Bulletins and News Discussion from May 27th to June 2nd, 2024 - The Virgin France vs the Chad Sahel - COTW: Chad
Bulletins and News Discussion from May 27th to June 2nd, 2024 - The Virgin France vs the Chad Sahel - COTW: Chad
Chad, a country in north-central Africa, borders a lot of active geopolitical areas - Niger to the West, Libya to the North, Sudan to the East - but is scarcely discussed itself. I'm not really knowledgable enough to give anything like a decent history, but the recent gist is that the country was ruled for three decades by Idriss Déby until he was killed in battle in 2021 while fighting northern rebels. Idriss was part of a few wars - such as the one against Gaddafi in Libya, and also the Second Congo War. While he was initially elected democratically in 1996 and 2001, he then eliminated term limits and just kept on going.
After his death, Chad has been ruled by his son, Mahamat Idriss Déby. In early May 2024, elections began which were meant to result in the transition from a military-ruled goverment to a civilian-ruled one. Needless to say, Mahamat won the election - with 61% of the vote. Both father and son have been on the side of the French and the US, whereas the opposition is against foreign colonizers and has attempted to put pressure on the government in numerous ways to achieve a more substantial independence. France maintains a troop presence in Chad, and it's something of a stronghold for them - when French troops were forced out of Niger, they retreated to Chad. However, it's not clear even to the people inside Chad what precisely the French are doing there. I mean, we know what their presence is really for - imperialism and election rigging - but in an official sense, they don't seem to be doing much to help the country materially. What is clear is that they like to intervene on behalf of the ruling regime and against rebels a whole lot - the most interventions by France in any African country, in fact.
The United States, so keen on human rights and democracy in so many places around the world like Russia, Iran, and China, have - for some strange reason! - decided for the last 30 years that they can live with a couple dictators and wars in the case of Chad. In fact, various American state propaganda firms like the ISW and Washington Post have warned the current government about the Wagner Group interfering with the country and spreading anti-Western sentiments as in the rest of the Sahel.
Things are very tough for Chad. They are among the poorest countries in Africa and host about one million people fleeing from nearby conflicts, which is a pretty large number when Chad has a population of about 17 million.
With the French Empire fading, they are beginning to run out of places to retreat to in Africa. Macron, in January, said that his defense council had decided to reduce troop presence in Gabon, Senegal, and the Côte d'Ivoire, though has maintained troop levels in Chad and Djibouti. Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet from France, anti-empire sentiments are boiling to the surface in New Caledonia/Kanaky, which is unfortunate for the French military as they really need that island, both for the massive nickel reserves, but also as an unsinkable aircraft carrier in the Pacific just in case a conflict with China pops off.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
The Country of the Week is Chad! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
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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.
Military detects over 90 balloons presumed to be sent from N. Korea across border
The balloons that have fallen so far did not carry leaflets but trash and other waste, the source said, with the military and police currently collecting the fallen balloons.
On Sunday, North Korea said it will scatter "mounds of wastepaper and filth" over the border areas in a "tit-for-tat action" against the distribution of anti-Pyongyang leaflets.
Hello Israelis. I know you are hurt by the feeling that entire world thinks you want a genocide. You are hurt that world thinks you are a blood thirsty monster. I know it feels bad. Here is what you can do to fix this situation.
BURN DOWN THE FUCKING IDF HEADQUARTERS WITH MOLOTOVES. WE GAVE SHIT TO GERMANS SO MUCH BUT EVEN THEY HAD PARTISAN RESISTANCE AND SABOTAGE TO THEIR NAZI GOVERNMENT. IF YOU THINK YOU DESERVE BETTER TREATMENT THAN POST WW2 GERMANS, PROVE THAT YOU PIECE OF SHIT INSTEAD OF SAYING IDF IS NOT KILLING ENOUGH AND YOU HATE NETENYAHU FOR TREATING YOU BADLY. EVEN FUCKING RUSSIANS ATTACKED THEIR OWN MILITARY INSTALATIONS FOR KILLING HALF THE CIVILIANS IN 4 TIMES LONGER TIME FRAME
The funniest part about American tariffs is that they're actually strengthening Chinese relationships with.... Everyone in the world.
What are the tariffs actually achieving? They're NOT achieving replacement industries. New suppliers aren't appearing to produce and supply the products that are getting tariff'd away.
What is actually happening is that the products made by China are being sold to Vietnam and then those products are being sold to the US. Or they're being sold to I dunno, south american countries and so on.
This is strengthening Chinese relations with these countries, which are in turn becoming more reliant on China.
The US is cooked. The only way you're replacing these supply chains is with some sort of command economy. Even something Keynesian isn't really going to pull it off. Markets just won't do what you want them to do in this situation they're always going to just create more hoops to jump through for Chinese goods instead of creating an entirely new producer.
Obviously the problem with this is that you need to move away from neoliberalism to do this. But they're ideologically committed to it.
The White House is saying that the strike that killed so many innocents also killed two Hamas targets that the Israeli military says are responsible for attacks on Israelis.
Brandon now supports 'Netanyahu's' war crimes in Rafah. What ever happened to the red line. Atleast pretend to be mad at Israel
For the first time in a year, opinion polls show that a majority of the Israeli population would back Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's reelection if ballots were to be held today. A survey presented by Channel 12 News on 29 May found that 36 percent of the electorate prefers Netanyahu over opposition leader and war cabinet member Benny Gantz when asked, “Who is better suited to serve as prime minister?” This marks a significant month-to-month surge from April, when support for Gantz stood at 35 percent, and Netanyahu lagged behind at 29 percent.
In the new survey, the current premier is also seven points ahead of opposition leader Yair Lapid and two points ahead of former prime minister Naftali Bennett. Netanyahu's party, Likud, also saw favorable results in the latest poll, picking up 21 of the Knesset's 120 seats. Nevertheless, Gantz's National Unity party edged ahead, picking up 25 seats. The Midgam Institute conducted the survey on Wednesday among 503 respondents via internet and phone, representing the entire population of Israel aged 18 and over.
The Zionists deserve a leader like Netanyahu. I'm glad to let them follow their wildly incompetent leader to their doom.
There was a midnight raid on the UCSC Palestine encampment. A lot of arrests. From what I’ve heard though, there’s still people in the encampment holding on. Unsure of the details at moment.
Three more UC campuses are going on strike next week. The Palestinian activists are inspiring. Some of the encampments elsewhere have settled for promises of meetings in the future, which has been noticed and refuted by people on the ground. There’s already been meetings between reps and admin staff where those kinds of offers have been refused. While the Union has had made a colossal fuck up that I can’t mention here for opsec reasons, there’s so much good stuff happening. I’m proud to do my part, however small.
Politico: Dems in full-blown ‘freakout’ over Biden
Famed Russo-Chinese state propagandist, Politico, is also joining the chorus of panic over Biden and whether there's actually any reason to vote for him.
Some choice quotes:
A pervasive sense of fear has settled in at the highest levels of the Democratic Party over President Joe Biden’s reelection prospects, even among officeholders and strategists who had previously expressed confidence about the coming battle with Donald Trump.
“You don’t want to be that guy who is on the record saying we’re doomed, or the campaign’s bad or Biden’s making mistakes. Nobody wants to be that guy,” said a Democratic operative in close touch with the White House and granted anonymity to speak freely. But Biden’s stubbornly poor polling and the stakes of the election “are creating the freakout,” he said. “This isn’t, ‘Oh my God, Mitt Romney might become president.’ It’s ‘Oh my God, the democracy might end.’”
Despite everything, Trump is running ahead of Biden in most battleground states. He raised far more money in April, and the landscape may only become worse for Democrats, with Trump’s hush-money trial concluding and another — this one involving the president’s son — set to begin in Delaware.
While he’s long lagged Biden in cash on hand, Trump’s fundraising outpaced the president’s by $25 million last month, and included a record-setting $50.5 million haul from an event in Palm Beach, Florida. One adviser to major Democratic Party donors provided a running list that has been shared with funders of nearly two dozen reasons why Biden could lose, ranging from immigration and high inflation to the president’s age, the unpopularity of Vice President Kamala Harris and the presence of third-party candidates like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. [...] The adviser added, “The list of why we ‘could’ win is so small I don’t even need to keep the list on my phone.”
...
But Democratic critics of the campaign’s approach — while agreeing that abortion should be a winning issue — said they’re challenged when pressed by friends to make the case for why Biden will win.
“There’s still a path to win this, but they don’t look like a campaign that’s embarking on that path right now,” said Pete Giangreco, a longtime Democratic strategist who’s worked on multiple presidential campaigns. “If the frame of this race is, ‘What was better, the 3.5 years under Biden or four years under Trump,’ we lose that every day of the week and twice on Sunday.”
Whatever the Biden campaign has been doing over the past two months — and it’s a lot of activity, including $25 million in swing-state ad spending, according to AdImpact — it has had only a limited effect. According to FiveThirtyEight, Biden’s average job-approval rating on March 7, the date of his State of the Union Address, was 38.1 percent. As of Friday, it’s 38.4 percent.
And his standing against Trump has also changed little. On April 22, the day Trump’s criminal trial began, the presumptive GOP nominee held a 0.3-point lead in national polls, according to FiveThirtyEight. Trump is up about a point since then, currently leading Biden by 1.4 points in the FiveThirtyEight average.
“New York Democrats need to wake up,” said Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine. “The number of people in New York, including people of color that I come across who are saying positive things about Trump, is alarming.”
“The greatest political challenge confronting the president starts with an “i,” but it’s not Israel, it’s inflation,” Torres said. “The cost of living is a challenge that we have to figure out how to manage.” He said Biden should focus on issues around affordability and continue to tout his success in capping insulin costs in areas with high rates of diabetes, like his Bronx district.
Judging from the socdems/social fascists I sometimes watch (e.g. at r/curatedtumblr), the anxiety is also heightening in the non-wonk population, too. Increasingly frequent shit like how you're transphobic if you don't vote for Biden, etc. Entirely plausible that if Biden can't get the cost of living down in the next five months, it is officially Joever. And just bleating "the economy is actually great, the best it's ever been actually" won't change that. You can't gaslight somebody into thinking that they haven't spent noticeably more money on bills lately no matter how many fancy indices you throw at them.
the best part of this gaza pier debacle is that we'll eventually find out that it only really cost like $10 million to construct (or whatever a reasonable price is, I'm not a pier expert) and the rest of the hundreds of millions of dollars were due to a contractor and subcontractor and subsubcontractor and so on 15 times down the chain grifting it at every single stage
I get that the mere dollar injection is a big part as to why these massive cost overruns are tolerated as our resident dedollarization expert+doomer constantly explains, but is it still entertaining to watch the projects of American empire fall apart due to sheer ineptitude despite knowing that? yes. I mean they could have just built a functioning pier worth 428 gazillion dollars and achieved the same result but I guess the notion of gaining profit by making and selling things specifically to be destroyed so that you can keep making them and selling them, such as with Western military equipment in Ukraine, is just that in-built at this point
Thinking about that article from the Atlantic yesterday that said
It is possible to kill children legally, if for example one is being attacked by an enemy who hides behind them.
Every single liberal that says this is lying through their teeth. There is an absolute 0% chance that any of these people would give the go ahead to bomb their home, with family and children inside, because a bad guy was hiding in their basement. Liberals are so ready to talk about their great morality until it comes down to being put into the situation themselves.
https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1d2tb8y/an_f35_crashed_on_takeoff_at_albuquerque/
F-35 crashed and exploded
Pilot ejected and is injured but unfortunately alive.
To anyone still participating in campus protests against genocide and the empire, I highly suggest connecting with STEM students. It will be an uphill battle because it’s very difficult to find an engineer who cares about anything beyond a paycheck, but those who do have morals may provide an advantage to resistance.
Because STEM is full of selfish, evil people here in the west, it’s likely that they have automatic trust in each other and be open about the different programs and events that directly contribute to the military industrial complex. This is especially true for the professors and researchers who are affiliated with military contractors or have projects sponsored by them. These projects are often done on campus and the equipment costs millions of dollars. Chanting and camping out is nice and all, but it’s clear that colleges don’t care and these machines keep on churning behind closed doors.
The other tricky part is that the engineers who are against the American empire are likely Arab and/or Muslim, and there are many here in the states. But the students and staff involved with the military projects are less likely to be Arab/muslim, and you can verify by viewing their project websites. The government’s racist law enforcement may make the only sympathetic engineers understandably uncomfortable getting involved. But it’s still worth reaching out anyway.
We need to start thinking more like the feds. Start putting our people in positions that have control and/or access to useful facilities. The Brits have managed to sabotage some weapons factories, and American universities are less guarded than proper factories. This may require a lot of manpower with high integrity. But it may also only require a couple of people in key positions to get the ball rolling. Another option is making these assholes’ fears come true and actually utilize “outside agitators”; if you know rich people who are not busy (or can crowdsource for tuition), get them to enroll in classes so they’re officially a student and start applying for the jobs around campus. This isn’t working “from the inside” to reform, it’s seeking to actively harm and slow down the murderous machine.
JUST IN: The Yemeni Armed Forces announce 6 military operations:
🔻Targeting the US Eisenhower aircraft carrier AGAIN
🔻An American destroyer in the Red Sea.
🔻The other 4 operations targeted ships belonging to companies that violated the ban.So, it turns out the Israeli's lied. The ceasefire that they rejected was pretty much what was agreed upon by the CIA dude. The latter came to the deal with the idea Israel would agree.
It wasn't changed by some rogue Egyptian negotiator as the Israelis said.
In other news, is the current proposal an actual ceasefire proposal or is it "humanitarian pause" with another name? I haven't followed the news much for 2 weeks.
Labour's millionaire private healthcare CEO candidate for Corybn's constituancy just launched his campaign online with the following photo:
People immeadiately noticed that literally every single person is white. In a constituancy that's easily over 45% ethnic minority.
Then people noticed that it looks like some of the placards at the back, where you can't see the people, appear to be photoshopped in to make the already very weak, very white crowd look bigger. Note the different colour grading and sharpness. And the more people looked, the more photoshop appears to be happening. Heads springing out from nowhere, tiny hands on an obviously bigger placard etc.
Also, I just have to highlight this guy
Palestine Action cut off Leonardo’s Edinburgh factory’s internet access:
https://palestineaction.org/leonardo-internet-access/Revealed: Israeli spy chief ‘threatened’ ICC prosecutor over war crimes inquiry
According to accounts shared with ICC officials, he is alleged to have told her: “You should help us and let us take care of you. You don’t want to be getting into things that could compromise your security or that of your family.”
Come join the Good Guys (TM), where we'll threaten your family if you try to uphold international law, we'll cut funding to global food security if you recognise a marginalised populations right to self-determination, push for global thermonuclear war if Ukrainian Nazis don't get to ethnically cleanse a third of their countrymen and also no, you won't even get to peacefully protest any of it, what are you, a free-speech absolutist commie-loving Hamas/Putler-supporter?
H5N1 virus in latest human case has mutated, officials say
The slight evolution in the virus is associated with ‘adaptation to mammalian hosts’, according to the Centre for Disease Control
The funniest thing would be; back when al-Awlaki was murdered the SCOTUS said that the president could murder as many US citizens as he wanted with no trial or oversight because once you say the "T" word it becomes a "Political Question" and they can't touch it. So the funniest thing would be Trump winning, declaring the Governor of NY a terrorist, and dropping a hellfire on him as a traitor to America or some shit. Where is the lathe? I demand access to the lathe!
World bank GDP PPP data just updated. (Most recent data for 2022)
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.PP.CD
#1 China, $31,773,060.55
#2 USA, $25,439,700.00
#3 India, $12,998,139.47
#4 Russia, $5,987,861.45
#5 Japan, $5,862,116.60
Germany falls off top 5, replaced by Russia.
China's electric vehicle company BYD has announced they've developed a new hybrid drive train that promises to deliver a 2,000km (1,250 mile) range on a full tank and a full charge. And one of the new sedans they're putting it in will retail for less than $14k.
Catch me in parking lots at 2:30am doing burnouts in my Chinese car for hours on end. Or don't because
Israel has been worried about war crimes prosecution and actively subverting icc investigations.
They also sought to convince the prosecutor that, despite the Israeli military’s highly questionable record of investigating wrongdoing in its ranks, it had robust procedures for holding its armed forces to account.
This was a critical issue for Israel. A core ICC principle, known as complementarity, prevents the prosecutor from investigating or trying individuals if they are the subject of credible state-level investigations or criminal proceedings.
Israeli surveillance operatives were asked to find out which specific incidents might form part of a future ICC prosecution, multiple sources said, in order to enable Israeli investigative bodies to “open investigations retroactively” in the same cases.
They've been spying on the court to find out what cases are going to be prosecuted and then pretending that they were already prosecuting those specific cases themselves.
News thread favorite John Mearsheimer in Kangerooland talking about "Israel". Covers a lot that we already know. Points he makes include: (as appropriated from the trueanon thread I found this on)
-Israel will never accept a two-state solution or a multi-ethnic democracy as their goal is explicitly an ethnostate. This is why they supported Hamas over the PLO historically, as Hamas provides a perfect foil compared to the PLO
-Israel cannot defeat Hamas, their only real options were ethnic cleansing of Gaza (which failed) or genocide (which is what they are currently doing)
-Israel is unquestionably an apartheid state, however, they are aware of the instability of apartheid (re. South Africa). This leaves ethnic cleansing or genocide as the only long-term solutions
-Post-10/7 Israel needs to deal with the fact that their reputation of deterrence has been badly damaged and they have reached pariah-state level
-Israel will have an increasingly difficult time dealing with external threats due to the advancements in drone and missile technology employed by Iran, Hezbollah, and Yemen
Well I'd like to see ol Donny trump wriggle his way out of THIS jam! ◀️ you are now here
(trump easily wriggles his way out of the jam)
Ah! Well. Nevertheless,
Sudan commits to building Russian Navy base in Red Sea
Give Yemen some submarines crewed by Russian "volunteers".it will be so incredibly funny if Trump's polling numbers go up after all this.
chuds freaking out because their beloved leader, the most innocent man who has ever existed, was imprisoned by the woke communist dictator Brandon, while the libs are freaking out even harder as their election prospects continue to sink despite - maybe even because of - putting Trump in prison. I thrive on schadenfreude, so watching both sides eat shit is really
Ayatollah Khamenei gives props to the global student movement, welcomes them to the Resistance, and advises them to read the Quran http://english.khamenei.ir/news/10823/As-the-page-of-history-is-turning-you-are-standing-on-the-right
Full text
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
I am writing this letter to the young people whose awakened conscience has moved them to defend the oppressed women and children of Gaza.
Dear university students in the United States of America, this message is an expression of our empathy and solidarity with you. As the page of history is turning, you are standing on the right side of it.
You have now formed a branch of the Resistance Front and have begun an honorable struggle in the face of your government's ruthless pressure—a government which openly supports the usurper and brutal Zionist regime.
The greater Resistance Front which shares the same understandings and feelings that you have today, has been engaged in the same struggle for many years in a place far from you. The goal of this struggle is to put an end to the blatant oppression that the brutal Zionist terrorist network has inflicted on the Palestinian nation for many years. After seizing their country, the Zionist regime has subjected them to the harshest of pressures and tortures.
The apartheid Zionist regime's genocide today is the continuation of extreme oppressive behavior which has been going on for decades. Palestine is an independent land with a long history. It is a nation comprised of Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
After the World War, the capitalist Zionist network gradually imported several thousand terrorists into this land with the help of the British government. These terrorists attacked cities and villages, murdered tens of thousands of people and pushed out multitudes into neighboring countries. They seized their homes, businesses and farmlands, formed a government in the usurped land of Palestine and called it Israel.
After England's initial help, the United States became the greatest supporter of this usurper regime, ceaselessly providing it with political, economic and military support. In an act of unforgivable recklessness, the United States even opened the way and provided assistance for the regime's production of nuclear weapons.
The Zionist regime used an iron-fist policy against the defenseless people of Palestine from the very beginning and has, day by day, intensified its brutality, terror and repression in complete disregard of all moral, human and religious values.
The United States government and its allies refused to even frown upon this state terrorism and ongoing oppression. And today, some remarks by the US government regarding the horrific crimes taking place in Gaza are more hypocritical than real.
The Resistance Front emerged from this dark environment of despair, and the establishment of the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran expanded and fortified it.
The global Zionist elite – who owns most US and European media corporations or influences them through funding and bribery – has labeled this courageous, humane resistance movement as "terrorism".
Can one call a people a terrorist nation for defending themselves on their own land against the crimes of the occupying Zionists? And is helping such a nation and strengthening it, an act of terrorism?
The oppressive leaders of global hegemony mercilessly distort even the most basic human concepts. They portray the ruthless, terrorist Israeli regime as acting in self-defense – yet they portray the Palestinian Resistance which defends its freedom, security and the right to self-determination, as terrorists!
I would like to assure you that today the circumstances are changing. A different fate awaits the important region of West Asia. The people's conscience has awakened on a global scale, and the truth is coming to light.
Moreover, the Resistance Front has grown in strength and will become even stronger.
And history is turning a page.
Besides you students from dozens of American universities, there have also been uprisings in other countries among academics and the general public.
The support and solidarity of your professors is a significant and consequential development. This can offer some measure of comfort in the face of your government's police brutality and the pressures it is exerting on you. I too am among those who empathize with you young people, and value your perseverance.
The Quran's lesson for us Muslims and all of humanity, is to stand up for that which is right: "So be steadfast as you have been commanded" (11:112).
The Quran's lesson for human relations is: "Do not oppress and do not be oppressed" (2:279).
The Resistance Front advances by a comprehensive understanding and the practice of these and hundreds of other such commands – and will attain victory with the permission of God.
My advice to you is to become familiar with the Quran.
Sayyid Ali Khamenei May 25, 2024
Simultaneously, the Palestinian Student Movement in Gaza has called for an escalation https://samidoun.net/2024/05/a-call-from-the-palestinian-student-movement-in-gaza-time-for-revolutionary-escalation-of-the-global-intifada/
Huge climate news that I go into detail about in this post
Climate scientists in China have demonstrated a method of removing CO2 from the atmosphere (long term!) with the side effect of improving soil quality and increasing crop yields.
US will be taking it's broken pier back for repairs.
It was totally still working after a big chunk of it floated off, that's just classic pier-teething problems, dummy. But we have to take the pier back now because it's slightly damaged and the starving Palestinians can probably wait longer it's fine.
EDIT: also AP: "after damage from rough seas" - pretty sure it just regular waves bud.
Just when I thought my day couldn't get any shittier, an HISTORIC fighter leaves us:
Mother of Plaza de Mayo Norita Cortiñas dies at 94
The beloved human rights activist was recovering from a hernia operation and a pulmonary infection
Nora Cortiñas, a historic human rights activist who co-founded the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo (founding branch), died on Thursday. She was in intensive care after undergoing a hernia operation two weeks ago. She was 94 years old.
Nora Morales de Cortiñas, better known as “Norita,” co-founded Mothers of Plaza de Mayo in 1977. At the time, she was desperately searching for her eldest son, Carlos Gustavo, who was forcefully disappeared by the military dictatorship that ruled the country between 1976 and 1983. Gustavo was a political activist, a member of the Peronist party Partido Justicialista and armed organization Montoneros. He was kidnapped on April 15, 1977, and never seen again.
Cortiñas carried on the fight to bring justice to him and the 30,000 people disappeared by the dictatorship. She expanded her activism to other areas regarding human rights, such as the right to safe and free legal abortion and the fight against police and gender-based violence.
Born on March 22, 1930, Cortiñas was a social psychologist and taught at the University of Buenos Aires’ Economic Sciences faculty as head of the “Economic Power and Human Rights” course.
“I was a traditional woman, a stay-at-home mom. I got married to Carlos Cortiñas when I was very young, and we had two sons: Carlos Gustavo and Marcelo Horacio. My husband was a patriarchal man, he wanted me to devote myself to family life,” she said in an interview. “At that time I was a teacher of haute couture and I worked without leaving my home, teaching many young women to sew.”
After Gustavo was disappeared, she said, she started a whole new life. “We are no longer mothers of one child, we are mothers of all the disappeared. Our biological child became 30,000 children,” she said. “And for them, we gave birth to a completely political life in the streets.”
Cortiñas was last seen in public on March 24 at the National Day of Memory, Truth, and Justice march. Despite her age and mobility issues, she was present at Plaza de Mayo in her wheelchair, appearing with her usual white handkerchief over her head and a picture of Gustavo hanging from her neck.
“Deeply concerned in these times about the serious situation our country is going through and always ready to be present wherever there was an injustice, Norita fought until the last moment for the construction of a more just society,” said the communiqué published by her family. The Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo, the grandmothers of the dictatorship’s desaparecidos, said goodbye to their “sister” in a communiqué, calling her an “undisputed leader of the human rights movement in Argentina.”
“In solidarity with all the struggles of the country and the world, she knew how to connect with the younger generations, who recognize her as an example of coherence and activism,” they wrote. On Thursday, in the weekly march the Mothers do in the Plaza de Mayo since 1977, the demonstrators sent strength and love to her, before shouting: ¡Venceremos!, “We will triumph.”
She was an absolute champion, during the worst days of the dictatorship she went into a clandestine detention and torture center (Mansión Seré) BY HERSELF to look for her missing son. Extremely courageous woman who fought with all her being during our darkest days and continued to do for Memory, Truth and Justice until the very end. Please, do read about Mothers of Plaza de Mayo and Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, extremely important non violent social movements that to this very day are still finding children and grandchildren of Desaparecidos during the last military junta.
Rest in Power, Norita.
It's Balkinization time:
https://twitter.com/AryJeay/status/1795038233534869592IMPORTANT: Margaliot settlement has decided to CUT CONTACT with the Israeli regime & kicked out all soldiers from Margaliot.
The settlement is COMPLETELY closing. Nobody, including the military, will be allowed to enter or leave the settlement.
Eitan Davidi, Chairman of Margaliot says the settlement doesn’t need protection from Hezbollah but from the Israeli regime, which is crushing the settlement with its decisions. Margaliot is directly harmed by their regime and the Ministry of Agriculture's decisions, causing more damage than Hezbollah's anti-tank missiles.
Vamos carajo (my poor attempt at Spanish):
https://twitter.com/dana916/status/1795650134182691056🇲🇽⚔️🇮🇱 Chaos in front of the Israeli Embassy in Mexico: hooded individuals throw Molotov cocktails and attempt to remove barriers.
❗️ The images captured at the scene show dozens of protesters hurling incendiary objects, stones, and smoke bombs at the police guarding the Legation and shouting slogans against Israel and its war with Hamas.
Violent clashes have also been reported between the protesters and officers, who were attempting to disperse them with tear gas. Several police officers are reported to have been injured.
Edit: https://twitter.com/lifepeptides/status/1795677186319651122
the Eisenhower's captain posted a video from March 2024 as "proof" that the ship was not hit by the Houthis in the last couple days, and the ship is hightailing it to Jeddah. I now officially believe that Ansarallah did in fact hit the aircraft carrier, though obviously not enough to sink it or anything
edit: now there's a new video showing half the ship, but with an extremely conveniently well-placed dude directly in the way of the camera who is standing still throughout the entire video such that he blocks the view of the other half of the ship. this really is gonna be a whole saga, isn't it
In an act against Israel, Lula da Silva withdraws ambassador permanently.
article
In a decree published today (29), President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva appointed Brazilian ambassador Frederico Meyer as the country's representative at the UN Conference on Disarmament. With this decision, the diplomat is permanently removed from Israel, a post he held until February. The decree does not name a replacement for Meyer in Tel Aviv.
The act does not mean a complete break in diplomatic relations with Israel. But it is the strongest gesture Brazil has ever made against the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
From now on, the embassy will be headed only by the Chargé d'Affaires, reducing the importance of the representation. Diplomatically, it is a sign to the Israelis of the degree of priority and relevance that the Lula government wants to maintain with the Netanyahu government. The withdrawal comes on the eve of a decision by the International Criminal Court on the request of its prosecutor to issue an arrest warrant against Netanyahu for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Israel's head of government is still facing criticism from international organizations and world leaders, such as Emmanuel Macron, who have denounced the killings of Palestinians. As UOL revealed last week, Meyer returned to Israel after three months of the worst diplomatic crisis between the two countries. In February, because of Lula's comments about the Second World War and the situation in Gaza, Israel declared the president "persona non grata". It also called Meyer and demanded that the Brazilian apologize, which he never did.
Lula WIsrael's reprimand took place at the Holocaust Museum, in Hebrew and in front of the ambassador. The act was considered a “humiliation” at Itamaraty. A few days later, to demonstrate his dissatisfaction, Lula summoned the diplomat back to Brasilia, officially for consultations.
Last week, however, he returned to Israel and, in recent days, even signed official telegrams to the other Brazilian ambassadors, indicating that he was in Tel Aviv. But at no point did he inform the Israeli government that he was back in his post.
He has therefore not resumed his post. Now, in the Official Gazette, Lula appoints Frederico Meyer to the “position of representative of Brazil to the Conference on Disarmament in Switzerland, removing him from the Brazilian Embassy in Tel Aviv to the Permanent Mission of Brazil to the UN”.
Although it plays a strategic role, the Conference on Disarmament has been completely paralyzed for the last 20 years, and UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned of the risk of such a body. Until now, the post was held by Ambassador Flávio Damico.
Eide [Norway's Foreign Minister] believes Israel is hiding behind anti-Semitism (NRK, machine translated):
Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide says in "Politisk kvarter" that it has previously been effective for Israel to respond to criticism with accusations of anti-Semitism.
But now something is starting to happen, he believes.
– Israel is about to lose its power in that, because the vast majority of people understand that distancing themselves from children being burned to charred corpses in Gaza is not an expression of anti-Semitism.
not that this is really news to anyone, but it feels significant that our foreign minister is willing to publicly say it now
The Houthis, who control Yemen's capital and most populous areas, have attacked international shipping in the Red Sea region since November in solidarity with the Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas, drawing retaliatory U.S. and British strikes since February.
i was curious how the western press is framing the retaliatory strikes by yemeni forces against the genocidal imperial navy. the allies of god in yemen "control the capital and most populous areas" in much the same way that, for instance, the u.s. federal government controls the capital and most populous areas. i will be using this description for the regime in washington from now on.
A U.S. defense official told Reuters they were not aware of any attack on the Eisenhower.
straight up denial? or just a vague way to undercut yemen's narrative. "technically i spoke to someone who is technically a defense official and technically that person was not yet aware of the attack that had just happened. this person is not even necessarily related to the navy, mind you, so there's no reason to expect some nameless defense official to know any details or even be aware of it. but it's certainly my job as an objective reuters journalist to include this uninformative line that gestures in the direction of yemeni claims being false so that my readers draw the correct conclusions."
Yemeni Armed Forces have reportedly struck the USS Eisenhower after firing a number of ballistic and cruise missiles at the aircraft carrier.
https://twitter.com/eyesonsouth1/status/1796492078098325995?s=46
Simplicius’ weird and chud media criticism / right wing media conspiracy blog started with a quote of Zizek
“Beyond the fiction of reality, there is the reality of the fiction.” — Slavoj Zizek
Two thoughts:
- That’s a really good quote. Fucking Zizek is a fraud but his wordplay slaps
- The transition of Zizek from a leftist Jordan Peterson to a regular Jordan Peterson continues as the conspiracist anti-globalist right continue to embrace him, although oddly at the moment when Zizek is taking firmly “globalist agenda” pro-imperialist stances.
Please, if you're ever going to do propaganda for our Revolution don't do it on AI. Like, please, just.... don't. These men have three arms and for some reason there are big rifles with bayonets behind, like old ass muskets or something. And no, I don't know what the flag is supposed to say. At least the AI got the hammer and sickle right. Also lmao at the AI trying to figure out if the soldiers should have hats or helmets, it's very confused.
It was done by one of those Hinkle/Haz "communists", so yeah.
Thankfully we have not only a much better understanding of what Communism is, we also produce better propaganda.
Well it looks like all the rumblings of a BJP collapse were wrong. Exit polls are finally allowed to be reported in India and it's now widely expected Modi and the BJP will do much better than expected. Many are stating they might get a two thirds majority, allowing for constitutional changes. Not good folks. https://www.reuters.com/world/india/india-votes-final-phase-elections-both-modi-rahul-gandhi-eye-victory-2024-06-01/
Yemen has announced the targetting of 6 ships. 3 in the Red Sea, 2 in the Arabian Sea, and 1 in the Mediterranean sea - the oil tanker Minerva Antonia. Of the 6 targetted, the Yemeni government has said only 1 (in the Red Sea) was hit and damaged.
“Iran’s technical know-how to produce such anti-ship missiles is now at the disposal of the Yemeni military forces,” Tasnim said. Tehran’s first locally manufactured anti-ship ballistic missile, the Qadr missile, was developed over ten years ago by late Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Brigadier General Hassan Tehrani-Moqaddam. According to Tasnim, Yemen’s Muhit missile – revealed in a military parade in the capital, Sanaa, in September last year – is directly modeled after the Iranian Qadr missile. The Muhit has a range of around 400 kilometers.
The Armed Forces of Yemen’s Sanaa government – which is militarily aligned with the Ansarallah resistance movement – has possessed surface-to-air missiles for several years. Following the start of the Saudi-led coalition’s war on the country in 2015, the Yemeni Armed Forces revealed its Qaher missiles, which were converted from surface-to-air missiles to surface-to-surface missiles.
Washington and other western nations accuse Iran of smuggling weapons to Ansarallah in Yemen. However, Yemen has been under a tight Saudi-led blockade for nearly ten years, making bringing arms into the country extremely difficult. Sanaa’s Armed Forces are also still in possession of weapons stockpiles from the Soviet era and have been known to locally produce weapons.
Additionally, inside Gaza, it seems Hamas is indeed making the capture of Israel troops a trend - so Israel is doing the classic doctrine and killing their own troops before they can be captured.
Al Qassam opened an official xitter account and Arabs are already posting out of pocket shit like I'm pretty I saw someone comment "Hire me so I can clean Yahia Sinwar's toes 🥺", would probably last a few hours before
bans itChina's lander has successfully landed on the far side of the moon.
If it succeeds, it will bring back the first ever samples from the far side. They're still on track for a manned mission by 2030.With the EU parliamentary elections coming up next week (and usually having low turnout compared to the regular elections) some Polish
NGO decided to put out a propaganda video showing people getting abducted by what looks to be Russian soldiers and then they are about to be shot by them in a prisoner camp but then the captured people remember to 
and put up their pens and then everything is good after that. POOTIN crisis averted because 
.
South African elections are on Wednesday this week. As I am going to be
ING this week, I, like a complete nerd, decided to look up political party manifestos. It's not looking good folks. Really, it's looking quite bad. Political parties divided along racial, social, and/or ethnic divisions, and not in a good way. The ANC had the opportunity to be the political party that unites us all, but they've blown it with their corruption and austerity. These manifestos suck.A tool with a summary of all the major manifestos, as well as the actual manifestos
The amount of times "clean coal" and "privatisation" are mentioned by these parties is going to drive me mad. The fact that the "GOOD party" (yes that's it's actual name) led by Patricia De Lille is the most socially progressive party with the best electricity/energy policy is embarrassing. The fact that the white supremacist FF+ has a better electricity policy than half of the major parties is honestly tragic. It's like going to a restaurant where they have 50 dishes on the menu, and they're all terrible.
AP: US dampens criticism of El Salvador’s president as migration overtakes democracy concerns
Absolute banger of a headline
Yemen has divine right to heaven
they will never send a second submersible
Allah/God bless Jenin, I truly can’t understand how they’ve survived from a purely materialist perspective
Pro-Ukrainian spaces on twitter are asking, begging even, the West to let the UA use western made weapons on russian soil in order to "strike back" after the russian attack on that mall or something. If we dig down a little deeper (we don't have to go really far the see the core of the argument), we will understand first that the UA has already used western equipment on russian soil many times in the past, including raids on Belgorod and attacks on Crimea in general and Kerch Bridge in particular. Let alone things like the attack on the Moscow Concert Hall which might have connections with Ukraine or the super mysterious destruction of Nord Stream, something that won't be talked about for decades until someone, who's about to die, opens up about it.
What they really want is for the UA to fully unleash things like HIMARS on civilian targets deep inside Russia, like they did in Donetsk not so long ago. Now they're blaming the West for... kinda conspiring with Russia against Ukraine lmao. That's what I take from their arguments.
Twitter thread on UAE subimperialism in Africa and how they rob multiple African countries of their gold:
https://twitter.com/african_stream/status/1796266916446654927Pictured: us soldier more aware what the fuck he is doing, than 100 % political natsec analysts (link to video on twitter)
Canadian soldiers are crossing the border and invading 4 American states. Namely both the Dakotas, Montana, and Minnesota.
Where Canada's 'super pigs' are most likely to invade the US — and potentially cause millions of dollars in damage
official account of israel posted this
I feel like we need coked up osint bro to figure out what it means
Russia may launch psychological operation about opening new front from Belarus, Kyiv warns
The Ukrainian Security and Defense Council's Center for Countering Disinformation forecast the launch of a new Russian psychological operation about opening a new front in the region, aiming to "stir up mass panic" in Ukrainian society.
"We expect a series of provocative statements by the top leadership of Russia and Belarus threatening Ukraine soon," the statement said.
Thoughts? They call it a psyop, which implies that nothing will actually happen. What would be the point of that, though? Maybe they secretly believe that Russia will actually open another front, but they don't want to evacuate the civilians?
Death to the occupiers
I would like to bring you all back to 2003 when Alan Dershowitz defended his claim that “Israel is the only country in the Middle East that has abolished any kind of torture, in fact as well as in law” by admitting that they were doing “until 1999, was what the US is now doing in Guantanamo,” and “B’Tselem is wrong because they define torture in a way that would include what the US is doing” https://youtu.be/vxXLPBMst4Y
Just had this on my mind as the occupying forces abducted 4 children from a school in Saraa
Ethiopian Airlines to manufacture parts in venture with Boeing
Running away from safety regulations
In adventurism news, in Germany a fash party's wannabe MP and some activists were injured in a knife attack.
Apparently there are some gnarly videos about it but i haven't checked.
Hamas released more info on the soldiers the new POWs
CW// dead body
https://streamable.com/umtz77Translation
[Abu Obeida talking]
The occupation forces are digging between the rubles looking for a pieces of their imprisoned, those who they intentionally bombed earlier, and it shoves thousands of soldiers between tight alleyways, and sacrifices them for the personal and private gains of Netenyahu and the interests of his fascist right wing government.[WA]
Jabalia military camp, saturday 25/05/2024
After the Mujahideen of Al Qassam baited occupation soldiers into a tunnel, the enemy inserted a drone in the eye of the tunnel to explore it and it wasn't able to spot the Mujahideen inside, and right after leaving the tunnel, the Mujahideen moved into the area of the trap according to the plan, the moment the enemy soldiers reached the trap inside the tunnel our Muhajideen fought at from point 0, and managed to kill 2 soldiers and blew up the eye of the tunnel, after that the enemy dug the area surrounding tunnel to reach its path, and shoved their soldiers in thinking that our Mujahideen left, and unlike what he expected... our Mujahideen made another trap and planted a number of hidden IEDs, the enemy entered with a supporting unit and after they reached IED they blew it up and they became in the line of fire of our Mujahideen, then our Mujahideen blew up the tunnel after retreating from it, this left enemy forces between dead, wounded and imprisoned, our Mujahideen have also managed to take hold of the equipment of some of their soldiers.[What was allowed to be published]
One of the targeted forces, his corpse is with us
You know him very well
Why are you lying to your people? is he one of the mercenaries that you didn't announce since October 7th? Or is your racism visible even when differenciating your dead?!
To the families of the dead and imprisoned, don't believe your government or army
You are invited into recognizing this soldier and the rest of the force units that have fallen between dead, wounded and imprisonedI think the guy looks somewhat Maghrebi? could be a Moroccan Jew or a Moroccan mercenary depending on if it was racism or a mercenary, another person said he looks Egyptian
News Bulletin from Washington DC
Former president Donald Trump has been found guilty on all 34 felony counts of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree in the state of New York. For the purposes of sentencing, charges do not stack and Trump faces a maximum of 4 years in prison. Sentencing will most likely take months and will be decided by a judge. Given that the 45th president had a legally clean record before this, the innocous nature of these felonies, and his status as a former president he will most likely receive probation and perhaps a fine
For his part, former president Trump claims the trial was a "disgrace" and "rigged" by Joe Biden. This felony does not prevent Trump from running or holding office, and he will be able to vote in Florida as long as he avoids jail time
Polls show that over 50% of voters say they won't vote for Trump if he is a convicted felon, but the reality of that will be seen
BREAKING: Iran has increased its enriched uranium near to weapons-grade levels, according to a report by the UN nuclear watchdog:
https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/1795177047192371348(Although this source is apparently not that good?)
Fucking around: Gaza should be flattened like Auschwitz.
Finding out: We have no other country and I have no other home.https://twitter.com/TameeOliveFern/status/1796410587146342792
Sure you may have resided here for generations, but I have a gun and the flimsiest plywood known to man, so we live here now. Revolting to see settlements go up in real time
More box tanks spotted, this time mid-offensive. The poster claims that a certain number of conversions per company have been ordered by the higher ups, dunno if that's accurate.
Also, the Russian term for these is apparently a Mangal, which is a grill for making kebabs.Yemen's deputy foreign minister responding to a tweet saying the dprk is looking for new markets for its rockets
If Ansarallah ends up equipped with ICBMs in the near future it would be spectacular.
EDIT: Can't find the tweet. Maybe deleted or maybe not real.
EDIT2: The tweet does have abnormally high view count compared to other tweets on the feed, as if someone with a larger following boosted it and then deleted. Every other tweet this channel puts out has 1k views.
IMO, The funniest outcome to all this is that Brandon does a touchdown dance and spikes the football thinking that it's smooth sailing, only to lose to Nikki Hailey. I know a lot of people will says a Debbs scenario is funnier, but to me, losing to some sentient bag of tapioca pudding would be funnier.
New :gender-neutral-toilet: just dropped.
The Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo (where decorated war criminals are buried and the museum is basically holocaust denial for Japan's brutality in East Asia) was graffitied today.
The word 'toilet' (in English) was spray painted in red on a pillar during the early morning of 1 June, according to local reports. Work is now underway to remove the offensive truehood.
Original reporting in Japanese from Mainichi Shinbun, carried by yahoo news: https://archive.md/n6kHP
https://youtu.be/RncKjp9UzRc?t=718
The (pro-Russia) Military Summary channel says that Russia may be preparing to accept large numbers of volunteers/mercenaries from Afghanistan to fight in Ukraine.
They also suggest that Russia is checking in with its allies in the CSTO to see if they would join the war should the defense pact be triggered.
Danish state media has been talking about the Trump case all morning, which has made my commute unbearable. They also refer to it as "trump being convicted of illegal bookkeeping" which is probably the correct way to describe the case, as it is itself very boring. Only good part is that one of my bosses is a trial lawyer who has been having a field day with recounting all the different ways that the lawyers involved are fucking things up, which is mildly funny.
In other news, a candidate for the European Parliamentary elections has withdrawn their candidacy after it has been revealed that the candidate participated in a "pro-Putin and Pro-russian" forum, which was opened to people who had parents from russian-speaking countries and basically functioned as a cultural exchange program. Naturally all the libs I know are celebrating and every non-white person is pointing out that we're basically prosecuting people in the papers for the crime of having russian ancestry.
All in all, these last few days have been really dumb
I missed this one. It appears the RF is trying to set up reciprocal foreign asset seizures ahead of expected formal seizure of RF assets in the US. Here’s a very short article in Xinhua.
This actually looks like an attempt at de-escalation to me. The seizure of foreign property is an act of war, and the Putin administration seems to be looking for a way to appease RF entities holding those frozen assets in the US without a war declaration, should those assets be subject to formal seizure by the US. Am I reading this correctly?
This is how RFK JR. will win the elections:
TERF island news:
Keir Starmer is walking back on yet more of his own promises:
Keir Starmer has insisted that he is a socialist and a progressive, but said the country does not have the money to allow him to fulfil some of the pledges he made during the 2020 Labour leadership race.
When asked by the Guardian if he would rule out raising tuition fees, following warnings from vice-chancellors and former ministers that universities will be at risk of bankruptcy without increased funding, [Starmer] did not directly answer the question.
[...] “I said that we should abolish tuition fees. Now with the damage that’s been done to the economy, particularly by Liz Truss, it is not possible to do that … I think that is basic honesty with the electorate." “I think it’s more important to stand in front of the electorate and say, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t now afford what I said before because of the damage done to the economy’ … What I’m saying to the electorate is this: I’m going to tell you in advance of the election what I don’t think we can afford to do.”
.
Palestine Action just **won** a legal case they've been fighting since 2021 over whether its legally defensible to damage property in order to prevent weapons being sold to Israel (rare dub for the british legal system)
On Friday, Leicester crown court acquitted two Palestine Action activists accused of criminal damage to an Israeli weapons factory in 2021. The jury was persuaded by the defence’s argument that Joe Irving and Ferhat Ulusu’s actions were admissible on the basis of preventing harm to civilians and property in Palestine.
The 2021 action saw four Palestine Actionists occupy the rooftop of UAV Tactical Systems, a Leicester-based subsidiary of Israeli weapons company Elbit Systems.
[...] The activists – who drank rainwater in order to extend the occupation to six days, and slimmed down the group to two halfway through in order to save food supplies – spray-painted slogans including “Shut Elbit Down” and “Free Palestine”, sprayed red paint on the building’s facade and damaged a skylight in order to expose a drone being manufactured inside.
The action was one of the less disruptive the group – which has been known to cause hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of property damage for Elbit – has undertaken. In court, Elbit Systems’ representatives claimed that installing additional security as a result of the action had cost the company £40,000 per month, £1.6m in total.
.
the latest result in the years long clash between Jewish Voice for Labour (evil bigots who antisemitically asked Israel to stop bombing children) and Campaign Against Antisemitism (brave defenders of justice doing the hard work of standing up to human rights organisations) is that the Charity Commission has decided that supporting Israel is actually apolitical so CAA will retain its charity status
The Charity Commission has dropped its investigation into the Campaign Against Antisemitism – four years after the regulator was asked to look into allegations of political partisanship against the organisation.
The leftwing Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL), which has faced criticism from the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA), including being called a “sham Jewish representative organisation”, made a complaint against the CAA to the commission in 2020.
However, earlier this month, the commission wrote to JVL saying that its application had been refused because it was not “a person that is or may be affected by the registration of CAA”, leading to consternation at JVL, given the length of time taken and the regulator’s previous statements.
The veteran human rights lawyer Sir Geoffrey Bindman KC said: “There can be no dispute that political campaigning requires investigation. The evidence provided by JVL is of CAA challenging criticism of Israeli policies and conduct towards Palestinians. This is clearly political.
“While combating antisemitism and other forms of racism is clearly a legitimate charitable purpose, attacking expressions of opinion about Israeli conduct towards Palestinians is not.”
Charity regulations state that “an organisation will not be charitable if its purposes are political”.
The Labour MP John McDonnell, who has been criticised by CAA in the past, and Rabbi Chaim Blayer, a community rabbi from north London, have also contacted the commission about the CAA investigation.
The CAA made the initial submission to the Equality and Human Rights Commission about antisemitism within Labour, which led to the watchdog finding that the party was responsible for unlawful harassment and discrimination.
During Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, the CAA organised protests outside Labour HQ and a petition, the wording of which was changed from Corbyn “must go” to Labour “must act” after a previous regulatory compliance case led to the commission telling it to do so “to ensure it complied with our guidance on campaigning and political activity”.
.
Rishi Sunak has denied he will flee the country to become government in exile in California if he loses the election
The prime minister has said claims he will move to California if he loses the election were "simply untrue." [...] "It's simply not true, I mean, it's just simply not true."
The prime minister also defended his new National Service policy despite refusing to comment on what sanctions people would face if they refused to take part in it.
:sunak:.
also Nigel farage did a racism again (Breaking: Water is Wet)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vn_9lVvMkX4
no transcript to copy from here but basically after a bit of dancing around the point of who he means when he's referring to the people who hate british values, want to destroy britain and support Hamas, he says its muslims of course and than adds that also there's "middle class girls called Jacasta" involved too
https://x.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/1796564954964791522
Maybe this is just wishful thinking on my part, but it seems like that's not a huge escalation, and not really different from what's been happening already.
Belgium promising 30 F16s to Ukraine, but there's a lot of mixed messaging:
De Croo had already announced last year that Belgium would send F-16s to Ukraine in 2025 — without saying how many.
"These F-16 jets will be provided to Ukraine as soon as possible. Our aim is to be able to provide first aircraft before the end of this year, 2024," De Croo said at a press conference with Zelenskyy. “We will do everything in our capacity to deliver some planes already this year.”
Belgium has committed to supplying the 30 F-16 fighter jets before 2028.
trump debate will be hilarious in june, felon don and sleepy joe going at it, prolly will get rinsed tbh.
The trots in Terf island
are running a independent candidate for the upcoming general election, looks like their main focus for their campaign is going to be the war in gazaVote for Fiona Lali – Kick out the war criminals!
Following her takedown of Suella Braverman, and with a surge of grassroots support, Fiona Lali is standing as a revolutionary communist candidate for Stratford and Bow in the upcoming general election. Vote for Fiona! Bring down the warmongers!
In Gaza, innocent men, women, and children are being butchered and starved to death by the brutal Israeli war machine. And both the Tories and Labour have blood on their hands.
here is the tweet, mostly being criticized by zionist labour and tories with the account of the Workers Party of Britain accusing of spliting the vote.
Going to
after lunch. There's three ballots I have to vote on, national, regional and provincial.⚡️Speech SUMMARY of Saraya al-Quds’ Spox Abu Hamza:
• We are engaged in an existential war in the West Bank and Gaza, and it is a challenge in which we will only emerge victorious.
• We are still confronting the Israeli enemy, and our marks are clear and evident.
• Over the past weeks, we have carried out numerous sniper operations targeting the heads of enemy soldiers and snipers across all incursion fronts.
• We announce the disabling and destruction of dozens of military vehicles in Rafah, Jabalia, and Zeitoun, as well as on the outskirts of the central governorate, using tandem warheads and highly explosive barrel-piercing bombs and drones.
• We have shot down 11 israeli drones, including SkyLarks and quadcopters, and other intelligence and reconnaissance drones across the confrontation area in the resisting Gaza Strip.
• We announce our near-daily targeting of enemy forces and their gatherings in Rafah, Jabalia, and 'Netzarim' with dozens of mortar shells and 107mm rockets.
• In the past few days, we have shelled the Gaza envelope, Be'er Sheva, Sderot, and Ashkelon simultaneously with repelling the pathetic enemy forces in Rafah.
• We are fighting a complex security battle to preserve our enemy prisoners.
• The only way to recover your prisoners is to withdraw from Gaza, conduct an exchange deal, and end the aggression.
• We give our enemies good news sayinc that we are still doing very well.
• The upcoming attrition terror will compel the enemy to withdraw from Gaza in humiliation.
• The results of determination and immense sacrifices in the Battle of the Al-Aqsa Flood are gradually becoming apparent through global solidarity with the Palestinian cause.
• We extend our greetings and gratitude to the support fronts in Yemen, Iraq, and Lebanon for their notable, continuous, and painful escalation against the enemy forces.
• We extend our greetings to all the free people of the world in American universities, European cities, squares, and Arab capitals.
• We salute our patient people in displacement tents and amidst the ruins of destroyed homes, as well as our brigades and our people in the West Bank, Occupied Jerusalem, refugee camps, and the diaspora.
The English Ambassador to Mexico has been reportedly sacked for pointing a gun at a local staffer.
The incident occured in April but did not receive press attention until a video began circulating on Twitter in late May.
The university of Copenhagen has given partial concessions to students protesting the genocide in Gaza and will divest from companies on the UN list of companies operating within the West Bank. The university claims that investments of roughly DKK 1 mill. will be affected by the decision.
This is far from a full abandonment of financial ties to zionism but it is a small step in the right direction. Bullying works.
Protectorate of Jews battling antisemitism by pushing an elderly orthodox Jewish man onto the pavement, head first, then threatening anyone who comes to his aide. https://t.me/FotrosResistance/6699
Sounds too good to be true but here's hoping it inspires similar acts:
https://twitter.com/SilentlySirs/status/1797323174826459476?mx=1🔴⚡️URGENT: An Israeli soldier suffering from severe psychological issues after fighting in the Gaza Strip went to the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv today and threw hand grenades at the ministry. It is unknown if there are any casualties.
Excuse me for a sec while I do some great man of history psychologizing
If Biden loses in November he'll be ok with it because he'll think he's sacrificing his presidency for Israel
That said, I think he's the favourite 55:45 over trump. Americans don't vote based on foreign policy, there are a lot of Normal Whites in the country, and for the 8 Americans that do vote based on policy, he's the same as the republicans except Normal anyway.
Several European regimes has joined NATO leader Jens Stoltenberg's recent demands for the Kiev regime to be allowed to use NATO weapons to attack Russian soil.
German premier Olaf Scholz has given the Ukrainians a carte blanche to attack Russia with German weapons, as long as it is "within international law". French supreme leader Emmanuel Macron has also joined the choir for escalation, albeit with the caveat that attacks inside Russia should only be against missile systems targeting Ukraine.
Danish autocrat Mette Frederiksen is baying for more war as well, giving the Ukrainians the same blanket permission to use Danish weapons for whatever they like as long as it is within "international law". As an example of the state of the serious and objective journalism we're blessed with in the west, I give you the following exerpt from Danish government broadcaster DR:
"The prime Minister's statement is a natural development," says Kenneth Øhlenschlæger Buhl, military researcher at the Institute for Strategy and War Studies at the Defence Academy.
"One must also recognize that if Ukraine is to have a chance to win this war, this step must be taken, otherwise Ukraine will be fighting with one hand tied behind its back - and that's not how you win wars."
Mette Frederiksen also said in the interview with TV2 News that she agrees with the Ukrainian assessment that one cannot defend oneself if "one is not allowed to do something the other way."
jacobin posted another silly article
I just feel the third campist vibes emanating from the pixels on the screen.
How soon until Mosad starts assassinating ICJ justices and lawyers?
Check in on your chud relatives, they're probably not doing well right now.
Two ministers - interior and finance - with their parties promised to leave the ruling coalition in Israel if the government led by Netanyahu accepts the peace plan proposed by Biden.
Everything is predictable - the nationalist Ben-Gvir and the Haredi Smotrich are sharply against such a plan, because this is simply Israel’s capitulation against the backdrop of the fact that the IDF in the Gaza Strip has not yet achieved a single goal
Yeah I'm going to be Congo posting for the foreseeable future as I work my way through Gérard Prunier's primer on the 21st century's deadliest conflict. To the surprise of nobody, in reading Africa's World War I've regrettably discovered that the first and second Congo Wars were indeed in part proxy wars between the French and the Americans for control over the DRC's vast mineral wealth. Obviously a lot more complicated than just a proxy war, and it involved dozens of state and non-state actors, but the French tried desperately to uphold the Mobutu regime in Zaire whilst the Americans poured money and even American troops into Kagame's RPF to overthrow Mobutu. If you'll remember, Mobutu (leader of Zaire after the CIA/Belgian assassination of mildly leftist Lumumba in the 60's) was allowing the perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide to re-arm in refugee camps on the Zaire/Rwanda border. The following excerpts are from pages 118-120
The U.S. government did not sound very keen to get involved, declaring, “We want to co-operate with our partners in solving the crisis in Eastern Zaire. But we must make sure that these plans are sound, logical and that they would work.” This was partly a result of the Somalia syndrome and also partly due to the fact that other segments of the U.S. government were physically supporting the operation without making that fact public. As the crisis unfolded it became obvious that decision making in Washington was taking place at several levels simultaneously and that they were not always in agreement with each other. But the general tone of the U.S. approach to the crisis was of support for the Kigali regime and its actions; U.S. Gen. George Joulwan, head of NATO, even described General Kagame as "a visionary."
After the taking of Bukavu, whose last defenders had been FDD Bu¬rundian guerrillas, the mixture of RPA and Congolese rebel troops pushed southward. They were soon joined by a group of about sixty African American mercenaries. According to English-speaking Zairians who had occasion to talk with them, they had been privately recruited in the United States and flown to Uganda, from where they had been taken by road to Kigali and later to Bukavu. The way their passage from the United States had been facilitated by Customs and police suggested undeniably that they were on some kind of unofficial government mission. They were soon battling the FDD at Mwenga and Kiliba.
It was increasingly obvious that the refugees had become political pawns. France and the pro-Mobutu West African francophone states pretended to back a multinational intervention force (MNF) to save the refugees; what they really wanted was to save Mobutu. On the opposite side the United States was dragging its feet on the MNF question (and Rwanda was openly opposing it) because it was increasingly collaborating in trying to bring Mobutu down, while not caring too much about what would happen to the refugees, or even, in the case of Rwanda, wanting them back under control, dead or alive. Similarly among foreign NGOs and political parties, pro-Hutu groups saw the refugees as innocent lambs about to be slaughtered, while the pro-Tutsi groups saw them as largely killers who were getting their comeuppance.
On November 8 fighting started around Mugunga, and UN Secretary General Boutros Ghali called for the rapid creation of a multinational intervention force, fearing the possibility of “genocide by starvation.” In spite of frantic diplomatic activity from Paris, negotiations were still bogged down. The British press made “the West” in general responsible for the delay, while the French press clearly accused the United States.
More
action from a bunch of plane nerds on how the still non-existent B-21 raider Stealth Bomber can hold off the entire Chinese airfleet by itself and an f-35 spotterLike I just fucking can't, how do these people even fucking believe this shit much less come up with it in their mind palaces.
US Navy Operations Specialist
explains how a B-21 Raider loaded with a gazillion of air-to-air missiles could keep Chinese J-20 stealth fighters at bayJust an FYI. There's only, to my knowledge at this time, only 1 flying B-21. And that was produced as one of those public proof-of-concept exhibitions after years of dumping money on the bonfire of vanities that is the military industrial complex. Who knows how long it will take them to even have enough for a single wing.
The Raider
The B-21 Raider will be a dual-capable penetrating strike stealth bomber capable of delivering both conventional and nuclear munitions. The B-21 will form the backbone of the future Air Force bomber force consisting of B-21s and B-52s. Designed to operate in tomorrow’s high-end threat environment, the B-21 will play a critical role in ensuring America’s enduring airpower capability.
I wonder if "high-end threat environments" include rainy weather, something that apparently defeats and routes its predecessor the B-2.
The B-21 Raider will be a component of a larger family of systems for conventional Long Range Strike, including Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, electronic attack, communication and other capabilities. It will be nuclear capable and designed to accommodate manned or unmanned operations. Additionally, it will be able to employ a broad mix of stand-off and direct-attack munitions.
Yap yap yap the most it'll likely be used for is dick-waving the Russians and Chinese from a safe distance and maybe, if someone's unlucky enough, be used to bomb civilians who can't fight back.
Given its unique capabilities would it be possible to load a B-21 with air-to-air missiles and keep an entire air force at bay?
An exceptionally
take I never thought I'd ever see in my lifetime. "Wot if one plane could hold off an entire country's airfleet by itself"Fuck is this? Gamer logic?
B-21 paired with the F-35
Eric Wicklund, former US Navy Operations Specialist, explains on Quora;
Well there's your first mistake. You're delving into the internet's morass of dumbasses.
I give you the B-21 Raider (below) paired with the F-35, which could be an awesome combination.
'Currently, the Chinese air force has a long-range missile called the PL-15, with a range of 120–190 miles. Some have called it an “AWACS Killer” because it can be loaded on the stealthy J-20 aircraft. Theoretically, J-20s might sneak past American fighters and launch on the AWACS or aerial tankers, removing vital force multipliers for the American side.
So back in like 2022 there's been quite a few encounters between the f-35 and J-20 out and around the south China sea, with a U.S PACOM airforce commander remarking that their AWACs were insufficient for detecting the J-20s effectively, which when read between the lines means there's a good chance that J-20s can indeed take down AWACS and tear holes into any airforce C4ISR networks.
Combine this with China's work in creating anti-stealth radar system countermeasures that have been reported to be capable of detecting F-22 decades back and how most likely this tech has continually been developed since then it would stand to reason that China's air defenses would be a tough nut to crack so as long as they maintain a regional defense strategy while utilizing the J-20s combined with KJ-500s as surgical implements to take out strategic assets and hamstring any attempted offensive air operations. Now you're probably feeling pretty thoughtful and introspective right now after reading this, so let me give you a heads up to prepare for some major whiplash of dipshittery.
B-21 with a gazillion AIM-260 missiles
‘So, why not load up a B-21 with a gazillion AIM-260 missiles. F-35s would scout ahead looking for any J-20s trying to slip past the fighter screen. J-20s are stealthy, but not as much as the F-35, and this would allow the F-35 to target the J-20 before they get close enough to launch. An F-35 pilot could request a launch from the B-21 and then take over control of the missile, directing it towards the inbound J-20.
Ever play the game battleship? Imagine a ten thousand by ten thousand peg board with the enemy team using "boats" that only take up 1 peg, and your plan is to try and sus them out like that. Fucking jackass
‘And even if a J-20 is able to launch, F-35s could direct the missiles to intercept the inbound PL-15s.’
The fuck do you mean "if"? Do you got magic hypersonic missiles that can hit the military airbase on mainland China from fuckknowswheresville outside of the PLA missile commands reach? If that's the case why the fuck do you need F-35s near by?
Jesus christ holy shit how high off your supply are you fuckers
Wicklund concludes;
Please you don't have to. I insist
Other than that, there’s no reason to expect holding off a large air force with just one aircraft. If it’s big enough it won’t be stealthy enough. If it’s stealthy enough it won’t have space for the fuel to have the necessary loiter time. But, having multiple aircraft teaming together, you could have similar effect.’
A message to everyone involved making this article.
In the last thread I was discussing the fact that the Labour right has spent the last five years being advised by the US Democrats in how to restrict electoral turnout and fight a strategy dependent on low-turnout, highly exclusionary elections. Also the fact that Labour absolutely would not reverse the provenly (and now confirmed to be deliberate by Tory sources) prejudicial voter ID laws. Both me and @Awoo@hexbear.net agreed that Labour probably wouldn't reverse them.
Der Starmer was asked about it earlier today and, after some confused waffle, said no (in such a way to avoid a quote of it).
Slovak premier's health improving after attack, says Slovak government
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico's health is improving as he recovers from an assassination attempt this month, the Slovak government and the hospital where he is being held said on Monday.
An assailant shot Fico four times at close range as the prime minister greeted supporters at a government meeting in the central Slovak town of Handlova on May 15.
- On June 2, in addition to president, Mexico will choose all 500 deputies in the lower house of Congress and all 128 seats in the Senate.
- The main presidential candidates are left-wing Claudia Sheinbaum and right-wing Xóchitl Gálvez, with center-left Jorge Máynez representing a third, dark-horse option.
- Both Sheinbaum and Gálvez want to invest more in renewable energy, but disagree about some controversial infrastructure projects.
MEXICO CITY — Mexico will hold elections on June 2 that are likely to shape the country for years to come. In addition to president, all 500 deputies in the lower house of Congress and all 128 seats in the Senate are on the ballot. The winners will have to reckon with a host of pressing environmental concerns that range from renewable energy and mining to access to clean water and infrastructure.
Not to lathe this into existence, but sometimes I wonder if platforms like YouTube or Facebook will someday hide identifying information in plain sight when you screenshot something and share it. Similar to how YouTube adds ?si=nNelxk402fj38fh to urls, but harder to identify. Could be as simple as a seemingly random pattern in the background, decodable by an algorithm and then searchable by feds.
My earlier comment about the national security state pushing the scale for a Biden victory is timely. With Trump being a felon now, electors have a perfect out to be faithless. The electors in swing states are going to unironically pull "we have to save the prestige of the POTUS by not voting for a felon into the Oval Office" out of their asses. Blue MAGA will cling their wine glasses at their celebratory brunch because everything was done by the book, and what's left of insurrectionist red MAGA who didn't get hit with multiple federal charges from Jan 6th can join the ACLU and patsocs in protesting Biden's win. Everyone else, commies and non-commies alike, will just collectively shrug their shoulders and mutter, "well, Trump sucked anyways."
Here's a video of an Al-Quds brigrades (Palestinian Islamic Jihad) and an Omar Qassim forces (Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine) members making bombs together
Trump found guilty in hush money trial
I'd like to see ol' Donny Trump wriggle his way out of this jam!
Today a large majority in the Danish parliament consisting of the succdems and other right-wing parties passed a law increasing the yearly transfer of money to the royal family from USD 18.4 mln. to USD 20.9 mln. In addition the state will now party for internal maintenance of palaces and castles used by the royals. The income is tax free.
To my surprise giving more money to the royals is not a popular move. A recent poll shows that while 48 percent of people disapprove of the royal raise, only 20 percent supports it.
Succdems have tried to explain the lack of generosity towards the nation's most pampered family by complaining about the question not explaining that they really deserve it. I think the explanation is completely different. For its entire time in power, the current succdem-led right-wing regime has tried to scare the public into being more "crisis-conscious", constantly talking about how the world is a scary place where danger looms everywhere, especially Putin's Asiatic hordes who lusts for conquest. There's no money for anything, not for schools, not for healthcare, not for green transition, everything has to be spent on more military stuff to defend ourselves against the Russian menace. — And then these ghouls come and throw money at people who wants for nothing. It doesn't make sense and it feels like they're adding insult to injury.
A disappointing result of rainbow imperialism is that the most vocal and aggressive NATO leftists I’ve come across irl have all been lgbt.
On the opposite spectrum, I’ve also had some of the most dedicated and well-read comrades in my country also be lgbt. Our old left is weak on lgbt but the younger generation has done a better job at bringing them over and keeping them from falling into the NATO-Rainbow Trap.
At first I thought the timing of this might be intentional to use the Trump trial shit as a distraction, but on second thought I don't think most Americans give a shit either way :/ https://apnews.com/article/yemen-houthis-us-britain-strikes-weapons-shipping-9f13a9739a139abfecb6fdc499280a89
Reading about the different elections here makes me realize how Guatemala is one of the few countries that doesn’t have a really strong “legacy party” that’s been around for decades. Our oldest parties that still gain significant seats in congress were all formed in the mid to late 2000’s. Seems like we go through a new cycle of them every couple of decades.
Just finished
ING in the South African elections. So I . Process was smooth, though something pretty funny happened. I was standing behind a Harry Potter lib wearing a Hogwarts shirt in the queue lmao. I'm not making this up. A Harry Potter lib in South Africa. Was very funny when she saw an example of the ballot papers, and swore in Afrikaans when she saw the picture of the DA leader John Steenhuisen. If the DA(white liberal political party) can't even keep Harry Potter libs as supporters, it's over for them.For some serious analysis, election results are going to be highly dependent on voter turnout. IPSOS modelled some turnout scenarios with their polls. Low turnout benefits the ANC, IFP, and MK, high turnout benefits everyone else
Italian village with 46 residents has 30 local election candidates (Guardian)
spoiler
The last time Igor De Santis ran for mayor in Ingria, a tiny village surrounded by forests and mountains near Turin, he won an easy landslide victory. But he faces a tough challenge in his bid for a fourth mandate, after his mother joined a rival camp.
Ingria, one of the smallest villages in Italy, is home to 46 inhabitants. A further 26 people, registered to vote from abroad, make up the electorate.
De Santis, 42, has led the administration since 2009 and had expected competition in the mayoral race from an opposition councillor, 70-year-old Renato Poletto. The situation became more complicated when Stefano Venuti, a Milan resident who has a second home in Ingria, threw his hat into the ring. “We weren’t expecting that,” said De Santis.
And then the micro-race was fully upended by Poletto announcing that he had secured the support of De Santis’s mother, Milena Crosasso, and had put her forward for a councillor position in the ballot to elect a new council on 8-9 June, as part of a list comprising nine women and one man. In all, 30 people – about two-thirds of the village’s inhabitants – are now competing for positions.
“I did ask [my mother] to join me but after she saw that Poletto’s list was mostly women she decided to go with them,” said De Santis. “They are all volunteers who have worked really hard for the village.”
Crosasso said that the rivalry would not impact family harmony. “Both my son and I want the best for the community and this is an opportunity to give voice to women’s points of view without weakening family bonds,” she said.
Ingria is in Italy’s Soana Valley and experiences similar issues to other mountain villages, such as depopulation, scant services and challenges with snow during winter. Since 2022, when it was named as being among Italy’s “most beautiful” villages, it has also had to deal with an increase in tourism.
“There has been an incredible spike and we have to manage this,” said De Santis. “There are few residents, but a lot of second homes. Our main aim is to preserve Ingria’s beauty.”
Venuti told Corriere della Sera newspaper that he decided to run for mayor after being urged to do so by locals. “I’ve integrated very well,” he said.
Despite the competition, De Santis, whose grandfather was mayor of Ingria for 30 years, said he was “optimistic” that he could win.
Trump talking about someone wielding a machete in a McDonald’s
The UK and France had already signalled they were open to easing restrictions on Ukraine striking military sites on Russian territory, before US President Joe Biden said on Thursday night that American-supplied weapons could be used.
However a US official told the BBC: "Our policy with respect to prohibiting the use of Army Tactical Missile System [ATACMS] or long-range strikes inside of Russia has not changed.”
Interesting things happening in the India elections. They'll soon be in the seventh phase of voting and on June 4th-5th, we'll probably have a pretty good idea of who's won.
The ruling BJP's slogan is essentially that - screw just a majority, we're gonna get 400 seats or more out of the 543 seats in government for our ruling coalition (the NDA). In the last election, the BJP got 303 seats, and the NDA as a whole got like ~350, so that's quite a few seats to climb to reach that goal. But even if don't reach the goal, they still have a majority.
Right now, major pollsters are estimating between 335 and 393 seats just for the BJP. Meanwhile, there's people in the opposition who are estimating that not only will the BJP not get to 400 seats, but that they'll actually fail to get even a majority. The reason why is some polling data, which doesn't show exact voter sentiment for the parties but instead on what issues voters care about.
- 40% of those surveyed favour the BJP but satisfaction with the government is lower than in 2019, due to your regular suite of economic issues (inflation, poverty, unemployment)
- The whole thing where Modi goes out and consecrates a temple over the ashes of a mosque or whatever fucked up thing they do, that was only a major source of satisfaction for 33% of NDA voters and only 23% of the electorate, so not exactly great returns on that.
- Fewer respondents agreed that the government should get a second chance (44%) than in 2004 (48%), and the BJP lost that election.
- 2019 was an election marked especially by total opposition chaos, and even in those elections, a full 75% of the electorate did not vote for the BJP.
- The BJP won 60% (183) of the seats in 2019 by a margin of over 15%, so that's 40% (120 seats) of the seats that could be deemed vulnerable in an Indian election (where swings of 5-10% and up to 15% are pretty typical). And it won about 79 of those vulnerable seats with a margin of up to 10%. So if the BJP loses just half of the total vulnerable seats, or at least a big proportion of the more vulnerable ones (only a 10% lead in 2019), then it loses the election.
- In 2019, the BJP got a national vote share of 37%. This was a plurality so it wins in a FPTP system, obviously. The issue with projecting too much from this is that the BJP's bastions get them large amounts of unnecessary votes (60% or even higher, when they just need a plurality), while their vote share in less BJP-friendly zones is considerably less sturdy. But all the voters in the bastions masks that effect on a national scale.
- There's also obviously been the farmer's protests, which have dampened enthusiasm a little, too.
- There's also some more in-depth analysis about Karnataka in there too which I'm not knowledgable enough to talk about really.
So what's the takeaway? IDK, I'm not an Indian elections guy. If I woke up to a big BJP majority in early June then I wouldn't be surprised. And there's probably a ton of electoral shenanigans just like in every liberal "democracy", which would favour the party in charge of the government during the elections. But it's at least statistically possible beyond mere blind hope that the BJP is at least having a tougher time than I had initially thought here.
Article by one of the frequent nakedcapitalism.com commenters on potential for nato boots on the ground. He thinks is very unlikely in any meaningful way. Not just because they'd get rinsed by Russia, but challenges in advance of any actual deployment.
https://aurelien2022.substack.com/p/natos-phantom-armies
On the one hand this is a source of optimism because it just doesn't seem practical for nato to do more than what they're doing now. On the other hand, the futility of conventional armed conflict with Russia incentivizes nuclear escalation on the part of the west.
The trash campaign continues:
https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/600-more-trash-carrying-balloons-sent-from-dprk-to-south-korBrazilian government condemns attack that injured Brazilians in Lebanon
Article
Brazil's Ministry of International Relations said on Sunday (2) that the Brazilian family that was injured in a bombing last Saturday (1) in Lebanon was the victim of an attack by Israel.
Itamaraty formally accused Israel of the attack. “The episode occurred in the context of attacks by the Israeli armed forces in southern Lebanon and by Hezbollah in northern Israel,” it said in a statement. “The Brazilian Embassy in Beirut is in contact with the relatives and the medical team and is providing consular support.”
Until now, Israel's participation in the attack was only a hypothesis. Yesterday, an Israeli aircraft without a pilot was shot down over Lebanese territory by the extremist cell Hezbollah. Videos circulating on social media show a Hermes 900 drone crashing in the south of the country.
The Brazilian Embassy in Beirut says it has been monitoring the Israel-Palestine conflict “since the beginning”. “Brazil urges the parties involved (...) to prevent the spread of the conflict in Gaza and to avoid new innocent civilian victims,” the note continues. The Brazilian government expresses its indignation and condemns yesterday's bombing (...) which resulted in injuries to three Brazilian citizens. Itamaraty, in a statement Girl almost amputated
The home of Brazilians in the town of Saddike, in the south of Lebanon, was hit by a bombardment on Saturday (1st), at around 11am in Brazil. Fatima Boustani, 30, her 12-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son were injured. The girl was watching TV when the house was hit.
“She was rescued by neighbors in a state of shock,” says Hussein Ezzddein, cousin of the children's father, Ahmad Aidibi, who is staying at his home in Greater São Paulo. “The hospital planned to cut off her leg, but the family asked them to and another doctor performed a second operation on her leg. Now she's in the ICU under observation because she's lost a lot of blood.”
Fatima “is in a very serious condition”. With bleeding in her head and lungs, her condition is so serious that the Brazilian Consulate in Lebanon tried to transfer her to a hospital in the capital, Beirut, but doctors advised against it. “She's intubated. They didn't authorize an ambulance because of her condition,” says Ezzddein. The boy suffered abrasions and is under observation in the infirmary. The eldest son, 13, and the youngest, 7, were at their grandmother's house during the attack and were not hit.
Ezzddein asks the Brazilian government to repatriate the family and send a psychologist to help his father. Aidibi “won't accept it, he just screams and cries”, says his cousin. “He hasn't slept or eaten since yesterday. He just smokes and cries.” He keeps shouting: 'How come I'm walking and my daughter isn't? He's in a deep state of depression, he's in shock. Hussein Ezzddein, Aidibi's cousin
US SOUTHCOM general talking about the kenyan proxy mission into haiti
https://x.com/KawsachunNews/status/1792595782610120830
what a ghoul. her little smirk as she thinks about the torrent of cash she'll be administering through this puppet government. just bloodless.
link courtesy of this much larger article - https://www.blackagendareport.com/haiti-anatomy-invasion
I know someone from Chad irl, chill guy
Video description below
I found it neat that a way they're countering kamikaze drones hitting you while driving is by putting up a shitton of wooden Poles with nets on them all up and down the road. Very funny and primitive but if it works it works.
Good Erdogan Statement , its a Erdogan statement so dont expect anything beyond the Statement ..
spoiler
"O United Nations! What good are you in the 21st century if you cannot stop the genocide that all humanity is watching via live broadcast?
O American State! This blood is also on your hands.
Hey heads of state of Europe! You also participated in this genocide of Israel.
Because you kept silent.
They hit hospitals, schools, mosques, aid convoys, journalists, doctors and aid workers; You were silent.
Not only humanity is dying in Gaza; In Gaza, not only innocent pups and babies die; There is not only genocide and massacre in Gaza.
While humanity is dying in Gaza, democracy is dying and human rights are dying in Europe; Freedom of expression, freedom of the press, women's rights, children's rights are dying.
No one should be sorry...
From now on, no European should come out and talk to us about democracy, human rights, freedom of expression and freedom of the press with arrogance, patronizing language and finger wagging.
Israel killed humanity in Gaza; Europe, on the other hand, killed its own values and trampled all the values that created it under its feet.
The United Nations could not even protect its own personnel or aid workers, let alone stop the genocide. In Gaza, not only humanity but also the United Nations died along with its spirit.
I also have a few words for the Islamic world...
What are you waiting for to make a joint decision? What more needs to happen to react?
Babies' necks are cut off, people are burned in tents. When will you react?
When will the Islamic world protect the rights, laws, lives and honor of its Palestinian brothers?
I swear, God will hold you and all of us accountable for this.
While a handful of terrorists are committing Muslim genocide in the very center and heart of the Islamic geography, God will hold accountable those who turn a blind eye, those who turn a deaf ear, those who remain silent and unresponsive.
The world is watching the barbarity of a patient, a maniac, a psychopath, a blood-feeding vampire called Netanyahu, and it is watching it on live broadcast...
More than three-quarters of the 193 member countries of the United Nations recognize Palestine as a sovereign state.
The joint decision of 147 countries cannot be left to the discretion of the Security Council, which consists of 5 members.
The world is bigger than 5, 147 is bigger than five, the common conscience of humanity is bigger than 5."
18 Mexican police officers injured by firebombs thrown in riot at Israeli embassy
The anti-Israel activists claimed that the police used tear gas, operated fire extinguishers and threw stones at the protesters, who they said included children, seniors, and disabled people.
Article
Eighteen Mexico City Police officers were wounded by Molotov cocktails and objects thrown by anti-Israel activists in a riot outside the Israeli embassy on Tuesday, law enforcement said, in protests organized in response to ongoing IDF military operations in the Hamas stronghold of Rafah.
Sixteen officers were reportedly taken to the hospital for burns and other injuries, and two more were treated on the scene. Multiple fires were set in the area of the embassy, and five bus stations, several businesses, a police vehicle, and park benches were damaged.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry said that "there were no casualties but minor damage was caused in the vicinity of the embassy." Mexican Police said that protesters, some of them masked, clashed with the police who established a cordon.
Accusing police of brutality
BDS Mexico, which called for the protest on Monday as a response to the death of Gazans in Rafah in disputed circumstances, accused the police of brutality.
The anti-Israel activists claimed that the police used tear gas, operated fire extinguishers and threw stones at the protesters, who they said included children, seniors, and disabled people.
"We reiterate our solidarity with the Palestinian people and all the people who demonstrated in support of their cause," Comité de Solidaridad con Palestina GDL said on Instagram on Wednesday. "We will not stop speaking out against injustice and oppression, both here and anywhere in the world."
South Africa election results update:
With 99.87% of the voting districts counted, the results are quite clear at the top: ANC 40.2%, DA 21.8%, Zuma's MK 14.6%, EFF 9.5%.
Now coalition talks are starting.
Ramaphosa won’t resign despite historic ANC electoral loss, seeks coalition with DA - 2 June 2024
Snippets from the article and my opinion
Though he is bitterly disappointed that the ANC barely polled 40 percent, sources close to Ramaphosa said he reasons that “much is at stake” and South Africa is in need of political maturity that can provide stable governance after voters tore up the odds by making his predecessor Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe party the third biggest in the country.
The only route to that stability, for Ramaphosa and his closest allies within the ANC, is through a working arrangement with the Democratic Alliance.
The party’s Gauteng leadership and younger members of the ANC national executive committee have thus far favoured the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) as a coalition partner but this thinking has lost some of its currency with a far lower share of the vote than in 2019
Sadly I have to agree with all of the above, and have been predicting this outcome for months now. In fact, I've been predicting a ANC-DA coalition even before Zuma's MK party existed. Zuma's MK party is undoubtedly the worst and should not be allowed anywhere near national level power (want to scrap the constitution, introduce bourgeois dictatorial parliamentary rule, scrap LGBT rights, etc), and the EFF simply do not have the votes for a stable coalition and will require other parties to join to reach 50%. This means that the only way forward is an ANC - DA coalition nationally
There are two options. The first is a full-blown coalition in which the official opposition becomes the junior partner.
The second is a narrowly-structured pact where the DA agrees to cooperate on particular steps required for the government to function", notably the election of the president in the National Assembly and the passing of the national budget.
In return, the DA would secure key positions within parliament that would allow it to hold the executive to account. In any haggling of this nature, it is almost certain to demand greater devolution of powers to provinces...
"The agreement the president is going with is for the ANC to form a government and the DA takes the legislature, including the speaker of the National Assembly and chairing the parliamentary portfolio committees,” said one PEC member, who asked to remain anonymous.
But another PEC official reiterated that the ANC “would lose its base” — that is, the black working class in townships and rural areas — should the party adopt Ramaphosa’s strategy.
“Going into bed with the DA will ensure the ANC sleeps forever and does not rise. The EFF and MK will be the biggest beneficiaries,” the insider asserted...
For now, however, it appears – from what has informally been placed before the ANC – that the DA is leaning towards option two.
It entails concessions from the ANC on key pieces of legislation, including the National Health Insurance Act – signed by the president a fortnight before voting day.
This is all terrible, but it is the only way forward unfortunately. The ANC has messed it up for themselves by being corrupt and incompetent. Having no electricity for 8+ hours a day in the year leading up to the election, thanks to corruption and austerity, is not a winning strategy. The EFF's campaign of trying to appeal to Zuma supporters and Zulu nationalists and give them concessions, by having meetings with Zuma, publicly asking Zuma to join the EFF, and exempting land under the ownership of the Zulu King's trust from land reform, has backfired spectacularly. Zuma took all those new EFF supporters with him to the MK, and now the EFF has a worse result than 2019, and not enough of a share of the vote to form a coalition with the ANC. A multi party national coalition to barely reach 50% is a non starter. So an ANC - DA coalition is a consequence of all this.
Gabriel Boric announces that Chile supports and will join South Africa's accusation against Israel at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The Chilean president stated that Israel's actions in Gaza “require a firm and permanent response from the international community”.
Rare Boric W
Pretty good interview with Richard Wolff in which he discusses U.S. protectionism, multi-polarity, and capitalism in general. Nothing folks here don't know already (except maybe for stuff about the leaked WhatsApp discussion where capitalists decide to bribe Eric Adams to attack the student movement? new to me...), but it'd probably be a pretty good into to link new folks to.
Unfortunately he seems to forget all his MMT and spout a bunch of nonsense about taxes and national debt at the beginning, so I linked timestamp 15m58s which starts the good stuff. Trust me (or not, and confirm for yourself), nothing of value was skipped.
South Africa election results update:
It's 3AM on a Saturday morning, and 95% of voting districts are counted, with the ANC at 40.6% of the vote, the DA at 21.5%, the MK at 14.5%, and the EFF at 9.4%. The PA have lost fifth place to the IFP.
Overall Jacob Zuma's MK party was under polled by the predictions and did much better than anyone expected, the ANC lost more votes than anyone predicted, the DA have gained no votes since 2019, and the EFF has lost over a percentage of the vote since 2019. The PA are also relevant now. Overall a poor showing from most of the opposition, failing to capitalise on the collapse of the ANC. Only the MK and PA managed that.
China has a gun dog too now
https://www.theguardian.com/science/article/2024/may/30/chinese-armys-latest-weapon-gun-toting-dog
I imagine these will have RPGs on them with stabilisers that pop out within a few years. Could change tank warfare a lot.
- news from Iceland.
There is a contentious presidential election on the horizon in Iceland. The office of president is mostly ceremonial, in effect an elected King. The president should ideally be above politics. A preposterous notion because unlike most constitutional monarchies an Icelandic president has actually used his legislative veto privilege two times, once against laws on the media and once against the Icesave agreements. In the case of a veto the laws in question are voted on by the people.
There are many candidates but the most interesting one is the incumbent prime minister, Katrín Jakobsdóttir. She is nominally a soc-dem but formed a government with the brazen right-wing capitalist party and the opportunist centrist party. The government has weathered scandal after scandal, mostly generated by the right-wing party. The only thing keeping them alive is that the other soc-dem party is polling extremely well and history has shown that parties that dissolve governments get punished, even if the reason is good.
Why someone would go from the most powerful position in the government to the least powerful is a mystery. Especially to those versed in dialectical materialism. She has said that it was always her dream after she retired from politics.
There are 12 in the running but the contest is mostly between Katrín and:
two women named Halla, both "respectable" liberals. Both with ties to organized business.
Baldur Þórhallsson. A political "science" professor who happens to be gay.
The comedian Jón Gnarr, the former mayor of Reykjavík. My preferred candidate.
and various crackpots, of those the most interesting is probably Ástþór Magnússon, who is running for the fourth time. He has this aura of madness around him and has had grand plans to turn Iceland into some center for international peace. He has always talked against any kind of warfare, especially the Iraq war. But is now especially unpalatable to most because he takes the side of Russia in its conflict against the west and has even suggested that Putin get the Nobel peace prize for the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. Maybe it's because he has a Russian wife but who knows.
ohh and the volcano erupted again, hope the hot water stays on
DPRK reports a failed satellite launch.
KCNA Report on Accident in Launch of Military Reconnaissance Satellite
Pyongyang, May 27 (KCNA) -- The Korean Central News Agency made public the following report on May 27 as regards an accident occurred during the launch of military reconnaissance satellite:
The National Aerospace Technology Administration (NATA) of the DPRK conducted the launch of reconnaissance satellite Malligyong-1-1 aboard the new-type satellite carrier rocket at the Sohae Satellite Launching Ground in Cholsan County of North Phyongan Province on May 27, Juche 113 (2024).
The launch failed due to the air blast of the new-type satellite carrier rocket during the first-stage flight, the vice general director of the NATA said.
He said that the experts' examination of the field headquarters of the non-permanent preparatory committee for launching satellites made a preliminary conclusion that the cause of the accident is attributable to the reliability of operation of the newly developed liquid oxygen + petroleum engine, adding that other causes will be examined. -0-
www.kcna.kp (Juche113.5.27.)
http://kcna.kp/en/article/q/1eaaf37cec377d222bb28221ee13a2c2.kcmsfArticle
The Houthis said that Yemen will continue its military operations until the aggression and the siege of the Gaza Strip cease.
The military spokesman of the Houthi rebels, General Yahya Sari, reported on Wednesday that they carried out 6 military operations in the Mediterranean, Red and Arabian seas.
In the Red Sea three operations were carried out, in the first the ship Laax was hit and suffered serious damage; in the second, the ship Morea was the target and in the third operation, the ship Sealady.
Sari claimed "The ship Laax was badly damaged after a direct attack on the Red Sea, as were two ships 'MOREA' and 'Sealady". They also conducted two other military operations to attack the American ships Alba and Maersk Hartford in the Arabian Sea.
The sixth operation targeted the warship Minerva Antonia in the Mediterranean Sea. Through a statement, Sari highlighted the courageous resistance of the Palestinians and assured that Yemen will continue its military operations until the aggression and the siege of the Gaza Strip cease.
The Yemeni Armed Forces have carried out numerous pro-Palestinian attacks since 7 October, when the Israeli occupation started the war in Gaza, which has killed 36171 Palestinians.
Yemen announced in early May the fourth phase of its operations in support of Gaza and said it would attack all ships within its range bound for Israel. Thus, the United States and its allies created a coalition to protect Israeli-linked vessels by bombing civilian targets in Yemen.
Article
The draft resolution, demands that all parties respect the ceasefire and the surrender of hostages and prisoners by both sides.
On Wednesday, Algeria had a resolution culminating in a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. The motion was proposed by the UN Security Council, which also seeks to stop the growing Zionist offensive in Rafah.
The draft resolution, obtained on Wednesday afternoon by The Associated Press, also demands that all parties respect the ceasefire and the surrender of hostages and prisoners by both sides.
Some diplomats said they expected a quick vote, even on Wednesday." We hope it can be done as quickly as possible because life is at stake," Chinese Ambassador Fu Cong told reporters.
For her part, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said: "We are waiting to see you and then we will react". It should be remembered that the United States has vetoed multiple resolutions demanding a ceasefire in Gaza.
The draft resolution calls for compliance with previous Security Council resolutions calling for the opening of all border crossings and humanitarian access to the 2.3 million people of Gaza who desperately need food and other assistance.
It also demands the immediate cessation of shelling in the Rafah area, which is inhabited by more than 2 million displaced Palestinians. In addition, he points out the problems facing the Gazan population, such as famine and the proliferation of diseases.
Israel, for its part, has stepped up air strikes on Rafah, sowing chaos and destruction in its wake. For example, on Sunday night, Zionist attacks caused a fire that razed tents in a camp for displaced Palestinians west of Rafah, killing 45 people and injuring more than 100.
First. Death to colonialists
Time to catch up on news. I haven't been reading since half of the last thread. So, just gonna peak at this tread first and maybe the last one quickly for the next 45 mins.
In other news, I've been managing to limit my tabs due to the break I took.
The Morena party this afternoon declared Claudia Sheinbaum the winner of the presidential elections by a “two to one” difference over her main rival, the opposition Xóchitl Gálvez. “Sheinbaum has conquered the people of Mexico for her simplicity, tenacity and foolproof discipline,” said the group's president, Mario Delgado, from the campaign center of Sigamos haciendo historia, the coalition that also includes the Green Party and the PT. Earlier, Gálvez asked to take care of the vote during the count: “We are competing against authoritarianism and against power.
They are capable of anything. The fight for Mexico City also seems to be defined in favor of Morena and its candidate, Clara Brugada, according to at least three exit polls that give her a wide lead over the opposition Santiago Taboada. The first official quick count data will be available as of ten o'clock tonight.
im going to add more stuff to the linked post as new things come out
I want Chad to take over
europeNorthwest AsiaIf only he hadn’t farted so much
good writeup on the "Zeitgeist"
spoiler
One by one, the US empire is discrediting all of its own arguments for why it should lead the world. All the violence, tyranny and injustice it claims to be keeping at bay with its globe-dominating leadership is being inflicted by the empire itself, in more and more brazen and egregious ways each year. The entire premise behind the empire’s containment strategies, military encirclement and cold war brinkmanship with China is that obviously the PRC needs to be stopped from rising and displacing the US as the global leader, and arguments about the need to control Russia and Iran by any means necessary arise from the same premise. These arguments are accepted as a given by many on the basis that the US is a free and democratic country which promotes liberal values and opposes authoritarianism, so of course it’s better to have the US in charge of world affairs.
But every point which could be used to bolster that argument is being rapidly eroded by the US itself. The US is making the world a much more violent and dangerous place. The US is assaulting freedom by perpetrating and facilitating more and more injustice and authoritarianism. The US is undermining international law by constantly violating it. Every argument that could be made for the merits of US global leadership gets weaker by the day. As the US backs Israel in routinely committing horrifying massacres in Gaza, it’s clear that the US cannot claim to be making the world a more peaceful and harmonious place. As the US and its allies recklessly ramp up nuclear brinkmanship with Russia over the failing proxy war in Ukraine, it’s clear that the US cannot claim to be making the world safer.
As the US denounces the International Criminal Court for applying for arrest warrants of Israeli officials, and supports Israel in dismissing the orders of the International Court of Justice to cease its assault on Rafah, it’s clear that the US has discredited its claim as the upholder of the “rules-based international order”. As online censorship and banned pro-Palestine slogans are increasingly normalized throughout the US-led western world, it’s clear that the US has discredited its claim to being a protector of the freedom of speech. As the US inflicts violent police crackdowns on anti-genocide protesters on university campuses nationwide, it’s clear that the US has discredited its claim to being a protector of the freedom of assembly. As the US backs Israel in murdering a historic number of journalists and shutting down Al Jazeera, while itself imprisoning Julian Assange for journalistic activity exposing US war crimes, it’s clear that the US has discredited its claim to being a protector of the freedom of the press.
As the US supports its proxies in Kyiv canceling elections in Ukraine while providing military assistance to most of the world’s dictatorships, it is clear that the US has discredited its claim to being a major promotor of democracy. Whatever argument you could come up with for why the world benefits from US leadership, there are major stories in the news right now which soundly discredit such claims. The evidence is in, and that argument has been lost. This is not some empty rhetorical point I’m just making to show that my worldview is better than those of the mainstream western empire apologist; it is extremely relevant to present and future developments of unparalleled importance to the survival of our species.
The US empire has been simultaneously ramping up aggressions against China and Russia as well as in the middle east with increasing recklessness that appears bound for a massive military confrontation with at least one major nuclear-armed state at some point in the coming years. It is doing so because the rise of China means US planetary hegemony will be on its way out the door unless something significant occurs, and the empire managers appear to have calculated that it’s worth risking the life of every terrestrial organism to force that something significant to occur. The only possible argument that this is a sane or reasonable thing to do is that the world is better off with US leadership than without it. But as we just discussed, every possible premise of that claim has been soundly discredited by the actions of the United States. And it’s only getting worse.
This to me makes it abundantly clear that the world would be better off without US leadership. Whenever I say this I get empire apologists in my comments furiously arguing that if the US doesn’t dominate our planet then China will, but there’s no evidence that China seeks to supplant the US as a unipolar planetary hegemon, and the assumption that there must always be one unipolar power dominating the globe is ahistorical nonsense. In all of human history there has been only one unipolar planetary hegemon, namely the US empire, and it didn’t exist until the fall of the Soviet Union in the nineties.
It is not rational to believe that something which has only happened one single time in all of history must be the norm for our world. Multipolarity has been the norm, not the exception, throughout all the rest of our time on this planet prior to the emergence of US global supremacy some three decades ago. None of this is to suggest that a multipolar world will solve all our problems or give rise to peace and harmony. But it is clear that accepting the emergence of such a world is preferable to a world in which the US empire seeks to suppress and delay its arrival with rapidly increasing amounts of violence and aggression, up to and including ramping up for World War Three and playing insane games of chicken with armageddon weapons. The US empire is too crazy and sick to be allowed to rule the world anymore. There is no argument to be made that the benefits outweigh the costs. There is no reason the world’s great powers cannot come together and collaborate toward a healthy world for the benefit of everyone, if humanity can just shrug off its primitive impulse to dominate and control.
I love days like today where my brain goes "we're having a good day, let's be high too", no drugs required. at least it waited until after work so I don't have to explain why I'm so giggly. like weed, I don't even notice until I stand up and go wheeee. wish it would ask permission first.
but seriously, kinda tripping apropos of nothing. it's bizarre. at least it's a nice body high this time. stg my body/brain makes too many cannabinoids sometimes. it feels exactly like a low/mid dose delta-9 gummy. it's a little worrying cause THC/anything close enough is a seizure trigger for me. might be in for a rough night.
Current electoral status in México: today is the
The INE said more than 99% of the ballots are already installed
The first instance of violence happened in Puebla after there was a shooting close to a ballot that killed 1 person, also puebla and 2 other stated report attemps to burn ballots
In the News for the official results of the South African elections, the MK party, led by Zacob Zuma, has just overtaken the EFF in the official count, and are steadily pulling away. The MK is expected to get 14% of the vote by the time vote counting is complete. A very disappointing result incoming for the EFF, not only have they lost all of their new supporters to the MK, they are losing supporters from the 2019 elections and are expected to have a worse result than 2019. I know a lot of communists internationally critically support the EFF, so I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news. The DA have also gained no new supporters, or all the new support they have gained is offset by losses to other parties, which was expected given their campaign.
The ANC has effectively been split by the MK and PA. Zuma took his support base with him, first to the EFF after he met with them, and then to his own party in the MK. Zuma played Malema and Shivambu of the EFF, his political instincts are still great. The PA took a lot of Christian nationalist/Zionist and coloured (an ethno-cultural group in South Africa made up of mixed race people, it's not a slur here) votes from the ANC. As a trend overall, political parties are breaking down along racial, ethnic, cultural and religious lines in a reactionary way, with social conservatism making a big comeback. This is combined with there being no credible left opposition to the ANC. Overall it's a very worrying trend.
people be writing about arab street as a separate entity from countries rulers, and then waxing poetic about democracy of the westInitial election results and predictions for the 2024 South African elections are in, and it's not looking good for anyone, except for the MK party. The ANC are predicted to drop well below 50%, the DA are stuck in the low 20% range, and the entirety of their increased support (all 1% of it) comes from ex FF+ voters. The EFF has lost a huge amount of ground to Zacob Zuma's MK party, over half of their support as the EFF was polling around 20% and are now only expected to get 9%, which is what happens when you practice tailism and try to appeal to the personality cult of Zacob Zuma. Zuma can always start his own party and take his supporters with him. Which is what he did. The Christian nationalist PA are in fifth, which is worrying.
https://hexbear.net/comment/4955487
So here's a few screenshots of the headlines on the frontpage of a few MSM sites.
CNN's captions includes Israeli claim that they killed 2 Hamas leaders in the attack.
Both yahoo (which I posted yesterday) and BBC's headlines imply that the Israeli bombing was in response to Hamas' rocket attack. Biggest problem with this implication is that, much like during the reporting during Oct. 7th, Hamas is the aggressor. Completely ignoring that Israel has been attacking Rafah for a couple weeks now and these attacks all started after Hamas had said they were going to agree to a ceasefire.
Maybe its the shitty design of their website with the gigantic banner begging for money, but their headline and caption for their coverage of the Rafah bombing was slightly obscured. The headline and caption was more or less in line with Yahoo/BBC though, so not all that different.
The "best" one and also most cursed for their complete lack of coverage on their front page is MSNBC. Israel killing refugees in a camp that they told them to go to can't top Trump. Like holy shit, they need to negotiate with Trump for the naming rights of the network. At this point its the Trump News Network.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva announced the donation of two thousand tons of meat to feed the victims of the heavy rains and floods in Rio Grande do Sul since the end of April.
Brazil: The death toll from the rain tragedy in Rio Grande do Sul rose to 169, according to the latest bulletin from the state Civil Defense while the number of missing persons fell to 56.
50 years of Malaysia-China relations: headlines
On May 31st, 2024, Malaysia and China will celebrate 50 years of successful relations. The written essay is still WIP so in the meantime I compiled headlines and quotes from across Malaysian and Chinese media highlighting the celebration.
Source of logo. They also released a song.Xinhua - Interview: "Shared chemistry" helps build Malaysia-China relationship, says Malaysia's party leader
"It's more than just trade ties. It's more than economic linkages. It's an appreciation that we speak to common ideals, common aspirations and a shared future for the betterment of not just economy and GDP per capita alone, but the betterment of people-to-people connection," she said.
Bernama - Malaysia-China to mark golden jubilee, boost trade, diplomatic relations via MOUs — Zafrul
The Star - Chinese nationals who came, saw and conquered BM [Bahasa Malaysia, “Malaysian” or Malay, the national language]
“I feel close to the people here,” he said, attributing it to the similarity in culture with the Chinese community and the shared religion with the Malays.
“I never felt like a stranger or an outcast. Here, I feel like a Malaysian,” he said.
As for the 50 years of Malaysia-China diplomatic relations, Cui said he is proud of the close relationship between the countries.
“We are the direct beneficiaries because of the good ties. When Malaysians know that we are from China, there is so much warmth,” he said.
The Star - 50 years of enduring Malaysia-China friendship
But unlike previous Malaysian PMs and other world leaders, Anwar has always looked beyond economic and strategic opportunities.
His trips to China, from day one, have been about Chinese values and philosophy, especially the Confucian mind, and the positive commonalities with Islam.
…But his sentiment was reserved for Admiral Zheng He, or Cheng Ho as most Malaysians know him. Zheng He sailed to over 30 nations in Asia and Africa during his time. He made seven stops in Melaka, in the early 1400s. His ship was five times the size of the ship which Christopher Columbus used to cross the Atlantic.
Said Anwar: "There was a great difference between Zheng He and the others. He did not conquer the nations he visited. He sought friendship instead
…For the first time, [the academic] wrote, a Malaysian leader had displayed such a "highly appreciative outlook towards a Chinese culture and civilisational heritage’’ and had a life-long passion for Confucian-Islamic dialogue and efforts.
Malaysia became the first Asean nation to establish diplomatic relations with China at a time when China was in isolation.
As Tan Sri Nazir Razak put it, the handshake between the late Chairman Mao Zedong and the late PM Tun Abdul Razak was arguably "the most important diplomatic handshake in Malaysia’s history”.
SCMP - The Chinese eunuch who beat admiral Zheng He to Malacca, and the exchanges that followed between its rulers and China
Malacca in present-day Malaysia was once a sultanate ruling over an extensive territory. As such it had regular exchanges with China’s Ming dynasty court
With Portuguese invading, China, as Malacca’s protector, called on vassals to go to its defence in its hour of need, but in vain. Thus did colonial rule begin
CHINA DAILY - Ambassador: China-Malaysia relations at their peak
Xinhua - Chinese premier meets Malaysia's deputy PM
New Strait Times - Public university branch in China will strengthen Malaysia-China relations, says senator
There are a lot of events and other news articles on this but I'll stop here. The point I am trying to showcase here is that the basis Malaysia-China of relations are much more holistic than just economics. It is about history, culture and civilisation - something that Amerika lacks and will never understand.
The Country of the Week is Chad!
Feel free to post or recommend any books, essays, studies, articles, and even stories related to Chad.
If you know a lot about the country and want to share your knowledge and opinions, here are some questions to get you started if you wish:
spoiler
- What is the general ideology of the political elite? Do they tend to be protectionist nationalists, or are they more free trade globalists? Are they compradors put there by foreign powers? Are they socialists with wide support by the population?
- What are the most important domestic political issues that make the country different from other places in the region or world? Are there any peculiar problems that have continued existing despite years or decades with different parties?
- Is the country generally stable? Are there large daily protests or are things calm on average? Is the ruling party/coalition generally harmonious or are there frequent arguments or even threats?
- Is there a particular country to which this country has a very impactful relationship over the years, for good or bad reasons? Which one, and why?
- What are the political factions in the country? What are the major parties, and what segments of the country do they attract?
- Are there any smaller parties that nonetheless have had significant influence? Are there notable separatist movements?
- How socially progressive or conservative is the country generally? To what degree is there equality between men and women, as well as different races and ethnic groups? Are LGBTQIA+ rights protected?
- Give a basic overview of the last 50 or 100 years. What's the historical trend of politics, the economy, social issues, etc - rise or decline? Were they always independent or were they once occupied, and how have things been since independence if applicable?
- If you want, go even further back in history. Were there any kingdoms or empires that once governed the area?
Check out the reading list. Nothing on Chad specifically yet, unfortunately.
Hezbollah video of them blowing shit up:
https://twitter.com/intelFromBrian/status/1797304495447167039?mx=1https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1d22hhz/aoc_calls_israeli_attack_on_rafah_camp_an/
thread there is surprisingly decent for r/politics
Brazilian government helps Argentina with Petrobras and avoids energy collapse. Argentina's request for help mobilized the Foreign Relations Minister and the Minister of Mines and Energy in Brazil.
Despite the lack of dialogue between Presidents Javier Milei and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian government came to Argentina's rescue this week to unblock the supply of natural gas from Petrobras and avoid an energy collapse in the neighboring country.
On the 22nd, Argentina hastily hired a ship with 44 million cubic meters (m³) of liquefied gas (LNG) from Petrobras to mitigate a sudden shortage of the fuel in the country.
The Milei government was racing against the clock, as the gas shortage was already paralyzing part of Argentina's industrial activity and causing queues and closures at gas stations. The crisis comes after a surge in consumption in recent weeks, due to an atypical cold snap not seen in decades, and on the eve of winter, when gas consumption increases dramatically to supply heating in homes.
More crying from settlers:
https://twitter.com/aljnoubi2000/status/1797107319987171776?mx=1Just a disclaimer: If you reply to me with "this is so obvious lol" I'm going to be unhappy. No it isn't. People post Jacobin all the time. You being paranoid about everything is not an accomplishment unless it motivates investigation. People are going to dismiss this too like it isn't accompanied by thousands of dismissals of revolutionary thought in their magazine. Because they have written an article for you. They have articles for me, they have my buddy Gpeyrol16's articles. Just like I know a guy who wrote for CAG without even knowing who Aaron Good is or his association with suslord RFK Jr.
and who do they also support? our lovely Jacobin teaching you how cool it is to slander Iranian leaders as soon as they hit the dirt (I use the term slander because it is a missed opportunity for real discussion of Iranian politics, it cuts both ways)
ripped from here: https://nitter.poast.org/UrOrientalist/status/1253691559364657155#m
didn't check their feed idgaf
The soc dems and dem socs in Mexico absolutely crushed it holy shit
Hi Nerds today besides the
for president there are also local elections including the for 9 governors and the race for them is currently looking like this:In Mexico City Morena lead with 51% and the PAN is in 2nd with 39%
In Chiapas Morena is winning with 78% of the
In Guanajuato PAN stays in with 51%
In Jalisco MC is currently at 49%
in Morelos Morena leads with 46%
In Puebla Morena is at 55%
In Tabasco Morena is at 81% of the votes
in Veracruz Morena lead with 58%
In Yucana PAN is at 47% and Morena at 46%
this are the current results using the PREP
The PREP is the system that shows the preliminary results of Election Day, through the Internet and various disseminators, after the capture and publication of the data provided by the polling place officials in the tally and count reports.
These results are informative and have no legal effect. The definitive results are determined in the district counts that take place after Election Day. Plus PREP only takes the first counted votes and the digital ones so this results could still change
Ancap Update:
Justice system freezes assets of leftist picket leader Eduardo Belliboni
Article
Assets of Polo Obrero leader Eduardo Belliboni, who is under investigation for alleged welfare fraud and embezzlement, frozen by federal judge.
Federal Judge Sebastián Casanello on Wednesday ordered the freezing of the assets of Polo Obrero leader Eduardo Belliboni, who is under investigation for alleged welfare fraud and embezzlement.
The move against the leftist social and picket leader is part of a government clampdown on welfare fraud and what it calls the ‘business of poverty’.
Casanello has asked for a lien to be placed on the assets of Belliboni, 64, a high-profile picket leader and leader of Polo Obrero, a Trotskyist social movement which has been at the forefront of demonstrations against various administrations for years.
Belliboni was summoned by the courts on Monday and will appear in June before Casanello, along with some 20 leaders of soup kitchens and social movements who are often managers of public aid programmes in a country where half the population lives in poverty.
The summons followed a series of raids in mid-May, in line with the government's intention to ‘audit’ social assistance and its alleged abuses. It alleges that in one audit, some 47 percent of soup kitchens registered with the government either did not exist or could not be located.
In the case of Polo Obrero, documents filed in court by government departments allege that only 30 percent of the 360 million pesos (US$395,000) placed into the organisation's hands between 2020 and 2023 as part of the ‘Potenciar Trabajo’ social aid programme were properly accounted for.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, Polo Obrero claimed that the funds “were fully accounted for to the Social Development Ministry, in the framework of the programmes for which they were allocated.”
The document, which denounces a “policy of persecution” on the part of Milei administration, states that the government is moving “against independent and militant organisations.”
“We have nothing to hide,” said Belliboni, who considers the case to be “a smokescreen to hide the fact that the economy is collapsing” and that thousands of jobs are being lost every day.
In the framework of the austerity programme implemented by Milei's government since he took office last December, chronic inflation is slowing down but the recession is worsening.
Belliboni said he will take advantage of his summons before the judge to file a complaint against the authorities' holding up of tonnes of food aid in warehouses.
Judge Casanello himself ordered the immediate distribution of this aid on Monday, but the government, which has filed an appeal, claims that these are “reserves” dedicated “to emergencies and catastrophes.”
On Wednesday, a demonstration was held in front of a warehouse where this food is stored in Villa Martelli, a suburb of Buenos Aires.
Mexican General Elections News:
The exit poll carried out in Mexico City by El Financiero gave the lead to the AMLO's Morena-PT-PVEM candidate, Clara Brugada.
The leaders of the two electoral coalitions, Heart and Strength for Mexico (Establishment Coalition) and We will Continue Making History (AMLO, Leftist), declared that they won the elections in ALL states, based on exit polls, with the leader of Morena (SHH) saying that they won all of it.
The Nmas channel has projected that the current electoral trends allow them to project the victory of Claudia Sheinbaum, candidate of the We will Continue Making History coalition, for the post of president of Mexico.
According to exit polls from channel TelevisaTV and ElFinanciero, Cláudia Sheinbaum will be the winner in the country's presidential elections.
Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo was born to a secular Jewish family in Mexico City. Her paternal Ashkenazi grandparents emigrated from Lithuania to Mexico City in the 1920s, while her maternal Sephardic grandparents emigrated there from Plovdiv, Bulgaria, in the early 1940s to escape the Holocaust. She celebrated all the Jewish holidays at her grandparents' homes.
Claudia Sheinbaum has openly identified herself as a feminist, aligning her beliefs and actions with the principles of gender equality and women's rights. She advocates for the legalization of abortion, aligning her stance with broader movements aimed at promoting reproductive rights and autonomy for women. During her leadership in Mexico City, Claudia Sheinbaum championed LGBT rights by implementing a gender-neutral policy for school uniforms. In 2022, she became the first Head of Government of Mexico City to attend the city's pride march.
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Tshisekedi, in power since January 2019, was re-elected in the first round last December with more than 73% of the vote.
On Wednesday, via National Television, the new presidential cabinet of President Félix Tshisekedi, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was announced.
Tshisekedi, in power since January 2019, was re-elected in the first round last December with more than 73% of the vote.
At the head of the new cabinet will be Prime Minister Judith Suminwa Tuluka. The announcement was highly anticipated, especially in the eastern part of the country, particularly the province of North Kivu, which is dealing with a serious security crisis.
"If the government has been revealed, we in North Kivu have only one expectation: the end of the war. The camps must be prepared so that everyone can return to their homes, "says Georges Yalala, a resident of Goma".
"We will be more satisfied to see that this government does not serve their interests or those of their families. The appointed members must understand that they are there to serve the Congolese people, meet their needs, solve their problems and work for the nation. " said biker Barabara Héritier.
During his tenure, Tshisekedi has prioritized job creation, economic diversification and increased purchasing power
This isn’t news necessarily, but a thing I’ve seen in the past, and a thing I’m seeing again currently. If you’re in a union, and especially if you’re close to power, keep an eye on your union’s paid staff. They’re supposed to be paid bureaucrats to help with paperwork and similar, but it very often can turn into an untouchable anti-reformist, anti-militant faction, fed and grown by nepotistically hiring their political allies and supporters. A whole network of power and collaboration hidden from common members.
Keep them on a short leash lol. It’s a pain in the ass to claw back power, even with decent elected reps.
#Double Death to Israel #815 5/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
deported to Rwanda for guess crimes
Okay map-bros and map-gals, what's going on in Ukraine? In Chasov Yar finally liberated? Is Ukraine finally on the verge of major frontline collapse? Are we in the weeks where decades happen or still in the decades where weeks happen phase? Which are the next major towns/cities to be contested?
#DEATH to Israel #818 4/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
what the fuck. what is this? THE FRENCH????
#A Century of Humiliation in the Span of One Week and Subsequent Death to Israel #816 3/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
GAS! GAS! GAS GAS GAS GAS
i am a tankie yes, but not all tanks deserve love. for example, merkava tanks deserve hell and destruction
#Tradle #813 4/6 🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟨 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 https://oec.world/en/games/tradle
spoiler
Size and disproportionately fishing income told me it was an island with under a million people, so I started with micronesia and then fumbled around with geoclues.
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#Comical Death to Israel #814 2/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
so I usually skim the wiki for each country when playing and sometimes the history section does a timeskip (usually past any socialist governments, nothing happened)
today the timeskip was >2000 years from 1000BC to the 16th century
Mexican Presidential Elections
Claudia Sheinbaum (MORENA-PT-PVEM) (AMLO Party)- 781,883 votes | 60.03% -
Xochitl Galvez (PAN-PRI-PRD) (Establishment Coalition)- 365,905 votes | 28.09% +
Jorge Alvarez Maynez (MC) (Liberal)- 120,236 votes | 9.23% +
Calculated: 2.70%
#Death to Israhell #817 3/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
thought it was Azerbaijan at first
#Deads to Israel #820 2/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
picked Kosovo first because I know that shit is on there
#A Grisly Death to Israel #819 2/6
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https://oec.world/en/games/tradlespoiler
[points at southern europe] somewhere around here
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Mexican Presidential Elections
Claudia Sheinbaum (MORENA-PT-PVEM) (AMLO Party)- 883,805 votes | 59.81% -
Xochitl Galvez (PAN-PRI-PRD) (Establishment Coalition)- 365,905 votes | 28.24% +
Jorge Alvarez Maynez (MC) (Liberal)- 120,236 votes | 9.32% +
Calculated: 3.04%
i used to joke about "president xi please fire the nukes" but at this point i think i would genuinely find nuclear bombardment of my country a reasonable outcome considering everything we have done/are doing to the world
Mexican Presidential Elections
Claudia Sheinbaum (MORENA-PT-PVEM) (AMLO Party)- 1,391,353 votes | 59.14% -
Xochitl Galvez (PAN-PRI-PRD) (Establishment Coalition)- 675,352 votes | 28.70% +
Jorge Alvarez Maynez (MC) (Liberal)- 226,365 votes | 9.62% +
Calculated: 4.67%
Mexican Presidential Elections
Claudia Sheinbaum (MORENA-PT-PVEM) (AMLO Party)- 296,473 votes | 60.49% +
Xochitl Galvez (PAN-PRI-PRD) (Establishment Coalition)- 137,667 votes | 28.09% -
Jorge Alvarez Maynez (MC) (Liberal)- 42,785 votes | 8,73% +
Calculated: 1.4%
Some things sometimes happen.
getting paid in cheeto dust and gamerfuel. Thats the live
Please Mr Stamrmer Replace Nuclear Alert System with Wiz Khalifa - See You Again ft. Charlie Puth [Official Video] Furious 7 Soundtrack It makes no difference what men think of war. War endures.
I'm guilty on all 34 counts? Wow. I didn't know that. You're telling me now for the first time.
is not reliable source of info
Trump will go to prison and run a dark Eugene Debs style campaign for president, win, liberals will do nothing, then Biden runs again in 2028 against Trump who claims one of his terms didn’t count because of impeachment
CONVICTED FELON DONALD DRUMPF 
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