this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2025
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Image is of destruction and damage inside Israel, sourced from this article.


Iran and Israel have struck each other many times over the last few days. There has been a general focus on military facilities and headquarters by both sides, though Israel has also struck oil facilities, civilian structures and hospitals, and in return for this, Iran has struck major scientific centers and the Haifa oil facilities.

Israel appears to have three main aims. First, to collapse the Iranian state, either through shock and breakdown by killing enough senior officials, or via some sort of internal military coup. Second, to try and destroy Iranian nuclear sites and underground missile cities, or at least to paralyze them long enough to achieve the first and third goals. And third, to bring the US into a direct conflict with Iran. This is because the US better equipped to fight them than Israel is (though victory would still not be guaranteed depending on what Iran chooses to do).

Iranian nuclear facilities are hidden deep underground (800 meters), far beyond the depth range of even the most powerful bunker busters (~70 meters or so), and built such that the visible ground entrances are horizontally far away in an unknown direction from the actual underground chambers. Only an extremely competent full-scale American bombing force all simultaneously using multiple of the most powerful conventional (perhaps even nuclear) bunker busters could even hypothetically hope to breach them (and we have seen how, in practice, American bunker busters have largely failed to impair or deter Ansarallah). There are several analysts on both sides who have concluded that it is entirely impossible to physically prevent Iran from building nukes.

I fully expect the US to join the war. I believe the current ambiguity is a deliberate invention of the US while they work to move their military assets into position, and as soon as they are ready, the US will start bombing Iran. After that, Iran's leadership must - if they haven't already - harden their hearts, and strike back with no fear, or risk following the path of Libya, Syria, and Iraq, either into either surrender, occupation, or annihilation. Every day where they do not possess a nuke is a day where lives are being lost and cities are being bombed.


Last week's thread is here.
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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 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.


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[–] [email protected] 26 points 24 minutes ago* (last edited 17 minutes ago) (4 children)

Israeli is giving off quite a few serious tells right now regarding Iran’s success thus far, and I think they are worth discussing.

We are hearing that Iran is firing a handful of missiles at a time now, 3-12ish range. Despite censorship efforts by Israel, we are still getting a slow drip of footage of these handfuls of Iranian missiles connecting with targets in Israel. From this, we can deduce that Iran is having a much higher success rate than earlier barrages, because it certainly doesn’t seem like we have seen that many fewer impacts comparatively.

Additionally, we’ve noticed fewer anti-missile defense munitions in footage of missile barrages. While some areas like Tel Aviv will still have a high ratio of anti-missile munitions to missiles in the air, we are seeing fewer around military installations and other places outside of Israel’s urban core. We are also seeing attempts to use cheaper intercept munitions on ballistic missiles, and have had footage of kinetic intercept munitions connecting with Iranian ballistic missiles and literally getting shot straight through while the missile continues on unaffected.

To me, this screams that Israel believes Iran is in this for the long haul, and that Israel is concerned about anti-missile munition stockpiles. On top of this, the media/internet censorship of Israel accompanied with banning citizens from leaving the country on flights is also telling that they are very afraid of creating a mass panic and exodus from the country. Personally, I believe that Israel and Iran have both identified Iran’s win condition: shatter the myth of Israeli superiority to their neighbors and scare enough people away that Israel begins becoming unsustainable.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 18 minutes ago

Totally agree. Iran still getting massive hits, including taking out intelligence buildings (today) and the Haifa refinery with much lower missile barrages speaks to their confidence. Israel hasn't achieved anything of note since the weekend in Iran either, lots of bombings but nothing nearly as spectacular as their opening moves.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 13 minutes ago (1 children)

I almost wonder if the missile self-targeting and misfires we saw have to do with the zionists having to use old munitions or poorly serviced launchers. I could be crazy but didn't those videos happen during the later barrages too?

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 31 minutes ago (2 children)

Fetterman is baying for war.

John Fetterman on Fox News calls for the United States to get engaged in Iran war:

"I think it's a great start with the 30,000-pound bunker busters. Just keep dropping them until you can actually confirm what exactly happened to them. We have the tools... we have to just, again, finish it out."

https://bsky.app/profile/justinbaragona.bsky.social/post/3lrsos7yw5k2l

Vid at the link.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 21 minutes ago

Inshallah his kid's birthday comes soon

[–] [email protected] 18 points 27 minutes ago (2 children)
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[–] [email protected] 28 points 39 minutes ago

Don’t believe everything you read on Twitter and don’t use it as an excuse to doom

“Tehran denies western media reports about 'seeking mediation' to end war

Iran has targeted Israel with ballistic missiles every day since the war began, and has vowed to intensify its strikes”

https://thecradle.co/articles/tehran-denies-western-media-reports-about-seeking-mediation-to-end-war

[–] [email protected] 18 points 27 minutes ago* (last edited 26 minutes ago) (2 children)

Trump is about to severely miscalculate, the dumb fuck

May they sink a fuckin whole ass carrier

[–] [email protected] 15 points 22 minutes ago* (last edited 16 minutes ago) (1 children)

Nimitz is supposed to be decommissioned next year and is sailing towards the Persian Gulf. A false flag on a carrier would be absolutely crazy shit, but it sure would hawkify the American public.

That or the fact that it’s scheduled for decommission means it’s seen as somewhat more expendable.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 13 minutes ago (1 children)

It should also be pointed out American military morale and psychological health is extremely poor, the US military is brittle and not used to high casualty events, a sunk carrier would be the equivalent of half an Iraq War worth of dead troops in a single event

We'd see a cascade of morale and discipline failures throughout the branches and then there's the troops in Syria and the Gulf, it could seriously fracture MAGA

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 minutes ago

Unfortunately, this could also mean the US goes nuclear out of spite.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 14 minutes ago

The fates spoke years ago, may they be eternally wet matt-joker

[–] [email protected] 26 points 41 minutes ago* (last edited 34 minutes ago) (1 children)

Update on the US military buildup against Iran. 17 mid air refueling aircraft on the move. F-35s and F-16s confirmed in tow, F-22s highly likely, and F-15Es suspected.

Source of one of the air trackers

[–] [email protected] 10 points 21 minutes ago

Iran shooting down an F-22 would be pretty great

[–] [email protected] 13 points 26 minutes ago

Lots of bombings taking place throughout Western Iran and Tehran, as expected and has happened over the past few days.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 52 minutes ago

Al Jazeera

New missiles launched from Iran spotted over Tel Aviv, occupied West Bank

According to reports in Israel, up to 10 missiles have been launched from Iran. A short while ago, sirens sounded in Amman. Just as we were coming on air, they sounded in Amman another siren, indicating that the missiles were not over Jordanian airspace any more. They were sighted over the occupied West Bank and Tel Aviv.

At this time, there are no confirmed reports of missile impacts. Israeli medical and emergency services have not reported treating any injuries. There is also no visual confirmation of any strikes so far. The area in Israel where alarms have been triggered is extensive, stretching beyond the boundaries of the larger Tel Aviv district.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 48 minutes ago (1 children)

On Air Force One - Trump told a CNN reporter why he left G7 ~44 seconds - https://www.youtube.com/shorts/KkjPW42OFf4

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 13 minutes ago

Now both sides aren't allowing anything to be shown, guess I'll have to buy a ticket to see shit live

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

About an hour ago Trump posted a creepy, fundie screenshot of a post written by Mike Huckabee. I put that shot into a "image to text" website. I couldn't find a single transcription. Fucking US media.

From Mike Huckabee, a Pastor, Politician, Ambassador, and Great Person!

Mr President, God spared you in Butler, PA to be the most consequential President in a century-maybe ever. The decisions on your shoulders I would not want to be made by anyone else. You have many voices speaking to you Sir, but there is only ONE voice that matters. HIS voice. I am your appointed servant in this land and am available for you but I do not try to get in your presence often because I trust your instincts.

No President in my lifetime has been in a position like yours. Not since Truman in 1945. I don't reach out to persuade you. Only to encourage you. I believe you will hear from heaven and that voice is far more important than mine or ANYONE else's. You sent me to Israel to be your eyes, ears and voice and to make sure our flag flies above our embassy. My job is to be the last one to leave. I will not abandon this post. Our flag will NOT come down! You did not seek this moment.

This moment sought YOU! It is my honor to serve you! Mike Huckabee

Trump certainly has supporters who need ALT text. I guess they have to transcribe their hero's screenshots again and again and again and again and...

[–] [email protected] 13 points 57 minutes ago

I saw an unverified post earlier claiming that Huckabee and Netanyahu got into a shouting match over the ability of Americans to leave Israel, with the idea being that Israel wanted to increase the chance of American deaths and force their involvement.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 hour ago (3 children)

NYT

Israel will no longer be able to provide its civilians with a 15-to-30-minute warning ahead of incoming Iranian missiles, a practice it largely maintained since Iran’s counterattack began, Lt. Col. Tali Varsano Eisman, an officer in the Israeli Home Front Command. She told N12, an Israeli TV channel, that the military now faces “difficulties in identifying” missiles fired on Israel and recommended that people spend the night in shelters or close to a safe space. She did not elaborate on why.

The Israeli military said in a statement that there are no changes in the Home Front Command’s guidelines, adding that “if there are any updates, they will be communicated through the official channels.”

[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

She did not elaborate on why

Ooh ooh can I guess!?

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (2 children)

I am legitimately am confused, I thought that Saudi Arabia and Jordan and now Syria would be littered with systems that detect as soon as Iranian drones and missiles enter the air so as to warn Israel as soon as possible.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 12 minutes ago

Maybe it's not that they can't provide the warning, it's that they don't want Iran to be able to wake everyone up and make them move a half dozen times per night. That has to be terrible for already-shaky settler morale

[–] [email protected] 11 points 59 minutes ago

Drones appear to be dealt with relatively easily, but the missiles may interact differently somehow

[–] [email protected] 41 points 1 hour ago

another crack in the façade of technoinvincibility. may the settlers never feel safe in their stolen land again

[–] [email protected] 5 points 28 minutes ago

Psyop to act like a victim

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 hour ago (3 children)

Is there any refutation of zei_squirell's post from the other day that I can read up on? This war's forecast seems heavily in the US/Israel's favor.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 38 minutes ago (1 children)

Iran is not Khamenei. I thought it was a pretty antimaterialist reading because, as much as it's possible that the Zionists reduce Iran's deterrence to make assassination of the Ayatollah possible, they still aren't going to cause a Libya or Syria style completely collapse with only assassinations, they'd need boots on the ground or proxies fighting actively to take territory in Iran (she did allude to this possibility but the kinds of proxy networks needed to destroy Iran take years to build).

[–] [email protected] 8 points 22 minutes ago

Agree. The older population has seen this before and deposed the US puppet, and the younger ones have learned about it their entire lives AND saw Saddam get blasted by his own puppet masters. There is no appetite the military or civilian populations for regime change, and the attacks were brazen in their lack of logic. I think any assassinations will harden resolve rather than weaken it.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 25 minutes ago* (last edited 21 minutes ago) (2 children)

Elijah Magnier - https://xcancel.com/ejmalrai/status/1934783722789691813#m

If Israel were to assassinate Sayyed Ali Khamenei, Iran would simply appoint another Supreme Leader. The institution would remain intact — just as it did after the death of Imam Khomeini. What such an act would truly trigger is a wave of popular mobilisation against Israel and a grave threat to the safety of every Israeli abroad.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s strategic calculus is not only dangerously shallow but emblematic of a broader collapse of international norms. His willingness to resort to targeted assassinations, car-bomb tactics reminiscent of terrorist operations, and open declarations of war against sovereign states — without consequence or international censure — signals the erosion of the very foundations of international law. Worse still, these actions are often met not with condemnation, but with tacit support or silence from the international community.

Also, on this vid (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iHpCUmoqaI) he mentions that the decisivity of the war depends on:

  • How long Israeli civil society is willing to put up with the difficulties of bombardment.
  • How sustaind Iran can keep up said bombardment.
  • The cohesiveness of Iranian civil society.

On the question of Is it possible that Israel wants to kill Khamenei, he thinks its 100% certain they want to kill him, yet this is not the decisive action that changes the course of the war because the Army has already put a solid chain of command that follows Khamenei's orders even on his death.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 15 minutes ago

I am of the opinion that people at the highest echelons of power in the west are not actually geniuses who have carefully studied Marxism and materialism and have an accurate understanding of reality. They by and large believe their own bullshit. I don’t doubt that if the west ever came after the DPRK, they would definitely attempt to assassinate Kim and would genuinely believe that would unravel the DPRK government.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

NYT

2 minutes ago

People across central Israel just received cell phone warnings instructing them to find shelter ahead of an imminent missile attack.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Already over, apparently it was another small scale launch, 3-5 ballistic missiles used.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 hour ago

What are your thoughts on these small attacks? Probing AD? Spooking settlers?

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Still seeing a lot of talk on here about the Fordow nuclear facility in Iran. The source I'm using for this writeup is by the Royal United Services Institute, a British military think tank. The whole report is here: https://www.rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/challenges-involved-military-strikes-against-irans-nuclear-programme

So they do a good overview of the depth of various Iranian nuclear facilities, and most Western analysts agree the depth of Fordow is between 80-90 metres, not the some 800 metres being thrown around here. Still very deep, but well within potential for a strike by the United States. As they write:

Firstly, the penetration achievable with each weapon will vary greatly depending on the material covering each target. A weapon that can penetrate through tens of meters of packed earth or sand may only penetrate a few meters of standard civilian construction-grade concrete, and even less reinforced, high-density concrete. Furthermore, most of the Iranian facilities are likely to be covered by different layers of reinforced concrete, rock, packed earth and potentially other materials.

For the FFEP [Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant] and new facility at Natanz at an estimated 80-100 meters, possibly with layers of reinforced concrete, even the GBU-57/B [the Big Bomb only the B2 stealth bomber can carry] would likely require multiple impacts at the same aiming point to have a good chance of penetrating the facility. Strikes with lesser penetrating weapons could still collapse entry and exit tunnels given good intelligence about their exact layout and location (with some information already available in open-source satellite imagery analysis). However, unless a longer-term campaign were mounted with regular follow-up strikes, efforts to dig down to the facilities to re-establish access and supplies would likely begin almost immediately.

Of course, even if such a strike is successful, as they and others argue it would ultimately not degrade Iran's ability to develop nuclear weapons by any significant degree.

The practical challenges of carrying out attacks against dispersed and hardened facilities makes clear the infeasibility of relying strictly on a military solution to the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear programme, likely necessitating a major operation to penetrate hardened facilities and/or degrade Iranian air defences. As has been repeatedly argued elsewhere, the highly dispersed nature and advanced state of the Iranian nuclear programme – including extensive latent expertise within the Iranian scientific community – further complicates efforts to eliminate the nuclear programme by military means. For this reason, any comparisons with Israeli attacks against Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 and Syria’s Al-Kibar facility in 2007 are highly misplaced. In both instances, the attacked countries’ programmes were highly concentrated and at a nascent stage, relying extensively on foreign assistance for their development. Following any military strike on its nuclear sites, Iran not only has the requisite indigenous expertise but will also have increased incentive to rebuild, and to rebuild deeper and more hardened facilities.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 hour ago

I better see the strait closed so fucking quick I swear to Allah

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 38 minutes ago) (2 children)

Shaded 238 jet powered drone shot down over Iraq

Shaded shot down over Syria by an AIM-9 Sidewinder, I've censored the faces.

Looks like the survivability of jet powered drones is not much higher than the propeller driven drones.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 39 minutes ago

I believe there are ways that censoring faces like this can be removed, I’m not 100% sure in that but I would echo what sisatici said out of an abundance of caution.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Maybe you should crop the parts of the image that indicate location and has nothing to do with drone itself. I dunno too much about this stuff tbh

[–] [email protected] 10 points 37 minutes ago
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