Image is of destruction and damage inside Israel, sourced from this article.
Iran and Israel have struck each other many times over the last few days. There has been a general focus on military facilities and headquarters by both sides, though Israel has also struck oil facilities, civilian structures and hospitals, and in return for this, Iran has struck major scientific centers and the Haifa oil facilities.
Israel appears to have three main aims. First, to collapse the Iranian state, either through shock and breakdown by killing enough senior officials, or via some sort of internal military coup. Second, to try and destroy Iranian nuclear sites and underground missile cities, or at least to paralyze them long enough to achieve the first and third goals. And third, to bring the US into a direct conflict with Iran. This is because the US better equipped to fight them than Israel is (though victory would still not be guaranteed depending on what Iran chooses to do).
Iranian nuclear facilities are hidden deep underground (800 meters), far beyond the depth range of even the most powerful bunker busters (~70 meters or so), and built such that the visible ground entrances are horizontally far away in an unknown direction from the actual underground chambers. Only an extremely competent full-scale American bombing force all simultaneously using multiple of the most powerful conventional (perhaps even nuclear) bunker busters could even hypothetically hope to breach them (and we have seen how, in practice, American bunker busters have largely failed to impair or deter Ansarallah). There are several analysts on both sides who have concluded that it is entirely impossible to physically prevent Iran from building nukes.
I fully expect the US to join the war. I believe the current ambiguity is a deliberate invention of the US while they work to move their military assets into position, and as soon as they are ready, the US will start bombing Iran. After that, Iran's leadership must - if they haven't already - harden their hearts, and strike back with no fear, or risk following the path of Libya, Syria, and Iraq, either into either surrender, occupation, or annihilation. Every day where they do not possess a nuke is a day where lives are being lost and cities are being bombed.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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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.
@MarmiteLover123@hexbear.net apparently China just (not just , like 3 days ago) deployed 2x 815A electronic surveillance ships to the Persian Gulf which are some of their most modern platforms. They claimed its for antipiracy patrols but come on lol. So ,any thoughts on implications. Would it be just to pick up and collect data from f-35s and B2 deployments ? What intelligence/data sharing they could provide to iran, in real time or not, that can make a differenece defensively and offensively given whatever the capabilities iran still has. help with shot downs, ship targeting , early warning idk. Any change in movements and deployments they may force the US to do just by being there and the threat of the above?
A cope sci-fi scenario would be that China could position some j20 in bvr range or some AD battery hidden and actualy shot down a f35 or more so likely the bomber especially since the latter would have a predictable path to the nuclear site. Would the US missions even have awacs support themselves or would they be going in blind like Israel since Iran is a non threat for these platforms? Retrieving some wreckage would be very valuable for China tbh. Like if they shot smth down over iran how could the US even prove it? Iran would claim shotdown and the US would look like moron losers if they claimed china helped. Wont happen but its fun to imagine
Think these are intelligence gathering ships, SIGINT and ELINT. They want to observe how the US operates and learn from it. Could share the information with Iran though.
They used the same "anti-piracy" reason for a similar deployment when the west deployed against the Houthis
They will do their thing quietly and won't interfere. China just want data, experience and to test how well their equipment works.
I think we can be pretty sure China is there to gather intelligence on US military activity. Observing American and zionist terror attacks against Iran can generate valuable intelligence to help China defend itself against similar attacks.
I would hope China shares some intelligence with Iran. China does not have allies but it is in their interest that Iran wins this war. The Americans themselves have also made a precedent by openly supplying intelligence to the Kiev regime while still insisting not to be part of the conflict. One shouldn't put too much hope in Washington being morally consistent though.
There is a lot of plausible deniability in intelligence sharing so there is and will be a lot of wiggle room for China so it wouldnt surprise me if they do it or of they already have. No one is really focused on them in the grand sceme of things of this war compared to the scale and publicity of western intelligence operations and sharing in ukraine
They're keeping an eye on their oil supply route, I think. No more complex than that. If the Gulf gets blockaded, they'll want to know about it as soon as humanly possible (and maybe they would then take a firmer stance)
I dont think so , platforms like these it seem way to way too overkill just to know some oil facility was bombed or that some blockade action was taken like 20 minutes earlier than they would otherwise . At the very least they are there to colllect data of cutting edge american platforms in deployment/use
I would think it's about intelligence collection on US deployments, definitely
There are some journal articles about 20km high weather balloons using thermal imaging to detect F35 exhaust plumes from 350-2000km, and using interference from Starlink significant to identify low observable aircraft.
They can already detect F35 and B2 aircraft with VHF radar, and Russia has fielded a radar platform which steps down in frequency to better locate and identify signals.
exatly ! Nothing more then that... They scan with their super radars the Skies & Seas of Iran - and then they just sit on that data and look if their shiprouts are safe.. It would be Unfair if Iran would have Radars that Israel cant touch since they are chinese..
I think it is high time that china adapts the "lying" technologies from the West ..
Nice of Non interventionist China to hunt Pirates 3000 miles from its shores.. Obviously unrelated little news item..
"Yes, I can assure you, we are merely doing anti-Taiwan military exercises when we send a portion of our fleet to the Persian Gulf. Nothing to worry about here!"
Lol if Pakistan suddenly starts sniping planes from beyond American surveillance range what would be the chance of the Americans finding out? Maybe satellites will catch them rearming but its not like they'd be able to visually confirm any missiles used against Israeli jets, and there's more than enough routes around American naval radars to operate with plausible deniability.
That's like a wet dream scenario that we would never be able to prove if done right. More likely the Chinese ships are giving Iran early warning capabilities.