Image is of destruction and damage inside Israel, sourced from this article.

Iran and Israel have struck each other many times over the last few days. There has been a general focus on military facilities and headquarters by both sides, though Israel has also struck oil facilities, civilian structures and hospitals, and in return for this, Iran has struck major scientific centers and the Haifa oil facilities.

Israel appears to have three main aims. First, to collapse the Iranian state, either through shock and breakdown by killing enough senior officials, or via some sort of internal military coup. Second, to try and destroy Iranian nuclear sites and underground missile cities, or at least to paralyze them long enough to achieve the first and third goals. And third, to bring the US into a direct conflict with Iran. This is because the US better equipped to fight them than Israel is (though victory would still not be guaranteed depending on what Iran chooses to do).

Iranian nuclear facilities are hidden deep underground (800 meters), far beyond the depth range of even the most powerful bunker busters (~70 meters or so), and built such that the visible ground entrances are horizontally far away in an unknown direction from the actual underground chambers. Only an extremely competent full-scale American bombing force all simultaneously using multiple of the most powerful conventional (perhaps even nuclear) bunker busters could even hypothetically hope to breach them (and we have seen how, in practice, American bunker busters have largely failed to impair or deter Ansarallah). There are several analysts on both sides who have concluded that it is entirely impossible to physically prevent Iran from building nukes.

I fully expect the US to join the war. I believe the current ambiguity is a deliberate invention of the US while they work to move their military assets into position, and as soon as they are ready, the US will start bombing Iran. After that, Iran’s leadership must - if they haven’t already - harden their hearts, and strike back with no fear, or risk following the path of Libya, Syria, and Iraq, either into either surrender, occupation, or annihilation. Every day where they do not possess a nuke is a day where lives are being lost and cities are being bombed.

Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.

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.

  • thethirdgracchi [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    75·
    13 hours ago

    —❗️🇮🇷/🇮🇱 Washington Post: ‘Israel will only be able to maintain shooting down Iranian ballistic missiles for 10 or 12 more days, then they will need to start rationing munitions’

    This could explain why Iran is opting to launch small but consecutive waves. Iran is likely using up some of their older / less sophisticated missiles to deplete Israeli defenses, to make way for the ‘real’ stuff later on. This is attritional warfare.

    In most cases, a small wave of 3-5 Iranian ballistic missiles is enough to prompt the launch of about 10-15 Israeli interceptor missiles, with each one costing at least $12 million dollars (in the case of THAAD).

    In contrast, even Iran’s most modern missile, the Fattah-1, only costs about $200,000 to produce. If we assume 12 interceptors for one Fattah-1 missile (as seen in a video today), that means Israel is spending $144 million dollars to ‘intercept’ (or not) a single Iranian hypersonic missile.

    This is simply not sustainable. Within about two weeks, if Iran keeps up the current pace of fire, Israeli airspace will be at the mercy of Iran’s far larger and more destructive solid fuel missiles. Unless, of course, the U.S. intervenes directly.

    From @Middle_East_Spectator, good analysis that lines up with a lot of what we’ve been saying here.

    • MarmiteLover123 [comrade/them, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
      32·
      12 hours ago

      In contrast, even Iran’s most modern missile, the Fattah-1, only costs about $200,000 to produce. If we assume 12 interceptors for one Fattah-1 missile (as seen in a video today), that means Israel is spending $144 million dollars to ‘intercept’ (or not) a single Iranian hypersonic missile.

      The numbers here are not necessarily wrong, but out of context. Yes Iran claims Fattah 1 costs $200 000, but that’s just manufacturing costs, there are and were other costs involved such as development, maintenance, deployment, training, etc. So the “full unit cost” could be substantially higher.

      As for the interceptors visible, those weren’t THAAD Talon interceptors. THAAD has a minimum intercept altitude of around 40km, this was taking place at a much lower altitude. Most likely David’s Sling Stunner interceptors directly targeting the missile or other missiles, or Iron Dome Tamir interceptors trying to hit debris, as they can’t directly target ballistic missiles. Stunner interceptors cost $700 000 each, Tamir interceptors between $50 000 to $100 000.

      So a more realistic number would be say a $400 000 Fattah-1 vs $8.4 million of Stunner interceptors, if they were all David’s Sling in the video. However it should be noted that for the missile to get to that point, it’s avoided being hit by SM-3, Arrow 3, THAAD and Arrow-2, which may have already fired and missed. These are really expensive interceptors as many have pointed out. That’s the real issue. SM-3 and THAAD are extremely expensive and stock is limited. Arrow 3 is not that expensive as those, but it’s still $4 million an interceptor.

      • Crucible [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
        21·
        12 hours ago

        Do you have any info on the speed of production on the interceptors outside Israel? Wondering if there’s a point where Israel runs out of interceptors and the US can’t get them enough replacements even if the money tap is on

        • MarmiteLover123 [comrade/them, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
          16·
          12 hours ago

          I think David’s Sling, Arrow 2 and Arrow 3 are all produced in Israel, though these are systems jointly developed with the United States. So there could be some US production in critical parts. Estimates and production numbers are all very classified as Israeli state secrets.

          As for the US SM-3 Block IBs, most estimates put stock at around 500, and there was a new agreement to manufacture 55 of them this year I think? THAAD production rates can apparently get as high as 96 a year if producing 8 interceptors a month can be sustained for an entire year, and stocks were at 900 at the beginning of the year, they celebrated delivering the 900th interceptor.