Karen Wake

I have news #CatsOfTwitter

When Aprils fools may happen #r4today dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1…

NEW | Hezbollah Foils Israeli Intelligence Plot, Ukrainian Embassy in Lebanon Under Scrutiny Khaled Al-Aidi, a Palestinian-Syrian operative with Ukrainian citizenship and a senior Israeli intelligence agent, is at the center of a major security crisis in Lebanon. Hezbollah first detained Al-Aidi on September 27, 2025, after discovering an explosive-laden motorcycle near Airport Road in Beirut’s southern suburb, intended to bomb a mass civilian gathering commemorating the anniversary of Hassan Nasrallah’s killing in 2024. Investigations revealed that Al-Aidi led a cell responsible for multiple terror attacks, including assassination attempts against Iranian diplomats, planting explosives, and coordinating strikes. He is suspected to have provided intelligence used in the 2024 Israeli airstrike that killed Nasrallah. Following an Israeli airstrike that damaged the building where he was held, Al-Aidi escaped and sought refuge inside the Ukrainian Embassy in Beirut. Lebanese authorities confirmed that the embassy attempted to facilitate his travel abroad, providing documents and passport details, raising fears of him being smuggled out. US officials, including the CIA station chief in Beirut, reportedly tried to intervene to secure his exit.

Revolutionary Cucumber-Picking Robots Deployed in Britain’s Cucumber Capital In a groundbreaking move for British horticulture, the Lea Valley has become the first in the country to introduce advanced cucumber-picking robots across its greenhouse operations. #Backbritishfarming

The Strait of Hormuz is not closed. It is sorted. Iran has built a three-tier access system for the most important waterway on earth. Tier one: allies transit free. Malaysia cleared seven vessels through diplomacy at zero cost. India negotiated zero-fee passage. Pakistan secured clearance for 20 ships. Iraq transits without charge. These countries proved geopolitical alignment and the IRGC waved them through the Larak corridor without collecting a rial. Tier two: compliant neutrals pay. At least two tankers, likely Chinese-linked, paid up to two million dollars each in yuan through Kunlun Bank intermediaries. COSCO container ships attempted the corridor, were turned back on first approach when documentation was incomplete, then succeeded days later with revised paperwork. These are the vessels that prove the system works. They submit IMO numbers, ownership chains, cargo manifests, and crew lists to the IRGC’s Hormozgan Command. They receive clearance codes. They are escorted by pilot boats through the five-nautical-mile channel between Qeshm and Larak. They pay in a currency that does not route through SWIFT. Every successful yuan transit is a live proof-of-concept for non-dollar energy settlement. Tier three: adversaries are denied entirely. The committee plan bans American vessels, Israeli vessels, and vessels from any country participating in sanctions against Iran. These ships do not get vetting. They do not get codes. They do not get escorts. They get the AL SALMI, burning off Dubai, as illustration of what the corridor looks like without permission. But the toll is not the real cost. War-risk insurance is. Premiums have surged from $40,000 per VLCC transit before the war to $600,000 to $1.2 million today, a 30-fold increase, now running five to ten percent of hull value. A VLCC carrying $50 million in crude oil can absorb a combined $3 million in toll and insurance as a fraction of cargo value. A container ship carrying $5 million in manufactured goods cannot. The insurance premium alone exceeds the profit margin on non-oil cargo. The strait has become an oil-only VIP lane. Crude flows selectively for those who can pay the combined cost. Everything else waits, reroutes around the Cape of Good Hope, or does not move at all. And the US Navy is not inside the strait. The Abraham Lincoln strike group operates from standoff in the Arabian Sea. Three Littoral Combat Ships sit in the Persian Gulf. Marine expeditionary units are positioned for contingency. But zero American warships have transited the strait or escorted commercial traffic since the war began. The Navy told the shipping industry it has “no availability” for Hormuz escorts. The world’s most powerful fleet keeps respectful distance from a waterway controlled by a country whose navy is 92 percent destroyed because the mines, drones, and shore missiles that remain make close-in presence prohibitively risky. The result is a geopolitical sorting algorithm operating at the molecular level. One hundred and eighty-one vessels transited in all of March. Pre-war traffic was 138 per day. Of those 181, roughly 70 percent were Iranian-affiliated. The remaining 30 percent were vetted allies or yuan-paying neutrals. The 20 percent of global oil that once flowed freely through this strait now flows selectively, conditionally, and in currencies chosen by Tehran. Iran lost its air force. It lost its navy. It lost two thirds of its production capacity. It retained the only thing that matters: 39 kilometres of coastline on both sides of the narrowest point. The US Navy will not enter. Chinese tankers will. And the sorting algorithm processes another vessel, collects another yuan payment, and demonstrates once more that geography is the one military asset that cannot be degraded by precision strikes. The strait is not closed. It is under new management. open.substack.com/pub/shanakaans…

Trump: You don’t have the cards Zelenskyy: I’m playing chess ♟️

Update from the land of the free:

TV reporter tells David Bowie the internet is "hugely exaggerated" David Bowie's response is the closest thing to perfection about the future.

This is a lie. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre has been cared for and maintained by Muslims for centuries.

It's important for us to process everything Trump says and does with ironclad recognition that he has ZERO sense of a greater good. Because he CANNOT see beyond himself. Not that he WON'T. He CAN'T. He is a smorgasbord of impulses and cravings - desiring wealth, power, adoration, grandiosity, and vengeance - he's a giant id. Deep down, he is insecure - as all malignant narcissists are - and he knows he's illegitimate, and his merit is illusory. And he knows he has secrets and lies he must protect and distract from. This need for grandiosity and to avoid humiliation is all he is now. It's why he blusters and boasts all day every day. It's why he so badly craved the Nobel Prize - which he saw as an inarguable legitimacy. Malignant narcissists NEVER change. They ALWAYS get worse. They NEVER want to go down alone. We're seeing his decline. And it's dangerous. He's become so false, so desperate, and so narrow, that I could argue this guy controlling nukes isn't even a fully formed person - he was always abnormal, now he's devoid of all normalcy. He is a pariah. A parasite. A pathology.

BREAKING: The White House said US President Donald Trump would be interested in calling on Arab countries to help pay for the cost of the war.

Trump’s new threat: US will be “completely obliterating” electric plants, oil wells and Kharg Island if Straight of Hormuz is “not immediately” reopened

BREAKING: Israel's Knesset has passed a law to execute Palestinian detainees. Death by hanging. Mandatory sentencing. No pardon. 90 days to carry out. It applies through military courts with a 96% conviction rate. It does not apply to Israelis.

The Geneva Convention says it’s a war crime to target journalists, even if they work for an enemy organisation. It’s also a war crime to target medical workers. After the killing of 3 Lebanese TV journos last week, several medics coming to help them were killed as well.

What a fucking embarrassment. American troops are being sent into harm’s way in Iran and this fucking idiot is doing his double jerkoff dance while waving a sword, like a drunk uncle at a wedding. This is who has the nuclear codes. America is a parody.

We would love to be nominated our charity goes above and beyond and has volunteers. We do all that we can to support our most highly vulnerable community around the UK who has pet dogs. These are the three categories below that I believe we would come under any nomination would be greatly appreciated as it closes tomorrow at 5 pm. 🙏🧡 facebook.com/share/p/1Kz6Lm… bbc.co.uk/makeadifferenc… bbc.co.uk/makeadifferenc…

This is Lord Rothermere the owner of the Daily Mail. He lives in a massive mansion in the English countryside, but he pays no tax here because he identifies as French. While the Daily Mail is registered in Bermuda and pays no tax anywhere. That is his ‘Patriotism’.

Today is Palm Sunday, marking the beginning of Holy Week as we approach Easter. Today's procession across Trafalgar Square to St Martin-in-the-Fields is a powerful retelling of the story of Jesus’s arrival in Jerusalem.

World leaders marched in Paris after the killing of Charlie Hebdo journalists The irony: among them was Benjamin Netanyahu the killer of journalists in Gaza. An even greater irony: the world watches in silence as more than 270 journalists killed in Palestime

1/ The world is facing a 'ticking time bomb' from its supply of oil, according to a briefing note from JP Morgan. Physical scarcity of oil is about to unfold across the globe, spreading sequentially through April from east to west, causing major economic disruption worldwide. ⬇️

The UK economy was not designed for one person to figure it out alone. Rent/mortgage, bills, council tax… everything assumes there are two of you. Finding a committed, sensible partner who understands money isn’t just romantic. In this country, it’s genuinely strategic. Single people, please choose wisely! This is not an advice, it’s a warning.