Palestine Open Thread 2023-279

Only for news & views directly related to the war in Palestine.

The current open thread for other issues is here.

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A Look At Others' Notes On Ukraine

The war in Ukraine is currently in a rather quiet phase, mostly because of bad weather with heavy rain and snow.

via time and date - bigger

Today's daily report (in Russian) by the Russian Ministry of Defense adds up to only 340 Ukrainian casualties, i.e. dead and wounded. That is the second lowest count since early March when I started to sum up the daily numbers.

The bad weather will continue over the next weeks. It prevents drones from flying and movement across now swampy fields. The level of fighting will thus be low.

Nonetheless the war continues. Recently several bigger pieces, nearly all pessimistic for Ukraine, have come out in the main stream media.

Simplicitus has a long overview of these:

New Raft of Articles Tighten the Screws on Zelensky, Plead for Course Correction

Several non-mainstream writers have also taken a deeper look:

Cont. reading: A Look At Others' Notes On Ukraine

Palestine Open Thread 2023-278

Only for news & views directly related to the war in Palestine.

The current open thread for other issues is here.

Please stick to the topic. Contribute facts. Do not attack other commentators.

Ukraine Open Thread 2023-277

Only for news & views directly related to the war in Ukraine.

The current open thread for other issues is here.

Please stick to the topic. Contribute facts. Do not attack other commentators.

The MoA Week In Review - OT 2023-276

Last week's post on Moon of Alabama:

Palestine:

• November 13 - Not Getting It
• November 15 - Shifa Hospital Bunker - How Would They Know?
• November 17 - One Religion's War Against All Others
  Related:
  - Were the Biblical Prophets Anti-Semitic? - Michael Hudson / UNZ
  - Israel’s War on American Student Activists - The Nation
  - TikTok Says It's Not the Algorithm, Teens Are Just Pro-Palestine - Vice
  - Israel told Palestinians to evacuate to southern Gaza — and stepped up attacks there - NPR
  - Gaza Shows the Difference Between International Law and the “Rules-Based International Order” - The Nation
  - Israel admits burning hundreds of people on 7 October - Electronic Intifada
  - Assessment: Hamas did not know about the Nova festival in advance - Haaretz (archived)
  The police investigation found that Hamas planned to go to Kibbutz Reim and other kibbutzim, and found out about the party in real time. It also emerged that a military helicopter that fired at terrorists apparently also hit several ravers

Ukraine:

• November 14 - Ukraine's Demographics Dictate To End The Fight
• November 18 - Urging Ukraine To Sue For Peace
  Related:
  - Why Ukraine may embrace China’s peace plan - Asia Times
  - Poland truck protests leave Ukrainian drivers stranded - BBC
  - BBC says nearly 20,000 men fled Ukraine to avoid conscription Pravda.ua

China

• November 16 - And Then Biden Blew It ... Again
  Related:
  - A Better Summit - Stephen Roach
  - Joe Biden’s failures on trade benefit China - Economist
  - U.S.-China Extinction-Level Event Narrowly Averted - Eve Ottenberg / Counterpunch
  - No serious effort to reset US-China relations at San Francisco summit - Indian Punchline
  - Canada’s Michael Spavor blames fellow prisoner Michael Kovrig for China arrest - SCMP

---
Other issues:

Cont. reading: The MoA Week In Review - OT 2023-276

Palestine Open Thread 2023-275

Only for news & views directly related to the war in Palestine.

The current open thread for other issues is here.

Please stick to the topic. Contribute facts. Do not attack other commentators.

Urging Ukraine To Sue For Peace

Larry Johnson has spotted one of the many signs that "the West" is giving up on its war in Ukraine:

This week’s “No Shit Analysis” award goes to Eugene B. Rumer for his Wall Street Journal op-ed, It’s Time to End Magical Thinking About Russia’s Defeat. Only took him 22 months to figure this out. He may be a slow learner but give him some credit, he finally awakened from his dream world and is beginning to grasp that the Ukraine project is swirling down the toilet.

Eugene B. Rumer is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University, Washington DC. Previously, he served at the State Department, on the staff of the National Security Council and at RAND.

Despite his pedigree, he is struggling to acknowledge reality and still feels the need to spin nonsense. Here is an example:

Putin has reason to believe that time is on his side. At the front line, there are no indications that Russia is losing what has become a war of attrition. The Russian economy has been buffeted, but it is not in tatters. Putin’s hold on power was, paradoxically, strengthened following Yevgeny Prigozhin’s failed rebellion in June. Popular support for the war remains solid, and elite backing for Putin has not fractured.

Yep. Russia’s economy is so battered that it is headed toward 4% growth, its defense industry is out producing Europe and the United States combined, it is manufacturing new, more deadly drones and the stores across Russia are filled to the brim. If that is “battered” give me some.

More signs that the official foreign policy establishment is throwing the towel can be found in the current edition of Foreign Affairs. There the former head of the Council of Foreign Relations, Richard Haass, is urging the Biden administration to push the Ukraine towards negotiations:

Redefining Success in Ukraine - A New Strategy Must Balance Means and Ends - Foreign Affairs - Nov 17 2023

Well, yes, the U.S., NATO and the Ukraine have lost their war on Russia. Let's redefine that as victory and forget about the rest:

Cont. reading: Urging Ukraine To Sue For Peace

One Religion's War Against All Others

Alastair Crooke in Al Mayadeen:

Israeli popular sentiment -- even amongst former liberals -- is moving toward a Greater Nakba. Gaza is under Nakba pressures. So is the West Bank, as settler violence against Palestinians surges. Even a ‘liberal’ such as former opposition leader Lapid now agrees that ‘settlers’ in the occupied West Bank are not ‘settlers’ at all, since the land is but the ‘Biblical land of Israel’.

Nakba ‘ambitions’ are widening to South Lebanon (up to the Litani River) too. The radical members of Netanyahu’s government say Israelis will never return to the kibbutz adjacent to Lebanon, without Hezbollah’s removal from the border area.

So, the call is heard for "Israel" to ‘take’ Lebanon up to the Litani (a key water source) -- and ‘serendipitously’ the Israeli air force has begun operating up to 40 kms inside Lebanon. Cabinet members now openly speak of the IOF needing to turn its attention to Hezbollah once Hamas has been ‘obliterated’.
...
Plainly, the White House is struggling to avoid the slide towards full regional war, as both the Lebanese front and the Iraqi front heats up: On Sunday, Iraqi movements again fired missiles at the American base in Shaddadi.

"Israel" is sensing the present crisis to be both an existential risk, but an ‘opportunity’ too – an opportunity to establish "Israel" across ‘its Biblical lands’ over the long term. There is no mistaking it -- this is the direction of travel of Israeli popular sentiment, from both Left and Right wings, to bloody eschatology.

As I had pointed out three weeks ago President Joe Biden had supported that Israeli Nakba strategy before he was forced to pull back:

Cont. reading: One Religion's War Against All Others

And Then Biden Blew It ... Again

In June U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was on a long desired trip to China. Just 24 hours after a somewhat positive statement of the meeting came out Biden blew it by calling Xi Jinping a 'dictator'.

The Chinese government was not amused:

China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning called Mr Biden's remarks "extremely absurd and irresponsible". Speaking at a regularly scheduled press conference on Wednesday, she said that the comments were "an open political provocation" that violated diplomatic etiquette.

Yesterday President Xi Jinping of China met U.S. President Joe Biden near San Francisco.

The Chinese spokesperson had set out the agenda:

Hua Chunying 华春莹 @SpokespersonCHN - 11:25 UTC · Nov 16, 2023

President Xi Jinping noted that there are two options for China and the U.S. in the era of global transformations unseen in a century: One is to enhance solidarity and cooperation and join hands to meet global challenges and promote global security and prosperity; ...
... and the other is to cling to the zero-sum mentality, provoke rivalry and confrontation, and drive the world toward turmoil and division. The two choices point to two different directions that will decide the future of humanity and Planet Earth.

Xi wanted to chose the first path. But shortly after their meeting Biden walked on the second.

He again blew it:

Remarks by President Biden in a Press Conference | Woodside, CA - Nov 16, 2023 - White House

Q And, Mr. President, after today, would you still refer to President Xi as a “dictator”? This is a term that you used earlier this year.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, look, he is. I mean, he’s a dictator in the sense that he — he is a guy who runs a country that — it’s a communist country that is based on a form of government totally different than ours.

Anyway, we made progress.

The Chinese view certainly differs.

The Democracy Perception Index (pdf) is the world’s largest annual study on how people perceive democracy. In the U.S. 76% believe that 'democracy is important' but only 54% answer yes when asked if their country is democratic. In China the agreeing percentages for the same questions are 88% and 73%.

Palestine Open Thread 2023-274

Only for news & views directly related to the war in Palestine.

The current open thread for other issues is here.

Please stick to the topic. Contribute facts. Do not attack other commentators.