My latest: The Iran Question Is All About China Why Operation Epic Fury Is the Opening Act of the Indo-Pacific Century The Iran question was never about Iran. Remove the Islamic Republic from the equation and China loses its pawns for a Taiwan contingency. Leave it in place and the Middle East remains what Beijing designed it to be: a second front that Washington can never afford to leave and can never afford to stay in. Trump's strikes are the first move by an American president who appears to understand that the road to the Pacific runs through Tehran. zinebriboua.com/p/the-iran-q…

Interesting

The Third-Worldist Logic Today’s condemnation of Israel—and America—comes from an intellectual lineage that sees the West as a permanent oppressor and any movement opposed to it as righteous. city-journal.org/article/isr… by @zriboua via @CityJournal

Haven’t they tried that several times already? Ukraine today is much more stronger, more powerful, and more sophisticated despite all of the challenges it had to face. Won’t work.

Heartbreaking.

China has reportedly got its hands on the cockpit canopy and a weapons-bay door of an Australian F-35. A few considerations on what that does, and doesn't, mean. An F-35's low observability rests on three pillars:

There were no major protests in Arab capitals defending the Islamic Republic, nothing like the Arab street after the Iraq invasion. Zineb Riboua (@zriboua) explains on Counterweight: Iran offered civil wars, fragmentation, and states within states. The Gulf was unimpressed.

The thing about AI doom, much like climate catastrophe, is that people are essentially reinventing religion from first principles. When there is a spiritual void, something inevitably fills it: apocalypse, original sin, collective guilt, prophets, heretics, and the promise of salvation. Same human impulse, over and over and over again.

Allow me to translate: a totalitarian regime that right now is arbitrarily detaining literally hundreds of Americans and other citizens of free nations really wants to welcome 100,000 American college students to propagandize them or use them as leverage. What a terrible idea.

We should all be watching #Ethiopia. What's brewing there could be a greater catastrophe than anything we've seen so far this century.

You can only fight "foreign influence" for so long, when the system is broken it goes without saying that others will take advantage of it, too much focus on the symptoms and not enough on the actual causes.

La FGD/PSU n’est en aucun cas une alliance de gauche, c’est le regroupement de l’extrême-gauche. Leur programme mènerait à l’appauvrissement du Maroc et paradoxalement au creusement des inégalités sociales car ce sont les plus faibles qui souffrent des déséquilibres macroéconomiques et des politiques de décroissance.

Wlad w bnat w chrraf dyal agadir, a question 4 y'all. Chno li khlakom tswto 3la pjd when this is its future prime minister ?

The Houthis are back in the news, advancing down the Red Sea coast and threatening to take control of Bab-el-Mandeb, though they have apparently reassured Washington that they mean no harm to international trade, at least for now. In this episode of Counterweight, Zineb Riboua (@zriboua) explains who these people are, why the Saudis seem to be struggling with them, and how a split between Saudi Arabia and the UAE is hindering cooperation against them. We also touch upon China’s role in the region, as well as the way Gulf countries are already preparing for a world with a much weaker Islamic Republic of Iran. 0:00 Cold open 2:31 Who the Houthis are 5:05 The Houthis' push towards the Bab-el-Mandeb 10:48 Why Riyadh struggles despite U.S. tech 12:35 Saudi–UAE split across the Red Sea theater 19:06 Trump considers striking the Houthis and Abraham Accords leverage 21:58 China behind the Red Sea crisis — satellite targeting data 24:37 China’s failed Gulf mediation 30:53 Iran feels the sanctions bite 37:15 Iraq’s Sep 30 deadline for militias to disarm 40:56 The Gulf preparing for a weaker Iran

Le PJD n’est pas un parti « conservateur à référence islamique ». C’est un parti islamiste extrémiste. Comme le disait Samira Sitail (actuelle ambassadrice du Maroc en France et directrice de la publication de 2M à l’époque de cette intervention), au lendemain des attentats de Casablanca, au micro de Thierry Ardisson : « c’est les moyens qui changent ; il y a ceux qui prônent la violence et ceux qui prônent cette autre violence encore plus terrible et meurtrière à la Une de leurs journaux [les journaux pro-PJD]. » Et elle poursuivait : « mais lorsque leurs responsables [ceux du PJD], à la Une de cette presse dont vous parliez tout à l’heure [la presse pro-PJD], font l’apologie de ces groupuscules radicaux, qui aujourd’hui agissent sur le terrain : ILS SONT TOUT AUSSI RESPONSABLES QUE CES 13 KAMIKAZES, QUI SONT MAROCAINS, DES JEUNES, QUI SE SONT FAITS ENCADRER ET MANIPULER PAR DES PERSONNES QUI AURAIENT PU ÊTRE CELLES DU PJD. »

Elections in Morocco today More people should be like her, boomers, conspiracy theorists, and anyone who says your vote doesn’t count is either stupid or incredibly vicious. Morocco is politically organized in a way that local politics matter more than ever.

Islamists are a disaster

My personal assessment is that it’s too early to tell, there are negotiations going on between Israel and Syria, we’ll know more soon.

Nine articles in the latest London Review of Books email newsletter, three are about Israel lmao

The UAE central bank has barred Iran’s Bank Melli from operating in the country, citing regulatory violations. All Bank Melli branches in the UAE are also barred from financial transactions with Iran, including trade finance and fund transfers. -Reuters

IRGC commander killed by an Iranian from Baluchistan province today. Things are heating up, no amount of memes can conceal the most catastrophic economic crisis of the Islamic Republic’s history.