Also known as “Foucault’s boomerang” or the “imperial boomerang”.
Image is of a sniper on the roof of the Indiana Memorial Union at Indiana State University, overlooking a student protest.
The Imperial Boomerang is the observation that the tactics of mass oppression and totalitarianism used by Western countries in their colonies and neocolonies will, sooner or later, return home to be used against the citizens of those Western countries. While the people living at the time of WW2 were, rightfully, in deep shock of the concentration camps used by Nazi Germany, those paying attention to what was occurring in Africa would not have been terribly surprised. Concentration camps were used in several countries in order to separate out ethnic groups and place them in more easily controlled environments which aimed to prevent them from rising up and fighting back against the Western governments which exploited them. There is the additional factor of governments taking notes from each other - Hitler was inspired by America’s racial segregation and genocide of indigenous groups, which author Carroll Kakel among others have written books on.
Today, the totalitarian strategies used by the Zionist entity in occupied Palestine are being brought home to Western countries as the American Reich and its global influence accelerate in their decline. Gaza was and is a cyber-concentration camp, with digital surveillance taking place alongside old-fashioned techniques of paying informants. Aside from being an unsinkable aircraft carrier and disrupting the entire Middle East, Israel’s primary role appears to be to generate new ways to monitor entire populations. Propaganda about China being an authoritarian police state with social credit scores and AI which knows where everybody is at all times was probably created, at least in part, to deflect attention from Israel doing those exact things. The paranoid and flimsy American regime with its gerontocratic upper circles now use these tactics at home: cracking down on any and all protestors with political views left of Mussolini; placing snipers on roofs ready to fire at the slightest provocation; and arresting organization leaders. Pegasus has wormed its way around the world, with a notable recent example in Poland, in which the previous conservative government used the spyware to monitor the current liberal ruling party. The Israeli military, experts only in killing children and not actual warfare, have trained the police of other nations.
It would be easy to end the preamble there, on a gloomy note about the brick wall - or, indeed, iron curtain - that upstart left-wing groups are up against. What history has shown is that these regimes are, in fact, beatable. Liberation movements around the world have found ways to counter imperialism, even if they required wars in which millions of their countrymen were murdered. The legacy of Israeli propaganda psyops and digital tracking is not victory, as Hamas demonstrated on October 7th and continues to show with every ambush executed and every Merkava destroyed. The legacy of Western military defence equipment is not success, demonstrated by every missile fired by Hezbollah and Iran which hits Israel. The legacy of the American Navy is not competence, with a naval blockade of the Red Sea still maintained after months by one of the poorest countries on the planet.
The protests of at least the last couple decades have been marked by failure to produce material results: from those against the Iraq War, to Occupy Wall Street, to the BLM protests of 2020. Of course, it would be silly to tell American protestors to start digging tunnels. But sooner or later, the failure of Western protest movements will be overcome, and a more effective strategy will be devised, in order to deflect the boomerang.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you’ve wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don’t worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
The Country of the Week is the United States! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
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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.
Israeli army tells Palestinians to temporarily evacuate parts of Rafah ahead of an expected assault
The Israeli army has told Palestinians to begin evacuating eastern Rafah, according to an Israeli Defense Force statement on Monday, signaling that a ground invasion is imminent.
People were told to move to Muwasi, an Israeli-declared humanitarian area near the coast. The army said it had expanded assistance into the area, including field hospitals, tents, food and water.
The announcement comes amid fragile cease-fire talks and ahead of a highly anticipated ground offensive that Israel has been vowing to undertake for months to weed out the remaining Hamas militants.
On Sunday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed Hamas wasn’t serious about a deal and warned of “a powerful operation in the very near future in Rafah.”
His comments came after Hamas attacked Israel’s main crossing point Sunday for delivering assistance, killing three soldiers.
Naturally, Formula 1 is completely terrible and I should be sent to the gulag for still watching it since the 1990s out of childhood nostalgia, knowing full well it’s absolutely haram. But…
It’s pretty hilarious that Trump showed up at today’s race, hung out in McLaren’s garage, and then dubbed himself Lando Norris’ lucky charm after his first ever win. What’s funnier is that Lando then said, “Donald is someone that you’ve got to have a lot of respect for in many ways,” which left fans upset that le epic bacon Twitch streaming driver would say such a thing
Imagine being surprised that someone from one of the UK’s richest families, competing in a sport formerly managed by someone who praised Hitler for being “a man who got things done” and someone else whose father led the British Union of Fascists, would have right-wing sympathies
Rishi Sunak on sack watch - Tories got hammered.
Conservatives crushed by ‘worst local election result’ in years
deleted by creator
Cops said they would gas the building but haven’t gone through with it yet. Building is still occupied as of this comment (3:00 AM EST)
Long live Palestine and long live the global solidarity movement so long as any person is shackled by the chains of imperialism. So proud of the brave protestors in America for rising up against this cruel and unjust system spearheaded by their criminal government.
These American students are DEFINITELY not ever getting those student loans forgiven at this point, but history will exonerate them a million times over.
Calls for a strike during finals week. This is the perfect opportunity to strike since finals week is crunch time for academic staff. An actual strike will grind university operations to a halt. There might also be room for malicious compliance like giving everyone A’s.
Movement to Socialism (MAS) party excluded the former president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, from the party’s leadership. The party’s new leader, Grover Garcia, is an ally of the country’s current president, Luis Arce.
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Israeli air attacks kill at least 10 Palestinians in Rafah as Hamas fires rockets at the Karem Abu Salem crossing, killing three Israeli soldiers and wounding 11 others.
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The latest round of negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza has ended in the Egyptian capital Cairo, but crucial gaps remain between Israel and Hamas.
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The Israeli cabinet has voted unanimously to close Al Jazeera’s operations in the country. The communications minister says the orders against the network “will go into effect immediately”. Al Jazeera calls the move a “criminal act that violates human rights”.
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At least 34,683 Palestinians have been killed and 78,018 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The death toll in Israel from Hamas’s October 7 attacks stands at 1,139, with dozens of people still held captive.
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Is it unreasonable or inaccurate to say that the Baltics are not real states and are merely buffers between Russia and NATO?
The following a comment left by user Emma under the Naked Capitalism story about Türkiye cutting off trade to Israel. Sharing it because it makes me hopeful, and I think we all appreciate have some hope:
I will say that I don’t think there’s going to be a real day after for Israel or the West, even if they ethnically cleanse all of Gaza or put it under some sort of PA led Vichy regime.
Ilan Pappe said that he thought the next 12 to 24 months will be very hard, but then Israel will break from its internal contradictions. People will leave, the struggles in the West Bank and with Hezbollah will intensify, and there won’t be a sustainable Jewish entity on the other end.
The external factors will also be very harsh on Israel. Once Russia is done in Ukraine, it and China will look to help Syria recover its territory and economy. Iran and China will also want to bring Iraq fully into the BRICS system and out of American domination. The salvo from this new Bahraini resistance organization suggests that Iran’s Axis of Resistance is spreading into places ruled by Western placed emirs and kings. The actual positions of ISIS and other regional players has been unveiled by their actions. All in all, an Israel that is now clearly intolerable to basically all Arabs is not going to last in a sea of Arabs.
Yes there are the nukes and the Samson option, but I don’t think Israelis have it in them to die for the land. Look how quickly the fanatical settlers in the north and around the Gaza envelop abandoned their homes. Look at how quickly the ultra orthodox deeply implicated in pogroms in the West Bank and lies of Zaka, threatened to leave the country if they’re called up for conscription. Look at the desertions of reservists in the latest call ups.
Would any of these people, who can still have comfortable lives in the Levant or in the West, really give up their lives for a land that they’re only willing to kill for (and in many cases, brainwash the young into killing for them)?
Especially now that their finally waking up somewhat from their October 7 freakout and are confronting the fact that Mass Hannibal was likely responsible for the majority of civilian deaths, and that their ‘most moral army in the world’ shot 3 white flag waving defenseless hostages in cold blood.
The Afrikaans didn’t use their nukes, even though their ties to the land go back centuries and their ancestors did die in large numbers in the Boer War. So while the chances of the Israelis using nukes is not zero, I hope and think its quite unlikely
Anyone got a recap on the context of recent negotations with israel and hamas and how israel is pulling its bullshit?
University of Wisconsin-Madison started an encampment today. Pretty damn good turnout of supporters protecting them as they set up in the morning. Never more than 3 cops anywhere even in sight of the protesters, and usually fewer than that (down to 0). As evening fell cops started amassing in numbers a few blocks away at a convention center and the school newspaper live reporting kept talking about how they were gearing up with full riot accoutrements to break up the camps but even as the non-campers left to go to bed there wasn’t a pig in sight. Only people I know of who had any contact with police at all were counterprotesters actually. And all this after the Chancellor sent a mass email to all 50,000 fucking students saying “no camping we will make arrests.” Either they’re waiting till the dead of night when everyone’s literally asleep or they’re giving them a day or something.
University: This is trespassing!
Five Nation Loghouse Confederacy: Pilgrim says what?https://twitter.com/decolonialsol/status/1785098398606975419
From Rybar:
The French conservative media @lesalonbeige reacted to the exhibition of trophies from the SMO, including French weapons, in the Victory Park in Moscow:
"#Macron and other Western leaders took billions of euros from the pockets of European taxpayers so that Western tanks could roll through Moscow.
But there’s a catch."
