New preamble:

Palestinian resistance groups have launched an operation in and around Gaza to fight the genocidal settler state oppressing them. Thousands of rockets have been launched towards the so-called state of Israel, overwhelming the Iron Dome. Settlers and the troops protecting them are being killed in the settlements surrounding Gaza, with many caught by surprise in the first few hours of the operation.

Palestinians are taking many Israeli settlers and soldiers hostage and bringing them back to Gaza. An Israeli general, Nimrod Aloni, has been confirmed captured. Palestinians are also taking military and civilian equipment back. Drones and MANPADS appear to be in use, and a number of Merkava tanks have been destroyed/disabled and their occupants removed and taken hostage. Palestinian forces appear to be heading in two main directions so far: southeast in the direction of Be'er Sheva, and along the coast in the direction of Ashkelon, but settlements all around Gaza have been assaulted and taken. It is obviously unknown how far they intend to go, or what their intermediate goals are.

Israel is bombing the Gaza Strip with aircraft, destroying buildings. It appears that their intelligence on the location of Palestinian forces outside of Gaza is very poor, and haven't been able to meaningfully strike them. Netanyahu has given a statement declaring that Israel is in a state of war. Iran has issued statements in support of the uprising, and Israel has responded with hostility to those comments. In all, the IDF appears to still be in a shockingly bad state hours after the assault began.

Old preamble on Antarctica:

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Much of the information for this news post, including both the images in the preamble, came from this article at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which has been circulating in the media lately.

Image has been taken from this article.

Antarctica has had a uniquely bad year.

While the sea ice extent in the last 50 years or so has been very gradually declining, it has done so very slowly on average - by 0.1% per decade. This began to change in 2016:

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Even so, this year is different, showing a remarkable decrease in the maximum sea ice extent. It is unconfirmed (I think) but this year may be the first in which the maximum extent fails to reach 17 million square kilometers - and is more than one million square kilometers lower than the previous record low maximum in 1986.

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The fall in sea ice has been linked by some researchers to warming in the uppermost ocean layer caused by lateral and upward mixing of warmer water. The ocean is a gigantic heat sink, and has been absorbing much of the excess heat that humanity has generated via the greenhouse effect. But put enough heat into a heat sink and it will eventually fill up.

These changes in sea ice extent is no mere abstract climate worry or scientific curiosity. It is having a direct, catastrophic impact on the Antarctic's ecosystem. Emperor penguin colonies have had trouble breeding, so much so that:

...there is high probability that no chicks had survived last year in four of the five known emperor penguin colonies in the central and eastern Bellingshausen Sea. This was because the sea ice had melted well before chicks would have developed waterproof feathers. ... Today's report says about one-third of the 62 known emperor penguin colonies in Antarctica were affected by partial or total sea ice loss between 2018 and 2022.

And, last year, scientists conducted a study on the two plants that are able to grow near Antarctica, looking at a single Antarctic island for simplicity, and found that the populations of these plants had exploded in the last decade - growing as much in the last decade as they had in the last 50 years - due to rising air temperatures. It was warm enough for the scientists to wear shorts and remove their shirts.

The Country of the Week is Syria! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

The weekly update is here!

Links and Stuff

The bulletins site is down.

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists

Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Add to the above list if you can.

Resources For Understanding The War

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.

Telegram Channels

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

Pro-Russian

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

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.

Last week's discussion post.

  • thethirdgracchi [he/him, they/them]
    ·
    1 year ago

    Chairman of the Executive Council of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hashem Safieddine: —

    We are in the position we should be in, and the epics being written by the resistance fighters today in Palestine are the beginning of a new phase.

    The resistance fighters in Palestine proved that they are capable of liberating all of Palestine, and their operations warmed the hearts of all Arabs and Muslims.

    Netanyahu, the zionists, and all “israeli” leaders will not recover from this shock.

    The failure of “israeli intelligence” means the success of the Palestinian resistance at various levels and the accumulation of military combat experience.

    The entry of the resistance fighters into the settlements that they thought were fortified and protected and the capture of a large number of zionists is a scene of humiliation that indicates the ability of the heroic Palestinians to take revenge for decades of injustice.

    These scenes indicate that the time for revenge and reckoning has come.

    The Islamic Resistance’s slogan has always been “March, March, March towards Al-Quds,” and we must always repeat this slogan.

    We have witnessed and are witnessing the complete and clear ratification of the statement of the Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, “The time of defeats has passed and the time of victories has come.”

    ×Netanyahu thought that with his extremist decisions he could do whatever he wanted in Al-Quds and Al-Aqsa Mosque, but the satisfactory answer came to him from the “Al-Aqsa Flood” that Al-Quds has its protectors and Al-Aqsa has its men and that the resistance can have many surprises.

    The battle is not over, and in some results, the “Al-Aqsa Flood” operation ended the notion of safe settlements in all of Palestine and is continuing, and what is coming is greater.

    This era is the era of armed resistance, blood, martyrdom, glory and pride, not the era of submission and normalization.

    The Islamic nation is becoming increasingly convinced, steadfast, solid, and certain that this entity is about to disappear.

    This battle is the battle of the entire nation in the face of this enemy, and everyone must engage in the battle to defend Al-Quds and the holy sites.

    Netanyahu must know that this battle is not a battle for the people of Gaza and the West Bank only, but the responsibility requires all our people in the Islamic and Arab nation not to be neutral, and we are not neutral in this battle.

    The resistance sent a greeting this morning to the Palestinian resistance, and we say that this message must be carefully considered by the Israelis.

    Our message to the Americans and the “israelis”: “Your foolishness, O “israelis” and Americans, and your disdain for the sanctities and your transgression of all lines, will lead you to the Al-Aqsa flood, and if you continue in your foolishness, it will lead to the flood of the entire nation, which will drown the entire entity.

    Greetings to the heroic resistors, to all the resistance factions in Palestine, and to the families of the wounded and martyrs, and we say to them, “The nation, we are with you, and our hearts, souls, missiles, and rifles are with you, because we are the resistance that originally existed for the sake of Palestine and Al-Aqsa.”

    In our dear resistance, we have always longed for these moments in which we clash with this enemy and we are fully prepared and ready when needed.

    Full statement from https://t.me/PalestineResist but lots of sites are reporting quotes from this.