Image is of a destroyed American AWACS plane in Saudi Arabia, of which there is a very limited supply and each of which is enormously expensive both monetarily and in terms of components. Iran hit this with a precision drone strike that likely cost ~$20,000.
I don’t have much to add from the last megathread description. This isn’t to say that nothing has happened or has changed since then - decades are still happening in weeks - but the general flow of the war is remaining the same. Trump sometimes threatens to open the Strait with troops and flatten Iran to rubble, and other times threatens that he’s gonna back off and let other countries handle it if they really want little trifles like “fuel” and “energy” so much. Iran continues to strike across the Middle East. The West continues to bomb civilian infrastructure due to their relative inability to affect the missile cities. In all: things are generally getting worse for America and the Zionists.
April is the month where the last ships that left Hormuz before it was closed will arrive around the world, so the last month of economic turmoil has been a mere prelude to what’s going to occur in the near-future. The silver lining is that Iran appears to be formalizing the new state of affairs in Hormuz, creating a rial-based toll to allow passage between a pair of Iranian-controlled islands where they can be monitored, meaning that, as long as the US doesn’t do something exceptionally stupid, the global energy crisis may “only” last a couple years instead of simply being the new reality from now on. Some countries have already agreed to this arrangement, and others will inevitably follow despite their consternation as their economies increasingly suffer.
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists’ destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
I feel like we need a pinned comment or something reminding people to remain calm and not just be a doomer about everything. People were dooming about nukes, then they were dooming about the ceasefire, now many of those same people are dooming about the ceasefire being broken, something many of us thought would happen. If you truly, honestly believe that things are so hopeless, that the US and Israel are truly undefeatable titans who cannot ever be stopped, then why are you even on here? Why are you even a communist if you clearly think communism won’t win and the US will reign forever? A revolution isn’t a dinner party, and neither is a war. A war isn’t a fucking video game, and neither is a revolution. If you’re suffering from a bout of doomerism, go outside, touch grass, build community, talk to your neighbours, spend less time online, join an org, especially join an org if you’re all doom and gloom.
Doomerism isn’t proper analysis, it’s depression disguised as analysis. It does nothing but encourage inaction in you and others, it’s wrecker shit, don’t be a wrecker, you’re better than that.
https://xcancel.com/unusual_whales/status/2041867909140770893
“The UK must accept it is no longer a global power,” per FT
News from November 1956 just dropped.
https://xcancel.com/AryJeay/status/2041968968748167439
A lot of anger among Iranians tonight for ceasefire violation in Lebanon. I was at one of the night gatherings and this guy told me: “We don’t want this cursed ceasefire if our brothers & sisters in Lebanon are being slaughtered. They stood by us, now we should stand by them.”
really hoping the reformist faction completely loses support and gets ran out of the country at this point
https://xcancel.com/AryJeay/status/2041941054438433271
Not a single reformist got a small scratch during this all out war. None of them.
True. A yellow taxi driver, yesterday, told me that if you want to stay alive in Iran, there are 2 places where you’ll be 100% safe: Hassan Rouhani’s home and Zarif’s home 😂
https://xcancel.com/ChristopherHale/status/2041959904823366074 https://archive.ph/DHY8k
NEW: A stunning new report claims that the Pentagon summoned Pope Leo XIV’s top American diplomat and threatened him after the U.S.-born pontiff gave his January state-of-the-world address. Leo used the address to denounce a world ruled by “a diplomacy based on force” and “zeal for war.” In January, behind closed doors at the Pentagon, Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby summoned Cardinal Christophe Pierre — Pope Leo XIV’s then-ambassador to the United States — and delivered a lecture.
westerners really love their lectures
America, Colby and his colleagues told the cardinal, has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world. The Catholic Church had better take its side. As tempers rose, one U.S. official reached for a fourteenth-century weapon and invoked the Avignon Papacy, the period when the French Crown used military force to bend the bishop of Rome to its will. That scene, broken this week by Mattia Ferraresi in an extraordinary piece of journalism for The Free Press, may be the most remarkable moment in the long and knotted history of the American republic’s relationship with the Catholic Church. In the speech that enraged Pete Hegseth and top Pentagon officials, Pope Leo XIV said: “A diplomacy that promotes dialogue and seeks consensus among all parties is being replaced by a diplomacy based on force.” “War is back in vogue, and a zeal for war is spreading. “The principle established after the Second World War, which prohibited nations from using force to violate the borders of others, has been completely undermined.”
Pete Hegseth’s pastor and mentor says the United States should ban public Masses, Marian processions, and Corpus Christi devotions. Hegseth invited the anti-Catholic preacher to lead a prayer service at the Pentagon on February 14. For the first time in modern history, the Pentagon offered no Good Friday services for Catholics this year. While Catholics don’t celebrate Mass on Good Friday, they do venerate the cross of Jesus Christ and receive the Eucharist. Earlier this year, Pete Hegseth invited his pastor to speak at the Pentagon. That pastor has called for banning public expressions of Catholicism in the United States.
UPDATE: Letters from Leo can now independently confirm that the meeting took place — and that the Vatican was so alarmed by the Pentagon’s tactics that Pope Leo XIV shelved plans to visit the United States later this year. Many in the Vatican saw the Pentagon’s reference to an Avignon papacy as a threat to use military force against the Holy See.
An informed source told Tasnim News that Iran will withdraw from the ceasefire if Tel Aviv continues attacking Lebanon:
https://xcancel.com/PauloMacro/status/2041959446696382488
There’s a 310MW fire at Abqaiq right now - nbd (and before you say gas flares, those run 10-20MW)
What’s there?
oh nothing, just Saudi Aramco’s largest oil processing and crude stabilization facility with nameplate processing capacity of 7mmbpd … you know… the largest single crude processing center in the world.
This is the same thing the Houthies hit in 2019, which made oil spike ~20%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abqaiq–Khurais_attack
At this point it seems the entity is actively seeking to get bombed.
I know their strategy is to have the US destroy Iran, but surely they must be aware that they will get pounded increasingly hard by Iran since they are smaller and smaller interceptor inventories.
When does this become a suicidal strategy?
This was probably the worst day of the war for us Lebanese. The scenes in Beirut today are just brutal, and it’s even worse in Sour and the rest of the abandoned South. Our government is nothing more than a Zionist tool against the Shia of Lebanon, and I can’t help but feeling backstabbed by the shortsightedness and naivety of Iranian negotiators. What is the value of a ceasefire that doesn’t lift the burden of the most vulnerable and wartorn part of the Axis of Resistance? God help us
Traders place large $950 million bet on oil price falling hours ahead of ceasefire
it’s all insider trading, isn’t it?
Interesting: Canadian media reporting on the attacks in Lebanon take a different tone than what we’re used to. No passive voice, mainly focusing on innocent civilians being injured, and discusses how the pager attacks were largely useless against targetting Hezbollah and mainly hurt civilians
Could this be a shift from western support of Israel to the government’s recognizing that Israel is beginning to threaten the stability of the western system?
⭕️ White House Claims Iran’s 10-Point Plan Was “Thrown in the Garbage” — Lebanon Not Part of Deal
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed Wednesday that Iran’s original 10-point proposal was “fundamentally unserious, unacceptable and completely discarded” – and was “literally thrown in the garbage by President Trump and his negotiating team.”
Leavitt claimed that as the deadline neared, Tehran submitted a separate, condensed 10-point proposal that Washington evaluated as a more reasonable and entirely different plan, and that it is this version – not the original plan Iran published and Iranian state media circulated – that serves as the basis for the ceasefire.
Leavitt also stated that “Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire,” adding that the position “has been relayed to all parties involved.” Trump separately told PBS that Israel’s continued strikes on Hezbollah were “part of the deal – everyone knows that. That’s a separate skirmish.”
The claims directly contradict Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who brokered the truce and declared an “immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon and elsewhere, EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY.”
Trump threatens 50% tariffs on countries supplying Iran with weapons - Al Jazeera update
Trump says imports from countries supplying Iran with military weapons will face immediate 50 percent tariffs with no exemptions, threatening the new duties just hours after agreeing to a two-week ceasefire with Tehran.
“A Country supplying Military Weapons to Iran will be immediately tariffed, on any and all goods sold to the United States of America, 50%, effective immediately, There will be no exclusions or exemptions! President DJT,” Trump wrote on social media, without naming any countries. China and Russia have helped Iran build military capacity to counter US and Israeli pressure, supplying missiles, air defence systems and dual-use technologies intended to bolster deterrence.
Both Beijing and Moscow have denied supplying any weapons recently, although allegations against Russia have persisted.
Iran said they targeted the Saudi East-West (Yanbu) pipeline that bypasses Hormuz. There is a big fire, the speculation is that they hit the main pumping station. Even if a less important part of the pipeline was hit (or even just oil storage next to the pipeline), you would expect this to be major news everywhere, that pipeline is the only real big bypass of Hormuz and it is working at 100% capacity right now. Instead, there is almost nothing. The censorship regime during this war is crazy.
Saudi Arabia’s oil pipeline to the Red Sea was hit by a drone attack on Wednesday afternoon, according to a person familiar with the matter. The damage is still being assessed, the person said. Saudi Aramco declined to comment. The East-West pipeline has served as a vital lifeline to getting Saudi oil to global markets after the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed by the conflict in the Middle East.
[edit] Ummm, let me be clear, Iran targeted the location hours before the ceasefire, in anticipation of major US/Israel strikes on their energy grid.
My theory is that both sides know exactly what they agreed to, which is a variant of Iran’s ten demands or whatever. What the Epstein Axis is banking on is that Iran pulls a 2024 Hezbollah and keeps adhering to the ceasefire while the US and Israel keep breaking it. Iran were happy to sign this agreement quickly because it gave them some very favourable terms, but the problem is that US and Israel obviously don’t fucking care about this ceasefire, they only offered it to dupe Iran into signing something that restrains their ability to respond for a while.
