Hello Reader,
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When The Economist derided Trump's claims about Nigeria's Christian deaths with a few dismissive adjectives, I was prepared to follow their narrative—until I examined the evidence.
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And this week's research led to more than one unsettling unsettling conclusion...
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The Global Fight for Freedom

1. Media Proves Trump a Fool*
2. Poland: Europe's Greatest Champion of Freedom
3. "China Is Going to Win the AI Race"
4. Green Shoots from Iraq's Ashes
5. A Gen Z Revolution Gasps for Air

*Ignore the dead Christians. ​
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Country names are followed by their 2025 freedom scores according to Freedom House. Not a ranking.
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It was 10:30 pm on a rainy night in June when a "killer squad" of over 40 gunmen stormed Yelwata—a tiny Christian farming village in northern Nigeria. They rode motorcycles in pairs, shouting "Allahu Akbar" as they opened fire. Moving house to house, they murdered villagers with machetes and set homes ablaze. More than 200 Christian villagers were slaughtered—mostly women, children, and displaced families who thought they had found safety here.
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​According to Nigerian Bishop Wilfred Anagbe, "Militant Fulani herdsmen are terrorists. They steal and vandalize, they kill and boast about it, they kidnap and rape, and they enjoy total impunity from elected officials. None of them have been arrested and brought to justice."
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This week, Donald Trump set off a firestorm, declaring: "Christianity is facing an existential threat in Nigeria. Thousands of Christians are being killed. Radical Islamists are responsible for this mass slaughter."
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​The Economist responded with derision, dismissing the killing of Nigerian Christians as "ostensible" slaughter and calling the country a "supposed hotbed of religious persecution"—even suggesting Trump was just watching too much Fox News. CNN and major networks parroted this narrative, and I was prepared to follow it too.
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But then I examined the evidence.
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The critical difference lies in sources. According to Nigerian-based investigative rights group Intersociety and Genocide Watch, Islamists in northern Nigeria have destroyed over 18,000 churches and murdered over 50,000 Christians since 2009. A further 5 million Christians have been displaced.
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​The Economist cited the politically correct Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) to portray religious killings as marginal. Indeed, many Muslims are impacted by the violence too, but the ACLED flattens atrocities like Yelwata by labelling them as “resource conflicts” or “communal violence”, categories that strip out religious motive.
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I may wish to see Trump apply his leverage more evenly— Iran’s Baha’i? China’s Uyghurs?—but for once, his rhetoric aligns with the data. Yet when mainstream outlets relegate Nigeria’s staggering Christian death toll to the margins, their motives must be called into question.
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I almost made the same mistake, but the evidence was glaring. And none of it came from Fox News.

Under cover of night in 2022, an elite Ukrainian military unit descended 80 meters into the Baltic's frigid waters, risking their lives for the resistance. Over two days, they planted timed explosives on the Nord Stream pipelines pumping Russian gas into European homes.
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Operation Diameter—carried out under direct orders from Ukraine's then-Commander-in-Chief Gen. Valeriy Zaluzhniy—sailed from Germany to Danish waters on a yacht chartered with forged documents. When charges detonated, they severed one of Russia's most lucrative revenue streams—a pipeline generating billions annually when Russia supplied 40% of Europe's gas.
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Last month, Poland denied Germany’s request to extradite Zhuravlev. A Polish judge righteously declared the sabotage "a military action in a just war," noting the pipelines were Russian property destroyed during armed conflict.
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As Prime Minister Donald Tusk had boldly declared: "The problem isn't that Nord Stream was blown up, but that it was built."
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Since Russia's 2014 Crimea invasion, Poland has spent 4.7% of GDP on defense—NATO's highest—building Europe's largest military with 216,000 troops. Last week, American Merops anti-drone systems deployed across Poland's eastern border. Earlier, Warsaw launched history's largest voluntary civilian defense training, aiming to train 400,000 citizens.
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Meanwhile, Germany's three-year investigation continues. Italy arrested another suspect in August—former special forces captain Serhii Kuznetsov—though Italy's top court blocked his extradition. An Italian court will decide his fate next month. #FreeSerhii!
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Poland understands what Berlin doesn't: tyranny respects only strength. Germany should thank Zhuravlev like a heroin addict thanks a friend for staging an intervention.
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And we should all thank Poland—for being Europe's greatest champion of freedom.

When U.S. bombers streaked through Iraqi airspace targeting Iran's nuclear facilities, Baghdad braced for retaliation. Iran's fearsome proxy network—militias that once attacked American bases—stayed conspicuously silent. The restraint revealed a shift that could reshape Iraq: after years of Iranian funded sectarian warfare that killed over 100,000 Iraqis, the militias that once served Tehran now serve their own survival.
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Today's parliamentary vote will test whether that calculation holds.
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23 years after America's invasion on faulty intelligence, Iraq has achieved a semblance of stability: seven largely peaceful elections since 2005, regular power transitions, zero coups, and now relative calm. Yet Iran-backed militias have dominated throughout.
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What changed? Iran's "Shia Crescent" shattered—Israel badly weakened Hezbollah and Syrian rebels toppled Assad. Rebel Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr quit the government in 2022. And Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani, installed by Iran-backed factions, emerged as an unlikely champion of Iraqi sovereignty, retaining U.S. forces to contain ISIS while cracking down on currency smuggling into Iran.
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In September, the Trump administration reclassified four militias as terrorist organizations and threatened Iraqi ministries with sanctions. The militias seem to have capitulated, fearing Hezbollah’s fate.
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Now Sudani enters as the front-runner. Yet his coalition remains fragile, held together by Iran-aligned parties who may reassert control. And Iraq’s democracy—with its elite power politics, factious security forces, and over-centralization—remains deeply flawed, and voter participation has plummeted.
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But now Iraq has its first real chance to build sovereignty, free from two decades of sectarian violence.
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Green shoots are breaking through the scorched earth of America’s catastrophic war.

“China is going to win the AI race.”
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Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s stark warning this week sent tremors through Washington’s corridors. While America drowns in regulatory quicksand—50 states contemplating 50 different AI rules—Beijing subsidizes energy costs to make power essentially free for tech companies. Huang’s diagnosis was brutal: Western “cynicism” is strangling innovation while China sprints ahead, developing AI superiority that could erase any remaining American military advantage.
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This isn’t hyperbole. Superior AI allows faster battlefield decisions, autonomous drone swarms, and precision targeting systems that process information beyond human capability. Even a demographically challenged China—facing population collapse—could leverage AI-powered weapons to compensate for shrinking manpower, automating warfare. Meanwhile, its cyber warfare capabilities increasingly target dependent American systems.
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And China isn’t waiting. This week’s commissioning of the Fujian—an 80,000-ton behemoth featuring electromagnetic catapults launching J-35 stealth fighters—signals Beijing’s rising naval dominance. Only America’s USS Gerald R. Ford possesses similar technology. China’s navy is now projected to command 435 vessels by 2030 versus America’s 294.
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Meanwhile, the Trump’s administration’s renewed chip export bans to China may accelerate Beijing’s domestic semiconductor development, forcing Chinese companies toward independence from American technology.
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Huang captured the stakes perfectly: controlling AI development means “winning developers worldwide.” Instead, America’s fragmented regulatory chaos and protectionist reflex hand China exactly what it needs—motivation to build everything itself.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

"The Arab Spring is a chance for a generation of young people to remake the world…The arc of history does not bend on its own, but bends toward justice when ordinary people demand it."
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​—Barack Obama, 2011
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But history did not bend. It absorbed the blow, and then it hardened.
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Now, another generation is rising with the same hope—that courage, conviction, and solidarity will be enough to break the shackles of corrupt power.
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Last year, Bangladesh's Gen Z revolutionaries achieved the impossible, forcing Sheikh Hasina—who spent 15 years dismantling democracy—to flee after her forces massacred 1,400 protesters in five weeks. Hasina had abolished the system that guaranteed fair elections, enabling three brazenly fraudulent elections. Her regime forced over 1,000 critics into "House of Mirrors" prisons, captured courts, and drained $230 billion through corruption.
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Gen Z’s revolution provided a rare window of opportunity for "a new political settlement built on fairness, accountability and dignity for all."
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But that window is closing fast. The man they tasked with resurrecting democracy—Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus—has banned Hasina’s Awami League under broadened terrorism laws, bypassing courts and alienating millions who now refuse to vote in February’s election. Meanwhile, the Bangladesh National Party—once ranked world's most corrupt—plots a comeback under Tarique Rahman, another dynastic heir-in-exile like Hasina once was. Student leaders now threaten boycott, fearing a reversion to the norm.
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The Arab Spring suffocated under the weight of the old guard. Gen Z’s revolution is alive—but in Bangladesh, it’s gasping for air.

Bloody Tyrant of the Week: Abdulmalik Al-Houthi

Note: I promised “Freedom Fighter of the Week” would return—but a story too irresistible got in the way. The dark side steals the spotlight once more. Freedom Fighter returns next time—for real.
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​"God is Great, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse the Jews, Victory to Islam."
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The slogan echoes across Yemen, chanted by followers of a diminutive and soft-spoken man who claims descent from the Prophet Muhammad himself. Abdulmalik Al-Houthi descends from the Zaidi Shiites who ruled Yemen for 1,000 years, until a 1962 military coup.
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In 2004, government forces killed Hussein Al-Houthi, Abdulmalik's older brother, for launching a revivalist movement. Abdulmalik then orchestrated a guerrilla war until his forces seized Sa’dah province during the Arab Spring. In 2014-15, they captured the Yemeni capital of Sana'a, overthrowing the transitional government. A Saudi-led coalition launched airstrikes, but Al-Houthi withstood years of bombing.
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Today, the Houthis govern most of northern Yemen. They operate a full state apparatus: defense, security, courts, education, media, taxation. Now controlling a third of Yemen, they capture as much as $2 billion in annual revenue, while Iran supplies steeply discounted fuel, weapons, and military training.
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According to the UN, recruitment exploded from 30,000 fighters in 2015 to an estimated 350,000 by late 2024—as Al-Houthi positioned himself as the last defender of Palestinians.
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Behind this power lies savage oppression. Detainees in Houthi prisons are subjected to torture, mock executions, genital beatings, and electric shocks. The security headquarters features "squeezers"—jail cells three feet long and under two feet wide. Last year, a Houthi court sentenced nine men accused of homosexuality to death—some by stoning, others by crucifixion.
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In August, Israel killed Al-Houthi’s prime minister and 12 senior officials. He didn’t break. U.S. strikes forced him to go underground—but the attacks resumed, more selectively aimed at commercial ships linked to Israel.
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When Israel struck Iran in June, Hezbollah held back. Hamas was already shattered. Only al-Houthi kept fighting.
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From a network of mountain bunkers, the man who rarely sleeps in the same bed twice and seldom appears in public has turned a provincial militia into the last active front of the Iranian axis.
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Al-Houthi says he will honor any truce signed by Hamas. But for now, he is the last Tehran ally still firing.

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