Our picksAl-Qaeda Chief Al-Zawahiri Is Dead | The Dumbest Sort of Traitor’ | Climate Migrants, and more

Inside the Neo-Nazi Cabal Tied to Marines and a Porn Star(Tray Conor, Daily Beast)
The evidence includes a sickening video of live-fire weapons training that ended with the masked participants giving “Heil Hitler” salutes.

After Christchurch: Mapping Online Right-Wing Extremists (Lise Waldek et al., The Interpreter)
For all the hate, sometimes extending to talk of violence, the extremist milieu is also a highly social space.

Republican National Security Experts Call on Trump to Concede, Begin Transition(Tom Hamburger and Ellen Nakashima, Washington Post)
Shame clearly hasn’t forced Republican leaders to put pressure on President Donald Trump to begin the transition—but perhaps demands from national-security experts and top business executives will. The Washington Post reports a group of more than 100 leading GOP national-security experts, including former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, have urged their congressional counterparts to demand Trump administration immediately acknowledge Joe Biden’s victory and start the handover. “President Trump’s refusal to permit the presidential transition posts significant risks to our national security, at a time when the U.S. confronts a global pandemic and faces serious threats from global adversaries, terrorist groups, and other forces,” a statement signed by more than 100 GOP luminaries said. The statement also called on “Republican leaders—specifically those in Congress—to publicly demand that President Trump cease his anti-democratic assault on the integrity of the presidential election.”

In 1864, Like in 2020, America Just Got Lucky(Clint Smith, The Atlantic)
The arc of history does not bend inevitably toward justice. Sometimes, Americans barely avoid disaster.

Al-Qaeda Chief Al-Zawahiri Is Dead(AFP / The News)
Al-Qaeda chief and Egyptian national Ayman Al-Zawahiri has died in Afghanistan from natural causes, Arab media reported on Friday.
The news reports came a few days after social media carried speculation that the Al-Qaeda chief had passed away. Zawahiri was last seen in a video message that was released by the militant group on the 19th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in the US.

Facebook Condemned for Hosting Neo-Nazi Network with U.K. Links(Mark Townsend, Guardian)
Tech giant criticized for failing to act after being told two years ago about extremist activity on its platform

’The Dumbest Sort of Traitor’: Israeli Spies Aren’t Exactly Rejoicing at Jonathan Pollard’s Release(Noga Tarnopolsky, Daily Beast)
The Pollard affair remains one of the most controversial in Israeli history, and his release on Saturday was no different.

Migrants Flee Climate Change Ravaged Central America as Record-Breaking Hurricanes Hit(Jeff Abbott, Daily Beast)
Central America will be one of the regions hit worst by climate change. Two record-breaking hurricanes show why, with more people fleeing to the U.S. in search of refuge.

France’s Dragnet for Extremists Sweeps Up Some Schoolchildren, Too (Norimitsu Onishi and Constant Méheut, New York Times)
When France held a tribute to a teacher killed after a class on freedom of expression, the police interrogated at least 14 students over comments flagged as inappropriate.