Image is of Cuba’s National People’s Power Assembly.

The most recent geopolitical news around Cuba is the arrival this week of four Russian vessels, including a nuclear submarine - not carrying any nukes, (un)fortunately - to Havana. This will, in Putin’s words, merely be a visit celebrating historical ties and no laws are being broken. Nonetheless, it’s not hard to imagine how American politicians and analysts are taking the news, especially as it comes shortly after Russia promised an “asymmetrical” response to further NATO involvement in Ukraine (notably, officially allowing the use of US weapons such as missiles in Russia, albeit in a small part of Russian territory, near the border).

Meanwhile, China has been increasingly co-operating with Cuba to overcome the economic hardship created by American sanctions. China has recently re-allowed direct flights to Cuba and has recently donated some small photovoltaic plants as part of an initiative to eventually boost the Cuban energy grid by 1000 MW - and any electrical expansion helps as Cuba is plagued by blackouts which last most of the day. Additionally, the EU has made meaningful contributions to Cuba’s energy situation too, with large solar installations. Hopefully, the Belt and Road Initiative will help preserve the Cuban revolution against reactionary forces as the power of US sanctions wanes. The proximity of Cuba to the United States makes this much more challenging than it would be for countries elsewhere, however. Similarly to the situation in Mexico, it seems unlikely that the US’s influence over Cuba will massively diminish for decades to come unless there is a catastrophic internal collapse in the American authoritarian regime.

The Havana Syndrome will continue until American morale declines.

The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you’ve wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don’t worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is Cuba! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

Please check out the HexAtlas!

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week’s thread is here.

Israel-Palestine Conflict

If you have evidence of Israeli 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 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.

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.

  • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]@hexbear.netOPMEnglish
    62·
    18 days ago

    Amal Saad, scholar of Hezbollah:

    With the downing of the third Hermes 900, one of Israel’s most advanced drones, Hizbullah has now eliminated 12% of Israel’s reported fleet of 25 such drones. It has now downed a total of 7 Israeli drones since October, resulting in a significant financial loss for Israel. However, the true significance lies in the fact that Israel’s once unchallenged aerial supremacy is now under threat. In addition to downing drones, Hizbullah has challenged this superiority by targeting Israeli jets, compelling them to retreat from Lebanese airspace on two occasions last week, infiltrating Israel with its own drones without being detected or intercepted, and even striking Israel’s Iron Dome.

    Coupled with how Hizbullah has turned the tables by not only creating a buffer zone inside Israel for the first time in its history, forcing tens of thousands of Israelis to flee northern settlements, but also by using the Galilee as a research and development lab to test its weapons - a reversal of Israel’s long-standing tactics against Lebanon - it’s clear that Israel is now facing the most significant threat in its history and is fighting a new type of enemy.

    Hizbullah’s current approach marks a significant shift from its previous strategy, which focused primarily on preventing an Israeli occupation and achieving victory by simply surviving. No longer content with defensive measures, Hizbullah has now taken the offensive against Israel, engaging in a protracted war of attrition. The movement’s goals have expanded far beyond mere survival and the liberation of Lebanese territory; it now seeks to compel Israel to change its behaviour and calculations by imposing unprecedented costs. Furthermore, rather than countering Israel’s “complexity” with Hizbullah’s “simplicity,” as Nasrallah characterized the 2006 war, Hizbullah is now confronting complexity head-on with audacity and more advanced weaponry.

    There was also a major ambush operation by Hamas today, where they toppled a building on top of an Israeli force. Israel is probably claiming 2 soldiers lightly grazed and -1 deaths, as in a new Israeli soldier popped out via mitosis

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
      55·
      18 days ago

      Whoever gave Hezbollah more modern anti air weaponry has done something very important that deserves to be recognised as a key contribution to the resistance. This is keeping Lebanese civilians safe as it means Israel cannot fly their fighter jets with impunity and bomb everything.

      • Greenleaf [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        43·
        18 days ago

        Personally I take Putin’s comment about “arming neighbors” or whatever to not be about Cuba, but about Iran and Hezbollah.

        • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]@hexbear.netOPMEnglish
          26·
          17 days ago

          I don’t see what other countries Putin would even be talking about, other than the DPRK. There are anti-Western countries here and there (Cuba, Venezuela, the Sahel states, etc) but I don’t think sending weapons above and beyond what they’re already doing would be a productive pressure point as a response to NATO escalations. Like, “They’re allowing Ukraine to strike our territory with NATO missiles? I’ll send more tanks to Burkina Faso. That’ll fucking show 'em.” doesn’t make much sense. But strengthening anti-Western forces in the critical regions of West and East Asia would actually be pretty meaningful counters to broader US strategy.