this post was submitted on 11 Mar 2026
92 points (100.0% liked)

news

24666 readers
612 users here now

Welcome to c/news! We aim to foster a book-club type environment for discussion and critical analysis of the news. Our policy objectives are:

We ask community members to appreciate the uncertainty inherent in critical analysis of current events, the need to constantly learn, and take part in the community with humility. None of us are the One True Leftist, not even you, the reader.

Newcomm and Newsmega Rules:

The Hexbear Code of Conduct and Terms of Service apply here.

  1. Link titles: Please use informative link titles. Overly editorialized titles, particularly if they link to opinion pieces, may get your post removed.

  2. Content warnings: Posts on the newscomm and top-level replies on the newsmega should use content warnings appropriately. Please be thoughtful about wording and triggers when describing awful things in post titles.

  3. Fake news: No fake news posts ever, including April 1st. Deliberate fake news posting is a bannable offense. If you mistakenly post fake news the mod team may ask you to delete/modify the post or we may delete it ourselves.

  4. Link sources: All posts must include a link to their source. Screenshots are fine IF you include the link in the post body. If you are citing a Twitter post as news, please include the Xcancel.com (or another Nitter instance) or at least strip out identifier information from the twitter link. There is also a Firefox extension that can redirect Twitter links to a Nitter instance, such as Libredirect or archive them as you would any other reactionary source.

  5. Archive sites: We highly encourage use of non-paywalled archive sites (i.e. archive.is, web.archive.org, ghostarchive.org) so that links are widely accessible to the community and so that reactionary sources don’t derive data/ad revenue from Hexbear users. If you see a link without an archive link, please archive it yourself and add it to the thread, ask the OP to fix it, or report to mods. Including text of articles in threads is welcome.

  6. Low effort material: Avoid memes/jokes/shitposts in newscomm posts and top-level replies to the newsmega. This kind of content is OK in post replies and in newsmega sub-threads. We encourage the community to balance their contribution of low effort material with effort posts, links to real news/analysis, and meaningful engagement with material posted in the community.

  7. American politics: Discussion and effort posts on the (potential) material impacts of American electoral politics is welcome, but the never-ending circus of American Politics© Brought to You by Mountain Dew™ is not welcome. This refers to polling, pundit reactions, electoral horse races, rumors of who might run, etc.

  8. Electoralism: Please try to avoid struggle sessions about the value of voting/taking part in the electoral system in the West. c/electoralism is right over there.

  9. AI Slop: Don't post AI generated content. Posts about AI race/chip wars/data centers are fine.

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

A reminder that as the US continues to threaten countries around the world, fedposting is to be very much avoided (even with qualifiers like "in Minecraft") and comments containing it will be removed.

Image is of a Khorramshahr-4 medium range ballistic missile, which has a range of about 2000km.


As I said in the last megathread, trying to figure out what exactly is happening is becoming ever more difficult. The gist of things is that Iran has, very justifiably, refused to negotiate (assassinating their leader and striking their country with hundreds of missiles in the middle of negotiations causes some reluctance to return to the table, I suppose). Censorship across the Middle East has further ramped up, with reportedly extreme punishments for posting footage of Iranian strikes online. From what I can gather, Iran's number of strikes have stabilized at a comfortable daily rate, with strikes into both the Gulf monarchies and Occupied Palestine continuing apace. Official charts of these strikes over time seem very disconnected from reality on the ground, but again, it's hard to really get at the specifics.

The messaging on how long the war is expected to last is rather muddled on both sides. The Trump administration fluctuates more than daily - and even sometimes in the same speech - on whether the war is already won or whether it's going to last months longer. The US seems to be coming up a new possible scheme every few hours: a ground invasion with the Kurds? A ground invasion without the Kurds? An amphibious assault? A series of commando operations to steal Iranian uranium? A massive parachuting operation into Tehran? Fuck it, let's just send the Navy into the Strait of Hormuz? There doesn't seem to be a coherent plan for continuing hostilities beyond firing more and more of a limited stockpile of cruise missiles into mostly non-military targets, hitting easily replaceable drone and missile launchers with a limited stockpile of drones, and burning a limited stockpile of interceptors at an astounding rate (and, in the process, disarming every other Western-aligned country of their interceptors).

Meanwhile, from Iran, I've seen rumors and reports from classic anonymous "senior IRGC officials" (no doubt some invented by Zionists to sow confusion), that I don't know how to substantiate, ranging anywhere from "If the US pulls back their forces now, we will restart negotiations," to "It doesn't matter what the US or the Zionists do or say, we aren't stopping until every last trace of Zionism in the Middle East has been extinguished," to a few positions in between those poles. Despite the damage to infrastructure in Iran, it doesn't seem like there has been any political or social fracturing. Not to speak too soon - perhaps the West will start earnestly trying to overfly Iranian territory to drop their very plentiful bombs soon - but every indication is that there will be no regime change nor societal collapse in Iran in the short and medium term.

The US is desperately trying - and mostly failing - to keep a lid on the economic firestorm they have ignited. There has been much ado about oil prices and oil futures and indexes and what all the myriad Lines going up and down signify and things like that, which is befitting such a financialized empire which is so disconnected from the actual physical flows of materials and much more attuned to vibes and speeches. The only thing I'm personally paying much attention to on the economic front is the drones and missiles slamming into fossil fuel infrastructure, the Hormuz blockade, and the resulting global shockwave of shortages, stoppages, closures, bankruptcies, and force majeures spreading out from the epicenter that is Iran.


Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.

Please check out the RedAtlas!

The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.

The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine

If you have evidence of Zionist crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.

Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:

UNRWA reports on the Zionists' 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.

Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.

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.


you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] WhyEssEff@hexbear.net 63 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (13 children)

As Israel continues to destabilize, I've been having uncomfortable thoughts about how we deal with the Samson Option as a society.

Is there a realistic path that denuclearizes or effectively denuclearizes Israel before its collapse, cows them into not pressing the apocalypse button before they dissolve, or otherwise neuters the Samson Option such that the Hitler Factory does not take humanity down with it? I write this with the base assumption that a nuclear strike would lead to a feedback loop of escalations per MAD. How the fuck do we avoid the excision of this social tumor spiraling out of control?

[–] glimmer_twin@hexbear.net 42 points 2 days ago (4 children)

I feel like israel needs to collapse internally for this reason

That doesn't necessarily preclude them from nuking others on the way out. It does makes it less likely to happen, but I think there are still plenty of realistic scenarios where their zealotry, dogmatic cruelty, and supremacist fanaticism leads them to try to destroy as much as they can in their death throes, even if what is fatal to them is internal to their own cancerous project. Even if it is the case that they collapse from the inside, it is still going to happen in the presence of external pressure and threats, and their hatred of Palestinians and others is also not going away. Hell, I think it could even be internal strife about the Samson option that could potentially lead to a terminal split in the Zionist project leadership.

[–] InexplicableLunchFiend@hexbear.net 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

America would need to use their special forces to secure all of the nukes so that no rogue extremist israeli elements fire any off.

[–] darkcalling@hexbear.net 16 points 2 days ago

Problem: The zionist entity has a triad. The air launched ones we could blow up the planes and prevent their capability, the missile silos could be bombed or seized by SOF. But their submarines could we do anything about them? If we had advanced notice and they weren't cruising far from the entity perhaps. If the leaders had planned for this possibility and sent them deep and far away? Odds not so great.

I suppose I question whether America would dare to strike the zionist entity. I'm not confident they would resort to bombing them. I think up until the launch of the weapons our Evangelical fanatical zionist top military men would deny that the entity would actually do that. The entity might not nuke the US simply because they need a place for their leaders to flee to and live in safely, then again they might and there are enough fanatical zionists here that they would work to hide them from angry Americans or deny they ever came here like the rat-lines, have them fly to South America then smuggle them to the US and claim to the American people recovering from the nukes that they don't know where they went or that they've already killed them in airstrikes and recovered their dead bodies.

So the situation is not great all around. Best hope is someone buys off enough of the top zionist military people, the mossad people, etc, has waiting 10 million dollar mansions and bank accounts of 8-9 digits waiting for them if they refuse to carry out the order and just flee with themselves and their families.

[–] Lovely_sombrero@hexbear.net 20 points 2 days ago (1 children)

That might force the US to come in and take the nukes. It might be the only way. But how likely is it?

[–] Nama@hexbear.net 6 points 2 days ago

It could happen under the guise of stopping the Islamic countries from seizing them.

[–] jack@hexbear.net 16 points 2 days ago

Which includes Palestinian military victory enabled by Iran and Hezbollah

[–] supafuzz@hexbear.net 40 points 2 days ago (1 children)

appeal to the basic humanity of the people with their fingers on the buttons? agony-wholesome

[–] supplier@hexbear.net 7 points 1 day ago

Samson Option

Destroy the zionist entity in steps, each blow diminishing their capacity significantly, but not enough to where they would go full Samson

[–] Rey_McSriff@hexbear.net 34 points 2 days ago (1 children)

This is a bit off topic but I wonder the same thing about the US. How will other countries manage the US's decline when the US will probably be foaming at the mouth to use its nukes as it's removed from its position as the world hegemon? Will its nukes be handed off to a new type of government like the USSR's, or will it be forced to dismantle them?

As for Israel it seems like the only option will be to convince the US that disarming Israel and retreating from the Middle East is better than allowing Zionists to take the world down with them.

[–] SchillMenaker@hexbear.net 24 points 2 days ago (2 children)

The US will balkanize and nuke itself. Problem solved.

[–] someone@hexbear.net 19 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] BodyBySisyphus@hexbear.net 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

this-is-fine Nobody with any weird apocalyptic ideas down there, should be hunky dory.

[–] ElChapoDeChapo@hexbear.net 13 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

California and Mexico have an obligation to humanity to invade and civilize the Texans

Also if we're lucky their power grid will do the work for us and keep the nukes from launching

[–] mkultrawide@hexbear.net 27 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

Is there a realistic path that denuclearizes or effectively denuclearizes Israel before its collapse

Military coup is probably the best bet, probably through bribery and sanctions, similar to how we have attempted it with Iran. That's who actually controls the nukes.

If you tried to force it militarily, it would likely involve an embargo to shut them off from the global economy, bleed them of resources, and then establish air superiority over the country. Honestly it would probably have to be a joint operation between all the permanent UNSC members.

There would probably have to be some sort of diplomatic offer that is enticing enough, either way, to bring it to conclusion.

[–] hellinkilla@hexbear.net 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

but who is the active force in this situ?

[–] mkultrawide@hexbear.net 3 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

What you mean by active force?

[–] miz@hexbear.net 27 points 2 days ago (1 children)

maybe the nuclear material the MC-130Js are mobilizing for isn't Iran's trollface

[–] D61@hexbear.net 2 points 1 day ago

Damn... that would be ... interesting to see.

[–] SteamedHamberder@hexbear.net 24 points 2 days ago

Since the “Flood” My mind keeps going back to a quip from citations-needed that Israelis love pointing out that Arafat was “no Mandela,” but nobody ever counters by asking about an Israeli DeKlerk. What is the first step that israel can cede to reach a short term normalization with Iran and a pathway to a stable region? Of all of the pundits no one is asking this.

[–] marxisthayaca@hexbear.net 13 points 2 days ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Nuclear Weapons were only good for the brief moment that no one else had a nuke. Now that several countries have those weapons, their usage becomes less effective, because a) your own country would immediately be nuked; b) the fallout could reach back to you; c) everyone has deadman switches for their weapons, so there'll never be a guarantee of a preemptive (and final) first strike. If nukes were so attractive and effective for changing foreign policy, let alone bring about Jesus' second coming, the evangelicals would have used them by now; but I think it goes to show that their devastating power scared the worst nutjob of all, Ronald Reagan.

That said, I think that Israel should be immediately disarmed and demilitarized. I think the possibility of bribing a certain group to coup the government and murder every kahanist that's in power, would help.

[–] Formerlyfarman@hexbear.net 21 points 2 days ago

If European capitals are taken down, that seems like a win, Iran can be rebuilt, Europe can't.

[–] godisidog@hexbear.net 11 points 2 days ago

feedback loop of escalations per MAD

Who’s gonna escalate? Assuming Israel only used them in the Middle East, and I see no reason why they’d attack further afield, why would Russia or China involve themselves? Maybe Pakistan could, what are Israeli-Pakistani relations like?

[–] SoyViking@hexbear.net 9 points 2 days ago

I think at the moment our best hope is that Zionist leadership chooses to flee to their off-shore mansions instead of going down with their ship. For that to work they would need the world to be intact and the scenario with no nuclear terrorism seems to be h the one that is most constructive to this.

There's a lot of ifs in this. The situation is very dangerous.

[–] manuallybreathing@lemmy.ml 7 points 2 days ago

Americans need to elect Harris in 2028! /s

[–] hellinkilla@hexbear.net 6 points 2 days ago

Is there a realistic path that denuclearizes or effectively denuclearizes

It is a general question idk if there is any answer.

Kind of one of the fundamental problems which was immediately identified as soon as the idea of nukes was put on the table.