Title is a reference to Resistance imagery about how Israeli soldiers will enter Gaza alive but leave it in coffins - the same is true for American soldiers in the Middle East if the regional war expands.
The image is of the Fattah-1 Iranian hypersonic ballistic missile, which its creators boast can overcome any missile defense system on the planet, has a range of 1400 kilometers (and thus Iran can strike Israel), and has a terminal impact velocity of Mach 13.
Dozens of American soldiers have been injured and 3 have been killed on a base in the Middle East. There has been confused reports about whether the attack was on Syrian territory or Jordan’s - the Al-Tanf base is in Syria, but Tower-22 in Jordan is another base that helps supply Al-Tanf, and Tower-22 is the one that is alleged to have been hit. These is the first confirmed deaths of American troops since the conflict began, though it’s not likely that this is actually the first deaths after hundreds of drone/missile strikes throughout the region on American bases, unless you think American soldiers are having extremely timely heart attacks just after a missile hits.
The attack is certainly impactful, though it does also have considerably symbolism. Courtesy of John Helmer:
The operational success of the strike for the attackers is strategic. Tower-22 is a logistics, supply, and rear guard post for the Al-Tanf base which US troops are operating thirty kilometres north across the border in Syria. The attack demonstrates that both Tower-22 and Al-Tanf, Jordan and Syria, are newly vulnerable to weapons which the US forces have failed to detect and neutralize. Just as significantly, the massive US airbase called Muwaffaq Salti, 230 kilometres west across Jordan, is also vulnerable now.
It indicates that Iran now possesses Russian expertise in countering American equipment:
“This is a significant accomplishment,” one of the sources said. “Was the bypassing of the US air defence system at Tower-22 pulled off with Russian assistance? US bases generally rely on the C-RAM [Counter Rocket, Artillery and Mortar] system. It was sent to Ukraine last year where the Russians have been learning to defeat it. What now of American EW [electronic warfare]? They’ve been doing a fair job of knocking drones down up to now. It seems a ‘coincidence’ that, not a week after the meetings in Moscow with Arabs and Iranians, we see this success. It’s a success the circumstances of which, we can be sure, Biden and Austin are not keen to advertise.”
I am putting my take on the table right now: I am 99% certain that the US won’t attack Iran directly. I think we are still quite a while away from that being a possibility. Much more likely is that Iranian officials in Iraq or Syria will be hit by a retaliatory strike, as Israel has done recently. It is a significant escalation nonetheless. And it comes as Israel seems to be gearing up for a suicidal war with Hezbollah.
The Country of the Week is Iran! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Updates continue to be AWOL - but I am cooking something. Hopefully.
The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week’s thread is here.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel’s destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
I love how the EU just pledged €54 billion in aid to Ukraine and nobody is talking about it.
Leave it to the Europeans to start throwing money at a war when the US basically already pulled out and nobody gives a fuck about it anymore. Pure self-destruction.
Mondoweiss: U.S. admits it hasn’t verified Israel’s UNRWA claims, media ignores it
I think the article is right that the U.S. and Israel and the West would like to deny generations of Palestinians of refugee status, of course:
Many on the pro-Israel and Israeli right and center believe doing away with UNRWA would essentially allow Israel to do away with Palestinian refugees because they believe UNRWA is the only thing maintaining that generational definition.
But I think a more urgent point is that denying Palestinians aid right in this moment is a way to advance the genocide. There’s a reason the acute attack on UNRWA came on the fucking day the ICJ made its ruling.
Hilariously, though, it says Israel may be trying to reverse the U.S. de-funding of UNRWA because such abrupt starvation of people might tend to cause the global population to force an end to the military component of the genocide:
The Israeli official made clear what the Netanyahu government’s reasoning was. “If UNRWA ceases operating on the ground, this could cause a humanitarian catastrophe that would force Israel to halt its fighting against Hamas. This would not be in Israel’s interest and it would not be in the interest of Israel’s allies either.”
Like, not so fast, U.S.: WE want to genocide these people; no stealing our thunder!!!
But nothing is as familiar to Joe Biden as the own-goal. By suspending the aid to UNRWA, he now has to take positive action to restore it, which will leave him even more vulnerable to bipartisan attack.
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Iran, the only more-or-less decent new BRICS+ member.
Also, UNRWA has announced a possible suspension of humanitarian aid into Palestine is now looming on the horizon. According to liveuamap, it is likely by the end of February. The primary cited reason is funding cuts but even if hypothetically, China, Ireland and South Africa stop pissing about and pick up the slack, there’s the matter of military and “civilian” rioters going out of their way to prevent the delivery of food and medicine.
The
is of course, celebrating it. There is also no longer any functioning fire engines, with Civil Defense and medical functions all but collapsed. This in an area where the population density may have swelled to at least 20,000/km2. Allegedly, the Gaza Civil Registry has also been destroyed. There is no more record of degrees, birth/death certificates, addresses, families, etc. essentially declaring the 2.3 million people nonexistent, save for maybe a refugee in Johannesburg who still has their papers.
along with Finland, Italy, Austria, Romania, Netherlands and Estonia have cut funding as of writing this.wishing all american occupation bases in the middle east a very being annihilated by ballistic missiles
Guys, New Communist Party just dropped
A New Party is Born: Founding Announcement of the (New) Communist Party of Canada
Today, we announce the formation of the (New) Communist Party of Canada (the (N)CPC), the succesful completion of its Founding Congress, and the public release of its Political Program.
The new Party is announced today, but it was not born today. The (N)CPC was born in clandestinity over two years ago, in 2021, after the protracted Unity-Struggle Process of 2020-21 succeeded in rallying communist revolutionaries from across Canada, old and new, with many veterans of what we have come to calling the “third,” and even some from what we are calling the “second,” communist party-building movements in Canada, alongside a great many newer, younger proletarian revolutionaries who were only too ready to carry forward the torch of proletarian revolution in the world today.
they appear to be maoist, of which variant im not sure yet, i dont think they are gonzalites since they normaly name drop him alongside marx, lenin and mao
The Political Program of the (New) Communist Party of Canada
this is their program on a quick glance it looks fine, a funny line about quebec people in the nations of canada sections, but they seem fine, hopefull they will be an ok communist party since the biggest ML one collapsed after trying to hide SA within its ranks.
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Drove by the Palestine protest in my city today. 4 hours in and it was till packed. Also the pigs were probably extremely mad. Also a ton of horse shit on the ground from the mounted pigs.
CW: Blood, Partial nudity, Torture, Satanic IOF Cruelty
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there once was a country called the United States of America, and its propaganda was so good it even fooled itself
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Common Palestine Action W:
https://twitter.com/Pal_action/status/1753396383506149493
https://nitter.cz/Pal_action/status/1753396383506149493
BREAKING: Logistics giant, Kuehne + Nagel, confirm they’ve cut their contract with Elbit Systems and will not work with the Israeli weapons maker again.
This victory comes after Palestine Action targeted the firm over their transportation of Israeli weaponry.
https://aje.io/dh4xnf?update=2678134
Disgusting’: Rebuke mounts against WSJ column targeting US Arab community
“Welcome to Dearborn, America’s Jihad Capital,” The Wall Street Journal headline read in reference to Dearborn, Michigan in the United States.
Since the column – which focused on local advocacy for Palestinian rights – was published on Friday, municipal officials, rights advocates and US legislators have come to the defence of the Michigan city that is home to large Arab and Muslim American communities.
“This is disgusting. WSJ should be ashamed of itself for promoting this kind of Islamophobic BS, and should immediately apologize to the residents of Dearborn and to Muslims everywhere,” Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal wrote in a social media post today.
US Senator Gary Peters, who represents Michigan, also said the column “endangers the entire Dearborn community”.
