Image features Haitian Creole, meaning in English: "Let's Join Hands To Remove Haiti From The Boot Of Domination-Occupation!"
Welcome to the first news megathread of 2024! Last year saw rather little territorial movement in Ukraine (though shocking levels of attrition), and while BRICS has made some important moves, such as the upcoming expansion, there's no massive anti-imperialist offensive yet for us to really analyze. Instead, a lot of things have been going on behind the scenes, with the anti-hegemonic axis of China, Russia, Iran, and others forming a lot of bilateral currency deals as they distance themselves from the dollar. This all culminated in a rather boring year, or so I had thought until October 7th. The courage and heroism of the Gazan Resistance showed us that the imperialists truly are paper tigers, and Ansarallah demonstrated that American naval control is more illusory than the likes of John Bolton would like to admit.
This year will almost certainly be even more interesting and horrific. Debt across the developing world is at record levels, and the incoming hurricane that is the global recession not just on the horizon, but rapidly moving inland. Russia seems to once again be escalating in Ukraine with the return of large missile strikes, and the Zionist entity is failing to make much progress against Hamas, let alone Hezbollah, let alone Iran - instead vying for civilian bombings and propaganda campaigns (e.g. wedding proposals and drawing stars of David in Gaza to prove just how not mad and not owned they are, as their soldiers shit their pants due to insufficient military preparation and brigades are withdrawn due to the tremendous casualties they are experiencing). I'm sure there will be other sudden events that will occur this year. Here's my bingo grid:
In the midst of all this, it's easy to forget the other underdog nation on the other side of the world from Palestine - Haiti. Since I last covered them, about half a year ago, the UN was on the verge of allowing a Kenyan police force to enter Haiti to "restore order", as the country is in a chaotic, perhaps potentially revolutionary situation. This has been described by various Haitian analysts and experts as essentially a US military force in blackface - white blows from a black hand - and Kenya's president, Ruto, has received a lot of aid from the US because of their willingness to step up, including a five year military deal. It took a while longer than I thought for the vote to occur, but on October 2nd, the UNSC allowed Kenya to do this (Russia and China abstained). However, the Kenyan Supreme Court needs to confirm that this is constitutional, and will give their verdict by January 26th. Many Kenyan lawyers and opposition leaders say that this is blatantly not constitutional, but given all the US aid on the line, breaking the constitution might be worth it to Ruto, whatever the backlash.
From the article from which much of the above information has been sourced:
But Washington now has its hands full with other problems. Its proxy war against Russia via Ukraine is going very badly, a fact that even the U.S. mainstream media is now forced to acknowledge. Meanwhile, the successful Oct. 7 uprising by Palestinian fighters against Israeli occupiers has apparently blindsided both the U.S. empire and its foremost client state. The entire Arab world and Global South are both horrified and outraged by Israel’s ever-growing war crimes, as over 20,000 Palestinians, half of them children, have been slaughtered and starved. Meanwhile, the dysfunction in Washington is deepening, Biden’s approval rating is plummeting, and the U.S. economy is lurching toward another crash.
All this means that Haiti may finally catch a break. The desperation in Haiti is very intense but so is the apprehension of and indignation against another foreign intervention. That resistance continues in the streets of Haiti and its diaspora.
Viva Haiti!
The weekly update is here on the website.
Your Tuesday briefing is here on the website and here in the comments.
The Country of the Week is Haiti! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
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.
Made a few calls to my family in Lebanon today just to gauge how people are feeling about possible escalation. The situation is definitely tense, my aunt for example bought lots of rice and other dry foods today in case there's some mass bombing of Beirut and we get Gazafied by the Zionists. My communist uncle is still on team nothing ever happens, although I did sense some rare dread from him for the first time since October 7th. His take on the situation was basically "I hope nothing happens for the good of the people here, but I hope something happens because the Zionist fucks deserve a major slap", which shows the dilemma that Hezbollah and the rest of the resistance is facing right now. I have a cousin that works in an office in the South, and everyone was told to chill at home for the next week in case something happens. Another cousin works at an international company in Beirut that has offices in Dubai and a few other places, and the EU passport holders at her company have started to leave for either Dubai or back to Europe because some of them got emails from the head office telling them that embassies have reached out and told them to start evacuating. I'm still leaning towards nothing significant happening, but I'm more worried now honestly.
The rest of the west may be sparkling fascists but to get the real authentic nazis you gotta go to
Free Palestine is Coming. Ned Stark declares for Palestine and rallies his banners to march on Zionist strongholds
Show
"Without hunger and thirst among the Gazan population, we will not be able to recruit collaborators, we will not be able to recruit intelligence, we will not be able to bribe people, with food, drink, medicine, in order to obtain intelligence" - Israeli Knesset MK Tally Gotliv
i think thats it , i think we reched maximum cope
Show
White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby describes South Africa’s 84-page suit against Israel's genocide in Palestine as “meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever.”
why would you put yourself in this position? they're going to be found guilty dude
IMMENSE shoutout and uncritical support to the person who covered the Israeli propaganda “missing people” posters around the corner from my apartment with posters of missing people actually in our area. Genuinely incredible and simple idea that I want to see Zionists get mad about
Israeli ambassador to the UK Tzipi Hotovely says every school, mosque and second house is a target for Israel.
Asked if that’s effectively a call for the destruction of all of Gaza, she asks “do you have another solution?”
A clear call for genocide.
update the ICJ 'intention of genocide' complaint
Israel’s National Security Minister hits back at Biden: “We are not another star on the American flag…the emigration of hundreds of thousands from Gaza will allow [Israeli] residents [of the border area] to return home and live in security and protect IDF soldiers.”
in response to the US saying "we're fine with you doing ethnic cleansing but jesus christ stop saying it out loud"
In communist North Korea the crazy regime puts a ridiculous number of medals on their generals.
Illustration: Unrelated image of Danish court bureaucrat
Show
Bringing in the New Year with a bang:
UPA Corporal Roman Shukhevych Museum destroyed by Shahed Drone on Bandera's Birthday
Now you might ask: who was UPA Corporal Roman Shukhevych, this man who was awarded the Hero of Ukraine in 2007, who has a museum, statues, stadia and streets named after him in Ukraine and Canada?
He collaborated with the Nazis from February 1941 to December 1942 as commanding officer of the Nachtigall Battalion in early 1941,[2] and as a Hauptmann of the German Schutzmannschaft 201 auxiliary police battalion in late 1941 and 1942.[3] Shukhevych was one of the perpetrators of the Galicia-Volhynia massacres of tens of thousands of Polish civilians.[3] It is unclear to what extent Shuchevych was responsible for the massacres of Poles in Volhynia, but he certainly condoned them after some time, and also directed the massacres of Poles in Eastern Galicia.[4][5]
Remember, if you think Naziism is alive and well in modern day Ukraine you're a Putinist stooge.
It's the soviet union that collaborated with the Nazis from 1940 to 1942, tankie. Banderites? No no, they were just forced to help each other to survive genocides or something.
It's so frustrating when people bring up the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact when it is a historical fact that Stalin tried signing a tripartite agreement with the British and French FIRST against Nazi Germany but the British and French declined. Stalin wanted peace.
The parallel universe where Hitler invades the Soviet Union first (and thus probably receives help from England, France, and the US for doing so) really would be the worst timeline. Actually, I'm not sure why Hitler didn't do that. Some WW2 history buff might be able to fill me in.
I'm not sure why Hitler didn't do that.
Well, the one of the immediate causes of the Nazis' rise to power was widespread German resentment over France's demand for huge reparations payments after Germany lost WWI. In fact, France even annexed the profitable territory of Alsace–Lorraine back from Germany, after Germany had taken it from France following the Franco-Prussian War. France and Germany were literally fighting over that territory since 843 when Charlemagne essentially created France and Germany by giving the two regions to two rival sons, who both cooperated to invade the third son sandwiched between them. Anyway, Hitler invaded France first because it was very popular with the people of Germany, especially his Nazi followers, who wanted revenge over the WWI reparations payments. He also wanted to take pictures in Paris, standing in front of the conquered Eiffel tower - here's a picture of him cutting some propaganda doing just that: https://www.annefrank.org/media/filer_public_thumbnails/filer_public/88/ca/88ca45d2-50c5-400c-afa6-f8755d8f84fb/hitler_speer_y_breker_en_paris_23_de_junio_de_1940.jpg__1536x1536_q85_ALIAS-limit_large_subsampling-2.jpg
France and Germany were literally fighting over that territory since 843 when Charlemagne essentially created France and Germany by giving the two regions to two rival sons, who both cooperated to invade the third son sandwiched between them.
If I had a time machine and wanted to do something really funny, I'd try to arrange it so that Alsace-Lorraine was given to the Jewish diaspora as a homeland in recompense for the holocaust instead of Palestine.
Poland was not going to give either side military access so had to fall first. The Czech and Polish annexations also provided gold reserves and slave labour to keep the German economy from collapse.
It is wild to have the entire world microchip industry on a contested island
