New preamble:
Palestinian resistance groups have launched an operation in and around Gaza to fight the genocidal settler state oppressing them. Thousands of rockets have been launched towards the so-called state of Israel, overwhelming the Iron Dome. Settlers and the troops protecting them are being killed in the settlements surrounding Gaza, with many caught by surprise in the first few hours of the operation.
Palestinians are taking many Israeli settlers and soldiers hostage and bringing them back to Gaza. An Israeli general, Nimrod Aloni, has been confirmed captured. Palestinians are also taking military and civilian equipment back. Drones and MANPADS appear to be in use, and a number of Merkava tanks have been destroyed/disabled and their occupants removed and taken hostage. Palestinian forces appear to be heading in two main directions so far: southeast in the direction of Be'er Sheva, and along the coast in the direction of Ashkelon, but settlements all around Gaza have been assaulted and taken. It is obviously unknown how far they intend to go, or what their intermediate goals are.
Israel is bombing the Gaza Strip with aircraft, destroying buildings. It appears that their intelligence on the location of Palestinian forces outside of Gaza is very poor, and haven't been able to meaningfully strike them. Netanyahu has given a statement declaring that Israel is in a state of war. Iran has issued statements in support of the uprising, and Israel has responded with hostility to those comments. In all, the IDF appears to still be in a shockingly bad state hours after the assault began.
Old preamble on Antarctica:
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Much of the information for this news post, including both the images in the preamble, came from this article at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which has been circulating in the media lately.
Image has been taken from this article.
Antarctica has had a uniquely bad year.
While the sea ice extent in the last 50 years or so has been very gradually declining, it has done so very slowly on average - by 0.1% per decade. This began to change in 2016:
Even so, this year is different, showing a remarkable decrease in the maximum sea ice extent. It is unconfirmed (I think) but this year may be the first in which the maximum extent fails to reach 17 million square kilometers - and is more than one million square kilometers lower than the previous record low maximum in 1986.
The fall in sea ice has been linked by some researchers to warming in the uppermost ocean layer caused by lateral and upward mixing of warmer water. The ocean is a gigantic heat sink, and has been absorbing much of the excess heat that humanity has generated via the greenhouse effect. But put enough heat into a heat sink and it will eventually fill up.
These changes in sea ice extent is no mere abstract climate worry or scientific curiosity. It is having a direct, catastrophic impact on the Antarctic's ecosystem. Emperor penguin colonies have had trouble breeding, so much so that:
...there is high probability that no chicks had survived last year in four of the five known emperor penguin colonies in the central and eastern Bellingshausen Sea. This was because the sea ice had melted well before chicks would have developed waterproof feathers. ... Today's report says about one-third of the 62 known emperor penguin colonies in Antarctica were affected by partial or total sea ice loss between 2018 and 2022.
And, last year, scientists conducted a study on the two plants that are able to grow near Antarctica, looking at a single Antarctic island for simplicity, and found that the populations of these plants had exploded in the last decade - growing as much in the last decade as they had in the last 50 years - due to rising air temperatures. It was warm enough for the scientists to wear shorts and remove their shirts.
The Country of the Week is Syria! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.
The weekly update is here!
Links and Stuff
The bulletins site is down.
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can.
Resources For Understanding The War
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.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
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
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.
Last week's discussion post.
Part 7
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LGBTQIA:
Content Warning - this section is not usually good news.
An article on the Ghana LGBTQIA+ situation (not good), with a case study of a man from Ghana who was the victim of a violent hate crime, who then reported it to the police and refused to take an out-of-court settlement.^OD^ A popular Iraqi transgender personality Noor BM was shot dead in Baghdad.^Advocate^
Romania’s Social Democrats reluctant to recognise same-sex marriage
NYPD Officers May Be Cleared in Killing of Gay Black Man, According to Draft Report
Bomb Threats Target LGBTQ+ Events Across the U.S. Over the Weekend
California Gov. Gavin Newsom Signs 9 Pro-LGBTQ+ Bills Into Law
Gavin Newsom Vetoes Bill Requiring Custody Decisions Involve Affirming Children’s Gender Identity
Montana State Rep. Zooey Zephyr Says She's 'Thankful' After Judge Blocks Trans Care Ban Sylvia Swayne Aims to Make History as Alabama’s First Trans State Representative Kentucky and Tennessee Bans on Trans Care for Youth Upheld in Court Florida School District Bans LGBTQ+ Books From K-8 Libraries ‘I was arrested for protecting a pub from the far-right’
The conservative ‘debate’ over trans rights is no debate at all
Cancel culture? Trans-inclusive writers say they face abuse and censorship.
Climate:
Hydrogen: A reality check. Belgium prepares harbours for massive green hydrogen imports.^Euractiv^
Governments are starkly divided over plans for a loss and damage fund, with two months to go until it is due to be established.^CCN^ The International Energy Agency calls on countries to bring forward net zero targets and rely less on fossil fuel technofixes like carbon capture.^CCN^ Carbon capture is mainly used to extract more fossil fuels from the earth, rather than permanently locking away carbon,^DS^ and has other problems like potential escape of CO2 and the potential for earthquakes and groundwater contamination.^ICN^ Italian oil giant Eni knew and did not care about climate change in the 1970s, based on a report on the "catastrophic" climate risk of burning fossil fuels.^DS^ The rate of decarbonisation is falling dangerously short of what is required for a safe future climate.^Ecologist^
The cruise industry is saying that LNG is a solution to emissions, when it very obviously isn't.^CCN^ Antarctic winter sea ice hits 'extreme' record low.^DW^ A new report finds aluminum manufacturing worldwide emits more than a billion tons of carbon dioxide annually, as well as chemicals called perfluorocarbons that warm the planet for 50,000 years.^ICN^ Is the Great Barrier Reef dying, "in danger", or just "under serious threat"? Hmm...^MR^ Is China at peak oil? Maybe.^CGS^ More offshore oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico,^CD^ which organizations are unhappy about.^CD^ Biden Creates the American Climate Corps, 90 Years After FDR Put 3 Million to Work in National Parks
A report from the Tufton Street group Civitas claimed that achieving net zero emissions will cost the UK £4.5 trillion, or £6,000 per household, by 2050, though came to that conclusion through embarrassing mathematical errors (confusing megawatts and megwatt-hours) and just false statements (claiming that onshore wind turbines will cost £1.3 million per MWh when in reality it is only £50-70), and even if you use their figures, they still do the maths wrong.^DS^
Megaherbivores like elephants, rhinos, wild water buffaloes, and gaurs could potentially be used to combat invasive plant species.^MB^
An article on how infectious diseases could change as the climate continues to change.^Science^
A Chinese scientific expedition has reached the summit of Cho Oyu, the sixth tallest mountain on the planet, to investigate environmental changes in the region.^SCMP^
Science and Technology
Months after hospitalization for COVID-19, MRIs reveal multiorgan damage.^Science^
Chinese scientists set a record in water desalination with solar power, which is more green and efficient and capable of filtering significantly more water than similar methods.^SCMP^ Enhanced optoelectronic coupling for perovskite-silicon tandem solar cells.^Nature^ An article on "inverse" vaccines, which, in contrast to regular vaccines which train your body to attack something (a virus or bacteria), instead train your body not to attack something, which could be very useful for treating autoimmune diseases.^DW^
An article on digging up ancient, 35 million year old animals in Amazonia.^Nature^ Uniquely preserved gut contents illuminate trilobite palaeophysiology.^Nature^ Scientists have found a way to compress liquids - on a technicality.^Nature^ The weak equivalence principle, which essentially states that anti-matter does not experience anti-gravity and instead is regularly attracted to regular matter (but is quite hard to actually prove because antimatter doesn't like to exist), has been tested and it looks like it's true.^Nature^
The first image from China's Wide Field Survey Telescope is of the Andromeda galaxy, available in the article. Earthworms boost crop yields significantly, adding the equivalent of one slice of bread for every loaf for wheat alone. LEGO is giving up on a plan to make its bricks out of recycled polyethylene terephthalate plastic bottles, but is working on finding other sustainable alternatives. A volcanologist monitors water safety and volcanic activity on the Congo-Rwanda borders, where violence is common. And an image of the inside the sample-return capsule from the NASA mission OSIRIS-REx, which took samples from an asteroid three years ago and just landed back on Earth.^Nature^
Miscellaneous Analysis:
JPMorgan’s Settlements Reach $365 Million Over Civil Claims It Banked Jeffrey Epstein’s Sex Trafficking of Minors; Criminal Charges Could Lie Ahead
Bank of America’s Unrealized Losses on HTM Debt Securities Total $106 Billion; 34 Percent of All Such Unrealized Losses Reported by 4,645 Banks
The Perfect Storm Hits Big Banks: Tumbling Deposits, Rising Unrealized Losses, and Higher-for-Longer Interest Rates
Why Are People Frightened That Kids Will Learn About Sex? Why The Problem Isn’t Single-Parent Families
Precariousness and surveillance: digital platforms, ever richer thanks to Europe’s poorest regions 'Torture and barbarism' endemic in porn industry, finds study
“Welfare for Markets: A Global History of Basic Income” – book review
Dipshittery and Cope
South Africans’ support for Russia is rooted in misplaced nostalgia, in which the author argues that South Africans are too stupid to tell the USSR and Russia apart.
How China can avoid the Japan trap. My brother in christ, China is the biggest economy, largest industrial power, and may quite possibly, within years and not decades, possess the most powerful military on the planet (with a little help from Russia).
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Trailblazing LGBTQ+ Rights Advocate, Dies at 90.
Maybe politics should be more mindful.^FT^
I Love My Trans Comrades!
Can’t wait for them to report back that we’re all going to die from climate change 2.5 years sooner than expected