Image is from this SCMP article.
Much of the analysis below is sourced from Michael Roberts’ great website.
Japan’s ruling parliamentary coalition, consisting of the LDP (purple) and it’s junior coalition partner Komeito (in light pink) have lost their ruling majority. They have ruled post-war Japan for almost its entire history. The LDP is currently led by Shigeru Ishiba after Kishida stood down due to a corruption scandal, and ties to the Unification Church.
While geopolitical factors (over the cold war between the US and China, etc) may have played a role, by far the biggest reason for this result in the poor economic conditions over the past few years. Inflation has risen and real wages have fallen, with little relief for the working class via things like tax reductions. While inequality in Japan is not as extreme as in America, it is still profound, with the top 10% possessing 60% of the wealth, while the bottom 50% possess just 5%.
Shinzo Abe previously tried to boost economic performance through monetary easing and fiscal deficits, while Kishida ran on a “new capitalism” which rejected Abe’s neoliberalism and promised to reduce inequality. Nothing substantial has resulted from all this, however, other than increasing corporate wealth. Innovation continues to fall, and domestic profitability is low, resulting in decreasing investment at home by Japanese corporations. Labour productivity growth has only slightly picked up since the mid-2000s and is falling again. The rate of profit has fallen by half since the 1960s, and Japan has been in a manufacturing recession - or very close to it - since late 2022. In essence: there is no choice but between stagnation or decline.
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Last week’s thread is here.
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.
Barclays bank has divested from Elbit Systems because of Palestine Action’s targeting of them over the last year.
https://www.thecanary.co/uk/news/2024/10/31/barclays-divest-elbit-palestine-action/
spoiler
After a year-long campaign against its premises by Palestine Action, Barclays PLC has sold all of its shareholdings in Elbit Systems Ltd (ELST). Until recently, Barclays owned over 16,000 shares in Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons company.
Barclays: divestment from Elbit, finally
Starting just over one year ago, Palestine Action’s campaign saw activists undertake 54 actions against Barclays premises nation-wide. Smashing branch windows, spraying them in blood-red paint, many of these actions put Barclays sites out of operation for weeks, actions which sought to raise the costs associated with dealing with Elbit:
In the latest U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings, Barclays owned 0 shares in Elbit Systems Ltd (ELST), down 16,345 since the previous filing, 15 May 2024, worth over $3,400,000.
Until then, recent filings had showed Barclays’ Elbit shareholdings at record high quantities, having steadily increased from zero ten years ago. The most recent SEC filings and NASDAQ data record an immediate total sale of Barclays’ ELST shares, abruptly sold just when Palestine Action’s campaign hit them hardest.
Initial research published in July 2022 by Campaign Against Arms Trade, War on Want, and Palestine Solidarity Campaign showed the bank held shareholdings worth over £1.5billion in companies complicit with Israeli apartheid. Palestine Action adopted the campaign in October 2023 due to the bank’s investments in Elbit Systems — the group’s primary target.
A sustained campaign by Palestine Action
Palestine Action’s 11-month long campaign against Barclays reached its peak on 10 June 2024, when 20 branches had their windows smashed, drenched in red paint, in a co-ordinated nationwide overnight action:
Four days after, Barclays CEO CS Venkatakrishnan penned in the Guardian that the bank is concerned about “overall suffering” in the region, and is very accepting of the type of “peaceful protest” seen in multiple years of campaigning up until this year. But, in a media campaign co-ordinated with former Defence Secretary Grant Shapps, Venkatakrishnan complained of Palestine Action’s disruptive actions against the bank.
Inadvertently, Barclays CEO affirmed Palestine Action’s strategy, which is to make the cost of dealing in genocide, occupation, and apartheid exceed the potential to profit from it. Throughout this year-long campaign, several activists were arrested:
During questioning, police claimed that many actions caused damage between £250k to £500k in value. Most actions forced bank branches to close for weeks at a time, contributing to the financial disruption to the bank.
There are still many complicit institutions
These actions were taken as part of Palestine Action’s four-year campaign against the premises of Elbit Systems, and against the financial and industrial partners which support them like Barclays.
Elbit Systems is a major supplier of the Israeli military, its contributions including the vast majorities of Israel’s drones, along with mortuary munition and artillery rockets currently being used in Gaza.
The campaign has seen two of Elbit’s weapons factories forced to permanently shut down in Britain, and has forced a number of partners to halt relations with Elbit. Recently, activists have struck at over a dozen premises in Britain of Allianz a major shareholder in and insurer of Elbit.
A Palestine Action spokesperson said of the Barclays decision:
Through a focused strategy, direct action has achieved multiple successes and forced the hands of many complicit institutions. We will remain committed and focused to the task at hand and target any and all institutions and businesses which enable Israel’s biggest weapons firm to maintain their genocidal operations.
That means, if Barclays does reinvest into Elbit Systems in the future, Palestine Action will come knocking again.
Danish teen was arrested for “praising” a “terror attack” against Israel the terror attack was Hamas bombing israel with rockets and the “praise” was this comment on facebook “Yaaaaas😍 🇵🇸”
Before/after shots of Lebanon villages where Israel has been bombing
Looks like 80% of all buildings destroyed to me, very similar to descriptions of the US bombing operations in DPRK during the Korean War.
Found a probably untrustworthy site attempting to map the Lebanon front with Israel: https://english.iswnews.com/36624/latest-khiam-on-al-khiam-front-map/
Pretty much the only mapping I’ve ever seen of the Lebanon invasion but that could be because there’s practically nothing to map so far because of how much Hezbollah have been fucking the IOF.
The video footage above shows moments of several Israeli airstrikes on al-Khiam town.
In addition to armed confrontation, the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah has conducted five rocket and artillery strikes against the movements and gatherings of Israeli troopers in the southeast of al-Khiam.
The Israeli regime’s army bulldozers are also creating defensive embankments and fortifications in the eastern outskirts of al-Khiam front, similar to actions previously taken in the Netzarim Corridor, a 6km stretch of land that divides the northern and southern Gaza Strip.
This measure is aimed at providing security for infantry forces and protecting Merkava tanks from guided anti-tank missiles. It appears that the Tel Aviv regime is preparing for a heavy confrontation in al-Khiam axis.
Al-Khiam town is a significant target for the Israeli regime, and heavy preparations have been made for it.
Another here: https://english.iswnews.com/36626/israeli-occupying-forces-demolish-villages-of-umm-al-tut-marwahin-in-southern-lebanon/
Hitler wasn’t elected, he was appointed chancellor by the lesser evil candidate.
Kamala has vowed to have a Republican in her cabinet.
These two statements have absolutely no relation whatsoever.
DPRK published footage of the launch of a new ICBM model called the “Hwasong-19”
https://tankie.tube/w/8zrvst6VVXhwuDfQqc3f1F
Smoke plume from battery plant fire near Fredericktown forces evacuations
at this point, no other country will need to bomb us, all of our stuff will simply explode on its own given enough time.
I had a great time handing out candy for Halloween with my neighborhood.
It’s my favorite holiday. It was awesome as a kid but man as an adult it’s almost better? Like, it’s just nice to have one day where everyone gets to pretend for a bit, get some candy and just have a nice time with people from the community.
So basically I touched grass tonight and it was nice
least racist American soldier
SourceThe US election really is wild. Going off polling data it looks like Kamala wins with a close electoral victory if the Dems over perform again like they did for the midterms. If it goes exactly like the polls then Trump wins with a healthy lead.
(Week-old news) AP: One of 3 judges weighing request for ICC arrest warrants against Netanyahu and others is replaced
The decision is likely to further delay a decision on the request by the court’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan.
I saw the sexual misconduct allegations against Khan, but somehow I missed this story.
Anyway, it’s now 164 days since Karim Khan requested arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant. Reminder that it took just 23 days to issue Putin’s warrant (for putting injured kids in hospitals).
Jesus christ, bill Clinton gave an incredibly pro genocide speech
Edit:
How many civilians should Israel kill? “I am sorry but we are not keeping score that way.”
He literally did the Hexbear post
Eight of the eleven justices of Mexico’s Supreme Court of Justice have resigned from their posts on the body. The decision comes after the approval of the Judicial Reform Law, which established direct elections for the country’s judiciary. The information was confirmed by the country’s Senate.
If France attempted to attack Algeria, who would they attempt to set up as puppet rulers? There will be consequences for Western Sahara being thrown under the bus.
Some news from the Donbass.
Russian forces liberated Kurakhovka, a Donetsk People’s Republic town south of Gornyak: https://s5.cdnstatic.space/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/kurakhovka.mp4?_=4
Russian forces liberated Novoukrainka, a DPR settlement northwest of Ugledar: https://s5.cdnstatic.space/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Novoukrainka.mp4?_=2
Russian forces captured an undamaged, US-built M1A1 “Abrams” tank in the DPR: https://news-pravda.com/world/2024/10/31/818544.html
Anti-fascist partisans burned a Kiev regime Mi-2 helicopter: https://odysee.com/@Support4Z:b/📽️-A-🇬🇧-🇫🇷,-Our-Partisan-Brothers-in-Ukraine-move-on-to-helicopters!:3
