France is transitioning government desktops to Linux, with each ministry required to formalize its implementation plan by autumn 2026.
France has incorporated Linux desktops into its national digital-sovereignty strategy. DINUM, France’s Interministerial Digital Directorate, announced a transition from Windows to Linux workstations.
According to an official government press release, this change is part of a broader initiative to reduce reliance on non-European digital technologies (source, in French).
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And as you can see, this is a big deal. It is not a leak, rumor, or unofficial plan. It is a formal declaration from one of Europe’s largest governments, explicitly designating Linux as the replacement for Windows workstations as part of a broader interministerial strategy.
dizzy: Onaquietday.org is brought to you on Linux. dizzy uses Debian Linux on laptops that are over a decade old, your Android phone is Linux, the boxes that connect to broadband are overwhelmingly Linux, Onaquietday’s hosting and most machines on the internet are running Linux.
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United States Secretary of War Pete Hegseth speaks during the press conference held by The United States President Donald Trump in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House on April 6, 2026, in Washington DC, United States. [Celal Güneş – Anadolu Agency ]
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday that Iran’s “motivation” to maintain the ceasefire is “very high,” while warning that US forces remain “maximally postured” to resume war if Tehran rejects a deal, Anadolu reports.
“Our forces are maximally postured to restart combat operations, should this new Iranian regime choose poorly and not agree to a deal,” Hegseth said during a Pentagon briefing.
He urged Iran to “choose wisely,” warning its military leadership that Washington is closely “watching” their actions.
Hegseth said Iran’s command and control capabilities are “highly degraded,” limiting its ability to coordinate operations, but noted that its “motivation to want to stay in the ceasefire is very high.”
“They understand that a violation of that ceasefire means a commencement,” he continued.
“We are reloading with more power than ever before, and better intelligence, even more importantly, better intelligence than ever before,” said Hegseth. “As you expose yourself with your movement to our watchful eye, we are locked and loaded on your critical dual-use infrastructure, on your remaining power generation and on your energy industry.”
“We’d rather not have to do it, but we’re ready to go at the command of our president and at the push of a button,” he added.
Hegseth also said the US Navy controls traffic in and out of the Strait of Hormuz, enforcing a blockade with “less than 10%” of America’s naval power.
Separately, Joint Chiefs Chair Dan Caine said the blockade applies to all vessels heading to or from Iranian ports, regardless of nationality, but stressed it does not constitute a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz itself.
The remarks came as the US and Iran have been holding negotiations to extend a two-week ceasefire announced last week, which is set to expire on April 22.
Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz has been severely disrupted since the US-Israeli war against Iran began Feb. 28, and a US naval blockade announced Monday, after Washington said talks last weekend failed to yield a deal.
About 20% of global oil supply passes through the strait daily, and heightened insecurity has driven up oil prices as well as shipping and insurance costs.
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Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump calls for help from NATO allies in securing the Straight of Hormuz despite saying on 7 March 2026 that they don’t need people to join wars after they’ve already won. He’s challenged with the claim that he lies as much as the IDF.
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Protesters march through downtown Chicago during an “Emergency Protest” on April 8, 2026 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. [Jacek Boczarski – Anadolu Agency]
In the Middle East, the perception of ordinary Americans has long followed a familiar script: detached, uninformed, inward-looking, and politically shallow— a society of ‘gas guzzlers’, with little grasp of global realities beyond their immediate geography.
This perception did not emerge from thin air. It was cultivated—reinforced, even—by American political and media institutions themselves. Politicians claimed to speak on behalf of ‘the American people’, while mainstream media shaped what those people knew, and, crucially, what they did not know.
For decades, Americans overwhelmingly aligned with Israel. This was not merely ideological; it was instructional.
The public was told—repeatedly—that Israel reflected ‘American values’: democracy, civility, modernity. Palestinians and Arabs, by contrast, were framed as perpetual antagonists, initiators of violence, and ‘obstacles to peace’.
Some Americans embraced this framing on religious or ideological grounds. But for the majority, the pro-Israel position became a default—an inherited conclusion rooted in limited access to alternative information. Israel was ‘good’, Arabs were ‘bad’. The narrative was simple, binary, and rarely challenged.
With mainstream media as the primary source of information, this perception hardened over time. Support for Palestine, and for broader Arab causes, remained confined to academic spaces and activist circles—often informed by anti-colonial and anti-imperialist frameworks, but numerically marginal and politically contained.
The mainstream remained locked in place. But that lock has been broken.
The shift did not happen overnight. Among Democrats, cracks began to appear as early as the mid-2010s. In 2016, Gallup data still showed Democrats sympathizing more with Israelis than Palestinians. By 2018, that gap had narrowed. Significantly. By 2021, parity had nearly been reached. And by 2024–2025, Democrats—especially younger voters—were expressing majority sympathy for Palestinians, with some polls showing support exceeding 50 percent among those under 35.
This transformation was driven in part by grassroots activism, particularly within progressive circles, where Palestine became a central moral and political issue. But it was also driven by something far more consequential: the collapse of narrative control.
The Israeli genocide in Gaza accelerated this shift dramatically. Not only because of the scale of violence in the besieged Strip, but because, for the first time, the reality of war was not mediated solely through the filters of corporate media. Independent journalism, social media, and direct visual evidence disrupted decades of curated narratives.
The informational balance—long skewed—began to tip.
At the same time, American trust in mainstream media reached historic lows. According to Gallup, by 2025, only about 31 percent of Americans expressed trust in mass media to report news “fully, accurately, and fairly,” with trust among younger Americans even lower.
Up to this point, one could still argue that the shift remained politically contained: Democrats moving toward Palestine, Republicans remaining firmly aligned with Israel. But then came a rupture.
On February 27, 2026, Gallup released a poll showing that, for the first time in modern polling history, more Americans sympathized with Palestinians than with Israelis—41 percent to 36 percent. This was not a marginal fluctuation. It was a structural break.
That moment should have been seismic. Yet, it was not treated as such. Mainstream media largely buried the story. And within days, the political conversation shifted to a new crisis: the war with Iran.
In the weeks that followed, polling attention moved rapidly to American attitudes toward military escalation. Across multiple surveys, the outcome was consistent: Americans rejected war, and an even greater number rejected the idea of a prolonged military entanglement.
Yet mainstream commentary refused to connect the dots. Palestine was treated as one issue. Iran as another. Venezuela, interventionism, and global militarism as separate, disconnected phenomena. Each was analyzed in isolation, stripped of its broader political and moral context.
Instead of recognizing a pattern, commentators fragmented the evidence. Opposition to war was framed as ‘war fatigue’, or economic anxiety, or partisan resistance to President Donald Trump. The focus was placed on gas prices, electoral calculations, and political polarization—not on the possibility that Americans were making moral judgments independent of elite narratives.
But the pattern is there. And it is unmistakable.
True, Americans are still told what matters—Israel, Iran, energy security, the Strait of Hormuz, etc. The agenda remains largely intact. But the conclusions no longer follow automatically. The chain between attention and consent has been broken.
This is not simply a political shift. It is a cognitive and moral one. Economic concerns and partisan affiliations still shape public opinion, as they always have. But they no longer fully determine it.
Increasingly, Americans are evaluating global events through a moral lens—one that prioritizes civilian suffering, questions power asymmetries, and challenges the legitimacy of endless war.
This is not speculation. It is confirmed by data—most clearly in the case of Palestine, which has emerged as a moral compass for a wider transformation in American public consciousness. The shift in sympathy toward Palestinians is not an isolated anomaly, but a signal of a deeper rethinking of power, justice, and resistance. And it is likely irreversible.
Mainstream media will continue to set the agenda for the foreseeable future. But it has lost something far more important: its ability to manufacture consensus at scale.
That signals possibility. And perhaps, for the first time in generations, a reason for cautious—yet unmistakable—optimism: that ordinary Americans are no longer passive recipients of power, but active participants in shaping a more morally conscious political reality.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.
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Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump calls for help from NATO allies in securing the Straight of Hormuz despite saying on 7 March 2026 that they don’t need people to join wars after they’ve already won. He’s challenged with the claim that he lies as much as the IDF.
A person holds a sign reading “impeach, convict, remove” as they rally at Grant Park during the “No Kings” national day of protest in Chicago on March 28, 2026. (Photo by Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP via Getty Images)
“He’s a clear and present danger to America and the world,” wrote one critic. “We’ve got to do whatever we legally can to remove him from office.”
US President Donald Trump’s flurry of increasingly deranged late-night social media posts over the weekend—combined with his continued violent belligerence overseas—prompted fresh calls on Monday for congressional Democrats to immediately force an impeachment vote.
Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) introduced 13 articles of impeachment against Trump last week, accusing the president of usurping congressional war powers by waging unauthorized assaults on Iran and other nations, illegally deploying National Guard troops in US cities, unlawfully detaining and deporting citizens and immigrants on the basis of their political views, lawlessly dismantling worker- and consumer-protection agencies, and other offenses.
In a statement on Monday, constitutional attorney John Bonifaz applauded Larson for introducing the impeachment articles but said that “we need the congressman to now take the next step and force an immediate floor vote on these articles at this critical hour for our nation.”
“And, Democratic leaders in the Congress should stop standing in the way of such a vote,” said Bonifaz, co-founder and president of Free Speech for People (FSFP). The group’s petition urging the US House to impeach Trump a third time has received more than a million signatures, but the Democratic leadership has so far shown no willingness to push ahead with another impeachment process—which would require some Republican support to be successful.
“Momentum is on the side of action,” FSFP said Monday, warning that “further delay only emboldens the president.”
Bruce Fein, a constitutional scholar who served in the Reagan Justice Department, said Monday that the “impeachment of President Donald Trump is urgent.”
“How can any decent person indulge Mr. Trump’s Hitler-like declaration that ‘a whole civilization will die tonight’ with our tax dollars-paid weapons?” asked Fein, referring to the US president’s genocidal threat against Iran last week.
By one count, more than 85 Democrats in the Republican-controlled US House have called for Trump’s removal via the impeachment process or the 25th Amendment in recent days. Last week, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said he would introduce legislation to establish a commission tasked with removing the president if he is deemed unfit to serve.
“This is plainly out of the realm of normal politics,” said Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, urging the White House physician to immediately evaluate Trump’s cognitive fitness. “When the president of the United States threatens to extinguish a civilization on social media, rants about combat missions with children at the Easter Egg Roll, and drops profane tirades on Easter morning, we have indisputably entered the realm of profound medical difficulty and concern.”
Growing calls for Trump’s impeachment and removal came after the president launched into an unhinged social media tirade late Sunday, hours after high-level talks with Iran ended without an agreement to halt the war that the US president and his Israeli counterpart started in late February.
Trump is having a mental health episode right now. He’s been posting on social media all night. He posted at:
Trump said Sunday that he would impose a naval blockade on the Strait of Hormuz—an illegal act of war—and is reportedly considering a resumption of aerial strikes on Iran.
After the talks concluded, Trump posted a lengthy attack on Pope Leo XIV, a vocal critic of the war on Iran. The president then posted an artificial intelligence-generated image depicting himself as a Jesus-like figure.
“Beyond mentally unstable,” Rep. Yassamin Ansar (D-Ariz.) wrote in response to Trump’s post.
Robert Reich, the former US labor secretary, wrote in a blog post on Monday that “the president of the United States is stark-raving mad.”
“He’s a clear and present danger to America and the world. The American public is beginning to see it,” Reich continued. “We’ve got to do whatever we legally can to remove him from office. The 25th Amendment would be useful if Trump’s Cabinet and key advisers had any integrity, but they don’t. They’re ambitious, unprincipled traitors. Which leaves impeachment.”
Climate science denier Donald Trump confirms that he knows nothing about democracy and that more liquid gold is being secured according to his policy of global privateering.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
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A U.S. Air Force MQ-9 Reaper drone flies a training mission over the Nevada Test and Training Range, in Nevada, United States. [USAF – William Rio Rosado – Anadolu Agency]
The US has lost eight MQ-9 Reaper drones in the Middle East since April 1, raising the total number lost in the Iran conflict to 24, CBS reported.
According to the recent report, the financial impact is estimated at around $720 million, since each Reaper drone can cost $30 million or more depending on the model.
The MQ-9 Reaper, produced by General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, is an unmanned aircraft used for intelligence gathering, surveillance, reconnaissance, and precision strike missions.
Data compiled by CBS News indicates that the US and Israel have carried out strikes on more than 13,000 targets across Iran since launching joint operations on Feb. 28.
The same data showed that Iran has hit targets in 12 countries throughout the region during the conflict.
Although a two-week ceasefire was announced on Tuesday, Israel continued conducting strikes in Lebanon.
Donald Trump calls for help from NATO allies in securing the Straight of Hormuz despite saying on 7 March 2026 that they don’t need people to join wars after they’ve already won. He’s challenged with the claim that he lies as much as the IDF.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.