Bulletins and News Discussion from September 23rd to September 29th, 2024 - The War In The North
Image is of a Hezbollah missile attack on a military camp west of Jenin.
The situation between Hezbollah and Israel is rapidly escalating, with massive bombing campaigns on southern Lebanon by Israel predominantly on civilians (as the tunnels in South Lebanon are mostly unreachable to the Zionists, just like in Gaza), while Hezbollah and its allies respond with missile attacks predominantly on Israeli military facilities. Israel is spreading an evacuation order to the residents of southern Lebanese villages while also bombing their routes of escape and civilian infrastructure, similar to a terror tactic used widely in Gaza.
Northern Israel is currently under military censorship to hide their losses, so we get very little information other than what the Resistance provides and what videos and images get through the censors.
I don't know if Israel will dare a ground incursion soon, but it seems fairly likely in the coming days or weeks.
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.
It's just the initial propaganda push that happens after events like this to calm people down and prevent panic. Same thing happened after the Raisi helicopter crash, same thing happened after the US started bombing Yemen last year.
Yeah, this is why his death remained a very distinct possibility even after all the officials claiming he was alive and well, we've seen this song and dance before. Iran is perfectly willing to lie in order to manage (a more hostile word might be "manipulate") reactions to bad events. To be clear, this makes them no different to any other country, there has never been a government that has (consistently) immediately revealed the truth about events that are negative to them and most of them invent lies to cushion the blow.
All it means is that you have to base your analysis on state actions and precedents rather than fancy speeches or soothing words, which we are very familiar with as communists
It is, as it means that some people will want to listen to Western media and the accompanying propaganda to get the facts faster, which doesn't exactly help the West's media domination. But ultimately there's a hard decision to be made either way: tell everybody in Lebanon that the Resistance leader that they've known for most of their lives and saved them from Israel is now dead during one of the worst bombing campaigns yet, or keep it hidden for a day and suffer the aforementioned consequences but in a more controlled and calm environment
It buys time for an appropriate official response, gives the people time to emotionally process the situation, and subdues any initial panicked response. It's a propaganda tactic at the end of the day. Most organisations or countries would do the same in the event of the death of a senior leader. While us news thread people (including me) would just prefer the brutal honest truth as quick as possible, this might not be the best messaging tactic when communicating to millions of people more invested in the situation than us. I know it's an overused cliché, but the first casualty of war is always the truth.
it just feels like they're choosing to degrade public trust in the news for short term gains. it reminds me of when covid was first blowing up, facui had a good reason to lie but it severely degraded public trust in masking which had very bad effects later on. also, to me giving false hope only for it to come out he died is worse than just riding it out but idk im not too set on it ig
its state media. if Iranian leadership thought it was advantageous for people to believe he was alive while they discussed behind closed doors how to address this crisis, then they may as well lie. no one’s married to the truth during a tense moment like this
right my point is i dont understand why it's advantageous. i think it makes you look untrustworthy and or stupid to make a bold claim that he's alive and then like half a day later it comes out he's dead