Image is Israeli interceptors trying and failing to intercept missiles over their cities.
Israel just carried out a widespread bombing of Iran, which has killed a number of senior officials inside Iran (though it seems the leadership is more-or-less intact) as well as a number of civilians. Important facilities have been targeted, but the amount of damage is unknown so far (note that many important Iranian facilities are deep underground, making them both hard to damage but also hard to determine if they are damaged from just satellite imagery, so reports of damage will be he-said-she-said).
It appears the attack took Iran by surprise, given that a residential block was targeted that contained some senior officials - if one saw an attack coming, one would imagine they'd be in bunkers. Nonetheless, like the rest of the Resistance Axis, I suspect that Iran has adapted their military structures to be resistant to decapitation strikes by ensuring that replacement figures are ready to take the place of killed officials.
Iran has delivered a massive missile barrage in response to Israeli aggression, even though Israel is continuing to bomb Iran. Iran is now aware of the location of many important Israeli sites, including secret nuclear sites, due to their recent intelligence haul, giving them a distinct edge.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
If you have evidence of Israeli crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.
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.
Mouin Rabbani - 19h "It seems Israel is broadly pursuing the same approach to Iran..."
Note - It was a wall of text so I created clear paragraphs.
Full text
It seems Israel is broadly pursuing the same approach to Iran that it used last year against Hizballah in Lebanon: assassinate key leaders, eliminate key reservoirs of specialised/institutional knowledge, and degrade key capabilities at the very outset of the campaign in order to deal a decisive blow to the adversary. Although Hizballah was dealt severe blows and emerged significantly weakened, it was not defeated.
Its attacks on Israel continued and ceased only as the result of a ceasefire agreement, and it never deployed the most advanced and powerful weapons in its arsenal. It remains the most powerful armed force in Lebanon, is in the process of rebuilding, and is today constrained from resuming attacks against Israel primarily by domestic considerations rather than Israel (even if these domestic constraints can also be viewed as an outcome of the Israeli campaign).
Iran's disintegrating economy and significant domestic discontent notwithstanding, the Israeli approach is even less likely to work against a state, and one which has a much more powerful arsenal, relatively coherent institutions, and none of the constraints that hamper(ed) Hizballah. Under current circumstances, the prospect of an agreement with the United States and sanctions relief will play no part in Iranian calculations, because the Iranian leadership considers US complicity in the Israeli attack a given.
As in similar situations elsewhere, domestic critics and opponents can be expected to either rally in support of the state against foreign aggression or keep their counsel until the guns fall silent. The question is not if Iran will respond, but how. Particularly so given the ongoing nature of the Israeli campaign and the extent of Iranian resources that remain available for a significant response.
Iran is likely to have concluded that restraint only further whets the Israeli (and US appetite), and will be urged by many in the leadership to hit back hard. The question, in my view, is whether Iran will respond in a manner that seeks to minimise the prospect of direct US involvement, or believes it is also in its interest to deal a blow to US forces in the region on an assumption the latter are likely to become involved anyway.
I suspect that at this stage they will either avoid attacking US forces and focus on Israel, or send what they consider a shot against the bow towards the US. But what Iran views as a warning may be interpreted by Washington - encouraged by Israel - as a declaration of war. Fasten your seat belts.
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Last para should read "shot across the bow".
https://xcancel.com/MouinRabbani/status/1933390440096584031#m
In other news - thank god he finally makes long posts at Twitter instead of 1/37 stuff.