THE U.S. CAUSED THE Romanian government to collapse and can do the same to “any country we want”, a U.S. ambassador said, according to a Wall Street Journal report yesterday. In a dinner discussion in Greece about the imminent implosion of Romania’s administration, Ambassador Kimberly Guilfoyle said: ‘We can do this to any country we want. We can do this here too.’” No, you can’t, Greece’s Energy Minister Stavros Papastavrou responded angrily, saying that governments were elected by the people. The Ambassador, a former Fox News presenter, released a lawyer’s letter disputing the story of the argument at the dinner—but the newspaper said the words spoken at the heated discussion were related by an eyewitness present at the dinner in Athens. . ‘HEGEMON RUN AMOK’ The story broke at the same time that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the United Nations that “the dictatorship of a single hegemon has run amok”. Academics, including those in the US, broadly agree that the US conducts major political interference operations around the world, particularly in places on the borders of Russia and China—including Romania. . FUEL MONOPOLY What’s the long term goal of US interference in these nations? The US is pushing a pipeline called the Vertical Gas Corridor, or VGC, the Wall Street Journal said. Instead of buying affordable fuel from Russia, people in Eastern European nations will instead be steered towards purchasing exported American gas for billions of dollars. The US has already successfully created a huge market for its natural gas in western Europe, and has also made the Chinese island of Taiwan dependent on imported fuel from the US. Washington’s foreign policy is designed to make more people around the world dependent on American gas, and has been largely successful. For this reason, the US and allies have been working to cut non-US fuel suppliers, such as Iran, Russia, and Venezuela, out of all trade routes. . .

THE U.S. CAUSED THE Romanian government to collapse and can do the same to “any country we want”, a U.S. ambassador said, according to a Wall Street Journal report yesterday. In a dinner discussion in Greece about the imminent implosion of Romania’s administration, Ambassador Kimberly Guilfoyle said: ‘We can do this to any country we want. We can do this here too.’” No, you can’t, Greece’s Energy Minister Stavros Papastavrou responded angrily, saying that governments were elected by the people. The Ambassador, a former Fox News presenter, released a lawyer’s letter disputing the story of the argument at the dinner—but the newspaper said the words spoken at the heated discussion were related by an eyewitness present at the dinner in Athens. . ‘HEGEMON RUN AMOK’ The story broke at the same time that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the United Nations that “the dictatorship of a single hegemon has run amok”. Academics, including those in the US, broadly agree that the US conducts major political interference operations around the world, particularly in places on the borders of Russia and China—including Romania. . FUEL MONOPOLY What’s the long term goal of US interference in these nations? The US is pushing a pipeline called the Vertical Gas Corridor, or VGC, the Wall Street Journal said. Instead of buying affordable fuel from Russia, people in Eastern European nations will instead be steered towards purchasing exported American gas for billions of dollars. The US has already successfully created a huge market for its natural gas in western Europe, and has also made the Chinese island of Taiwan dependent on imported fuel from the US. Washington’s foreign policy is designed to make more people around the world dependent on American gas, and has been largely successful. For this reason, the US and allies have been working to cut non-US fuel suppliers, such as Iran, Russia, and Venezuela, out of all trade routes. . .

Saudi Arabia is committing war crimes in Yemen; today, it bombed a popular market in the town of Mawiyah, Taiz Governorate, resulting in the deaths and injuries of dozens of innocent civilians.

Saudi Arabia bombed the Al-Dalil Bridge in Ibb Governorate today, but this crime will not go unanswered, and Yemen has the right to defend itself. For your information, Saudi Arabia has been bombing Yemen's infrastructure since 2015 and continues to do so today, so don't blame us if we do the same to Saudi Arabia.

US Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle pushed Bulgaria and other Balkan countries to buy US LNG through a specific Greek company, Aktor. Aktor's paid lobbyist Christos Marafatsos ($440K+ in fees) attended her diplomatic meetings, often mistaken by foreign officials for her chief of staff. He wasn't disclosed as an Aktor lobbyist in meetings. A $6 billion deal was secured in Albania. Aktor estimates €1.8B in pretax profit from signed LNG contracts over 20 years. Competitor LNG companies say Guilfoyle ignored them: She has her favorites. Source: WSJ

Israel is revoking the diplomatic status of Dutch diplomats in Ramallah after the Netherlands imposed a ban on imports and trade involving products from the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. Foreign Minister Sa’ar told the Dutch Embassy that the diplomats must return their Israeli-issued diplomatic documents within seven days, after which their immunities and related rights will expire.

📺 #PresaDiretta - “Il codice Epstein” in onda su #Rai3 e in streaming su RaiPlay: bit.ly/RAI3diretta

A Note on Capitalist Organized Violence Prompted by a reader’s excellent comment, I want to quickly sketch out an observation and a thought: one about the “strategy of denial”, let’s call it, and the other about the nature of current imperial violence. On the “chokepoints” and infrastructure denial point: There is a long paper trail. While there is no single master document called “The Chokepoint Strategy,” it is a (relatively new, since around the 2010s) doctrine spread across several strategic papers. I am currently working on Part II of the NATO 3.0 essay, as well as a standalone piece on energy policy, which will dive into this partly and the other one deeply, but here is a sample of that paper trail: Brookings Institution (2014) – “Fueling a New Order?”: This paper discusses "mutually assured denial" regarding the U.S. and China. It outlines the U.S. strategy of sea blockades, noting that China is building naval capacity specifically so it "can’t be subject to an economic or energy blockade by sea," while the U.S. must recognize "China will develop enough naval capacity to stop the U.S. from blockading the sea lanes." Blocking energy by sea is an acknowledged U.S. Navy strategy. CSIS (2025) – “No Safe Harbor”: In evaluating China's port projects in Latin America, this paper assumes infrastructure will be weaponized: "Control or deep involvement in port operations can enable intelligence collection... privileged access to maritime logistics data, and the ability to deny or delay access during a crisis." Atlantic Council (2025) – “A US and allied strategy for Greenland”: This anchors the 2025 National Security Strategy to "deterrence by denial." The authors write: "To achieve its goals for the Arctic, the United States must work with its allies and partners to deny these adversaries the ability to dominate the region militarily and economically." This is about the denial of infrastructure among other things. U.S. Navy–Marine Corps–Coast Guard (2020) – “Advantage at Sea”: This is perhaps the most explicit. It states: "Where adversaries must cross open water, sea denial robs them of the initiative... We control or deny the seas by destroying an adversary’s fleet... or by controlling sea lines of communication. In collaboration with allies and partners, we will be capable of controlling critical choke points, enabling us to safeguard joint forces flowing into theater and to impose military and economic costs on our adversaries." Furthermore, there are a myriad of lectures from the Energy Defense seminars of the US Naval Academy that openly discuss oil as a weapon (and its different variants) and chokepoint control dating back to at least 2016. On Organized Violence & Capitalism I am currently going back and forth and trying to understand what we are actually all observing here: Is the thesis drawn from Copeland and others that because the empire is "standing on its last legs," it is desperately lashing out, the apt one? Or what we are mistaking for “lashing out” is actually more in line with Heide Gerstenberger’s thesis in the book Market and Violence. I am increasingly thinking that the extreme organized violence we see today is simply capitalism functioning as it is designed to when there are no brakes. Historically, capitalist organized violence wasn't tamed by the system maturing or by free markets; it was only ever domesticated by organized, scaled resistance and the construction of alternative institutions. Today, where are those brakes? Where is the resistance organized at a systemic scale (institutions that are organized differently, and don’t just work reactively as shields set up because of creeping hybrid warfare)? Without a global counter-force imposing friction, the U.S.-led core might just be operating as a frictionless machine of capitalist violence (and yes, that includes cannibalizing its so-called allies). This idea of what we are observing as unbraked violence or "desperate collapse" is something I’m trying to understand right now. I don’t think it is actually that obvious; maybe and somehow, it is a combination of the two.

They are afraid even of a small child’s bicycle… The moment Israeli soldiers took a bicycle away from a young child who was playing in the street.

Su Rai3 ho parlato di memoria e ipocrisie storiche: da chi chiuse gli occhi davanti al reintegro degli ex nazisti nella 🇩🇪 del dopoguerra, fino alla strumentalizzazione dell'antisemitismo e alle recenti "Linee guida per la scuola": temi al centro del mio nuovo libro. Un estratto

Senza immigrati, l’Italia si ferma. Ma a chi conviene raccontarli sempre come un problema? Famiglie, agricoltura, alberghi, interi settori produttivi: il lavoro delle persone immigrate sostiene ogni giorno questo Paese. In questo estratto, il sociologo Stefano Allievi

Senza immigrati, l’Italia si ferma. Ma a chi conviene raccontarli sempre come un problema? Famiglie, agricoltura, alberghi, interi settori produttivi: il lavoro delle persone immigrate sostiene ogni giorno questo Paese. In questo estratto, il sociologo Stefano Allievi

Macklemore says Robert Kraft — who owns Gillette Stadium, where Macklemore & Ed Sheeran were to perform later this month — called Sheeran. Kraft rallied other owners together behind an ultimatum for Sheeran: if Macklemore stays on the tour, you won't be allowed in our venues.

Israeli occupation forces raided dozens of Palestinian towns and villages last night and carried out arrest operations that targeted hundreds of Palestinians, including raids on the cities of Bethlehem, Ramallah, Al-Bireh, Nablus, Tulkarm, and Hebron. Israeli terrorist settlers also carried out several attacks across the West Bank, including in the villages of Al-Mughayyir and Burqa, which have been subjected to ongoing settler attacks.