Image is sourced from this Guardian article.
The Pope's fucking dead.
He gave JD Vance three chocolate easter eggs, exchanged pleasantries for 17 minutes, and then keeled over and died.
What a way to go.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
If you have evidence of Israeli crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
US airstrikes continue on Yemen for the 39th night in a row.
Multiple rounds of airstrikes have targeted Taiz, Hodeidah and Saada Governorates, along with Kamaran Island.
More airstrikes in Ma'rib Governorate.
Ballistic missile launched at Israel from Yemen, was reportedly intercepted.
Warning for potential graphic imagery of casualties during ongoing airstrikes:
Al Masirah TV twitter
Xcancel mirror
The Yemeni Armed Forces released a statement earlier today, about shooting down another MQ-9 Reaper drone, along with launching cruise missiles and drones at US Navy warships. Their anti drone air defence systems are proving very difficult to suppress under current SEAD doctrine.
In more US military movements to the region, two E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft arrived in Saudi Arabia today, and a third could be on it's way. This is quite a significant development, to move airborne warning and control aircraft to the region.
Lots of strategic bomber movement within the United States tonight, with a B-52 now tracking east over the Atlantic Ocean. We may see yet another bomber deployment, on top of the 10 USAF bombers currently forward deployed (6 B-2s in Diego Garcia, 4 B-1s in Japan).
The B-52 is currently approaching two mid air refueling aircraft over the Atlantic.
Is there any remote chance for Yemen to shoot down a B2?
I know these planes usually deploy standoff weapons, but don't they eventually get inside AD territory? Do they even have the capabilities (radar + the missiles) to lock on into one and shoot it down? Could there be a repeat of the F-117 incident in Serbia?
Basically zero, barring some extreme fuckup by the americans. Ukraine has been unable to shoot down su-57s launching kh69 stealth cruise missiles, and they have s300 and patriot air defenses. The b2 is stealthier and Yemen has worse air defenses. The missiles they've been using to take out the drones are small IR guided ones, which probably can't even reach the altitude of the bombers.
The one in Serbia was because the Air Force was flying a B-2 on the same bombing route through the same valley for several nights in a row, so the AA crew just set up in the right spot and waited for the bomb bay doors to open and break the stealth.
One imagines that they don't do that anymore, but it's not a very smart organization either...
it was f 117 not b-2