Image is of Yemen seizing the first ship in its blockade of Israel (the Galaxy Leader) with a helicopter raid.
Alternate title: What If It Was The Bab El-Womandeb And It Was Just For The Ladies?
Ansarallah is a key component of the broader Resistance movement, backed by Iran, and has been a stalwart member in engineering the ongoing collapse of Zionism. It has steadily escalated both its rhetoric and, rarely nowadays, its actions, proving that the mythical "red line" might actually exist in the world after all, after going MIA in both Russia and China. It has been striking first Israel-owned ships heading through the Bab el-Mandeb - the strait that leads into the Red Sea and then to the Suez Canal - and, recently, has demonstrated its promise that any ships that intend to dock in Israel will be attacked. While this is really only half a blockade, the cost of going around Africa is significant, and Western insurance companies really don't like it when their ships get blasted by missiles and drones. Several shipping companies have already stated their intention to alter/stop shipping routes through the Red Sea, trying to prompt the West to find a "solution".
Despite US naval presence in the area, Yemen possesses the ability to strike the oil refining facilities of the Gulf monarchies, leaving the US in a very difficult position. If they attack Yemen, then not only do Western ships risk being attacked directly, but those oil refineries may go up in smoke depending on if they help the West - and global oil prices will skyrocket, in an already declining world economy - and it might cost several Western leaders their leadership positions, including Biden himself. A regional war could ultimately tumble into worldwide chaos.
Equally, however, the US cannot afford to lose Israel. It is the single most important American imperial outpost, perhaps alongside Taiwan. If Zionism is destroyed as a local destabilizing influence, then the Russia-China-Iran axis will find itself in a leadership position over the region. Israeli military losses in Gaza increase every single day as they advance further into the labyrinth death trap under the obligation to show some kind of military victory, with Hamas' strategy of attrition taking its toll. And Hezbollah sits there, having destroyed most of the border infrastructure, silently threatening the obliteration of Israel's infrastructure under the rain of a hundred thousand missiles.
As world attention gradually shifts away from the Gaza genocide, we continue to approach the brink.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's 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 (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
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.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
::: spoiler 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.
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.
I’m fascinated by how long it took for America to have any kind of non-passive stance on Ansarallah. Like, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world suddenly is seen as treacherous and not worth the risk to use, due to military actions being taken by a Iran-backed militia movement that most of the world doesn’t recognize as a state actor. And it took weeks for the globe-spanning empire that built an entire global order off of the promise of safety provided by its giant navy to get involved? Its like the cops showing up to a domestic disturbance call 3 weeks late and saying “damn that sucks” to the half-decomposed corpse of the victim before leaving.
What are folks’ thoughts on why it took so long for something to be done? Was fear of escalation with Iran region-wide strong enough to deter yanks from doing basic “globe spanning maritime empire” anti-piracy stuff? Do you think it was anxiety about whether their current surface fleet is capable of engaging a force that relies so heavily on missiles and drones? What led to this historically unprecedented reluctance from the USA?
It's at least partially because the US is extremely nervous about starting a war in such a critical region, but honestly I think it's mostly because it just genuinely takes a long time to get forces in position no matter what country you are, but especially if you're an overextended country that is gradually crumbling and with inefficiencies due to capitalism and a parasitic financialised economy.
Like, even if the US had decided on October 7th "Alright, that's it, we're going to war with Iran, get everything ready for the invasion" preparations still would not be complete. You have to inform troops, prepare to move them, equip them, set up supply lines and infrastructure for the war, set up hospitals, set up barracks, get ships in position, and dozens of other things. And this is lengthened when every single corporation along the chain is trying to maximise its own profits. Like, it took literally 6 months for Ukraine to gather together even the shitty force that they sent to be annihilated in Zaporozhye, and that is one front in one war. What if you're the world hegemon, with dozens of theaters to handle (some in outright conflict, others more clandestine)? @[email protected] linked a Simplicius article talking about how the US navy is in a dismal state.
i know it's trite and overused but i just keep seeing historical parallels to the late (and i mean LATE) Roman empire
right down to the use of vassals, mercs, and the philosophy of "light, cheap" troops in which you increasingly can't find recruits for
but i'm guessing this is universal to all empires in an advanced state of decay no matter what era
would love to read an effortpost that detailed the Roman analogues
Mike Duncan wrote a book called "Before the Storm" some years ago that did that. I think it was focused on Trump though.
I'm certain there has been a reaction, but it's been behind closed doors trying to apply pressure to various vassals to make them do something about it. Similarly to the US pointedly ignoring attacks by militias in Iraq, if they talk about it too much the Holden Bloodfeasts in the house and senate will demand boots on the ground but there simply aren't enough boots nor enough transport capacity to do anything. Plus a decade of doing an air-power war on Yemen has completely failed, and that's the only kind of war the west can win.
In addition to what others have said, I have to wonder if they fear they might make it worse by aggravating Yemen into targetting Saudi oilfields.
I'm sure that fear is what is making the Saudis push forward with a peace treaty, they absolutely do not want to deal with drone and missile strikes on their oil infrastructure. As we're seeing in Israel, no amount of Western missile defense systems will stop even sugar rockets if a sufficient number of them are sent.
The Yanks often describe "Israel" as an unsinkable aircraft carrier, and the same can be said about Yemen. A US-led attack on Yemen would expose billions of dollars of US military assets (destroyers, carriers, aircraft), not to mention leave regional commercial infrastructure sorely exposed to counterattack. Meanwhile, any easy, high value targets in Yemen have already been exhausted or hardened against aerial assault by the civil war. There is a reason why only two nations in the region which have signed up are completely inconsequential island micro-nations (Seychelles: population 100,000, and Bahrain: population 1.4 million). The rest (United Kingdom, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, and Spain) live safely outside the region and are only interested in restoring the flow of treats.
Effectively disrupting the military capabilities of the Houthies will come at a devastating cost in materiel. I still think the US genuinely doesn't want to do this, but the demons who run this country see the alternatives as an unacceptable defeat to their reputation. The two carrier groups they already sent to West Asia were supposed to serve as a deterrent and are failing in that mission. Yemen isn't only calling "Israeli" impunity into question, but the efficacy of US power projection as well.
Also, it is worth keeping in mind that US elections are less than a year away and with 40% of the world trade passing through the Suez, a gremlin has been set loose inside our international just-in-time supply chain which threatens to rear its head in the most unexpected places, much reminiscent of the early Covid days. The price and availability of energy, as well as all sort of consumer and industrial products exists in a precarious state of flux.