RIO DE JANEIRO: Nearly a hundred escaped inmates remained at large from a state penitentiary in Brazil Tuesday after a deadly riot between rival gangs left nine prisoners dead, all of them burned and two decapitated, officials said.
The riot occurred on Monday in the Complejo de Aparecida prison in the center-west state of Goias. Another 14 inmates were wounded, one of them critically, the head of the state’s prison service, Lt. Col. Newton Castilho, told a news conference.
The violence broke out in a semi-open part of the penitentiary when “C-Block invaded the other wings and started brutal acts against its rivals,” he said.
“There were wounded, bodies burned, and two decapitations,” he said, adding that inmates set fire to a cell block.
The cause appeared to be “splits in the drug-trafficking crime world,” the official said.
A total of 242 inmates managed to escape by scaling a wall, authorities said. Dozens were quickly recaptured, but 99 remained fugitives.
The violent episode recalled a prison riot a year earlier in Manaus, in Brazil’s Amazon region, which left 56 dead.
The country’s penitentiaries often see confrontations between the two main criminal gangs, the Sao Paulo-based PCC and the Comando Vermelho from Rio de Janeiro, and their offshoots. Clashes claimed more than 100 lives last year.
Brazil has the world’s third largest prison population. Official data from June 2016 showed there were more than 700,000 inmates — more than double the capacity built to hold them.
A hundred inmates escape after deadly Brazil prison riot
A hundred inmates escape after deadly Brazil prison riot
Americans’ views on Israel at near-historic low while support for Palestinian state hits a high: Gallup
- Latest poll results reveal views on Israel are among the most negative Gallup has ever measured, while views on Palestinian territories are the most positive on record
- More Americans now sympathize more with Palestinians than Israelis, a reversal of the past 25 years in which Israel held large, double-digit leads in terms of US sympathy
NEW YORK CITY: The views of Americans on Israel have fallen close to their lowest levels on record, while support for the creation of an independent Palestinian state has risen to one of its highest levels in more than two decades, according to the latest research from Gallup.
The company’s annual update on US attitudes toward the Middle East reveals a significant shift in public opinion over the past year. For the past 25 years, Israel has held large, double-digit leads in terms of US sympathy, but this year more Americans said they sympathized with the Palestinians.
In the Gallup poll of 1,001 adults, carried out by ReconMR between Feb. 2 and 16, 41 percent said they sympathized more with the Palestinians, compared with 36 percent who sympathized more with the Israelis.
Though the five-percentage-point difference is not statistically significant, it contrasts sharply with the results of a Gallup poll a year ago, in which more people (46 percent) were sympathetic to the Israelis than the Palestinians (33 percent).
In fact, for more than two decades Israelis have garnered much greater sympathy than Palestinians; for most of the time between 2001 and 2025, the difference was in the large double digits.
However, the gap started to shrink in 2019, long before before the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas and the subsequent war in Gaza. This gradual shift in attitudes over the past seven years has now reached the point where Israel no longer holds a clear advantage in terms of American sympathy.
The shift has largely been driven by political independents, whose sympathies now favor Palestinians over Israelis by a margin of 41 percent to 30 percent. Previously, independents consistently leaned toward Israelis, including 42 percent last year compared with 34 for Palestinians.
Democrats have remained relatively consistent in their sympathies over the past year, after flipping strongly toward Palestinians in 2025 following an initial tilt in 2023. In the latest poll, 65 percent said they sympathized more with Palestinians, compared with 17 percent for Israelis.
Republicans continued to favor Israelis by a similarly wide margin: 70 percent sympathize more with Israelis, compared with 13 percent for Palestinians.
Still, sympathy for Israelis among Republicans has declined by 10 percentage points since 2024, hitting its lowest level since 2004.
Generational differences in attitudes are also pronounced. Among Americans between the ages of 18 and 34, 53 percent said they sympathized more with Palestinians. It was the first time a majority in this age group had taken that position. Only 23 percent sympathized more with Israelis, a record low.
Among those in the 35-54 age range, 46 percent sympathized more with the Palestinians, compared with 28 percent for Israelis, marking a reversal from 12 months ago when 45 percent sympathized more with Israelis and 33 percent with Palestinians.
Americans age 55 and older remain more sympathetic to Israelis: 49 percent compared with 31 percent for Palestinians. However, this year was the first since 2005 in which less than half of older Americans sympathized more with Israelis.
Beyond the question of sympathies, the poll also found that overall favorability ratings of Israel and the Palestinian territories had also shifted.
Americans rated Israel much more favorably than the Occupied Palestinian Territories in Gallup surveys between 2000 to 2024. The latest poll found that views on Israel were among the least positive Gallup has measured. Meanwhile, views on the Palestinian territories, though still net negative overall, were the most positive on record.
Support among Americans for a two-state solution also reached one of the highest levels in the history of tracking by Gallup: 57 percent of respondents said they favored the establishment of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, 28 percent opposed it and 15 percent had no opinion.
The support was strongest among Democrats, at 77 percent, and 57 percent of independents also backed a two-state solution, levels that have been generally consistent since 2023.
Republican support has fluctuated sharply in recent years. It fell from 43 percent before the Oct. 7 attacks in 2023 to 26 percent in the immediate aftermath, the largest single-year drop recorded among any party group. Support rebounded to 41 percent last year, before declining again to 33 percent in the latest survey.
With the exception of 2024, the current 44 percentage point gap between Democrats and Republicans is the widest Gallup has recorded on the issue.
Nevertheless, Americans remain more supportive of a two-state solution than Israelis or Palestinians themselves: in 2025, only 27 percent of Israelis and 33 percent of Palestinians living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem said they supported such a proposal.
