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.
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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 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.
Can we treat Iran as a big boy regional power with remotely competent leadership and long historical consiousness and agency, look at their choices and approachments regarding military partenerships and buildup and factor that in on the where China or russia are currently, regarding capability and willlingness to directly intervene in iran. As well as where Iran currently stands militarily. Instead of treating it like some big baby that is being let down by its bigger "anti-imperialist" daddies?
Sure China's willingness to intervene in military material, manpower and economic ways can be judged on its own but for that to even be possible we have to know the answer to some questions regarding Iran. Was iran ever open and ever attempted any level of meaningful military alliance with China? Even thought of hosting any military power or bases? Ever tried purchasing en mass any relevant Chinese systems and weapons? After the UN weapons sanctions/ limits or whatever ended in 2020?? iranian army and irgc generals and politcians visited China and Pakistan in official and unoffical capacities multiple times and inspected j-10c and JF-17s. Pakistan itself only procured them a couple of years before. After dragging their feet they made a su-35 deal with Russia AFTER the ukraine war started and have gotten ass as of yet. You cant actualy convince me with certainty that if they really wanted and were desperate for it that they couldnt have made some deals. We cant know details so its no use making accusations but its something to consider. Maybe it was distrust towards china and a pakistan like china dependency and "we got this" delusion, maybe to prioritize their proxies (keeping that bum assad in power and that state working probably cost them more than 100 j-10cs) in the region and domestic assymetric drone and missile capabilities. Maybe China said no no we cant cause US and israel said so but who knows.
What we do know is that Iran had its own views regarding own sovereignty, its military power and what and where it wanted to focus on and spend money and capital within its military strategism. And the urgency and type of approachments or proccurements it made regarding china and russia were a function of that as much as they were of what russia and china itself wanted or didnt want to do or give iran. Iran's view of itself, the west and russia or china along with the internal factions pushing in different directions forged today's Iran-Russia and Iran-China relations and relative standing just as much as China's and Russians foreign policies did. Even for non military, strategic partnership cooperation agreements like the one Iran fast tracked and signed today with Russia. They were literally dragging their feet until they were getting bombed and US tanker aircraft are flying over the Atlantic toward the Middle East. Who's to say irans government and strategism where not as much of a roadblock to some alt universe closer chinese relationship and cooperation that could have made a big difference in this scenario as China's non interverntion or do nothing brainworms or whatever we are calling them.
Even right now as we speak, should China be more desperate to provide militarily help to Iran than Iran is desperate to seek that very same help from China. Are people really sure that the latter condition exists right now, let alone 2 or 5 years ago to a sufficient degree and that the former condition was the issue? What exactly people think Iran's outlook and trust and effort for closer military and political alliance was towards China in recent years ? Their strategy and willingness to use and accept Chinece force and influence for their protection and regional aspirations?
And i repeat this should be judged irrispectively of China's willingness or strategy to do the regional moves or alliances or sell the things iran did or did not, would or would not ask? And where one side stands is directly related to where the other choses to, it goes both ways