Europe has cleared out, the Western Sahara plume has finally slowed down to a crawl and the Leviathan low (as I call it remains in place over the Black Sea. Also there is an interesting burst of activity in the Horn of Africa.
As you can see in this animation there was some intense convection over the the #Ethiopian highlands and Sudan today, certainly more than we have seen for a fair few days.
Here we see a wider angle view of today' convection over the horn before sunset. This storm is continuing strongly into the night. Question of the day is, is this signalling the beginning of the big rainy season for the horn.
This animation relates to the wider picture in the tweet before last and it also relates to the big rains. In this animation at the end you see at the end that the picture stabilises with steady mid-altitude winds (10kms) from India to the horn.
The animation is from the GFS model and covers 10 days. These three show slightly low altitude winds 300hpa vs 250hpa in the GFS in 10 days time. All four models see the position stabilising - and I think this is what we are looking for to power the big rainy season.
Here are today's 12-day and 10-day rainfall forecasts for the broader region. The first one you see is the 12-day KMA forecast. The other three are 10 day forecasts. Significant amounts of rain are falling north of the 15 degree line both the KMA and CMC forecasts now.
And speaking of rain heading north this animation shows clouds sending moisture north from the large storm over the horn today.
Here are three 48 hour forecasts for #NorthAfrica which include the rain clouds shown heading north up the Sudanese Red Sea Coast in the previous tweet.
The Arabian Peninsula was quieter today than it has been since the beginning on June with just a few small clouds forming over Oman and the Yemen Red Sea Coast.
10-Day June 14th, accumulated rain forecasts for the #MiddleEast from the GFS, CMC & KMA weather models.
. @Arab_Storms has no new live storm videos from the Arabian Peninsula for today but he does have some spectacular ones from Europe over the past few days. The first is from Spain yesterday.
There were further significant storms in Northern Spain today. as you can see in this satellite animation. And while things are a lot quieter than they have been recently over Morocco, there is still a fair bit going on.
Also as these images show. Just because you can't see clouds, that doesn't mean that water is not moving through the area.
And finally, June 14th 16-day (GFS) and 12-day (KMA) accumulated rainfall forecasts for the Middle East.
The GFS is again showing rains over the Arabian Sea getting very close to Yemen. This 16 day forecast also shows very heavy rains in #Ethopia in bottom left.
This video is about the work done by the “terrorist” who drove through the Magdeburg Christmas Market tonight at high speed killing injuring around 100 people.
How does a doctor practicing as a psychiatrist go from being a women’s rights defender focussed on Assisting Islamic women to escape an oppressive culture to being a multi murderer in his adopted country.
Meet @DrTalebJawad
A very unusual terrorist.
A good starting point for those interested in getting closer to the truth about what happened tonight is to visit @DrTalebJawad ‘s Twitter profile and look at his recent messages before the account gets locked.
It is immediately apparent that this is not your normal Islamic terrorist, in fact it quickly becomes apparent from his tweets that he was likely suffering from a psychotic break or something similar before he committed the horrific act of terrorism in Magdeburg.
This incident took place in Magdeburg a city relatively near to where I am currently in Eastern Germany. It was fairly late evening. But the news exploded locally very quickly on Twitter.
And the initial speculation was of course that the terrorist was Islamic and that it was another planned terror attack.
At this point several hours later however it looks like the perpetrator was having an accrue psychological break.
Follow @bartov_omer he is an Israeli Genocide Scholar and (my guess) a realist geopolitical analyst who will almost certainly be heard a lot in coming days and weeks. x.com/bartov_omer?s=…
…. In large part because his explanation of the true nature of the implementation of the current phase of the so-called “general’s plan” in Gaza and the criminality of @IsraeliPM Bibi Netanyahu is so clear and authoritative.
The war in Gaza is now over Bartov explains.
What is now happening, and what remains to be done on the a Israeli side is effectively the implementation of the full Zionist extremist (Ben Givir Smotrich and Netanyahu plan - I.e. removing Palestinians from Gaza altogether, an object that will be achieved through starving the remaining civilians and using other methods to make it impossible to continue to live there.
The strip is already being carved up into enclaves for this purpose. You could call them “Ghettos” (my word) corralling and keeping the Palestinian population separated whilst efforts to remake and settle the strip are completed.
. @amanpour It’s not just the IDF that responds to press questions with rote answers that are clearly false.
The U.S. @StateDept has been doing exactly the same thing throughout the war for 14 months. Parroting the line “Israel has a right to defend itself” when everyone in the planet knows this is not true.
I know you must know this also. We all do.
I commend your report but I ask you and your network to please go further and actively oppose this war. And to call for it to end.
It is clear now in recent statements from Trump and Netanyahu that another war is intended in the Middle East by the U.S. and Israel. Its advocates will stood start lining up to beat the drums for this war.
Please @CNN, it is now time to end all of this.
The question we all have then is “When will the U.S. bring this evil to an end?”
A war with Iran 21 years after the horrific war in Iraq will have devastating consequences beyond imagining.
In its unwavering support for Netanyahu these past 14 months the U.S. is in the process now of destroying itself. Just as Israel is, or has done already.
The first speaker in this star studded panel here is sober clear and damning.
“… featuring Mustafa Barghouti, Mads Gilbert, Ilan Pappe, and Ingrid Fiskaa – discusses and critically explores three key areas: the present moment where Gaza remains under constant genocidal attack from Israel; the so-called “legitimacy” of the rules-based order (including but not limited to international law) that’s supposed to prevent or stop such violence; and the future of rebuilding Gaza in a way that actually honours the hopes, dreams and aspirations of the Palestinian people.”
The panel is moderated by Paul Salvatori, senior producer and presenter at TRT World.
As Christmas and the New Year approach, reflection, both self and outward looking are part of the zeitgeist for the faithful throughout the world.
As it stands this Christmas in Bethlehem will be the “second Christmas during an ongoing Genocide”. Placed in quote marks here because it seems hard to reconcile with reality.
How can this still be continuing?
How is it that the @Statedept even now - 15 months after October 7th and more recently the defeat of both Hezbollah and Assad - is still mostly saying “Israel has a right to defend itself. As massacres of 50-80 Gaza civilians - predominantly women and children - continue to occur on a daily basis.
Could there at least be a Christmas and New Years Truce? A brief silencing of the guns, a break from the endless massacre of innocents via fire-from-the-sky, as if Gaza were now Mordor.
It is certainly already nearly as desolate.
Someone needs to ask Bibi Netanyahu who is unusually and nearly singularly responsibility for all of this. WHEN AND HOW DOES THIS END?
There is a new chapter on the story of Mosab Hassan Yousef.
This is the original production of this. But he will soon be known far better than he was when Chris Cuomo brought his story to life here back in December 2023 at the outset of the war, in the wake of January 7th.
Hamas Founder's Son Turned Israeli Spy - Mosab Hassan Yousef, "The Green... youtu.be/llJxz1pAlQQ?si… via @YouTube
“Hamas’s Aspiration is global”
“The Muslim Brotherhood is Here in the United States.”
For clarification Mosab Hassan is unquestionably completely genuine and in is views, and like me he is a pacifist when it comes to saving human life from conflict. And this as he articulates very very clearly remains his view.
And for this reason - notwithstanding the fact that this latest broadcast is extremely triggering, and will likely soon become very controversial, is also very important.
The target of this messaging is Americans. Not me.
And probably not you, even though a large portion of my followers are in the U.S.