Russian aircraft for Iran and multipolarity
By Drago Bosnic | November 29, 2023
After months of speculation whether Iran would acquire Russian weapons, particularly advanced fighter jets, on November 28, Deputy Defense Minister of Iran Mehdi Farahi dispelled previous rumors about the deal supposedly falling through and confirmed that Tehran had finally inked the contract to procure Su-35 air superiority/multirole fighters, Yak-130 light fighter/advanced trainer jets and Mi-28 attack helicopters from Russia. The announcement comes amid an enormous increase in the already massive American military presence in the Middle East, which includes everything from carrier strike groups (CSGs) to fighter jets and even strategic bombers. The tensions have escalated significantly in the context of the ongoing Israel-Gaza conflict, prompting Iran to urgently modernize its aging fighter jet fleet.
Speculation about the acquisition has been ongoing since last year, specifically after Egypt withdrew from the deal to buy Russian jets. Cairo’s fear of getting on America’s bad side pushed it to stifle its sovereignty (and security), an opportunity that Tehran took to make a deal that would otherwise take years to finalize. Western sources have been speculating about the Su-35 deal with Iran even before the special military operation (SMO). Rumors about the acquisition continued throughout 2022, followed by speculation about the deal allegedly not going through. However, by September, it became clear that the military cooperation between Moscow and Tehran would include even more than Su-35 fighter jets, particularly after the Yak-130 light fighters/advanced trainers were spotted in Iran.
The Yak-130 can double as both attack jets and advanced trainer aircraft, but their primary role is the latter, meaning they were especially indicative of the deal going through. Namely, the Yak-130 is used as the stepping stone in flight training for pilots preparing to fly the Su-35. Getting advanced fighter jets for the Iranian Air Force (IRIAF) has been a point of contention for decades as the country was under a strict Western arms embargo that prevented any advanced weapons acquisitions. This had its perks, as it forced Tehran to develop a plethora of indigenous industries, including a very robust and highly cost-effective drone production, and now it’s clear that Tehran’s advanced military industry is perfectly capable of going toe to toe with the world’s most powerful countries in terms of developing and deploying unmanned systems.
However, despite these advances that also include a plethora of other weapons, such as surface combatants, transport aircraft and long-range SAM systems (mostly based on Russian designs), Iran is sorely lacking in the manned combat aviation compartment. This is hardly surprising, given that only a handful of countries in the world have fully indigenous aerospace industries. Even Asian giants such as China and India still rely heavily on Russia to acquire top-of-the-line aircraft, although their respective advances in this regard are certainly commendable. By getting the Su-35, Tehran is pushing the capabilities of the IRIAF well into the 21st century. Various reports indicate that at least 24 fighter jets have been ordered to replace the aging F-14 “Tomcats”, while there’s speculation that it would acquire over 60 in follow-up orders.
Almost the same could be said for the Mi-28 attack helicopter. The advanced Russian rotorcraft has very few equivalents abroad and would certainly revolutionize Iranian capabilities. Namely, Tehran currently relies on its ancient Vietnam War-era AH-1 “Super Cobra” attack helicopters which are decades behind technologically, even with the incremental upgrades and overhauls that the Iranian military has been applying. Reports indicate that Iranian forces operating in Syria were impressed by the performance of Iraqi and Russian Mi-28s in both Iraq and Syria, which was a major contributing factor to the decision to acquire them. The superb flight characteristics and armament of this Russian helicopter are rivaled only by the less conventional coaxial rotors-equipped Ka-52 “Alligator”.
It’s important to note that the ongoing procurement is of the utmost importance to the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) and BRICS+ frameworks. Namely, Iran is already a member of the former, while it’s poised to join the latter in just over a month. With the US escalating tensions in the region, the primary target of which is precisely Tehran, the belligerent thalassocracy is looking to disrupt multiple peace processes in the region. Attacking Iran seems to be a very tempting prospect for Washington DC, as it would effectively “kill two birds with one stone” by making both SCO and BRICS+ look “weak” and unable (or even unwilling) to defend their new members. The US very likely believes this could be a deadly blow to the rapidly emerging multipolar world that will inevitably dismantle the existing “rules-based world order.” By arming Iran, Russia is making sure that any such attack would not only be a costly endeavor, but also a failed one.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.
Israeli detainee thanks resistance fighters for kind and humane treatment
Palestine Information Center – November 28, 2023
GAZA – Israeli ex-detainee Daniel Aloni has thanked the resistance fighters from al-Qassam Brigades of Hamas for treating her and her 6-year-old daughter Emilia kindly and humanely during their presence in captivity.
This came in a letter she wrote in Hebrew while she was in detention, in which she expressed her gratitude for al-Qassam fighters who were escorting and guarding her and her daughter during the days they had spent in Gaza.
Daniel and her daughter were among the first group of captives who were released on Friday by al-Qassam Brigades.
Below is the full text of the letter as translated from Hebrew and provided by the Brigades’ military media.
“To the commanders who have accompanied me in recent weeks, it seems that we will part ways tomorrow, but I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your extraordinary humanity that you have shown towards my daughter Emilia. You treated her like your own. You welcomed her in your room whenever she walked in. She says that you are all her friends, not just acquaintances. You are her true and good loved ones. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the countless hours you spent with her as caregivers. Thank you for being patient with her and showering her with sweets, fruits, and everything available, even if it wasn’t readily accessible. Children should not be in captivity, but thanks to you and other kind-hearted individuals and leaders we have met during our presence in her, my daughter considered herself a queen in Gaza and felt like she was the center of the world. We did not meet a single person, whether a member or leader, during our long stay [in Gaza], who did not treat her with kindness, tenderness, and love. I will forever be a captive of gratitude because she will not leave this place with a permanent psychological trauma. I will remember your kind manners, which you showed in here despite the difficult situation you were coping with yourselves, and the heavy losses that befell you here in Gaza. I wish in this world that we could be really good friends one day. I wish you all good health and well-being. Health and love to you and your families. Thank you very much. Daniel and Emilia.”
Iran finalizes purchase of Russian military aircraft
The Cradle | November 28, 2023
Iran has finalized arrangements to purchase Russian-made fighter jets and attack helicopters, Deputy Defense Minister Brigadier General Mahdi Farahi revealed to Tasnim News Agency on 28 November.
Farahi says the plans for the purchase and process of arrival of Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets, Mil Mi-28 attack helicopters, and Yak-130 jet trainers to join the combat units of the Iranian Armed Forces have been signed and finalized.
“In some areas, we are among the top countries; in others, we are on the path to maturity. In this way, in addition to the development of endogenous capabilities, we must also use shortcuts to complete the defense capability, and one of these areas is the field of air technology,” Farahi said in the interview with Tasnim.
“We have good capabilities in the field of helicopters; that’s why we are the best in quantity in the region, but the qualitative improvement of helicopters is on the agenda,” Farahi added.
Talks for acquiring Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets have been ongoing since late last year as part of joint military cooperation efforts between Tehran and the Kremlin.
Despite decades-long sanctions against Iran, the nation is still a major military power in West Asia and has over half a million active personnel.
Defense, trade, and banking ties between Iran and Russia have been growing over recent years despite western sanctions imposed on the two nations.
The central banks of both nations signed an interbank transfer deal earlier this year, allowing 52 Iranian banks to connect and transfer with 106 Russian banks.
Iran is also expected to join BRICS at the start of 2024, a group in which Russia is a key organizer.
Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi said at the 15th annual BRICS summit that the bloc expansion is “a new step towards establishing justice, ethics, and sustainable peace in the world.”
Iran has not made any significant purchases to its fighter aircraft arsenal in recent years besides purchasing a few Russian MiG-29 Fulcrum fighters in the 1990s.
Western embassies receive ‘suspicious’ arms deliveries in Lebanon: Al-Akhbar Report
The Cradle | November 20, 2023
Lebanon has been witnessing a “suspicious security movement,” Al-Akhbar reported on 18 November, as several Western military planes carrying weapons have arrived at Beirut International Airport since the outbreak of the Gaza-Israel war last month.
According to the Lebanese daily, some of these planes have also landed at a decommissioned airstrip in the Hamat military base.
The deliveries reportedly come in the wake of “requests sent by foreign countries to Lebanon to allow the entry of weapons and ammunition, under the pretext of enhancing the security of its embassies and evacuating its nationals and diplomats.”
Aircraft recently landed in Lebanon include US, British, French, and Canadian planes. The report adds that some of these planes came from Israel.
Sources told the newspaper that Lebanon recently rejected a French request to “agree on the entry of a ship carrying about 500 soldiers and approximately 50 vehicles.”
The Lebanese Foreign Ministry also received a request to grant two permits for a Canadian plane and a Belgian plane to arrive at Beirut airport, which was rejected.
However, Al-Akhbar’s sources say that “the Canadian plane had already landed at Beirut Airport and was found to be carrying various types of weapons (including silencers and detonators).”
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati listed these western requests on the agenda of the last cabinet meeting. However, nothing was decided on.
Western and Arab states reportedly sent requests to Lebanese security services expressing “fear that their employees or nationals would be exposed to attacks against the backdrop of what is happening in Gaza.”
Western embassies have not answered any questions about these shipments, the report says, adding that diplomats have referred all questions to military attaches “who coordinate all steps with the Lebanese army and security forces.”
In a statement last week, the Lebanese army command claimed these movements aligned with the routine transport of military aid.
However, Al-Akhbar’s sources say there are “suspicions regarding the aircraft entering and unloading their cargo, as it is not known to whom this equipment is going, and whether the destination is actually limited to the army.”
“What is happening has put the current army commander, Joseph Aoun, under the microscope … and has put question marks about the extent of his cooperation with Westerners nations,” the sources added, highlighting a possible “attack on the principle of sovereignty” in Lebanon.
Aoun has often been accused of having a very close relationship with the US embassy and Ambassador Dorothy Shea.
European liberals lose it over Hungarian government’s latest billboard campaign
BY THOMAS BROOKE | REMIX NEWS | NOVEMBER 20, 2023
Liberal lawmakers in the European Parliament have expressed their outrage at a recent billboard campaign by Hungary’s governing party ahead of next year’s parliamentary elections targeting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Hundreds of billboards have been erected across the country depicting von der Leyen with Alex Soros, the son of U.S.-Hungarian billionaire George Soros whom Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party claims is the financier of several liberal organizations attempting to discredit the Hungarian government and undermine conservative administrations across the West.
Images of the duo are shown alongside the caption, “Let’s not dance to their tune,” a quote taken from a speech by Orbán last month in which he labeled the European Union a “bad parody” of the former Soviet Union. He also insisted his administration would continue to run Hungary as it saw fit despite attempts by Brussels to wrestle control from national governments.
Budapest has ramped up its rhetoric against the European Commission in recent weeks, and Orbán again targeted the bloc’s executive during a speech at his party’s congress on Saturday as he called for the current model of EU governance to be replaced.
“The Union must not be left but changed, but this is only possible if there are radical changes in Brussels. Otherwise, the end will come. If it continues like this, the Union will not explode, it will simply fall apart,” he told attendees.
The advertising campaign appears to have angered all the right people as far as Fidesz is concerned, with arch-Eurofederalist MEP Guy Verhofstadt calling it “scandalous” and accusing Orbán of “dangerous Putinism and despicable anti-semitism,” the latter accusation borne solely from the fact that Alex Soros is Jewish.
Similarly, German Green MEP Daniel Freund, seemingly perennially enraged by the conservative administration in Budapest, called for the European Commission to suspend Hungarian’s upcoming presidency of the European Council.
“For von der Leyen, there is only one reaction to this dirty campaign: Suspend all preparatory meetings for the council presidency between the EU Commission and the Hungarian government,” he raged.
Von der Leyen, at least publicly is understood to have been unfazed by the campaign, according to the European Commission’s spokesperson Eric Mamer.
“I showed the pictures to the president. She didn’t bat an eyelash … completely unfazed. Let’s be clear: We know this is not the first time, it’s probably not the last time, we have business to do,” he told journalists at Monday’s press briefing.
“We have crises to manage, we have policies to implement, Hungary is part of the European Union … It sits at the table,” he added.
Ukraine reveals size of new international loan
RT | November 19, 2023
The Ukrainian government expects to get a loan of $1.1 billion from the World Bank, Prime Minister Denis Shmigal said on Saturday, adding that the aid will be used for social benefits, education, medicine, and other priorities.
“Ukraine continues to attract money from partners, with an almost $1.1 billion loan expected from the World Bank,” Shmigal wrote in a Telegram post.
The prime minister added that the country also expects to obtain €162 million ($177 million) in financial support from the European Investment Bank as part of programs to restore Ukraine, while $190 million and $70 million would be allocated by Norway and Switzerland, respectively.
Earlier this week, the Ukrinform news agency reported that EU military aid for Ukraine had reached €27 billion euros (some $28.8 billion) since the beginning of the conflict, marking a record high in the bloc’s history. The military assistance includes ammunition, air defense systems and tanks.
Meanwhile, financial, military, humanitarian, and refugee assistance provided by EU member states to Ukraine has already amounted to about $89 billion.
Last month, Gavin Gray, the head of the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) mission in the country, said that over time international support for Ukraine would inevitably decrease, urging Kiev to develop internal resources for self-financing.
In April, Ukrainian Finance Minister Sergey Marchenko said the monthly deficit of the Ukrainian budget had totalled $5 billion, with two-thirds covered by foreign loans and grants, while three-quarters of spending goes to military needs.
In August, the Finance Ministry reported that Ukraine’s national debt had exceeded $132 billion, having increased by $4 billion in July alone.
The IMF previously projected that Ukraine’s state debt would amount to 88.1% of GDP in 2023, and would exceed 100% of GDP in 2025.
Gaza: Al-Qassam Brigades reveals truth about occupation finding bodies of 2 female captives
MEMO | November 18, 2023
Al-Qassam Brigades announced that the occupation’s claims that the bodies of Israeli captives were found in hospitals in the Gaza Strip were false and that they were undergoing treatment there.
The brigades conveyed in an official statement on its Telegram channel: “We transferred a number of prisoners to care centres to receive treatment due to the seriousness of their health condition and to preserve their lives. This happened recently with the detainee, Aryeh Zalman Zdmanovich, card number 0010185791, who received intensive care.”
Al-Qassam Brigades explained: “After he recovered, he was returned to his place of detention. He died due to panic attacks as a result of the repeated bombing around his place of detention, and we will publish material documenting this.”
The occupation forces on Thursday announced the discovery of two bodies: a female Israeli soldier, who Al-Qassam confirmed was killed as a result of the occupation bombing her detention site, in addition to another female detainee, whose body they claimed was found in a building next to Al-Shifa Hospital.
Al-Qassam Brigades stated that the occupation forces have so far caused the deaths of more than 60 of its captives in the Gaza Strip due to the continuous brutal bombing of all parts of the strip, especially Palestinian homes.
Italy Becomes First EU Country to Ban Production, Sale of Synthetic Food
Sputnik – 16.11.2023
ROME – The Italian parliament on Thursday passed a law prohibiting production and sale of synthetic food and feed, making Italy the first EU country to introduce such a ban.
The law was supported by 159 members of the Italian lower house, while 53 voted against the measure and 34 abstained. The upper house of the parliament approved the law, which was developed at the initiative of the Italian Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Forestry and the Ministry of Health, back in June.
The new regulation prohibits the use in production, sale, import, export manufacturing and distribution of “food or feed consisting of, separated out or produced from cell cultures or tissues derived from vertebrate animals.” Violators face a fine ranging from 10,000 euros ($10,858) to 60,000 euros. However, if the law is violated by a large-scale enterprise, the fine may be increased to up to 10% of the company’s annual turnover and confiscation of the produced goods.
23 percent of 383 Israeli armored vehicles were destroyed in 5 days
By Boyko Nikolov | Bulgarian Military | November 13, 2023
Based on recent satellite images from northwest Gaza, it appears that the Israeli Army has sustained substantial losses, with 88 armored vehicles reportedly missing over five days. This accounts for approximately 23 percent of the 383 vehicles that could be seen in the area via satellite imagery.
Israeli forces have made notable progress, successfully dividing Gaza into two parts – north and south. However, through multiple video evidence, it’s clear that Hamas, along with other Palestinian militant groups, have managed to effectively incapacitate Israeli tanks and armored personnel carriers on several occasions.
Militias have employed a range of sophisticated techniques, among them are the use of explosives strategically placed on vehicles with the aim of neutralizing tanks’ active protection systems. This is typically followed by a storm of rocket-propelled grenades. Since the beginning of October, there have been verified reports of successful drone strikes on Israeli armored units operating outside the Gaza Strip.
Additional damage
The impact of the losses in Gaza is further underscored by the additional damage incurred by the Israeli armor on the Lebanon border in the North. As part of the ongoing tensions, Hezbollah’s anti-tank units have been particularly focusing on these vehicles. They are using anti-tank weapons that are far more sophisticated than those available to Palestinian militias.
Reports from regional media channels have revealed a concurrent rise in the attrition rates of Israeli armored vehicles. This correlates with the unfortunate news of the death of a tank brigade commander, Colonel Sheldag Zior. His loss signifies the most senior casualty within the Israeli force to date.
The rise in attrition rates correlates directly with the more frequent sightings of older tanks such as the Merkava IIIs, during the conflict in Gaza. Especially notable was the second week of October, when the number of Israeli armored losses surged.
Merkava tanks to Hamas hands
This was attributable to Hamas making significant progress, successfully seizing numerous military facilities and arms storage outside of Gaza. As a result, a considerable amount of new Merkava tanks and countless other armored vehicles fell into their hands.
Reports have been surfacing about substantial numbers of these vehicles undergoing destruction. As early as 2005, Israel embarked on the process to gradually retire the Merkava III from their primary service. The aim is to substitute the majority of the remaining Merkava III units with the upgraded Merkava V, commencing towards the end of 2023. Given the significant number of Merkava IIIs in use, analysts predict a possible shortage of the newer models.
However, obtaining accurate assessments of the casualties on both sides has become challenging due to the continued instability in the area.
US plans $320-mn transfer of precision bombs to Israel amid regime’s genocide in Gaza
Press TV – November 6, 2023
The United States is planning transfer of 320 million dollars worth of precision bombs to Israel amid the regime’s relentless genocidal war against the besieged Gaza Strip.
The Wall Street Journal revealed the information in a Monday report, citing a source familiar with the plan.
The report said US President Joe Biden’s administration has informed Congress of the planned transfer of Spice Family Gliding Bomb Assemblies through a formal notification sent to congressional leaders on October 31.
Spice Family Gliding Bomb Assemblies constitute a special type of precision-guided weapon, which is fired by warplanes.
Citing correspondence it had viewed, the report added that weapons manufacturer Rafael USA would transfer the bombs to its Israeli parent company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems for deployment by the Israeli military.
The report came on the 31st day of Israel’s genocidal war on the besieged Gaza Strip, which started after the territory’s resistance movements waged a surprise attack against the occupying entity, dubbed Operation al-Aqsa Storm, in response to its decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.
On Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza announced that the death toll from indiscriminate Israeli bombardments has reached 10,022 people, including 4,104 children and 2,641 women. It added that the number of those who have been wounded over the past 31 days has risen to 25,408.
The United States, Israel’s biggest and oldest ally, has provided the regime with thousands of arms consignments since the initiation of the war.
On Thursday, the US House of Representatives passed a standalone $14.3-billion military assistance package for Israel. The legislation, however, is yet to clear the Senate.
Washington, which has backed Tel Aviv’s ferocious attacks on Gaza as a means of “self-defense,” has also been casting its veto against the United Nations Security Council resolutions that called on the occupying regime to cease its aggression.
Kremlin weighs in on call for US to reverse course on Russia
RT | October 30, 2023
A recent article by US economist Jeffrey Sachs calling on Washington to establish a new sustainable détente with Russia is a rare sight, but evidence that debates on the issue are picking up steam, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov has said.
Speaking to reporters on Monday, Peskov commented on Sachs’ piece, which was published in early October but has only recently gained media traction. The economist, who serves as the director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, wrote that the world is on the precipice of a “30-year US neocon debacle in Ukraine.”
He explained that Washington’s long-cherished hopes for NATO expansion eastward to Russia’s borders have been dashed by Ukraine’s devastating losses on the battlefield, the threat of Moscow launching a massive offensive, and collapsing support for this course in both Europe and the US.
As Ukraine teeters on the brink, Sachs argued, the US could avert a potential catastrophe by changing course and reaching security guarantees with Moscow. A potential deal could include a pledge that NATO would not expand closer to Russia, as well as an agreement between Moscow and Kiev that predominantly ethnic Russian areas would be recognized as part of Russia, the economist said, apparently referring to Crimea and four other former Ukrainian regions that overwhelmingly voted to become part of Russia.
Commenting on the article, Peskov said Moscow has not received any proposals on the matter. While describing the piece as “an economist’s point of view, nothing more,” he noted that “such thinking is quite rare at the moment.”
“Nevertheless, some kind of a discussion is gradually gaining momentum,” Peskov added.
In the article, Sachs suggested that Russia’s demands to NATO and the US which were made shortly before the outbreak of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022 should be used as a springboard for a thaw in relations.
In the proposals presented in December 2021, Moscow asked the West to formally ban Ukraine from entering NATO, while insisting that the alliance should retreat to its 1997 borders, before it expanded. The overture, however, was rebuffed by the West.
US seeks strategic dialogue with Russia
BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | OCTOBER 30, 2023
Almost four weeks into Hamas’ attack on Israel, Russia is in no hurry to exploit the Biden administration’s quandary over the collapse of Middle East security. The western media was unanimous that Russia was waiting in the wings to seize the opportunity once the US took its eye off the ball in Ukraine. However, no such thing happened.
Ukraine war is on autopilot. The compass has been set, the die is cast and the calculus is holding steady with regard to the strategic objectives set by President Vladimir Putin in February last year. Russia senses that it has gained the upper hand in the war and that is irreversible.
Ukraine’s counteroffensive has failed and the fighting is presently restricted to two sectors of the frontline, as Russian forces strengthen the security of the Donetsk region and seek to regain control of territories up north in the borderlands of Donbass and Kharkov region from where they retreated for tactical reasons last September and October.
Yet, Moscow has not begun its grand offensive, as many had predicted. One plausible explanation is that Moscow is watching the maelstrom sweeping through the Middle East. Moscow is particularly sensitive about any spillover into Syria.
With an eye on the formidable US naval build-up in Eastern Mediterranean with the deployment of two aircraft carrier groups, President Vladimir Putin has publicised that Russian jets equipped with hypersonic Kinzhal missiles are roaming the skies above the Black Sea, which can strike targets 1000 kms away at Mach 9 speed, which no existing missile defence system can intercept. Suffice to say, the war in Ukraine remains attritional.
Curiously, Russia conducted a simulated nuclear strike in a drill on Wednesday overseen by Putin, hours after Russian parliament voted to rescind the country’s ratification of the global nuclear test ban treaty (CTBT). The drill needs to be seen in the broader context of global strategic stability. A Kremlin statement said, “The purpose of the training exercise was to check the level of preparedness of military command bodies, as well as the skill of the leadership and operational personnel in managing the troops (forces) under their command.” Everything, however, adds up in these extraordinary times.
At its most obvious level, the Palestine-Israel conflict is a manifestation of the growing imbalance in the existing system of international relations. New wars are emerging; longstanding conflicts are mutating (eg., Nagorno-Karabakh). Last week, Pakistan bracketed Palestine and Kashmir as the UN’s unfinished business in the post-colonial era. North Korea and Iran are flash points that have no military solution.
In the months ahead, without doubt, Washington will continue to provide Israel with military and diplomatic support but an extended Israeli operation lasting months in Gaza will mean dispersal of US resources that might be needed in other theatres. The conflict in Gaza underscores the imperative for a rethink in the US’ notions of global hegemony. The fact remains that the US, despite its self-proclaimed status as the “Indispensable Nation” (Madeline Albright) and the guarantor of “rules-based order,” failed to prevent the latest eruption of conflict in the Middle East.
Arguably, therefore, the latest US proposal for a systematic resumption of strategic dialogue with Russia can be seen as a sign of positive thinking. Unsurprisingly, Moscow has displayed a studied indifference to the US proposal. But that needn’t be taken as the last word. Historically, Soviet-American strategic dialogue brought on board into the agenda all major issues and most minor issues affecting international security.
The big question, therefore, is the timing of the US proposal. Against the backdrop of the gathering storms in the Middle East, the Biden Administration probably seeks to calm the nerves by proposing talks with Russia on global strategic balance, since the guardrails in arms control no longer exist. This is one thing.
At any rate, Russia’s “neutrality” in a Middle East conflict could also be a consideration. Equally, Western leaderships understand that the war against Russia is practically lost — although they will not admit it publicly — and engagement with Russia is needed.
Again, although the US has provided Israel with significant military and diplomatic support and keeps influencing the latter not to escalate the conflict, there are variables in the situation and any big conflagration in the Middle East will require a massive concentration of material and financial resources that are limited even for a superpower, since there are other unresolved problems in the world, too.
The breakdown of trust in the Russian-American ties hurts US interests. Fundamentally, it must also be understood that what Moscow seeks even today after nearly 20 months of battling NATO and the US in Ukraine’s killing fields is a sustained engagement with Washington and a willingness to accommodate mutual interests.
On its part, Russia is conducting itself as a responsible power vis-a-vis the crisis in Gaza. There is no shred of evidence to show that Russia has acted as a “spoiler”. On the contrary, Moscow has been projecting its credentials as a potential peacemaker who enjoys good relations with all key players — Israel, Hamas, Iran and other regional states alike.
In fact, President Biden’s recent remarks on the Gaza situation bring the US position rather close to Russia’s. Biden read out the following from a prepared text at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia:
“Israel has the right and, I would add, responsibility to respond to the slaughter of their people. And we will ensure Israel has what it needs to defend itself against these terrorists. That’s a guarantee…
“But that does not lessen the need for — to operate and align with the laws of war for Israeli — it has to do everything in its power — Israel has to do everything in its power, as difficult as it is, to protect innocent civilians. And it’s difficult. I also want take a moment to look ahead toward the future that we seek.
“Israelis and Palestinians equally deserve to live side by side in safety, dignity, and peace. And there’s no going back to the status quo as it stood on October the 6th. That means ensuring Hamas can no longer terrorise Israel and use Palestinian civilians as human shields.
“It also means that when this crisis is over, there has to be a vision of what comes next. And in our view, it has to be a two-state solution.”
Putin couldn’t have put this across differently. There is a sense of expectation in Moscow that in the emergent conditions in regional security, the US and its allies will “reconsider their notions of defeating Russia in the Ukraine conflict at any cost” — as an establishment think tanker wrote in the Kremlin-funded RT last week.
Trust is lacking, he concluded, “compromises without the full consideration of Russian interests” are difficult to reach, but “a pivotal stage in the (world) order … is taking shape before our eyes.”
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From the Archives
HOW THE UK AND US MEDIA DEHUMANISE PALESTINIANS
BY CLAIRE LAUTERBACH AND NAMIR SHABIBI | DECLASSIFIED UK | NOVEMBER 22, 2023
Nazis. Beneath animals.
This is a small sample of what Palestinians have been called by commentators speaking to Western media outlets in the last month of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict – examples of the bestiary of zoological terms natural to a coloniser’s view of the colonised.
Political philosopher Frantz Fanon wrote during France’s colonial war in Algeria of “hordes of vital statistics”, “hysterical masses”, “faces bereft of all humanity”, and “children who seem to belong to nobody”.
These are all terms that could describe how western media covers the suffering of Palestinians — “a tide of humanity… a teeming mass of Gazans”, as the BBC put it (15 October). This is all sharply in focus since Hamas’ October offensive, and Israel’s genocidal razing of the Gaza strip.
We analysed the front page coverage of Israel’s war in Gaza by five major US and UK news media — the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Guardian, the Times, and the BBC (the news landing page at 7am daily) between 7-26 October.
Over these three weeks following Hamas’ offensive, the mechanics of the Western press’ dehumanisation of Palestinians in death and life are revealed as clinical and routine. … continue
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- 90% Subsidized… Bielefeld Germany’s €7 Million Hydrogen Garbage Truck Fleet Sits Idle
- New Study: Declining Trends In 1980-2023 Tropical Cyclone Frequency, Accumulated Energy
- 46 IPCC Scientists Break Rank, Publicly Challenge Long-Standing Dogmatic Climate Claims
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