zaina

Today, for the third time in my mother's life and for the second in my own life, we lost a home due to it being bombed by the Israeli army. This home was in a building constructed by my uncle, the Lebanese historian Ahmad Beydoun, after my family was able to return to our ancestral hometown, Bint Jbeil, in the year 2000 when Israel ended its decades-long occupation there, during which they destroyed my mother's childhood home. In 2006, they would destroy both her and my home in Beirut, rendering us both temporarily homeless. Uncle Ahmad's building was a costly joint effort financed by himself as well as my mother and his other siblings. Each owned an apartment in the building, which also housed medical practices, a baby toys shop (owned and run by my cousin Jamal) and a branch for Bank Audi. Upon hearing this news, Uncle Ahmad wrote: "in our hearts, this is the least of our losses." We can all only be thankful that our family is unharmed: when I told this story to a distant cousin, she replied that her friend had lost both her mother and father in Israel's bombing of Beirut two days ago, which killed more than 300 civilians in the space of ten minutes. For reasons that are difficult to understand, the Israeli army posted a video of their crime, which I share here.

🚨SHOCKING: Apple just proved that AI models cannot do math. Not advanced math. Grade school math. The kind a 10-year-old solves. And the way they proved it is devastating. Apple researchers took the most popular math benchmark in AI — GSM8K, a set of grade-school math problems — and made one change. They swapped the numbers. Same problem. Same logic. Same steps. Different numbers. Every model's performance dropped. Every single one. 25 state-of-the-art models tested. But that wasn't the real experiment. The real experiment broke everything. They added one sentence to a math problem. One sentence that is completely irrelevant to the answer. It has nothing to do with the math. A human would read it and ignore it instantly. Here's the actual example from the paper: "Oliver picks 44 kiwis on Friday. Then he picks 58 kiwis on Saturday. On Sunday, he picks double the number of kiwis he did on Friday, but five of them were a bit smaller than average. How many kiwis does Oliver have?" The correct answer is 190. The size of the kiwis has nothing to do with the count. A 10-year-old would ignore "five of them were a bit smaller" because it's obviously irrelevant. It doesn't change how many kiwis there are. But o1-mini, OpenAI's reasoning model, subtracted 5. It got 185. Llama did the same thing. Subtracted 5. Got 185. They didn't reason through the problem. They saw the number 5, saw a sentence that sounded like it mattered, and blindly turned it into a subtraction. The models do not understand what subtraction means. They see a pattern that looks like subtraction and apply it. That is all. Apple tested this across all models. They call the dataset "GSM-NoOp" — as in, the added clause is a no-operation. It does nothing. It changes nothing. The results are catastrophic. Phi-3-mini dropped over 65%. More than half of its "math ability" vanished from one irrelevant sentence. GPT-4o dropped from 94.9% to 63.1%. o1-mini dropped from 94.5% to 66.0%. o1-preview, OpenAI's most advanced reasoning model at the time, dropped from 92.7% to 77.4%. Even giving the models 8 examples of the exact same question beforehand, with the correct solution shown each time, barely helped. The models still fell for the irrelevant clause. This means it's not a prompting problem. It's not a context problem. It's structural. The Apple researchers also found that models convert words into math operations without understanding what those words mean. They see the word "discount" and multiply. They see a number near the word "smaller" and subtract. Regardless of whether it makes any sense. The paper's exact words: "current LLMs are not capable of genuine logical reasoning; instead, they attempt to replicate the reasoning steps observed in their training data." And: "LLMs likely perform a form of probabilistic pattern-matching and searching to find closest seen data during training without proper understanding of concepts." They also tested what happens when you increase the number of steps in a problem. Performance didn't just decrease. The rate of decrease accelerated. Adding two extra clauses to a problem dropped Gemma2-9b from 84.4% to 41.8%. Phi-3.5-mini from 87.6% to 44.8%. The more thinking required, the more the models collapse. A real reasoner would slow down and work through it. These models don't slow down. They pattern-match. And when the pattern becomes complex enough, they crash. This paper was published at ICLR 2025, one of the most prestigious AI conferences in the world. You are using AI to help you make financial decisions. To check legal documents. To solve problems at work. To help your children with homework. And Apple just proved that the AI is not thinking about any of it. It is pattern matching. And the moment something unexpected shows up in your question, it breaks. It does not tell you it broke. It just quietly gives you the wrong answer with full confidence.

Why is there no one in the U.S. government stepping up to stop this insanity? The president of the US is openly threatening genocide against a country of 90 million people, saying “a whole civilization will die tonight.” No mass resignations and the opposition party is absent. What sick death cult. Unbelievably and shockingly dangerous.

🚨 Do you understand what Oracle just did.. they fired 30,000 people.. via 6 AM email.. while reporting a 95% increase in net income last quarter.. Oracle isn't a struggling company .. Oracle made MORE money than ever.. and still fired 30,000 people because they're spending $156 billion on AI data centres instead.. and Larry Ellison.. the guy who just fired 30,000 families.. is worth $200 billion.. the 3rd richest person on earth.. he owns an entire Hawaiian island.. Lanai.. 98% of it.. bought it for $300 million like it was a vacation home.. this is the same playbook every single time.. IBM fired 7,800 and replaced them with AI in 2023.. Amazon cut 27,000 the same year while reporting record revenue.. Atlassian cut thousands while profits climbed.. Google laid off 12,000 while sitting on $100 billion in cash.. they told you to learn to code.. you learned to code.. they told you to upskill.. you upskilled.. and then they replaced you with the thing you helped build and sent the termination letter before you woke up.. the company made record profits and decided the reward for that was firing the people who made it happen.

@oihamza Should’ve seen ur picture before my trip ! Such a cool shot !

A few seconds after I took this a friendly backpacker came up and asked if I’d take a pic of them the same way. I said yes and another onlooker asked if I’d do theirs. Before I knew it there were people forming a line. Humans are simple creatures

Tragic news continues to arrive in these days from the Middle East, especially from Gaza. I express my profound sadness regarding last Thursday’s attack by the Israeli army on the Catholic Parish of the Holy Family in Gaza City, which as you know killed three Christians and gravely wounded others. I pray for the victims, Saad Issa Kostandi Salameh, Foumia Issa Latif Ayyad, Najwa Ibrahim Latif Abu Daoud, and I am particularly close to their families and to all the parishioners.

‘Killed seeking aid.’ When did the world just sit back and let an increasingly rogue government do this to a civilian population, day after day?

انتهت حلول الارض ، كنت معارضة فكرة الرابط لكن المجاعة لها رأي آخر انشروا الرابط اذا سمحتم🙏 #GazaStarving gofund.me/0677560d

أصدقائي في #غزة.. يتابعني على الانستجرام أكثر من مليون متابع.. أبحث عن طريقة من خلال منصتي لعلّها تسند إخوتنا في غزة: أنا لا آخذ مالاً ❌ ولا أنشر روابط لي ❌ ولا أعمل كوسيط لنقل أي مال ❌ ⬅️ إلا عبر روابط جهاتٍ مرخّصة من قبل الدّولة (الأردن والكويت كمثال). ولكن يمكنني من خلال منصتي النشر عنكم وروابطكم أنتم: ✅ ارسلوا لي (الخاص أو في التعليقات) رابط التبرعات الخاص بكم. ✅ مع اسمكم الثنائي من حساب حقيقي بالاسم والصورة وليس وهميّ لضمان وصول الحقّ لكم دون أن يستغله جهلة من خارج غزة. سنقوم وأصدقائي من أصحاب الحسابات الواسعة بنشرها.. لعلّ وعسى نجمع ولو كيس طحين واحد لكل رابط.. ولا حول ولا قوّة إلا بالله. الله يفرجها عنكم وما تحتاجوا مساعدتنا الخايبة والله

@taimurabdaal If he practiced any other religion, no one would be making such assumptions

I watched Shaun Maguire's 28-min video about why he thinks Zohran Mamdani is an Islamist There's almost nothing relating to Islamism in there! Shaun uses the term "Islamist" to smear people who criticise Israel and the US, and as a cover to safely disparage large groups of people who disagree with him Video summary followed by detailed timestamp breakdown below, let me know if you think I've gotten anything wrong Summary: 1. By Shaun's own definition at the start, almost nothing in the video actually relates to Zohran being an Islamist. The video covers lots of things Shaun doesn't like about Zohran (no shit!) but this doesn't make Zohran an Islamist 2. Much of the video is about Zohran's father and what Shaun doesn't like about him. But again, I did not see even a tenuous link to Islamism, by Shaun's own definition at the start of the video 3. Partway through, Shaun seems to re-define Islamism. He outlines "3 different strains of Islamism" — "people that basically want to destroy the West, or want to destroy Israel, or want to spread Islamic fundamentalism" 4. The only way I could remotely make sense of the accusations is via Shaun's novel "3 strains" definition of Islamism, combined with a conspiracy-theory hermeneutic that interprets standard criticisms of Israel and the US as "wanting to destroy the West” Details: --- DEFINITION --- 1:30 - Definition of Islamism: “person who advocates increasing the influence of Islamic law in politics and society”. Sure, let’s go with that 👍 --- PART 1: MAHMOOD MAMDANI --- 2:25 - “I think this lays out just how big an Islamist his father is.” Shaun is talking about a guy who's married to a non-Muslim Indian film director! 3:58 - “This is his father justifying suicide bombing.” No it’s not — he’s explaining why he thinks suicide bombing is misunderstood by Western media. Shaun seems to think suicide bombing ⇒ Islamist 5:00 - “An intifada is basically a call to suicide bombing”. Obviously this is highly contested. Zionists may agree with Shaun about what “intifada” means, but others won’t. I don’t. 6:00 - “When you’re celebrating a 3rd intifada, you’re not just a normal person who wants peace, you’re glorifying death and destruction and saying that any means are justified to achieve your goal.” It goes without saying that these polemics will only resonate with someone who already agrees with Shaun’s politics and worldview. ‘Glorifying death and destruction’ is a common racist trope, and most people would associate ‘any means are justified to achieve your goal’ with Israel’s actions rather than the Palestinians’. 6:30 - “One of the architects of the anti-Israel movement in America”. Quite possible, but not Islamist 7:45 - “Palestinians have a right to resist. This is a colonial occupation, not a conflict” This is a mainstream view that Mahmood tweeted, also not Islamist So far, there is nothing here about Islamism — Shaun is simply going through some standard disagreements that a Zionist like him would have with an anti-Zionist like Mahmood Mamdani. Obviously Shaun doesn’t like the characterisation of Israel as an apartheid/colonial state! --- PART 2: IRAN --- 8:30 - “His father made it very clear who he is” Yes, he has — he is clear that he opposes Israel. This doesn’t make him an Islamist. 9:44 - “Three different strains of Islamism: wanting to destroy the West, destroy Israel, or spread Islamic fundamentalism” This is a very novel definition of Islamism and this “destroy the West” stuff is a bit hysterical. The majority of the world is against Israel and US foreign policy! 11:00 - Shaun’s telling of the the Iranian Revolution: the Ayatollahs (Islamists) and students + socialists were allies against the Shah’s regime. Together they kicked off revolution, the Shah fled, but then the Ayatollahs started jailing and executing the leaders of the student and socialist movements, and seized power for themselves. Shaun is worried that Zohran Mamdani is planning to do the same in the US. 11:50 - Shaun is worried that there are “sleeper cells” across the US, both ideological (Mamdani) and physical. 12:30 - “Socialism creates a vacuum for other intentions.” No idea what he means by this, or frankly what he means by ‘socialism’. --- PART 3: TAQIYYA --- 12:51 - Taqiyya is a concept in the Qur’an that gives Muslims permission to lie in life-threatening situations. Shaun says that Islamists have expanded this concept to justifying lying when it advances their agendas. Almost no Muslim actually knew about this word until it became a right-wing talking point recently, and ‘lying when it advances their agendas’ is a hallmark of many groups including the Israeli and US governments and the IDF. 14:30 - “Islamism is a political ideology like communism” This is very poor sociological/political commentary. Islamism is so vague and can describe such a range of disparate groups that it’s meaningless to try to single it out as a “culture” or “ideology”. --- PART 4: ZOHRAN MAMDANI (FINALLY) --- 16:20 - “Zohran’s intentions are unclear. His father’s intentions are perfectly clear.” Kind of undermines the whole "Zohran is an Islamist" thing! 15:00 - “Zohran is basically saying that it wasn’t al-Awlaki’s fault that he became the top recruiter for Al Qaeda.” No he’s not, he’s saying that the NYT article should have explored to what extent FBI surveillance may have contributed to al-Awlaki’s radicalisation. 18:30 - “15 years ago, the pro-Palestine issue in the US was very different than today. Back then, 90% of the people starting SJP (Students for Justice in Palestine) chapters were Islamists. Today you might just be some left-wing Marxist kid and then you start an SJP chapter, this wasn’t the case 15 years ago.” [paraphrased] I don’t know what data or definitions Shaun is using, but Operation Cast Lead was 16 years ago, in which Israel broke a ceasefire and killed over 1000 Palestinians including 300 children, which naturally turned a lot of people against Israel, so I am very skeptical of Shaun’s "90% Islamist" claim even whatever he means by "Islamist" here 20:00 - “A man in Malaysia locked me in his room and tried to give me a roofie.” Shaun ends the video by talking about how Zohran said that billionaires shouldn’t exist, how Zohran lied on his college application, and a tweet in which Zohran condemned people who downplayed the killing of Muslim Brotherhood supporters in the Rabaa massacre which Human Rights Watch described as “one of the world's largest killings of demonstrators in a single day in recent history”.

Let’s break down what happened in America today. At 9:37 a.m., Trump told his followers to buy stocks. 🧵👇🏾

Make no mistake about it. The Democrats laid the groundwork for the repression on university campuses we see today. Like the Old McCarthyism, the New McCarthyism has its roots in anti-Left ideology embraced by white elites across the political spectrum. This is a great article giving that historical context. thenation.com/article/societ…

@dissectpodcast Twenty one pilots albums 🙌🏽

After ‘Purple Hearts’ next week, I’ll be taking a few weeks off from Morale eps. I’ll be publishing content every week tho, including the epic Super Bowl analysis. Are there any albums or music-related topics you’d like to hear discussed during the break? Any guests?

I saw people protesting at my local Tesla service center today. Right on ✊🏾 I’m convinced that unelected co-president Elon Musk is turning the U.S. government into a version of how he runs Tesla—and that should terrify everyone. Hear me out. When I first got my Tesla, I loved it. They delivered it straight to my home during peak COVID lockdown. Anytime I had a question, I could easily reach a sales rep or advisor. Sometimes, we’d even stop by the Tesla store just to check out the cars—always a friendly experience, no issues at all. 🧵

@dissectpodcast The weeknd !!

So my question is “why do certain men have such a hard time hearing these facts and why has it always been deemed not important enough?” Do men hate women?

I don’t hate men. I love men. But the truth is most personal feminism is born from the ashes of women who were denied life at the hands of men and the failures of their government.

I am disgusted with everyone who has allowed the destruction of Gaza and Lebanon, going so far as to call it “victory” and a chance at a “new Middle East.” How dare you. How dare you rejoice in the death and pain of others as if they were bots in a video game? Shame. 7/

🇮🇪 I am very proud of our peacekeepers serving with the UN in Lebanon. They define Irish courage, honour and compassion. They bravely face real danger to keep people safe. Their duty is to peace and humanity. They do not take orders from Israel’s war machine. We send our solidarity to our peacekeepers and their families.

Yes, Middle Eastern politics are very complicated. However, they do become much simpler if you take it as a premise that children of all races are equally valuable.