The armed attacks perpetrated by criminal organizations in indigenous communities in Chiapas, Chihuahua and Michoacán are sinister: they invade territories, destroy habitat, forcibly displace families, rape women and girls, disappear and murder community members who resist. Their destructive power pulverizes community life and destroys all the natural resources that the people have preserved for centuries.

The absence and complicity of the authorities is atrocious. They make the facts invisible, trivialize the aggressions and silence the atrocities committed. They do not respond to calls for help or provide protection to the victims. They allow the violence to escalate and the attacked population to seek survival by their own means. They justify the armed incursions as a dispute between organized crime groups. The facts are not investigated, much less are the investigation files prosecuted. Impunity prevails and the criminal structure remains intact.

The gunshots furrow the paths of blood, and the murdered are left lying in the fields as dismal marks of criminal barbarity. Predatory agents continue to encircle indigenous territories. The cacique governments, now allied with criminal groups, remain unscathed with their clientelistic and gangster politics; the political parties dispute municipal presidencies and local deputies with ill-gotten money; the mining businessmen make pacts with organized crime and sow terror to devastate the natural landscape and overexploit the aquifers.

The loggers set up clandestine sawmills, burn the forest to enter the forest reserves, hire hitmen to transfer and sell timber and drugs. Community authorities are subordinated to the interests of organized crime. Their territories are disputed and used as strategic enclaves for crime. The mega-projects imposed by the federal government weaken the autonomous organization of the peoples, fragment the communities, and relegate them as central actors in their own development, commercializing their archaeological legacy and folklorizing the greatness of their culture.

Indigenous regions, being centers of resistance and rebellion, face wars of extermination and counterinsurgency strategies implemented by ethnocidal governments that sow terror. The fierce persecution against the rebels is systematic and they are obstinate in breaking the communal core. They have installed military zones in strategic places. They try to enlist the young men in the army and offer marriage to the girls. They want to truncate at any cost the future of the new indigenous generations that seek to forge a society of equals within their community spaces. The governments in power, through the militarization of their territories, the narcotization of their economy and the proliferation of criminal groups, de facto declare war on the indigenous peoples in order to subjugate them and derail their struggles for autonomy and self-determination.

The old-style integrationist policies and the implementation of new programs for individual benefit deepen government dependence, leaving intact the structures of cacique power; the security apparatus linked to organized crime remains untouched; the vices of a mercantilist and racist justice system persist; the economic exploitation and vassalage of the indigenous people expelled from their ancestral territories by landowners, businessmen, organized crime and government megaprojects is further deepened. The subjugation of community life, which is the hard core of the peoples’ resistance, is cracked by the gunfire of criminal groups that have set themselves up as the armed arms of the government in power.

In the Sierra Tarahumara, organized crime has diversified its illicit activities. For the past decade, illegal logging has been covered up with logging permits. Illegal logging became criminal logging because it was imposed on the ejidos under the armed coercion of criminals. In 2023, organized crime took control of the most important ejidos in the Huachochi Mesa.

The forests of the Sierra Tarahumara are in the hands of criminals. Its forest mass has decreased alarmingly; from 2001 to 2023 it lost 21,800 hectares to fires. The most affected municipalities are Bocoina, Guerrero, Madera, Huachochi, Guadalupe y Calvo, Uruachi and Chinipas. Recently, more than 300 people from the communities of Cinco Llagas, El Cajoncito, El Pie de la Cuesta, Las Casas, Los Placeres, El Silverio and La Trampa in the municipality of Guadalupe y Calvo were displaced by organized crime. They are crowded together in the community of Cinco Llagas, without food and in fear of being attacked by armed groups.

On September 4, in the municipality of Frontera Comalapa, Chiapas, confrontations between organized crime groups intensified. The population is hiding in their homes because of the constant shootings. They have no food and are held hostage by the criminals who prevent them from leaving the community. The criminals went from house to house to forcibly recruit all the young people and minors. Mothers are desperate over the disappearance of their husbands and sons. No authorities intervene to protect them and guarantee a safe exit from their communities.

In the Nahua community of El Coire, municipality of Aquila, Michoacán, from August 13 to 19, several groups of the Jalisco Cartel New Generation (CJNG) attacked the population; they disappeared 7 young people, murdered two, tortured several people and raped women. They looted houses and small businesses. The municipal authorities of Aquila counted 211 displaced persons, 76 of whom are under 12 years of age. In addition to Coire, the communities of Chacalapa, Zilapa, El Diezmo and El Salitre were also attacked by the CJNG groups. Most families fled and found refuge in Aquila and Coahuayana. The authorities have allowed division to flourish and crime to take control of the indigenous communities. The army only made one patrol on the day of the CJNG irruption, to justify the call made by the community. The criminal groups know that patrols by state agents are sporadic and that they will never stay in one place. They have sized up the situation and that is how they can act with total impunity.

The federal authorities have failed to guarantee the security of the indigenous population held hostage by criminal groups. What is unacceptable is the inaction of the security forces in the face of the armed invasions that assault community territories, displace the local population, murder defenseless people, disappear people, rape women and recruit young people and children. The security politics have left the indigenous population defenseless. They have allowed organized crime to subjugate them in order to break their communal nucleus. The indigenous reform that is on the horizon will not help to solve these serious problems, because they are denied the right to control their land and natural assets and their political representation before the legislatures is not recognized.

Original text by Abel Barrera published in Desinformémonos on September 18th, 2024.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.

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#chiapas #mexico #northAmerica #repression

Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, the Lebanese communist and Palestinian resistance fighter, was arrested by French police in Lyon on October 24, 1984. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for complicity in the execution of a Mossad agent and a member of the CIA in a trial filled with numerous irregularities. At the same time, Israel occupied Lebanon and massacred the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples throughout the assault and later, the occupation of south Lebanon.

Eligible for release under French law since 1999, Georges Abdallah is still in prison following diplomatic pressure from the USA and Israel and France’s own imperialist interests in the region. Despite his release being ordered in 2013 by the French justice system, he was kept in prison by a political decision of the Ministry of the Interior, which refused to sign off on his deportation to his homeland, Lebanon. Today, he is one of the longest-held political prisoners in Europe and has filed a new request for release that will be examined by the Court of Application of Sentences on October 7.

While the genocide in Palestine has been going on for a year and Israel is intensifying its assault on Lebanon, supporting Georges Abdallah means supporting the resistance of the Palestinian and Lebanese people for their right to live freely in their countries.

At the initiative of many organizations, campaigns and support committees , a large mobilization is being organized — as it is each year — to demand the release of Georges Abdallah, outside the Lannemezan prison where he is held. The Collectif Palestine Vaincra calls for broad participation, in particular by joining these two initiatives:

• Friday October 25 at 7 p.m.

Meeting in support of Georges Abdallah and the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples with the participation of Palestinian activists, anti-imperialist organizations, Robert Abdallah (brother of Georges Abdallah — by video) and Jean-Louis Chalanset (lawyer of Georges Abdallah — subject to confirmation).

Bourse du Travail (19 place Saint Sernin, Toulouse) – Free entry – Light refreshments on site

• Saturday October 26 at 2 p.m.

Demonstration in Lannemezan (65) to the prison where he is incarcerated. Departure by bus from Toulouse at a free price, meeting at 11:00 a.m. in the Basso Cambo car park in front of Quick (Basso Cambo metro – line A). To register, fill out the online form by clicking HERE

Take part in the support campaign!

Until October 26, we invite you to participate with us in various activities. In particular, you can:

• Participate in postering or distributing flyers in your neighbourhood or community (download materials on Georges Ibrahim Abdallah here)
• Suggest an initiative or invite us to hold an information stand during an event you are organizing
• Order stickers, flags, flyers and t-shirts “Freedom for Georges Abdallah! Freedom for Palestine!” (contact the Collectif Palestine Vaincra by email )
• Download the poster for the release of Georges Abdallah to print and distribute widely
• Participate in the mobilization on social networks using the hashtag #FreeGeorgesAbdallah
• Share the film “Fedayin, the fight of Georges Abdallah” around you, which retraces his story and that of Palestine
• Register for the free-price bus to participate in the demonstration on Saturday October 26 in Lannemezan

For any request, send us an email to collectifpalestinevaincra@gmail.com or a message on our various social networks (Facebook , Twitter or Instagram).

source: Samidoun

abolitionmedia.noblogs.org/pos…

#georgesAbdallah #lebanon #palestine #samidoun #Solidarity

Python data and variable types

I am a great believer in “blog your homework”. By homework, I mean (in this case) what I am learning about Python for my visual novel. In addition to my learning, I have two friends who are or are about to start using Python. This is a primer for all (3) of us.

Those who know their Python are invited to chip in if I missed anything or got something wrong. I’m here to learn too. There may be parts of this with updates from future me who just learned a thing.

What are variables

A quick refresher Python has two things that are data-related:

1. Variables
2. Functions aka Mthods in some contexts

Variables hold data and functions do something with data. 2+3=5 is a function where 2 and 3 are variables and 5 is the new variable that + made. This is what it looks like in code.

def adding(var,othervar): return var+othervarmyvar = 2myothervar = 3myanswer = adding(myvar,myothervar)print(myanswer) # 5

Types of variable – in general

Before we get to the depths of Python-specific stuff I want to revise variables in general.

Most of this will also apply to things called constants which are values that cannot (or should not) change. Constants are a special case that I shall only tough on a bit.

Boolean (bool)

Booleans are the most primitive variable type. They can be True or False and that is it. This should relate to binary 1 or 0 but different languages handle them differently. On the whole, booleans are [1] or [NOT 1] but can also be [0] and [NOT 0] because screw consistency, I guess.

Most languages have True and False as core contestants and it is best to use those. Python is no exception.

Later note: False and 0 are considered the same in Python.

Integer (int)

Whole numbers (called integers by maths and computer science people) are something you will probably work with at some point. These are the variables in my silly example of variables vs functions.

The number 42 is an int but 4.2 is not. That dot is what is different.

Reals, floats, doubles and their friends

These are all variables of various and fairly arbitrary precision. For now, the difference between these is not important. It might come up later but just think of numbers with a decimal point. That 4.2 (four point two) from earlier belongs here.

If you cast (converted) 42 into one of these floating point types, you would get 42.0 or more likely 42.000000…

Casting floats into ints gives you weird behaviour and maths errors. For example, push 3.14 (three point one four) and 4.2 through an adding function that outputs only ints, and you will get 7 (instead of 7.34).

Personal peeve side story: When you see a number like 3.14 and you say “three point fourteen” please understand that I may wish to percusively educate you with a large plank of wood. This is because this number is three point one four. The only time you may call it three point fourteen if it is part of a version number like this: 3.14.0.2289. Otherwise, please slam your head in the door until you can say it properly.

Char

A single character like a letter or a number (as text). This will come up in database stuff as a common field type is varChar (variable characters).

Array

An array is basically a list of variables. The details vary between languages and Python gets fussy about them.

An array has two parts – the index and the value.

Here is a PHP example because I know PHP better and Python gets a bit complicated.

$myarray = array('bannas','apples',12);$myarray[0] = 'Chips';$myarray[] = 'boats';$myarray['foo'] = 'bar';print_r($myarray);/*array( 0 => 'chips', 1 => 'apples', 2 => 12, 3 => 'boats', 'foo' => 'bar')*/

Arrays index by number starting from 0 (most of the time). In Python, a negative index number is the point that number from the end. In PHP a negative index is just another index.

Some arrays can have text (strings) as an index. In PHP that last array element also has a secret index value of 4.

Try not to worry about this, things only get stranger from here.

Strings

We mentioned strings. Strings are characters all hanging out together in a single variable. This entire post is stored as a complicated string.

Just to confuse you, some languages like Ruby don’t really have strings, they have arrays of char. Thus, you can grab any character you want from the string. A fair amount of languages now allow you to treat strings as pseudo-arrays (treat them like arrays even though they are strings).

Strings have encodings. This is because there are a lot of languages with a lot of different characters. And now there are emojis as well. While this should not matter until you start processing external data or using databases, it will come up eventually. If in doubt, I use UTF-8. However, check with your data provider or database person because mismatched encodings give funny-looking results.

Python defaults to UTF-8.

Weak or strongly typed variables

Sooner or later, you are going to come up against typing issues. For example:

myStr = "42"myInt = 42myResult = myStr+myInt # what will you get from this?

As this answer explains, in Python you will get an error. This is because Python is strongly typed and adding a number to text makes no sense.

In PHP you will get “4242” because PHP is weakly typed and you just merged the int into a string like a complete noob.

Classes (in general)

Most programming languages have the concept of a class object. A class holds variables and has methods with are just functions that belong to the class. Python is one such language. If I mention classes (and I will because Python data types are classes) this is what I am on about.

In python, you can use (dot) methods on classes.

Variable Names

It is said there are two hard problems in computer science – naming variables, invalidating cache, and off-by-one errors.

In this example, I have named the variables so as to remind you what they are. This is terrible practice for anything that is not really basic notes. Please, name your variables something that describes what it is for. Your future self and whoever inherits your code will thank you.

Don’t do this:

n = 'bob'i=22tt = '01843 123456'

You might know now what those variables are but will you always remember?

Instead, do yourself a favour and do something like this:

BobName = "Bob"BobID = 22BobTelephoneNumber = '01843 123456'

There are better ways of handling names and numbers than this but at least you won’t come across code like this and wonder what it is about.

if(i>23): tt=''

What is that code even doing?

Advanced example (skip if confusing)

As per my snark about the “good” example not being good: Assuming you made a class called person in a library called myPersonThing, you can make Bob an instance of that.

import myPersonThingBob = myPersonThing.person('Bob',22,'01843 123456')# Bob.Name = "Bob"# Bob.ID = 22# Bob.TelephoneNumber = '01843 123456'

Note: When we come to [url=#Dict]dict()[/url], you will have yet another way to approach this.

Variable types: Python specifics

This is where the blogging my homework comes in. While the basics are already covered, its time to get crazy. I’ll start us off slow.

For reference, there is a proper list of Python’s built-in types here. You can add more via libraries but I am not covering those.

Booleans

Booleans work exactly as you should expect them to. They are True or False. 0 counts as False. Logical.

AreYouAlive = Trueif AreYouAlive: breath()else: rot()

A better example:

UserCredits = GetUserCredits(Bob)if (UserCredits>0): print("Welcome citizen")else: print("Begone worthless fool")

The boolean here is hidden inside the logical test (UserCredits>0). But that is a topic for another long post. The outcome is unknown but depends on what the GetUserCredits() function returns. Judging from the code, we are expecting a number.

String (Str)

The str type is exactly what you would expect.

myStr = "42"print(type(myStr))

You will get an answer that this is a class of type str. You remember I mentioned classes, string is a class (technically str is a class).

This allows such behaviour as:

myStr = "foo bar baz boo"myNewStr = myStr.capitalize()print(myNewStr) # Foo bar baz boo

The capitalize() (note the spelling) method gives you a copy with the first letter capitalised.

Other methods you may need for working with other data encodings may include this one:

myStr = "foo bar baz boo"mySafeStr = myStr.encode('mac_latin2','ignore')

This will give you a copy of the string converted (as best as Python can) to mac_latin2 bytes. Here is a list of all encodings.

You can join strings together like this:

myStr = "foo"myOtherStr = "bar"myNewStr = myStr+' '+myOtherStr # we add the two with a space in the middle (that's a string too)print(myNewStr) # foo bar

Numbers

Python, it turns out, has three number types.

1. int
2. float
3. complex

That third one was a surprise to me.

Note: There is a fourth thing called a range but I covered it in the lists and arrays section like a fool.

Int

We covered integers in the general theory section. This is a whole number.

Here is how you might use them.

def adding(var,othervar): return var+othervarmyvar = 2myothervar = 3myanswer = adding(myvar,myothervar)print(myanswer) # 5

A better function would check the inputs are a number type. Do not copy this for any real-world code.

Float

When you encounter reals, floats, doubles and their friends in database stuff, they are all floats in Python. You should remember (unless you skipped it) that floats are numbers with a decimal point (also called a floating point number).

The number we all know and love – 3.1415926535… – is a float of (theoretically) infinite length. The longer your approximation of pi, the more accurate (and time-consuming) your maths will be.

42 as a float is 42.000…

If you don’t care about the precision, you can cast floats into ints but it is probably not a great idea.

myFloat = 3.14159265print(int(myFloat)) # 3

Here is a whole nerdy discussion about casting floats to ints for those who want to do that sort of nonsense.

Complex (skip if confusing)

Complex numbers are a fun part of maths that can make certain operations faster. For example, real-time radar. You might want to use them for making Mandelbrot fractal images.

In regular mathematics complex numbers have a real and a complex part like this 5+2i. The complex value i is used. the number i is what you would get if there was an answer to what is the square root of -1 (minus one).

In Python for reasons I am yet to work out, complex examples use i for the real part and j for the imaginary part. It is like someone read about the quaternions but only half remembered it.

The complex is two numbers together and can be generated by the function complex() like this:

myComplexNumber = complex(1,2) # 1+2imyComplexNumber = complex(1j) # 0+1imyComplexNumber = complex("9i+1j") # 9+1i

For most of us, complex numbers are things we will not have to deal with. Unless you are doing some serious science or intensive recreational mathematics.

Are lists arrays?

Remember when I told you about arrays? Ah, the days of easy stuff. Get ready for some Python-specific confusion. This is where I trip up coming from PHP to Python.

Allow me to introduce you to list, tuple, range, dict, set and frozen set. Yeah, I see that look. I had that same look on my face because I thought I would instantly understand this stuff.

x = ["apple", "banana", "cherry"] # a listx = ("apple", "banana", "cherry") # a tuplex = range(6) # a rangex = {"Name" : "Bob", "ID" : 22, "TelephoneNumber" : '01843 123456'} # a dictx = {"apple", "banana", "cherry"} # a setx = frozenset({"apple", "banana", "cherry"}) # a frozen set

Choose the wrong one and it will not behave how you were expecting. For me, I still think of these as types of arrays. It is probably better that you do not copy me.

Let’s look at them one by one.

List

This is what other languages would call a numerically index array. List items are ordered, changeable, and allow duplicate values. They are indexed numerically from 0. This is where you can try for a negative index and get not what you thought you would get. At least I did.

x = ["apple", "banana", "cherry"]print(x[0]) # appleprint(x[-1]) #cherryprint(x[2]) # also cherryprint(x[1]) # banana

Did you want to add a new item to your list? Sorry, you will have to make a new list that is one entry bigger.

Tuple

Tuples are a bit hard to explain. Python is the only place I have ever encountered them.

After a bit of reading, I can tell you this.

A tuple is like a list in that they are ordered and allow duplicates except the order cannot change and the values inside cannot change. You use round brackets to make them.

x = ("apple", "banana", "cherry")

Here’s a link if that was a bit unclear.

Range

The range is probably not really meant to be here. It is an ordered range of numbers.

The range function takes up to three arguments (values needed to use it). Like this: range(start, stop, step) – unless you only supply one – let me explain that.

x = range(6) # 0 1 2 3 4 5 - stop givenx = range(3, 6) # 3 4 5 - start and stop givenx = range(3, 20, 2) # 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 - start, stop, and step given

• start: Where you start from if you only give one argument, it will not be this one.
• stop: Where you stop (not included)
• step: Defaults to 1 but can be anything. To use this you need three arguments.

Another example. Say you want all the multiples of seven less than one hundred.

x = range(7,100,7)for n in x: print(n)

That prints only the numbers we want.

I guess you get a sort of ordered tuple?

Dictionary aka dict

This is what I, as a PHP programmer, would call a string-indexed array. As of newer versions of Python dictionary types are also ordered (they have a numerical index).

Dicts (try saying that out loud at work) are key-value pairs. Like field and value on a form. Each key must be unique.

Bob = { "Name" : "Bob", "ID" : 22, "TelephoneNumber" : '01843 123456'} # make the dictBob['xp']=400# you can also have more than one value by adding a tuple or a list or another dictBob['awards']=['Best Coder','Worst Farts','Employer of the year 1066'] # this list is now an entry in the dict

Note: there is no comma after the last entry in the initial dictionary definition.

In my opinion, if you need an arbitrary blob of data, dicts are usually what you want. That said, you will discover custom classes soon enough and you may want to use those.

Sets

As I write this, I haven’t a clue what sets are but I really hope they relate to set theory or are numerical random access changeable array things.

Nope, sets are more like set theory than data theory.

A set is an unordered unchangeable grouping. You cannot edit the items but you can remove items and add items. So, get item, remove it, make changes to the got item, and put it in again.

x = {"apple", "banana", "cherry", True, 99}print(len(x)) # 5x.discard("banana")print(len(x)) # 4#There is also a remove method but it throws an error if the thing is not there.x.remove("banana") # you just crashed the program noob

You can do some other stuff with sets. Popping for example.

offering = {"space", "adventure", "really wild things"}x = offering.pop()print(x) # you will get one of the things in offering.fixedIt = x.capitalize()offering.add(x) # put it back

We can also add other listy groups into a set

offering = {"space", "adventure", "really wild things"}avoiding = {"milk","cookies","an early night"}offering.update(avoiding)print(offering) # {"space", "adventure", "really wild things","milk","cookies","an early night"}

We can add those tuples and lists in the same way.

offering = {"space", "adventure", "really wild things"}avoiding = ("milk","cookies","an early night")offering.update(avoiding)print(offering) # {"space", "adventure", "really wild things","milk","cookies","an early night"}

Pay close attention – those last two may look nearly identical but they are not the same even if the output is. These things look like other things issues will trip you up if you are not careful.

Frozen sets

x = frozenset({"apple", "banana", "cherry"}) # a frozen set

A frozen set is like a set but you cannot change it. I’d have called that a constant but no one asked me.

And now we get into the weeds

Here we look at four odd fellows – bytes, bytearray, memoryview, and NoneType sounds a lot like The Null Hypthoisis if you ask me.

Each of these I learned about so I could write them down. They were all new to me.

Bytes

For some reason, you want the string as raw data (make sure you pick the encoding). You cannot change data of this type.

This is the type you get if you convert a nice well-behaved string into a specific encoding. You might want to do this to save a string in a format that is not UTF-8 because the people giving you the data are unrefined noobs or something.

Bytesarray

Yes, at last, an honest-to-goodness array. This is an array of bytes. You can change the array.

I haven’t a clue what you would do with one of these. Maybe manipulate some strangely encoded text?

Memoryview

This is a memory-safe way of looking into memory. NGL, this is all new to me. Here’s a post about it.

NoneType

It turns out that NoneType represents the distinct lack of anything. This SE answer explains it better than I could.

It is a good idea to check a return object against NoneType before using it.

obj = myUnreliableFactoryMethod(foo,bar)if obj is None: # throw an error or somethingelse: # do something clever

And that’s a wrap

We have looked at all the built-in variable types and the functions that make them. I half-arsed a few of the more esoteric ones at the end because my brain is melting.

I think I learned something. I hope you did too.

Feel free to pass judgment, offer corrections, or expand on something. I’m here to learn. Also, please ask questions if I was unclear or if you want to know more. If I can answer, I will. Otherwise, I will go away and learn the answer for you.

Welcome to your new life as a Python geek.

Syndicated to:

• brid.gy

#blogYourHomework #cherry #Python #There #variables [ap_hashcats

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