Russia

Africa

Niger junta pivots from the EU to Russia

The ruling junta in Niger has broken off a military partnership with the European Union that provided training and equipment for the counterinsurgency against jihadist rebels. The rupture is linked to the EU’s refusal to engage with the junta that took power in a July coup. Russian officials have meanwhile visited the country, signing documents to strengthen military cooperation. Russian support for other armies in the Sahel region has led to massive rights abuses, yet the EU’s own record was far from exemplary. The bloc spent large sums on Niger’s military but failed to implement measures to prevent abuses—resulting in civilian casualties that played into the hands of the jihadists. (Map: PCL)

Planet Watch

COP 28 looks at climate-conflict overlap

For the first time, the annual UN climate summit is focusing on the overlap between conflict and the climate crisis. This convergence is especially clear in rebel-controlled northwest Syria. A years-long drought is compounding the suffering caused by over 12 years of war, and devastating earthquakes that struck the region earlier this year. Water pumping infrastructure has been repeatedly hit by regime and Russian warplanes, leaving farmers without irrigation for parched fields. Since the start of October, the northwest has been experiencing the most intense military escalation by the regime and its Russian patron in nearly three years, with scores killed and over 120,000 displaced by air-strikes. (Photo: Mahmoud Abo Ras/TNH)

Palestine

Gaza & Yarmouk: forbidden symmetry

As Israel crosses the genocidal threshold in Gaza, a regional summit in Riyadh protests, issuing an urgent call for a ceasefire. Yet the regional powers at that summit are guilty of equivalent crimes—Saudi Arabia in Yemen, and Iran and the Basar Assad regime in Syria. Assad’s propaganda chief Bouthaina Shaaban especially decried Israel’s targeting of hospitals in Gaza. Yet just last month, the Assad regime bombed hospitals in Syria’s rebel-held north. Indeed, the Assad regime also savagely bombed and besieged Palestinians for months, at Yarmouk refugee camp outside Damascus. In Episode 200 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes with chagrin that key organizers of this month’s National March on Washington for Palestine included pseudo-left “tankie” formations that actively support the genocidal Assad regime. They also now abet Russia’s genocidal campaign in Ukraine, in which hospitals have been repeatedly targeted. This moral contradiction undercuts our effectiveness in advancing the demand for a Gaza ceasefire. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo: Palestinians await aid distribution at Yarmouk, 2014. Credit: UNWRA)

The Caucasus

Anti-Semitic riots, attacks in Russian Caucasus

An angry mob in Russia’s Caucasus republic of Dagestan stormed the airport of regional capital Makhachkala, seking to confront passengers arriving on a flight from Israel. Some held signs reading “Child killers have no place in Dagestan” and “We are against Jewish refugees.” The National Guard only showed up hours after rioters had overrun all areas of the airport, including the runway. Clashes then ensued, with several arrested. There was a similar scene in the Dagestani city of Khasavyurt, after reports on social media claimed that “refugees from Israel” were being accommodated at a local hotel. Another such rally was reported from Cherkessk, capital of Karachay-Cherkessia republic. And in Nalchik, capital of Kabardino-Balkaria, an under-construction Jewish cultural center was set ablaze, with “Death to the Yahudi” written in Russian on one wall. (Map: Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection)

Europe

Russia conducts simulated nuclear strike

Russia’s military conducted exercises with nuclear-capable missiles, shortly after the State Duma unanimously voted to revoke ratification of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. The Russian Strategic Missile Forces command claimed the exercises were part of a regularly scheduled annual training drill held every October. But Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the exercises were to simulate a retaliatory nuclear strike to be carried out if Russia were attacked with nuclear firepower first. The Russian military widely publicized videos of the exercises across state media. According to the Kremlin, the exercises were overseen by President Vladimir Putin from a Moscow command center. (Photo: Kremlin)

Europe

Evidence mounts of Russian war crimes in Ukraine

A new UN report finds continued evidence of war crimes and human rights violations committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, including torture, rape and the deportation of children. The report, the latest issued by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, documents additional indiscriminate attacks with explosive weapons, resulting in deaths, injuries and the destruction and damage of “civilian objects.” For example, 24 people, mostly women and children, were killed in an attack on a block of residential apartments in Uman, a city in the Cherkasy region, in April. (Map: PCL)

Palestine

Ukraine & Palestine — forbidden symmetry III

In Episode 197 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes that as Israel crosses a genocidal threshold in Gaza, Vladimir Putin hypocritically protests the carnage—despite the fact that he has already crossed that threshold in Ukraine. This hypocrisy is precisely mirrored by that of Joe Biden. The moral position of Ukraine’s resistance to Russian aggression, occupation and genocide is undermined by the contradiction of its Western backers such as the US marshalling massive resources—in the very same legislation just introduced by Biden on Capitol Hill—to assist Israeli aggression, occupation and genocide. Listen on SoundCloudor via Patreon. (Photo: Maan News Agency)

Europe

Ukraine bans religious organizations linked to Russia

Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, adopted Decision Number 8371, banning religious organizations found to have “colluded with armed aggressors” from operating within the country. The measure is clearly aimed at the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which has been accused of collaborating with Russia. Some 16% of Ukrainians follow the church, which is distinct from the autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine. The church claims that it is not currently aligned with the Russian Orthodox Church and argues the law is unconstitutional. Passage of the law follows the prosecution of church leaders, including the three-year prison sentence of Metropolitan Iosaf, for distributing pro-Russian literature, and imposition of a 60-day house arrest on Metropolitan Pavel, for “supporting Russia’s armed action against Ukraine.” (Photo of Kyiv’s Pechersk Lavra via Wikipedia)

Palestine

Ukraine & Palestine — forbidden symmetry II

In Episode 196 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes with alarm the police-state measures being put in place in place in Israel, as well as Germany, France and the United Kingdom to suppress protest against Israel’s criminal assault on Gaza, now approaching a genocidal threshold. This has obvious echoes of the draconian crackdown on anti-war dissent in Russia since the launch of the Ukraine invasion. The more Israel and its Western allies which are also backing Ukraine come to resemble the fascist state of Vladimir Putin, both in criminal military tactics and police-state measures to suppress dissent to such tactics, the worse it will to be not only for the Palestinians, but also in the long run for the Ukrainians. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Photo: Q Sakamaki via The Village Sun)

Syria

New flare-up of fighting in northern Syria

While the media’s eyes are elsewhere, a serious escalation of violence in rebel-held northwest Syria has forced more than 70,000 people to flee their homes. Shelling and air-strikes by the regime and its allies have killed dozens of civilians and hit hospitals, as well as displacement camps and mosques. Aid groups are particularly worried about this new wave of flight given the onset of winter and the fact that over half of the region’s more than four million residents have already been displaced at least once. Médecins Sans Frontières says that around 19 hospitals in the region are only able to provide emergency care, and even that is difficult. A statement from Siham Hajaj, MSF’s head of mission for northwest Syria, called for “urgent action” to improve trauma and surgical capabilities in Idlib. (Map: PCL)

Palestine

Ukraine & Palestine — forbidden symmetry

In Episode 195 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg warns that with “Operation Swords of Iron,” the massive military campaign in Gaza launched in response to Hamas’ “al-Aqsa Flood,” Israel may be crossing the genocidal threshold it has long been approaching. As the United Nations and human rights groups urgently appeal to Israel to rescind its illegal order for a mass evacuation of northern Gaza, obviously a prelude to yet greater bombardment and a re-occupation of the Strip, the US and other Western powers are complicit. Their support for Israel, a predatory annexationist power on Palestinian land, opens a moral contradiction that weakens the position of Ukraine in its struggle against Russia’s annexationist and ultimately genocidal aggression. Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Image: Seth Tobocman)

Africa

Russia in Africa: imperialist or pretender?

In Episode 194 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg reviews Russia in Africa: Resurgent Great Power or Bellicose Pretender? by Samuel Ramani. Oxford scholar Ramani traces the history from Imperial Russia’s Cossack adventures in Djibouti to the contemporary Wagner Group operations in Sudan, the Sahel nations, and across the African continent. Is Russia truly a Great Power that can challenge the traditional colonial and neo-colonial powers on the continent, or is it a “pretender” which is at this moment assuming a particularly bellicose posture to compensate for its lack of structural imperial power? And does it make a difference? Listen on SoundCloud or via Patreon. (Image: OUP)