Gaza: the heaviest bombing campaign in history.

A short 🧵. The pace and scale of the bombing campaign in Gaza is historically unprecedented. In less than seven weeks, Israel has destroyed a comparable percentage of buildings in northern Gaza (around 70%) as that caused by the years-long carpet-bombing of German cities during WW2.

Is Israel’s war on Gaza really about controlling the multi-billion-dollar gas resources off the Gazan coast?

A 🧵:
unherd.com/2023/12/who-wi… 1/ When we talk of the Israeli-occupied territories, or of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more in general, we tend to focus on the latter’s political, social and humanitarian dimensions. But there’s also an important economic dimension that is often ignored.

Henry Kissinger has died. Here’s everything you need to know about America’s most controversial and polarising statesman — ruthless imperialist and diplomatic genius at the same time.

A 🧵:
unherd.com/2023/05/kissin… 1/ As National Security Advisor and Secretary of State from 1969 to 1977 under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, Kissinger played a pivotal role in marshalling the United States through one of the Cold War’s most violent and turbulent decades.

America’s enabling of the carnage in Gaza, and its involvement in Israel’s low-intensity proxy war with Iran, are turbo-charging the demise of the Western-led order — to the benefit of China and Russia.

A THREAD 🧵.
unherd.com/2023/11/israel… 1/ Over the past five weeks, the IDF has been engaged in daily clashes with Hezbollah along the Israeli-Lebanese border, and has launched several air raids on militias in Syria. Meanwhile, Ansar Allah, the Houthi movement that controls most of Yemen, has launched...

As horrific as the situation in Gaza is, things could get much worse. The war is causing tectonic shifts across the region which could easily escalate into a regional or global war.

A 🧵 to make sense of the complex geopolitics of the conflict.
unherd.com/2023/11/will-i… 1/ Tensions are already flaring up throughout the region. Since the beginning of the war, Israel has been engaged in daily clashes with the Iran-linked armed group Hezbollah along the Israeli-Lebanese border...
aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/3…

🧵 We need to talk about Oslo.

Thirty years ago 🇮🇱 and 🇵🇸 signed a “historic peace deal” that was supposed to end the conflict. It failed. The reasons are still hotly debated, with most blaming the Palestinians. So let’s settle the issue once and for all.
unherd.com/2023/10/why-pe… 1/ In 1987 the First Intifada broke out, as a reaction against Israeli repression including “beatings, shootings, killings, house demolitions, uprooting of trees, deportations, extended imprisonments, and detentions without trial”.
jstor.org/stable/2537242

🧵 @elonmusk is once again at the centre of a media firestorm — this time concerning the role of his Starlink satellite system in Ukraine. But what is he doing there in the 1st place? And what are his ties with the US military-industrial complex?

A THREAD
unherd.com/2023/09/elon-m… 1/ The WP recently published excerpts from a new biography on Musk revealing that he thwarted a Ukrainian attempt to use SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet system to launch a major sneak attack in September 2022 on the Russian fleet based in Crimea.
washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/…

🧵 George Soros is reportedly pulling out of Europe. Good. There are ample reasons to oppose Soros and his philanthropic empire that have absolutely nothing to do with antisemitism or wild conspiracy theories.

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/09/is-thi…
1/ A bit of context first. According to a letter sent out to various partner organisations, Open Society Foundations (OSF), Soros’ powerful philanthropic organisation is planning to significantly scale back its operations in Europe.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

So I read the latest “China is taking over the world” FT article, accompanied by the trademark scary dragon imagery. Here’s what I learnt: For starters, China is sponsoring initiatives to promote development, alleviate poverty and improve health in the developing world. Ugh.

🧵 The Ukraine war — or more precisely the West’s response to the latter — is causing Europe to deindustrialise at frightening speed. What’s worse, there is ample evidence that, from America’s perspective, this was the intended outcome all along.

THREAD.
compactmag.com/article/americ… 1/ The Russia-Ukraine conflict has deeply transformed transatlantic relations, leading to a greater degree of European “vassalisation” (in the words of a recent @ecfr report) to the US than ever before.
ecfr.eu/publication/th…

🧵 A crucial point has been missing in the debate about Niger/other Sahel coups: monetary imperialism. These countries are all former French colonies which still use a currency — the CFA franc — largely controlled by their former colonial ruler.

A THREAD
unherd.com/2023/08/niger-… 1/ An anti-Western revolt is sweeping across the Sahel region of West Africa. On July 26, in Niger — not to be confused with neighbouring Nigeria — a military coup led deposed Niger’s pro-Western Mohamed Bazoum, elected in 2021 amid allegations of fraud.
theguardian.com/world/2023/jul…

🧵 Two agreements secured early in the conflict — the Black Sea Grain Initiative, and a deal that allowed Russian gas to continue flowing to Europe via Ukraine — avoided a global economic catastrophe. But one is gone and the other is at risk.

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/07/the-uk… 1/ It is often unappreciated just how much worse the global economic repercussions from the conflict could have been. Russia is the world’s leading exporter of gas and provided around 50% of the EU’s demand before the war; Ukraine, meanwhile, is a major exporter of grain.

🧵 Right-populist parties are on the rise everywhere in Europe. But — “anti-wokeness” aside — what alternative do they offer? As it turns out, on a number of issues, they are peculiarly aligned with the mainstream.

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/07/the-po… 1/ Predictions that the pandemic would spell the end of populism have turned out to be little more than wishful thinking. In the US, polls show Trump creeping up on Biden. In Europe, meanwhile, a new right-populist wave is sweeping the continent — freaking out liberal pundits.

A rather extraordinary article appeared in the @nytimes yesterday, which essentially makes the same case that I make in my @unherd piece. I feel like the article isn’t getting the attention it deserves, so here’s a short 🧵 about it.
nytimes.com/2023/07/11/opi… 1/ Its authors, Grey Anderson and Thomas Meaney, are respectively the editor of and one of the contributors to an upcoming book which I will definitely be getting my hands on: “Natopolitanism: The Atlantic Alliance since the Cold War”.
.versobooks.com/en-gb/products…

🧵 As #NATO leaders gather in Vilnius today, no one will be asking the most important question: what is the reason for NATO’s existence?

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/07/the-re… 1/ NATO presents itself as a purely “defensive alliance… working for peace, security and freedom”. The reality, however, is quite different.

🧵 Here’s how the West is using the war to open up Ukraine to Western capital, and plunder its resources, by transforming the country into a hyper-neoliberal dystopia. Disaster capitalism at its worst.

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/07/the-ca… 1/ On June 21-22, thousands of representatives from Western governments and businesses gathered in London for the Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC23). Officially, the meeting’s purpose was to “support Ukraine’s recovery”.
urc-international.com/urc-2023-info

🧵 Why are Britain’s technocratic elites literally engineering a recession under the guise of “fighting inflation”? Here’s why it has little to do with inflation — and much to do with crushing workers by crashing the economy.

A THREAD.
@unherdunherd.com/2023/06/the-ba… 1/ Most experts agree that the Bank of England’s recent decision to raise interest rates for the 13th consecutive time since the end of 2021 will push the UK economy into recession by the end of the year.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

The legendary Daniel Ellsberg passed away yesterday. In his final interview, just a few days ago, he made a very important point: Russia wasn’t just provoked by the US into invading Ukraine ― it was deliberately provoked, meaning the US was hoping for this outcome, i.e. war. twitter.com/i/web/status/1… politico.com/news/magazine/…

🧵 Western corporations are refusing to go along with the US-Western strategy of decoupling from China — and the militarisation of great-power relations. Is the capitalist class revolting against the military-industrial complex and the neocons?

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/06/the-ca… 1/ After marshalling Europe in its proxy war against Russia, America is now determined to repeat this success against China. And despite a few grumbles (Macron, etc.), European leaders are largely playing along with this increasingly aggressive approach.
ft.com/content/042d43…

🧵 Everything You Know About the Debt Ceiling Is Wrong

A thread about one of the biggest economic scams of our time — and how it’s used to fleece the masses while trillions continue to get pumped into the war machine.
unherd.com/2023/05/americ… 1/ For weeks we’ve been hearing that either Congress raises the debt ceiling or the US faces a catastrophic default — potentially as soon as this week, Yellen said.
nytimes.com/2023/05/22/us/…

🧵 War criminal or diplomatic genius? On May 27, Henry Kissinger will celebrate his one-hundredth birthday. Here’s everything you need to know about America’s most controversial and polarising statesman.

A THREAD.
unherd.com/2023/05/kissin… 1/ As National Security Advisor and Secretary of State from 1969 to 1977 under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, Kissinger played a pivotal role in marshalling the United States through one of the Cold War’s most violent and turbulent decades.