One year on. Hundreds of thousands are dying or dead, millions are displaced, the Middle East is undergoing its greatest changes in a generation, Iran has directly attacked Israel twice in one year, and Yemen has proven that the US Navy ain't worth shit. We are the closest we have been to nuclear war (discounting accidents) in decades, but also the fall of Israel.
Because one day, the prisoners of a concentration camp paraglided over a wall.
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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 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.
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.
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.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
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.
It’s not that they think they can turn it around, but that the window of opportunity is rapidly closing.
You have a 10% chance of success today versus a 1% chance in 5 years, you’d rather bet on that 10% chance.
The same with the US. Once Iran gets Russian air defenses (a process accelerated by the Ukraine war), then the US-Israeli air superiority in the region is over. If Iran gets its own nuclear weapons, they can actually retaliate against the US. They have to do this now before that opportunity is closed forever.
there's 100 ways they could have been more methodical and less clumsy if they were actually operating with a keen awareness of a 'window of opportunity', there's only a fascist anxiety absent real analysis or realistic prescriptions for victory. the nazis being somewhat aware that their capacity to do barbarossa was declining with time never reached the inescapably obvious conclusion it could not succeed, nor did it help them plan it appropriately---the push for the caucauasian oil fields only being granted priority after the campaign was underway
Like how?
Iran has positioned both of its direct interventions as replies to egregious provocations from israel. they would not have happened if there was any restraint on the zionists' part. the gains from their assassinations and terrorism do not match the damage and deeper commitment Iran has been forced into. and they're literally gearing up to do it again, apparently while running low on their air defenses. wasting resources bombing Syria. escalating in Lebanon before they can decrease commitments in Gaza or the West Bank.
how is this a "master plan"? this is a suicide pact relying on god or the united states to sweep in and fix everything for them. even if provoking US entry is the core pillar they're genuinely pursuing to the exclusion of fascist delusion that they can win 10 fronts at once: that is still irrational. the US has proven repeatedly it cannot wipe away entrenched resistance! they've also lost in Lebanon, and lost in Iraq!
The US and Israel both want to destroy Iran. There is no “provoking US entry”, both their strategic goals are completely aligned at this point. This is their last chance to get the damage done before the opportunity is lost forever. The war in Ukraine threw a wrench into their long term plan and they’re simply adjusting to the reality of having to accelerate the war before it is too late.
They’re willing to take the gamble, because the alternative is Israel losing its ethnostate dream and America losing its control of the Near/Middle East to China forever.
Both outcomes present an existential crisis to their respective ideologies: the Zionists are never going to give up the ethnostate dream because that would be the end of their ideology; the American imperialists are never going to let their control of the periphery slip away without putting on a real fight because that would also be the end of their imperialist ambitions.
how could the US-directed proxy war to break Russia be an unexpected hiccup in the long-term plan? surely if the people operating this are rational and aware, they'd be coordinating between their theatres. if we're going to assume a unity of action between israel and the US, we need to consider if the US is acting in a coherent and reasonable way to further their goals--would it be an unexpected analysis to posit they aren't either? the US has plans, has ideology, but mostly contradictory and uncoordinated. US plans global military hegemony---US neoliberal ideology demands no industrial capacity to maintain it. US plans to attack Iran---US also plans to attack Russia and China, but has no idea which first, which priority, how much to commit. they're listless and in the meantime exhausting their arsenal on the holding actions, inexorably decreasing their abilities to pursue any/all 3.
The primary objective of the war in Ukraine was to break Europe. That objective has been largely achieved. The unexpected consequence was that Russia did not fold under sanctions, and it backfired through inflation in the US domestic economy. This was why the Fed hiked rates for the past two years, placing the dominant status of the US dollar under unprecedented risk.
The last two years have been the Biden administration adapting to this new reality and gambling that China would not take advantage of this exposed weakness of the dollar, and their gambit worked. The US dollar has more or less restored its strength and now it’s time to turn against Iran before the entire Middle East fell to China’s influence - which is only a matter of time if the US doesn’t do anything.
You are assuming that capitalism cannot adapt to failures (which happen all the time), but in fact capitalism is infinitely adaptable to new dynamics, which is why Marxist-Leninist theories are so important - these opportunities that expose the weakness of the imperial power occur only once in a while, and if they are not seized upon, the gap would be filled in short notice.
one constellation of monetary policies projecting a seeming success does not mean everything the US has been doing is/was in service of the same policy, or that they've been successful. the US hasn't disentangled from Ukraine even if the "objective has been largely achieved", the materiel they expended on that has not been restored. the manufacturing deficiencies it exposed have not been addressed. Iran is the best equipped adversary they're attempting to challenge since ww2.. maybe Vietnam in the later years of the conflict was close--point is they're not prepared. the US dollar being 'strong' doesn't put missiles in the field.