Image is of the Preah Vihear Temple on the Cambodian border. Image sourced from the UNESCO World Heritage website.
Over the last few days, Thailand and Cambodia entered into a heightened stage of conflict due to a long-running border dispute. Like many problems on this planet, Europeans are ultimately to blame - specifically France. Certain sections of the border drawn up by France about a century ago were not fully agreed upon by both sides, with the ownership of some Khmer temples being the most visible points of disagreement.
Despite interventions in favor of Cambodia in the 1960s and later 2010s by the ICJ - one of the mainly mostly useless global institutions that liberals periodically disown - the border conflict has simmered at a generally low level. Of the two countries, Thailand is significantly more militarily and economically powerful.
Last Wednesday, a Thai soldier lost his leg by stepping on a landmine, prompting a rapid escalation between Cambodia and Thailand that has since resulted in dozens of deaths and tens of thousands displaced. Cambodia was willing to come to the negotiating table fairly quickly, but Thailand was more hesitant. International pressure on the two countries by Malaysia, China, and the United States eventually forced Thailand to the table, and they have recently agreed to an immediate ceasefire courtesy of ASEAN.
Notably, Trump refused to hold trade talks with either country until they agreed to peace, which suggests that he really wants a Nobel Peace Prize - which he seems a shoe-in for given that he’s met the two most important requirements that several Nobel Peace Prize recipients have needed to meet in the past, which are: 1) start at least one war, and 2) accelerate the genocide of millions of people as billions more people watch on. His policies vis-a-vis ICE creating a domestic terror regime only further increase his chances of winning the prize.
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.
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 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.
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.
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.
So why are multiple countries, including Qatar (where much of Hamas’ civil leadership is currently located), Egypt, the UK, France and other EU member states suddenly putting out statements or making UN statements about recognising a Palestinian Authority led Palestine State, with Gaza demilitirised and Hamas surrendering all power?
I think it’s because of the latest Israeli ultimatum, according to Israeli sources. These sources have said that if Hamas do not sign the “60 day ceasefire”, Israel will formally annex parts of Gaza, speculated to be the so called “buffer zone” first, followed by the rest of Gaza if no agreement is reached. The Israeli plan is obviously supported by the United States, if the US didn’t come up with it themselves. There’s speculated to be a 48 hour countdown on this, which started at 14:00 UTC, July 29th. It’s currently 01:00 UTC, July 31st, so 35 hours have passed. This means that Israel, if they’re going to follow through on this, will have to announce the plan sometime on July 31st. This would explain all the statements on recognising a Palestinian state sans Hamas that have come out over the past days, both a last ditch effort to pressure Hamas into signing the 60 day ceasefire/surrender (especially in the case of Qatar) to avoid the formal annexation being triggered, and as a way for some western European countries to wash their hands clean of the potential upcoming formal annexation of Gaza, as they won’t officially recognise it.
I could obviously be very wrong here, this is speculation. But the timeline is very coincidental. It also lines up with the September 2025 part of the Palestinian recognition. If a 60 day ceasefire is signed on July 31st, it would last until 29 September.
Why is a formal annexation different from current and previous Israeli military occupation? To reverse/undo annexation, two thirds of the Israeli parliament must vote in favour of it’s reversal (80/120 seats) or a national referendum must vote in favour of reversal, according to past precedent. The military or Netanyahu can’t just decide to withdraw if annexation goes forward, any withdrawal or reversal will require large political alignment.
Netanyahu Proposes to Annex Parts of Gaza in Attempt to Appease Far-right Minister if Hamas Does Not Agree to a Deal - Haaretz
Yes this is a low follower random twitter account, but their reporting has been highly accurate in the past:
Israel is set to decide on the annexation of territory in the Gaza Strip within 48 hours, should Hamas fail to agree to a deal - 29 July 2025, 14:00UTC
Prime Minister Netanyahu is considering a plan to annex territories in Gaza if Hamas doesn’t agree to a ceasefire plan - ABC News New York affiliate
Qatar, Saudi, Egypt join call for Hamas to disarm, give up Gaza rule - France24
Precedent on annexation, archive link
Correct me if I’m wrong, but this strikes me as exactly the same shit that precluded the Sabra and Shatila massacre. Negotiate with the resistance to lay down their arms, we pinky promise that we will stay true to our word, and then use that as an opportunity to massacre the Palestinians anyway. The colonisers can never be trusted, they will never, ever stay true to their word.
Qatar when it realized Hamas is fighting Israel instead of kidnapping women and killing minorities
Notice that all these offers of recognizing a Palestinian state (which I should point out, should not even be up for debate since the State of Palestine was created with Israel by the UN in 1948) all include “if Hamas disarms”. This is a non-starter, it’s basically them dangling a little carrot to accept Israel’s “offer”. If Hamas disarms then it’s likely the entire population of Gaza will be removed at best, and murdered down to the last child at worst. Also, recognition is nice but isn’t worth much. Israel and the US don’t give a single care if the entire world recognizes a Palestinian state, they still won’t. It’s exactly what they do with the blockade of Cuba. The whole world tells them to stop, and the US just gives the world the finger.
I think images of starving kids make these politicians feel a little heat. So they are making an offer they know Hamas cannot and will not accept to save face.
And regarding annexation… the situation of who holds what is quite murky right now. Maps say one thing, but I don’t think the IOF is much able to hold on to anywhere close to that much ground. And meaningful annexation i.e. bringing in settlers… that is not possible. Not without a lot of dead settlers. Israel abandoned Gaza for a reason. I don’t see how Israel could do anything more than an annexation on paper than denies use of some land to Gazans but functionally doesn’t allow Israel any more than that (though admittedly, that is still quite bad as it would pack more Gazans into a smaller area). I also get the impression the Israeli military is really looking for a way out of this, I cannot see how they would think maintain a partial annexation would be viable long term.
To be clear, I am not disagreeing with anything you are saying, just offering a different perspective.
Its disheartening to somehow take the 4 or 5 so euro countries doing the two-state solution again and libs clapping for themselves the loudest.
This genocide was not prevented despite the majority of countries recognizing Palestine as an independent country. Gazans need mass medical care right now and that fact is nowhere on these “boons” supposed to be given to hamas.
To add to the point of disarmament: We’ve already seen how the genociders weaponize any ties to Hamas as justification for murder, kidnapping, and more. Disarming Hamas to the satisfaction of these ghouls would mean to disarm all of Gaza - to eliminate the possibility of any and all armed resistance.
This is their ostensibly humanist final solution to the Palestinian problem. They know that israel’s final solution is untenable, like you said, but Western capital benefits too much from zionism/fascism to stand against it, so this is what they offer instead.
A state without a state. People who are alive but so debilitated that they are not fully alive. “Democracy” not in the form of independent political institutions, equal rights, and self-determination, but the land and people being open to new forms of exploitation by Western financiers, NGO’s, and the like.
So what happens if Hamas disagreees?
“The house always wins” if hamas surrenders israel will finish its genocide and maybe gazans can have that small strip of costal territory that is a superfund site now. If hamas refuses its their “fault” and Israel can finish its genocide.
In both cases the blame will be placed solely on hamas. And not on the western empire, the arab puppets and sheiks and the hundred of millions of enablers.
“Hamas could have given Palestinians their statehood if only they had chosen to disband themselves and stop attacking Israel. It would have been fully backed by the international community. But, since they refused to do so, Hamas has effectively condemned Gaza to be annexed and robbed the rest of the Palestinians of their only chance to have their own state. Alas, as is common in the uncultured, underdeveloped parts of the world, corruption, tribalism and extremism got the best of them. A great tragedy but there is only so much that we the civilized nations can do if these people don’t even want to help themselves.”
Genocide and war continue, and Israel may announce formal annexation of parts of Gaza in the coming days. Don’t know what will happen to the civil leadership of Hamas in Qatar.
The situation is extremely depressing, to say the least. I have other words, but I won’t say…
How is that any different from if Hamas demobilizes?
deleted by creator