Realm of Violent Dreams

It is the third day of 2024, Realm of Violent Dreams according to the universal solar calendar. Exactly half the moon will be illuminated in the cold evening sky. That half moon set a few hours before I wrote this, but is scheduled to rise again at 12:52 am tonight (technically tomorrow).

During the daylight hours, Houthi rebels from Yemen are attacking ships in the Red Sea, one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. A couple days ago, four small boats attacked a container ship owned by the Danish shipping firm Maersk, and then fired on the U.S. Navy helicopters that responded to the ship’s distress call. The helicopter crews sank three of the boats, killing their crews. Yesterday, Iran sent a naval frigate to the Red Sea, and Maersk announced it would stop using the Red Sea route until further notice. 

In Beirut, a drone strike killed the deputy political head of Hamas. In Iran, more than 103 people were killed and scores more injured in a terrorist attack at a ceremony in Iran to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the US killing of Qassem Suleimani, the head of Iran’s al-Quds force. It is not clear if either of Suleimani’s principal adversaries - Israel or the Islamic State - were responsible for the bombing. 

Ukraine and Russia have announced the largest exchange of prisoners since the start of the war 22 months ago. More than 200 soldiers from each side were exchanged in a deal mediated by the United Arab Emirates.

In northern Mexico, masked gunmen abducted 31 migrants from a bus in an apparent ransom-for-release scheme.

Alabama intends to kill a prisoner by an untested method using nitrogen gas that could subject him to cruel and inhuman treatment amounting to torture. The prisoner was sentenced to death for the 1988 murder of a woman whose husband, a pastor seeking an insurance payout, had offered the prisoner $1,000 to kill her. At trial, the jury voted 11 to 1 to give the prisoner a life sentence, but the judge overruled them and sent him to death row. Alabama has already attempted to kill him once before through lethal injection, but after four hours of searching for a vein, officials called the procedure off, making the prisoner one of the few people to have survived an execution.

Violent dreams in the realm of violent dreams.