U.S. replenishes weapons for Israel
Jerusalem Post, 4/30–The United States recently shipped 6,500 tons of munitions and materiel to Israel within 24 hours, using two large sea vessels and multiple cargo aircraft…In a large-scale global logistics operation, the two cargo ships docked at the ports of Ashdod and Haifa, carrying thousands of air and ground munitions, military trucks, Joint Light Tactical Vehicles (JLTVs), and additional military equipment…“Since the launch of Operation Roaring Lion, Israel has received more than 115,600 tons of military equipment in 403 airlifts and 10 sealifts”...At any given moment, cargo aircraft and ships are en route to Israel, carrying thousands of tons of munitions and military equipment.
U.S. runs low on weapons used against Iran
NY Times, 4/23–Since the Iran war began…the United States has burned through around 1,100 of its long-range stealth cruise missiles built for a war with China, close to the total number remaining in the U.S. stockpile. The military has fired off more than 1,000 Tomahawk cruise missiles, roughly 10 times the number it currently buys each year. The Pentagon used more than 1,200 Patriot interceptor missiles in the war, at more than $4 million a pop, and more than 1,000 Precision Strike and ATACMS ground-based missiles…the drawdowns have left these regional commands less ready to confront potential adversaries like Russia and China…
Fight in Iran is connected to petrodollar
Fortune, 4/20–The United Arab Emirates apparently dropped a hint the dollar’s dominance isn’t assured in the global oil trade…UAE officials…pointed out the U.S. started the Iran war and said they may be forced to use China’s yuan or other currencies for oil transactions if the availability of dollars gets tight…Any pivot away from the dollar by a top oil producer would represent a major threat to the currency’s supremacy. Saudi Arabia’s decision in 1974 to price its exports in dollars helped establish the dollar as the standard across the global oil trade…the Iran war could worsen some cracks that had already been forming in the so-called petrodollar regime, analysts at Deutsche Bank warned…
Israeli navy used to capture aid workers
MSN, 4/30–Activists on a flotilla of boats seeking to break Israel’s naval blockade of Gaza said Thursday that Israel forces intercepted the vessels overnight, smashing engines and detaining some of those onboard while they were sailing in international waters near Greece, hundreds of miles from Gaza and Israel. The Global Sumud Flotilla set sail earlier this month from Barcelona. Organizers have said more than 70 boats and 1,000 people from around the world would be participating, with more vessels joining the original boats as the flotilla sailed east across the Mediterranean…
U.S. Supreme Court ready to accelerate ethnic cleansing
NPR, 4/29–The Supreme Court’s conservative majority seemed ready Wednesday to allow the Trump administration to potentially proceed with mass deportations of more than a million foreign nationals, including those from Haiti and Syria, who live and work legally in the United States. Until now these individuals have been accorded temporary legal status because their safety is imperiled by war or natural disasters in their home countries…Representing the Haitians, lawyer Geoffrey Pipoly described the administration’s review as “a sham.” “The true reason for the termination [of TPS status] is the president’s racial animus toward non-white immigrants and bare dislike of Haitians in particular”...
Genocide in Sudan shows the horrors of capitalist competition
DW, 4/30–Her fingers are emaciated down to the bone…Hassaina…is deeply scarred, both mentally and physically. It has been about six months since she and her four children survived the massacre in their hometown of el-Fasher in the embattled Darfur region of Sudan…”I saw genocide with my own eyes and experienced it firsthand”...The violence reached a peak last October: The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia, which is fighting against the government army and allied militias, captured el-Fasher, the largest city in the Darfur region, after a long siege and carried out a massacre of immense proportions against the civilian population…”The atrocities have a hallmark of genocide,” concludes UN chief investigator Mohamed Chande Othman…