet impounded at Lusaka airport in Zambia after a flight from Cairo, and enough is now known to suggest a possible explanation of what was going on. It appears that the Egyptians on board the jet had flown to Lusaka to…Egypt5 min readEgypt5 min read
Aug 21Fool’s gold and fistfuls of dollars: the strange tale of a private jet’s flight from EgyptLast week Zambian drug enforcement officers searched and impounded a private jet after it landed at Lusaka airport on a flight from Cairo. It turned out there were no drugs on board but what the investigators found instead was startling: $5.7 …Egypt8 min readEgypt8 min read
Jun 20Nord Stream sabotage: a look at the evidence so farLast September a series of explosions ruptured three of the four Nord Stream pipelines laid under the Baltic Sea to deliver natural gas from Russia to Germany. The explosions released vast quantities of methane, a major contributor to global warming, into the atmosphere. Investigations by three of the affected countries…Andromeda19 min readAndromeda19 min read
