CounterVortex

Planet Watch

Podcast: is the Jewish homeland in outer space?

The escalating global crisis and the very real crimes of the “Jewish state” make the world a more precarious place for Jews—as recent events demonstrate all too clearly. The contradictions underlying Zionism make its promise of dignity and security for Jews illusory. Earlier efforts also proved to be empty dreams—such as the Jewish Autonomous Oblast of Birobidzhan in Soviet-era Siberia. A new book (facetiously or not) seeks a solution to the interminable “Jewish Question” in space colonization. In Episode 328 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg discusses The Luftmenschen of Planet Birobidzhan by Zvi Baranoff.

Syria

Syria: arrest in Assad-era chemical attack

Syria’s Interior Ministry announced the arrest of deposed regime brigadier Khardal Ahmad Dayyub, a former head of Air Force Intelligence in Daraa, for his involvement in systematic human rights violations committed against civilians. Dayyub is accused of running an “assassination committee” in Daraa, as well as involvement in the chemical attacks on Eastern Ghouta during his later service in the Damascus regional branch. He is also said to have had a key role in coordination with Hezbollah and Iranian forces in Syria that were introduced to back up the Bashar Assad dictatorship. (Photo: SANA)

East Asia

Hong Kong trade unions face ‘structural collapse’

A new report by the Hong Kong Labour Rights Monitor (HKLRM) details how Hong Kong’s labor protections face “profound and alarming structural collapse” as national security surveillance becomes the “new normal” under Chinese rule. The report outlines the developments in administration and policy of the last year, documenting how the workers’ rights movement is facing significant constrains. The “dual pressure of the National Security Law (NSL) and draconian amendments to the Trade Unions Ordinance (TUO),” which came into effect in January 2026, are leading to a “hollowing out of trade unions,” says the report. (Photo: antha26/Pixabay via JURIST)

Africa

Podcast: West Africa escalates toward genocide

Alarming reports that Nigeria has established “concentration camps” for the Fulani ethnic minority cast an ironic light on Nigeria’s tension with the Sahel states of Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso to the north. These three regimes have broken from the Western imperial camp (to embrace the nascent Russian imperial camp)—but are likewise subjecting their Fulani minorities to persecution and massacre. With the recent shock rebel offensive in Mali, the “terrorist” stigma that attaches to the Fulani and Tuareg peoples across the imperial camps makes their position more precarious than ever. Meanwhile, prominent voices on the both the right and the (supposed) “left” are spreading propaganda about the struggle in West Africa that is alarmingly wrong, because it exclusively views the crisis through a campist lens. In Episode 327 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg tries to provide some clarity on these fast-escalating and grossly under-reported conflicts. (Photo: Az-Zallaqa via LWJ)

Syria

Fighting again erupts in Syria’s Suwayda

Clashes broke out in Syria’s southern as-Suwayda province between the central government’s Internal Security Forces and Druze armed groups affiliated with the region’s self-declared “National Guard.” Fighters from the Guard’s “501 Knights of Hamza” battalion attempted to advance toward government lines in the governorate’s western countryside under heavy cover fire, including from truck-mounted machine-guns and rocket-launchers. Government forces responded with mortar fire. Since the fall of the Bashar Assad dictatorship in December 2024, Israel has occupied large areas of eastern as-Suwayda, and is believed to have dropped arms to Druze fighters in the region. The province has been effectively divided since fighting broke out last year between Druze militia and central government forces and their local Bedouin allies. (Map: Google)

Watching the Shadows

Podcast: Can we at least 86 the bullshit?

The surreal spectacle of ex-FBI director James Comey surrendering to federal authorities to face charges of threatening Donald Trump over an innocent Instagram post illustrates the line between a mere conservative and an actual fascist. CounterVortex chief ranter Bill Weinberg had a personal run-in with Comey back when he was a federal prosecutor. Later, as FBI chief, Comey was accused of trying to prejudice the electorate against Hillary Clinton—only to be himself targeted by the Trump Justice Department. The absurdity of the latest charges against Comey are obvious to anyone who has worked in the restaurant industry. Trump should indeed be eighty-sixed—through legal and constitutional means, such as impeachment, 25th Amendment invocation, or nullification of his illegitimate election. And, indeed, sent to face war crimes charges at The Hague. In Episode 326 of the CounterVortex podcast, Weinberg says: Yes, #8647! Fuckin’ A! (Screenshot via, inter alia, CNN)

Syria

Syria: arrest in Assad-era massacre

Syria’s Internal Security Forces arrested Amjad Youssef, principal suspect in a massacre of civilians in the Tadamon neighborhood of Damascus in April 2013. Footage emerged in 2022 showing Syrian soldiers leading captives, bound and blindfolded, to a pit before shooting them. The video became one of the most direct pieces of visual evidence of extrajudicial killings by forces of the Bashar Assad dictatorship, which was finally overthrown in December 2024. The leaked footage was released as part of an investigative report prepared by researchers from the Institute for War, Holocaust & Genocide Studies (NIOD) at the University of Amsterdam. Apprehended in a rural area of Hama province following a manhunt, Youssef appeared in the footage, and is believed to have been a member of the notorious Branch 227 of the Assad-era Military Intelligence Directorate. Estimates by the Syrian Network for Human Rights indicate that the death toll in the Tadamon massacre may exceed 450 people. (Photo: SNHR)

Africa

Shock rebel offensive driven back in Mali

Russia’s Africa Corps launched air-strikes and helicopter assaults to drive back a dramatic rebel advance on Mali’s capital Bamako. Former rival insurgent groups, the jihadist Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) and the Tuareg separatist Front de Libération de l’Azawad (FLA), came together for the joint offensive against the ruling military government, with simultaneous attacks on Mopti, Gao and Kidal as well as the capital. Mali’s defense minister, Lt. Gen. Sadio Camara, the key liaison between the army and Russian mercenary forces, was killed in an apparent suicide truck bombing on his residence outside Bamako. (Map: PCL)

Iran

Podcast: Trump to The Hague! III

In Episode 325 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg continues to make the case—political, legal and practical—for sending Trump to a jail cell at The Hague to face war crimes charges before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Actual precedent refutes the conventional wisdom that this demand is “unrealistic.” Serbia’s long-ruling strongman Slobodan Milosevic died in a cell at The Hague while awaiting trial before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, while Philippines ex-president Rodrigo Duterte is currently in a cell at The Hague awaiting trial before the ICC. The Court just confirmed that it has jurisdiction in the Duterte case despite the Philippines’ withdrawal from the ICC. Contrary to the dogma of “American exceptionalism,” such an outcome for Trump is within the realm of possibility. (Photo: Tony Webster via Wikimedia Commons)

Europe

Ukraine: fund launched to repair drone-damaged Chernobyl shield

With aid from the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development (EBRD), Ukraine has opened a special fund for the restoration of the protective structure over the entombed reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. The €30 million agreement was signed on April 26 during a Chernobyl International Conference on Recovery & Nuclear Safety, actually held at the site of the disaster that took place on that date in 1986. The “New Safe Confinement” structure has since 2016 provided a second layer of protection over the “sarcophagus” that Soviet authorities built to entomb the exploded reactor after the disaster. It was breached by a Russian drone strike on the site in February 2025. (Photo: Wikipedia)

Europe

Ecological devastation in Great Game for Russian oil

A $106 billion EU emergency loan is now on its way to Ukraine, following the fall of Hungary’s strongman Viktor Orban, who was holding it up. However, as a condition of the loan, Kyiv is obliged to re-open the war-damaged Druzhba pipeline, which sends Russian oil through Ukrainian territory to Hungary, Poland and Germany. Kyiv is cooperating in getting the pipeline operational again—but is meanwhile drone-bombing Russian oil facilities on the Baltic and Black seas, in hopes of diminishing how much petrol Moscow will have to export through that pipeline. The strikes have caused “apocalyptic scenes” in the Black Sea port of Tuapse—air thick with toxic fumes, a huge column of smoke blotting out the sun, black rain falling from the sky. Russia, unwilling to sacrifice its own oil revenues but seeking to punish Europe for backing Ukraine, has announced that it will cut off the flow of oil from Kazakhstan through the Druzhba pipeline. (Image: Soviet postage stamp celebrating oil pipeline. Via Wikipedia)

The Andes

Peru: US arms deal behind cabinet shake-up

Peru’s government made a $462 million payment to US defense contractor Lockheed Martin for purchase of 12 ‌F-16 fighter jets, the first installment in a controversial multi-billion-dollar deal that triggered the resignation of two top ministers. In stepping down, Defense Minister Carlos Díaz and Foreign Minister Hugo de Zela cited their opposition to interim President José Balcázar’s attempt to delay the deal. The payment came days after a $2 billion contract for the F-16s was signed by an official in Peru’s Air Force—over the head of Balcázar, who was informed of finalization of the deal only after the fact. (Photo: Wikipedia)