They Should Be Ashamed: Mass Global Suicidal Empathy

"Canada intends to recognize the State of Palestine at the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in September 2025."

"This intention is predicated on the Palestinian Authority's commitment to much-needed reforms, including the commitments by Palestinian Authority President Abbas to fundamentally reform its governance, to hold general elections in 2025 in which Hamas can play no part, and to demilitarize the Palestinian state."

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney

 

"I recognize the legitimate concerns regarding Israeli co-operation access to polling stations, and the integrity of the electoral process, particularly in Gaza."

These are serious challenges, but they must be addressed rather than used to justify another indefinite postponement of Palestinian democracy."

"I am therefore appealing to you to intervene personally and urgently with President Abbas, together with Canada's international partners, to ensure that the Palestinian Authority honours its commitment to hold elections."

Sameer Sinijlaw, head, New Path (Masar Jadid) political movement 

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is seen last month in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Palestinian elections set for next month have been delayed by a year. (Mahmoud Illean/The Associated Press)

 

"[We] deeply regret Abbas' decision to postpone elections scheduled for November 28]."

"Credible elections are an important element of the commitment that President Abbas and the Palestinian Authority made to reform, including democratic renewal and accountable governance, and are in line with the July 2025 New York Declaration."

"Strengthening Palestinian governance is essential to continue building the institutional foundation of a viable two-state solution, which is the only path to lasting peace and security for both Israel and Palestine.

"[The undersigned will] continue to support efforts to deliver on these elections."

Foreign Ministers of Australia, Canada, France, U.K. 

 

"While the Canadian government pursues punitive measures and sanctions against Israel, it must demonstrate that the Palestinians will also be held accountable for failing to honour their commitments and undermining the prospects for peace."

"Yet the Canadian government offers no indication of what consequences the PA will face, while suggesting that Israel is somehow to blame." 

Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs  

Israeli medics and volunteers treat the injured at the site of a Palestinian suicide bombing in Jerusalem, Israel. (credit: GETTY IMAGES)

 

When Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced a week earlier that the scheduled November 28 Palestinian elections, about two decades overdue, would be postponed to September 2027 as a result of "obstacles posed by Israeli measures" that would interfere with the "free, fair and inclusive elections", he was simply acting true to form. The last election, held in 2006, demonstrated the popularity of Hamas among Palestinians, enabling it to take majority rule of Gaza. Since then, Hamas has grown even more popular among Palestinians, and the Palestine Authority president more unpopular.

 

Western countries supporting Palestinian statehood urge a democratic election take place, one that does not include the terrorist Hamas group. But in trusting Palestinians to elect their politicians to reflect the values of a civilized society those same Western democratic countries reveal their ignorance of the Palestinian voting psyche. Immediately following the gruesome mass rapes, mutilations, slaughter and hostage-taking of 7 October 2023, the majority of Palestinians both in Gaza and the West Bank approved of the mass carnage that took place in southern Israel. Given the chance they would vote overwhelmingly for Hamas.

 

Mahmoud Abbas, whose Fatah-led administration's school curricula teach young Palestinians that the Jews living next door are their implacable enemies, prepared to liquidate them, not merely oppress them -- urge their children to dedicate their futures to the extermination of Israel, that in engaging in missions to murder Jews they guarantee themselves a place in Paradise. Those that do commit crimes against humanity in Israel are guaranteed a place of honour and a lavish salary from the PA's Martyr's Fund, popularly called its "pay for slay" fund. These are the neighbours that France, the U.K., Canada, Spain and Ireland feel Israel should accommodate itself with.

 

"Israeli measures" that so irritate the  Palestinian Authority include the pressing, ever-present need to remain militarily vigilant in the prevention of suicide attacks against Israelis. Before the separating wall between Israel and the territories and the several Intifadas, the murders perpetrated by Palestinian terrorism on Jewish Israelis kept mounting. That vigilance against further and future such attacks against Israeli civilians is interpreted by Mahmud Abbas as 'occupation'. By a nation unable to trust its neighbour, knowing that once its guard is relaxed, it becomes an invitation for mass slaughter.

 

When Samer Sinijlaw wrote to Canada's Mark Carney to appeal to him to 'do something' about the postponed election, he was writing to a leader of a country which has never been in the unenviable position of having its intelligence services, military and police on constant duty to ensure that any dire plots of mass murder are nipped before they become reality, and living with the knowledge that they cannot possibly stop all such plans and there will be those that succeed. From afar, leaders like PM Carney posit their simple solutions.

 

Protesters march during a pro-Palestine demonstration in London, May 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Thomas Krych)

 

To the perennially threatened these are not solutions, but risible black humour unworthy of world leaders whose neutrality in recognizing an established civil nation with values and laws like their own in a democratic union with its people that include not only Jews, but a significant number of Arabs, Druze, Bedouin, Christians, Kurds, B'hai and others with full citizenship rights. In choosing to abandon the human rights of this civilization by viewing those who continually threaten its existence by mass violence with equal consideration, these world leaders betray their own commitment to human rights, the rule of law and international civil and social mores to an underlying suspicion, if not enmity toward Jews and the Jewish state.

 

Continuing to support a Muslim fundamentalist aspiring state that rejects the presence of a different ethnic and social, cultural and religious group legitimately existing on its ancestral land hoping for peace with all its neighbours, and succeeding with a growing number, the Western leaders who decry Israel's reaction to mass slaughter of its citizens as 'disproportionate' and make use of language totally out of context with the reality of a forced invasion, betray both a lack of conscience and a subliminal distrust and dislike of the very qualities that the Palestinians reject and plot murder against. 

 

Their attitudes, statements and  deliberate isolation of Israel, their voting patterns in the United Nations General Assembly, and their tolerance for the demeaning of a nation and its people is shocking yet predictable, as a reflection of the world's most ancient pathology. That very attitude is transmitted to their own general publics which sense the censure and adapt it as their own. That the West has been suffused in the past several decades with waves of immigrants, refugees and migrants from the Middle East and North Africa leading to a surge of Muslims living in the West, bringing with them their own traditions of Jew-hate, compounds the issue of growing global antisemitism. 

 

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced Oct. 10, 2026, that elections will be postponed, again. (Screenshot State of Palestinian website)

 

"Postponing these elections would undermine precisely those Palestinians who are working to build a credible, peaceful political alternative."

"For the sake of our children, I ask Canada to stand firm. They deserve accountable leadership, a voice in their future, and a reason to believe that peaceful political change is possible."

Samer Sinijlaw, Palestinian New Path 

Forewarned Is Forearmed -- Or Is It?

"[Threats to such facilities mark a] major shift [in] Iranian ambitions to come at harder targets like military sites."

"[The suspected plot against the Royal Air Force Fairford base, on September 27 was] not unique. [There have] been other examples [of similar threats to installations] not just in the U.K. but around the world -- most particularly in Iran's own region." 

"[Iran has been forced to rely on] hiring criminals to do their bidding [in Britain and Europe]." 

"Given what we've seen in practise, [Iran has not demonstrated] anywhere near the level of capability [to launch a sophisticated attack on British military bases or other installations]."

"Since I started in this role in 2020, there has been another generational shift. We have again entered a new era of national security – requiring a new response."  

MI-5 Director-General Ken McCallum 

 

"[We will] keep threatening U.S. and Israeli interests worldwide until we've avenged every child in Gaza, Iran, Lebanon, and the resistance nations." 

"[People should] stay away from Zionist and American interests." 

Iran proxy group Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia — or The Islamic Movement of the Companions of the Righteous (IMCR)

Director General of MI5 Ken McCallum speaks at Thames House, the headquarters of the U.K.'s Security Service in London, Tuesday Oct. 13, 2026. (Jonathan Brady/PA via AP, Pool)

 

In its yearly update to dangers facing the United Kingdom and its allies, MI-5's director-general laid out his agency's most pressing concerns among which was the plot uncovered a month earlier as an example, against a British airbase, as forming a scheme plotted by the Islamic Republic of Iran to mount unattributed attacks by in situ groups infiltrating the U.K. and acting as agents for Iran. The attacks have struck high-security targets such as military sites and intelligence facilities. 

 

"The intensity and scale and shape" of the threat emanating from Iran is "shifting at the moment". The linkage reflects fallout from the U.S.-Israel war on Iran seven months earlier, motivating Iran and its Republican Islamic Guard Corps to focus on threatening and attacking American allies. The annual address on security threats included Mr. McCallum's security assessment that Russia "remains aggressor No. 1" against Britain and its allies which links to European support for Ukraine during Russia's now-five-year 'special military operation'. 

 

In recognition of the prevalence of the threats and the nature of the attacks, MI-5 saw the necessity of forming a dedicated new intelligence group linked to the agency meant to focus on potential threats that may in time become a more dire threat not only to the region, but beyond. Advances in artificial intelligence that take into account the possibility of chemical or biological weapons manufacturing guided by AI, and their potential use as instruments of warfare. 

 

Police patrol the perimeter of RAF Fairford as a U.S. Air Force Rockwell B-1 Lancer bomber lands Sept. 28.  Ben Birchall / Press Association via Getty

 

"[Iran has demonstrated that it is] keen on subcontracting its U.K. violence … using criminal proxies to try to intimidate oppositionists, Iranian media organizations, and Israeli sites."

"Sadly, much of this aggression has been aimed at British Jewish communities, with whom I want to express solidarity." 

The interrupted plot against the Fairford airbase is still under investigation by British counterterrorism police. Its occurrence saw the United States evacuate the dozen B-1 bombers it had stationed at the airbase. Recent weeks saw some seven suspects arrested, including five British citizens who were detained soon after midnight on September 27 and subsequently released on bail. The five were in three vans travelling toward the base perimeter, used by U.S. bombers in their strikes on Iran. A nearby farmer was alerted to their suspicious presence and informed police.

 

This was an apprehended incident marking a departure from more recent years' pattern where Iran has been linked to lower-level proxy attacks recruited online to engage in sabotage, arson or stabbings, many of which targeted Jewish communities. Over 50 arrests have been made in the past year in "Iran-linked operations", stated Mr. McCallum. These activities are known to have taken place as well in Canada where Iranian-linked criminals were hired to disrupt life and target Jewish institutions.   

"Many terrorists would dearly love to have some kind of capability with bio, chem or radiological weaponry."

"[If guardrails meant to safeguard the spread of AI fail to gain complete control, a risk presents that] AI could generate novel pathogens not previously seen."

"[A new MI-5] threat centre [was created this year with an aim to focus on such dangers]."

MI-5 Director-General Ken McCallum  

It seems clear enough that what cannot be predicted and what has become a publicly-aired dilemma over increasingly alarming news being released from among the Artificial Intelligence community that bots are striking out on their own -- deliberately taking steps to shield their activities from the notice of their human trainers to plot among themselves and act in swarms disrupting communications while managing to escape the guardrails meant to confine them -- is becoming an entirely new threat on its own. 

 

According to Mr. McCallum, the technology is "supercharging the cybersecurity contest between attackers and defenders". His concern and that of his agency is that AI could enable terrorist networks or state adversaries in the acquisition of  unconventional and extremely toxic and potent weapons that the world must now contemplate contending with. Much, much simpler to deal with challenges posed by state actors in their supercharged yet hard-to-pin-down efforts at world domination.

 

The world is faced with the trifecta of China's and Russia's ambitions on the world stage to prove themselves contenders for the position of superpowers, and the theist-motivated fundamentalism of Islamist conquest exemplified by the Islamic Republic of Iran and its proxy terrorist groups to fundamentally alter the world's religious, cultural, social, judicial, academic and human rights normalcy from the contemporary struggling against the worldwide threat of infiltration and Muslim population density power of institutional alteration of Western democracy.  

"[Russian military and intelligence services] are once again escalating their attempts at hybrid warfare, [while being careful not to trigger NATO’s Article 5 threshold, in which other countries would be expected to defend their allies]."

"We see them scrambling to pay criminals to do their bidding. The whole aim of hybrid tactics is to try to intimidate us."

"[Within the U.K.’s] multifaceted relationship with China [— Beijing is a major trading partner to London — MI5 has been focused on efforts by the Chinese government] to conduct espionage, coercion or democratic interference."

MI-5 Director-General Ken McCallum  

Police officers at Leipzig Airport in Saxony, Germany, search for a drone Aug. 7. Sebastian Willnow / dpa via AP

 

Canada's Idea of Protected 'Free Speech' ... the U.K. and U.S. Reality of Terrorist Entities

"Palestine Action Canada targeted GeoSpectrum Technologies in Peterborough."

"[GeoSpectrum's site is] not just a design and testing facility for 'maritime surveillance and exploration' systems; it is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Elbit Systems, Israel's largest weapons manufacturer."

"There is no company that profits more off of the genocide of Palestinians." 

Palestine Action Canada Instagram post 

A video provided by a group claiming to be Palestine Action Canada showing red paint being splattered on the entrance to GeoSpectrum Technologies Inc. on Whittington Drive in Peterborough in the early morning hours of October 12, 2026. (kawarthaNOW screenshot)

An Ontario business in Peterborough, Ontario has been vandalized, leading the Peterborough Police Service to investigate the event as a hate crime. Not too big a stretch of the imagination, since an anti-Israel group that has been outlawed in the United Kingdom under their terrorism laws, has quite publicly claimed credit for splashing red paint on  the building exterior of GeoSpectrum Technologies Inc. The company specializes on producing underwater acoustic systems, is headquartered in Nova Scotia, with a facility in Ontario.

Contacting the police, a concerned Peterborough resident informed them that there was "red paint and writing" on the building. On arrival at the site, police found damage on the building exterior, and further inspection revealed damage to a communication box on the GeoSpectrum property. The Peterborough Police Service brilliantly deduced that GeoSpectrum might have become a target as a result of its being a subsidiary of Elbit Systems, an Israeli defence technology company. 

A video posted on Instagram by Palestine Action Canada was proud to take responsibility for the damage inflicted on the property they connect to Israel's military-production establishment. In the video a masked individual is shown cutting wires in a dark room, a flashlight illuminating the scene of the crime. Additional footage is that of a masked man standing beside the entrance of a building splashing red paint on its front. 

A video provided by a group claiming to be Palestine Action Canada showing a masked individual interfering with unidentified equipment in the early morning hours of October 12, 2026. Peterborough police said an outdoor communications box was damaged at GeoSpectrum Technologies Inc. on Whittington Drive in Peterborough. (kawarthaNOW screenshot)

Blame is cast by the anti-Israel group on Canada for its purported role in support of the parent company of GeoSpectrum. "And our own settler-colonial state, so-called Canada, trades, buys and invests in Elbit. We will not stop until Palestine is free!" concludes the post. Or until they are brought to account, as a terrorist entity operating illegally in Canada. 

This is not the first and only time that Palestine Action Canada acted against a Canadian company it claims has connection to the Israeli defence industry. The group claimed responsibility for targeting a manufacturer in Concord, north of Toronto, when Dishon Limited was also vandalized. The activities of this  group have prompted calls on the federal government to recognize Palestine Action Canada as a terrorist entity and designate it as such under the Criminal Code.

The federal government was called on to designate the group for what it is, through a House of Commons e-petition that closed in September. The July event that involved Dishon Limited was presented in the petition as evidence of the campaign of direct action -- violent action -- against businesses in Canada, Palestine Action Canada operating as a terrorist group in Canada. 

"The appropriate authorities have been notified, and we are working with them as we assess the extent of the damage", a spokesperson for GeoSpectrum confirmed, in validating the occurrence of the vandalism, courtesy of the Palestine Action Canada group. Jewish advocacy group B'nai Brith Canada urged the federal government in May to take action against the group following its release of a map of locations to "target", citing ties to Israel, within Canada.

Source: Facebook

According to the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Palestine Action "has supported numerous acts of terrorism since July 2020". Sanctions were issued against the group in the United States. Canadian authorities are in no great hurry to sanction the group that has clearly committed violent criminal activities, threatening even greater such unlawful actions crying out for arrests, and judicial proceedings including both prison sentences and deportation when appropriate. 

 

 

 

Indigenous Female Victims ... Indigenous Male Victimizers

"Indigenous people find themselves disproportionately and excessively imprisoned, while Indigenous women and girls suffer from unacceptably high levels of violence and abuse."

"The lessons of the sentencing circle are more than just a source of factual information relevant to a fit sentence, but are key to understanding the Indigenous perspective on sentencing..."

"What is required is that a sentencing judge reasonably engage with the perspectives expressed in the sentencing circle in crafting a fit and appropriate sentence."

Supreme Court decision 

The landmark judgement, R. v. Cope, concerns a Mi’kmaw man from Nova Scotia who pleaded guilty after violently assaulting his intimate partner, a Mi’kmaw woman, in 2021. (File photo)

 

The Supreme Court of Canada has twisted itself like a pretzel to find the halfway point between holding an Indigenous male guilty for his criminal acts, while being aware at all times that Indigenous people are incarcerated for crimes in disproportion to their numbers in society and generally granted lighter punishment. One cannot merely draw the obvious opinion that Indigenous men are more disposed to criminal acts than the general society, for it is deemed to be racist, without considering the effect that 'colonialism' has had on the Indigenous psyche.

 

At the same time, to hand out lighter sentences to Indigenous males for their propensity toward violence against Indigenous women holds males to lesser account, while victimizing the women they threaten, abuse and murder. This kind of male behaviour to their female counterparts also cannot be construed as a cultural default since this too is racist and one must again consider the generational trauma suffered by Canada's Indigenous population as a whole as a result of colonization and the effect of residential schools which separated Indigenous children from their families and tribes in an effort to provide them with an education analogous to what every Canadian child received in the public school system.

 

The Supreme Court has recently sat with the intention of resolving competing judicial imperatives in addressing Indigenous over-incarceration and the high rates of violence committed by males of Indigenous descent against Indigenous women; where both victim and victimizer are Indigenous, in a search for a Solomonic solution. There were 22 intervener groups that included three provincial attorneys-general, First Nations and Indigenous organizations, law groups, and human rights, civil liberties and constitutional advocacy organizations. All presumably putting their collective brains to work out a just response to a vexing problem.

 

The Supreme Court justices at a ceremony to mark the opening of the judicial year, at the Supreme Court of Canada in Ottawa, Oct. 5, 2026. Photo by David Kawai/Postmedia

 

In the end, the justices that comprise the Supreme Court -- nine in number -- were split five to four in their recently released decision. The majority opinion set a framework that judges are to follow in situations of this nature. As, for example, the 2021 case of Harry Arthur Cope who attacked his common-law partner in Halifax on a public sidewalk where he repeatedly struck the woman. When police arrived, her face was swollen and bloody, she having suffered severe injuries to her face and upper torso.

 

At the man's 2023 sentencing following his guilty plea to aggravated assault after court heard he had severe mental health challenges, no longer took medications and consumed illicit drugs the complications were duly recognized. Mr. Cope also had a significant criminal record. Provincial Court of Nova Scotia Judge Christine Driscoll ordered an Indigenous Background Report. According to a First Nations' sentencing circle it was the opinion of community members that more incarceration would not help Cope, recommending instead in-patient treatment.

 

Duly considering Cope's background, Judge Driscoll, weighing special factors from the victim's perspective, rejected the proposal for a conditional sentence and decided to sentence the man to five years in prison. His sentence was then reduced to three years by the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal. That appeal decision brought the Cope case to the attention of the Supreme Court. 

 

The majority of Supreme Court judges upheld the appeal decision of a reduced sentence, while dissenting justices in the minority preferred the restoration of the trial judge's five-year sentence. According to the majority decision the sentencing judge should have adhered more closely to the mental heath factors to arrive at the offender's moral blameworthiness and in effect held she should have engaged with the input by the sentencing circle. 

 

According to the minority justice opinion, the original five-year sentence should be restored; that the sentencing judge appropriately considered the nature of the crime and the particular vulnerabilities of the victim, even as the judge had properly, as required by law, considered the circumstances of the offender, taking into account the compelling Gladue factors and Mr. Cope's mental illness. 

 

eStock Mark Bruxella

 

"In cases where an Indigenous offender commits an offence against his intimate partner who is an Indigenous woman, a sentencing judge must apply the principles related to both Indigenous offenders and victims of crime, and do so harmoniously to arrive at a just and proportionate sentence."  

"[The majority opinion said the sentencing circle process] will be relevant both to understand the availability of alternative sentencing options that may exist in the community, as well as the community perspective on the sentence that will best achieve the relevant sentencing objectives." 

Supreme Court Majority opinion 

War In Sudan

"Canada has been involved in many peace initiatives, like Colombia and others. We are working to have a political process which will require a lot of support in capacity and expertise."

"This is a war of attrition. I don't see any outright victory for any side. There's no military solution."

Sudanese former prime minister Abdalla Hamdok

Zak Irfan 123 // Shutterstock

 

On a visit to Canada, Mr. Hamdok -- now a civilian, once the Sudanese prime minister toppled in a military coup in 2021 -- is engaged in discussions with Canadian politicians and federal officials, looking for a commitment that Canada is prepared to lend its diplomatic expertise to the Sudanese peace effort. This man is obviously feeling in dire straits for the future of his country but his choice of Ottawa and Canada as representative of a country capable of extending its 'diplomatic expertise' to aid in a ceasefire leading to peace in Sudan is quite naive. 

 

In the sense of what 'diplomatic expertise'? In the sense of a country aspiring to middle power status and repeatedly stumbling in the process, having any diplomatic or political clout to lend to such an enterprise.

What is happening in Sudan, is a matter for North Africa and the Middle East to be more acutely involved in, to strive toward peace. Islam is at war with itself in that extended geography, and always has been. The tendency to resort to conflict is not uniquely Middle Eastern or African, but it is a common enough occurrence aided by the traditional culture of tribal and sectarian hostility and power politics.

 

How a country such as Canada, far removed both geographically and ethnically, not to mention, culturally could be of any use other than as a cheerleader on the sidelines for reason and a desire to spare the populations concerned from any further threats of death, displacement, starvation and disease, all endemic to the violence of conflict, is beyond imagination. 

 

However, Mr. Hamdok, as a loyal patriotic Sudanese citizen has been travelling the globe to lobby for aid in peace efforts. He is also involved in a process of political unity led by civilians among important Sudanese groups and parties in a country where war rages in various areas -- where hundreds of thousands have been killed and some 13 million citizens were forced to flee from their homes and villages since 2023 when the Sudanese military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces have waged a war of control. 

 

UNDP/Giles Clarke People displaced by conflict take shelter at a bus station in Gedaref, Sudan.

 

While over 30 million Sudanese are reliant on emergency food aid, countless ceasefire proposals have been discussed, rejected, and broken with both sides convinced they can win the war where cities have been captured and recaptured, and heavier episodes of dread drone strikes continue to threaten the population.  The war has recently spilled into Ethiopia, where the RSF accesses drone bases and weapon supplies. As for Ethiopia, it is beleaguered with Eritrean troops crossing into the north of the country, in its own escalating conflict. 

"This has the potential of engulfing Sudan."

"It's dangerous because this is the most fragile region in the continent. It's alarming."

"All the neighbouring countries are definitely involved. Already our house is on fire, and then you see neighbours' houses also going up in flames."

Abdalla Hamdok 

In his belief that the peace process in Sudan is the process of gaining momentum, Mr. Hamdok speaks of the emergence of the "Quintet" representing five international blocs involved in attempting to resolve the conflict. The African Union and the European Union, as well as an expanding 'non-aligned' coalition of Sudanese civilian groups and political parties making up its membershipm with the inclusion of Sumoud, Mr. Hamdok's own group.

 

The Sumoud group has received $2.5 million from Canada since 2024, according to a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada. Whether Canada has diplomatic involvement in Sudan sufficient to exercise much influence over the peace process is questioned by independent analysts. One the war began in Sudan, Canada closed its Khartoum embassy, and currently relies upon its Ethiopian embassy to cover Sudan. Furthermore Canada has no formal affiliation with the Quintet. 

 

A Canadian based group, the Sudan Solidarity Collective comprised of diaspora Sudanese, argues that Mr. Hamdok's coalition should not be viewed as the sole representative of the Sudanese people in view of its alleged links to the United Arab Emirates, reported to supply weapons to the RSF. Which seems peculiar in the extreme, since the UAE uses a conciliatory approach generally as a peaceful nation for which conflict is anathema and tolerance for differences in human relations a byword. The RSF is, in fact, comprised of former Arab Janjaweed, known for their cruel massacres in the Darfurian Black farming community.   

"Canada cannot be helpful in terms of the peace process without meaningfully joining the Quintet and appointing a special envoy for Sudan or the Horn of Africa."

"[Canada should push for an expansion of Mr. Hamdok's civilian alliance, which is weak in its representation of youth groups and women]."

"It is still too narrow [to be effective in its representation]." 

Khalid Mustafa Medani, chair, African Studies Program, McGill University 

A Sudanese Armed Forces soldier walking on the Shambat bridge that once connected Omdurman with the Khartoum neighborhood of Bahri on the opposite bank of the River Nile on April 27, 2025. Giles Clarke/Avaaz via Getty Images

  

"Only three or four of us in the leadership are living in the United Arab Emirates. The bulk of our leaders are in Egypt."

"As refugees, we cannot pick and choose where to live."

"The UAE is not imposing anything on us."

Abdalla Hamdok 

The Climate-Changing Himalayas

"Nepal is very vulnerable to this because half our country is covered with mountains. That's going to affect the people living lower down below the valley along the river."

"It's a big threat. The moment glaciers recede ... the lakes are going to rise and then one day, it's going to breach and break. And that's exactly what is happening."

"It happened in Thame [his father Tenzing Norgay Sherpa's home town], half of the village was wiped off [the map]." 

"I think we have to be very careful now as to how we look at mountains and how we approach climbing mountains nowadays."

Jamling Tenzing Norgay Sherpa, 61

Edmund Hillary, left, with Tenzing Norgay in Kathmandu, Nepal, in 1953.  AP

 

Tenzing Norgay Sherpa's son is convinced the world needs to sit up and take notice. The Himalays are being transformed by climate change. Mountaineering which his father Tenzing Norgay Sherpa pioneered on the majestic mountain considered to be the tallest and certainly one of the world's most difficult to climb is now more dangerous in its laborious ascent and descent. He is also in a sense, celebrating a long-overdue view back at his father's historic climb alongside mountaineer Sir Edmund Hillary of New Zealand. The story of their summit on Mount Everest has always been told from the perspective of Sir Hillary, never Tenzing Norgay.

 

For climbers and mountaineering Sherpa community, the changes are also making their occupation more dangerous, with unpredictable weather and frequent avalanches. RTE100

 

That never-before succeeded spectacular feat of sheer human stamina and determination in the face of the seemingly impossible, 70 years ago was a rare event in human expeditionary adventure. Yet, the Himalayas of those long decades past is not the Himalayas of the present era. Nepal, whose mountainous terrain and approach to Mount Everest and its sister mountains represent the most-commonly favoured routes to ascending those famous peaks, is not the Nepal of yesteryear. 

 

Tenzing Norgay Sherpa's home village of Thame, at an altitude of 3,800 meres (12,460 feet in height) is no more. Two years earlier, a devastating flood caused by a glacial lake outburst swept it away. Another more recent event in August saw a glacial collapse trigger a massive flash flood along the Rishuli and Bhote Koshi river systems in Nepal and Tibet. Close to 800 people lost their lives. The areas in question have become ecologically fragile.

 

Jamling Tenzing Norgay in 2001. Carlos Avila Gonzalez / The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images 

 

In 1996 Tenzing Noray Sherpa's son Jamling Tenzing Norgay Sherpa set out to follow his father's footsteps. "I looked up to him as my greatest role model, you know, he was my hero, and I wanted to become just like him." Some geological events and incidents of historical moment however, cannot be emulated entirely in their original form. Guides now find water at Camp 2, situated some 6,400 metres (21,000 feet) high up the slope of Mount Everest. "There was never water at all. It's always solid ice up there", emphasized Sherpa.

 

Unpredictable weather has always been a problem climbing such unapproachable peaks where raging winds and devastating snowstorms can mean the difference between life and death. But the unpredictable weather now includes a definitely notable warming trend resulting in more frequent avalanches, both auguring far more dangerous and difficult conditions being faced by climbers and the mountaineering community of Nepal's famous Sherpas. Add to that the dangers inherent in the newly-crowded conditions found on the mountain with the popularity of these prestige-assuring climbs

 

This photograph shows mountaineers climbing a slope lined up during their ascent, May 20, 2026, from the Hillary Step to summit Mount Everest in Nepal.  Furte Sherpa/AFP via Getty Images

 

"I think it was long overdue, a film, a biopic about my father, his life."

"But at the same time, he really didn't care about it. It wasn't the fame he looked for, why he climbed the mountain."

"He climbed because it was his passion and he had a dream to climb this mountain."

Jamling Tenzing Norgay Sherpa 

 While the mountains, said Sherpa, were a passionate longing for his father, and many Nepali climbers are now finally being recognized for their own heroic stature in climbing the Himalayas and Mount Everest in response to eco- and mountaineering-popularity, the mountaineering industry is driven for the most part by financial necessity. "The Sherpas climb today to keep bread and butter on the table, you know, to feed their children, to give their children a good education, so their children wouldn't have to do the same thing", he explained. 

"It's not only affecting us in the Himalayas, it's affecting European countries, it's affecting places in the U.S. with all these wildfires."

"If we don't star taking care of our planet, there's going to e a price to pay."

"While he [Tenzing Norgay] was still alive, before the '80s, nobody talked about climate change because we didn't see the changes."

"We notice this now."

Jamling Tenzing Norgay Sherpa 

The Impartial, Principled Navanethem Pillay, Nobel Laureate

"[The Nobel Peace Prize winner, Navi Pillay] contributed to strengthen the institutions of international law.'"

"Her independence, expertise and steadfastness have made her one of the most respected international jurists of our time."

"In awarding this year’s Nobel peace prize, the Norwegian Nobel committee wants to remind the world that the rule of law – national and international – underpins the system we have set up to ensure peace and resolve conflicts non-violently."

Nobel Committee 

 

"I don’t know about it so much. The question is: is it true? Being a lawyer and a judge, I still want to verify it [whether she was to be awarded the prize]."

"The last thing I did was the report on Gaza naming what’s happening there as genocide."

"One of the main reactions to that report was people [complimented] me for my courage. You can imagine how surprised I was. Why would you need courage to speak the truth. You interpret the law. You look at all the facts, so it’s an impartial decision."

Navanethem (Navi) Pillay, Nobel Laureate  

Navi Pillay, then-U.N. high commissioner for human rights, addresses the ninth session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, September 2008. Credit: Jean-Marc Ferré/U.N. Photo

 

 The inventor of dynamite felt so conscience-stricken over his genius invention that of course had peacetime applications, but would also and obviously be used in conflict situations, blowing up both enemy installations and innocent civilian lives, that he felt he had to somehow make amends. The hugely respected Nobel prizes in recognition of human endeavours in the fields of medicine, science, the arts and the art of peace salved his conscience. While he was the discoverer of a means to end lives, that was clearly not his intent. Now he is known as one whose legacy is that of a truly noble endeavour; to recognize and reward human intelligence, ingenuity and genius.

Yasser Arafat, Palestine Liberation Organization, Egyptian Palestinian Leader, Nobel Peace Prize1994

 

In being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, this accomplished lawyer, human rights advocate and internationally respected past director of many United Nations committees upholding all the qualities that the international body has traditionally promoted, respected and supported, this woman stands out as an icon of courage to many, and inchoate hateful bigotry to others. Just as the United Nations has chosen to make an exceptional example of the tiny state of Israel as a human rights denier for refusing to allow itself to be threatened with annihilation, citing a plethora of 'human rights violations' it attributes to a genuinely dedicated democratic state for which human rights is inviolable, so too has Ms. Pillay distinguished herself by her contemptuous regard for Israel, naming it for what it most positively is not -- genocidal.

 

On the surface, Ms. Pillay's extensive experience in international law and human rights prepared her for the recognition that is now universally held to be her right. Now 85, she is a former UN high commissioner for human rights. In her role as chairwoman of the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, inclusive of East Jerusalem and Israel, her commission issued a 72-page report in 2025 whose conclusion was that Israel was guilty of committing genocide in Gaza against Palestinians. 

"[Awarding the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to Pillay represents a] grotesque weaponization of an award to legitimize anti-Israel hatred and prejudice."

"If there were a prize for lies, hatred and blood libels, Navi Pillay would not merely be a candidate -- she would be the front-runner."

"Now that the Nobel Committee has rewarded the biggest lie of the 21st century, Joseph Goebbels is surely applauding from hell."

Israeli Foreign Ministry 

Grotesquely, ironically, Pillay spoke at the very same Nuremberg courtroom in Germany, the site of the trials held to hold Nazi leaders to account for the atrocities of the Second World War. Where death sentences were handed out to 24 of the 177 defendants, another 20 of whom were sentenced to life imprisonment. Of the total 98 others were given variable prison sentences, several were sentenced in absentia, while 7 including Hess and Speer were sent to Spandau Prison where the four wartime powers, Britain, France, Russia and the United States took turns guarding and caring for their welfare. History will also judge Navi Pillay. 

"At the Nuremberg Court ... I cannot think of a stronger symbol for the devastating collapse of the human rights institutions and principles you were entrusted to uphold and protect, equally and consistently."

"Never again is now."

Michal Cotler-Wunsh, Israeli special envoy for combatting antisemitism  

Nuremberg War Crimes Trial, Archives 1945