#Deir Ezzor

[dougielombax]

Oh look.

More of them.

They really have been busy.

Anyway.

[postcard-from-the-past]

Al-Hamedi Mosque in Deir Ezzor, Syria

French vintage postcard

[etccsy]

Parallel Zones Project

Exploring a 'parallel zones' plan Deep insights by @issamkh on Syria's current situation. He highlights the need for diplomacy, collaboration, and negotiation in achieving a stable future. Balancing national and international interests remains key

By, Issam Khoury CSIORS &CESD June 2023 This is a roadmap for resolving disputes in Syria under American guidance, and with the oversight of Syrian figures who believe in the culture of coexistence, freedom, and human justice. It aims to ensure successful implementation of the Geneva I Conference decisions by Syria, without the unnecessary Russian interference seen in the Astana…

[girlactionfigure]

🔅Tuesday morning - ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

🔻Air attacks on Israeli civilians… 

Hamas rockets at Sderot, Ibim, Nir Am, Netiv HaAssara, Gavim, Sapir College

Hezbollah rockets at Betzet, Shlomi 

.. SINCE the UN Resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire there have been 3 rocket launches out of Gaza.

..  The IDF says it struck a Hamas rocket launching position used in a barrage earlier today on Ashdod. The launchers were located adjacent to a civilian shelter in central Gaza's Deir al-Balah.

▪️CEASEFIRE.. following the UN Sec Council resolution of ceasefire, Hamas's appetite increases against the background of international developments: it rejected the American proposal for the hostage deal.  An American delegation is still in Qatar to continue talks.

▪️US RECOMMENDS MAGIC?  US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken emphasized in his meeting with Defense Minister Yoav Galant that there are alternatives to a ground operation in Rafah - ones that will better ensure Israel's security and also protect Palestinian citizens, according to the US State Department. 

(( While the US has been repeatedly stating this, we have yet to hear a SINGLE suggestion on how. In the meantime, the hostages ROT. ))

▪️MAJOR ATTACK ON IRANIAN SITES IN SYRIA.. attack in the Syrian-Iraqi border town of Albu Kamal. According to the reports, senior members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards have been eliminated.

Targets:  Ayash warehouses in the western area of ​​Deir Ezzor, warehouses for storing Iranian weapons. The headquarters of the Iranian militias in the villa neighborhood in Deir Ezor. Several sites near the El Hari crossing on the Syria-Iraq border.  The headquarters on Al-Taz Hagana street in Albu Kamal city includes a security office in the area of ​​Badar Hospital, which is itself an Iranian base. The headquarters of the Iranian militias in the El Tamo neighborhood in the city of Al Mayadin, east of Deir Ezzor.  The communications headquarters of the Iranian militias and the Alawite security headquarters on the University's President Street in the city of Deir ez-Zor.

Unknown if the attack was by Israel or the U.S.  Syria blames Israel.

🔸SUMMARY - Israel internal politics is reaching a crescendo due to the “Movement for Quality Govt”’s High Court case, in the midst of the war, over draft law and charedi low participation in the IDF.  

On one hand the IDF is manpower stressed due to the war, on the other hand the IDF has taken only minor steps to accommodate this population segment and the political class has not pressed or improved the issue over the past 15 years. Sometimes the opposite, demonizing the charedim and driving them away.

The possibility of the war coalition dissolving over this issue is growing, while the core coalition is attempting to build a recruitment law with incentives and disincentives that the charedim can accept, the attorney general will defend, the High Court will not overturn, the IDF can actually implement, and secular society won’t protest… and do so within a month.  The good news is Israel is a place of miracles.  The bad news is they need it.

[satellitebroadcast]

The US military has transferred large amounts of weapons and military equipment, including defense systems, to its illegal bases in Syria over the past month in an attempt to prevent the recurrence of resistance attacks against its bases and soldiers, Al-Akhbar reported on 7 September.

Local sources speaking with the Lebanese newspaper revealed that "in the last month, the Americans brought 22 batches of weapons and equipment to the bases in Hasaka and Deir Ezzor, including 19 batches that arrived by air to the Kharab al-Jir, Al-Shaddadi, Conoco, and Al-Omar bases, and three batches that arrived by land via the illegal Al-Walid crossing with Iraq."

The sources added that "most of the weapons transported are surveillance and monitoring systems, in addition to equipment designated to confront close air targets such as drones and medium and short-range missiles." [...] "the American bases used laser systems for the first time in missions to monitor, observe, and target drones and missiles.

In addition, the US has carried out additional military exercises. The sources stated that "the [US] coalition carried out more than 15 live training exercises on the use of these weapons and selecting their readiness, most of which were at the Omar field bases and the Conoco gas plant."

The sources believed that "these unprecedented movements in Syria, at least in terms of density, reveal American intentions to strengthen Washington's military presence in Syria," adding that "there is a great focus on the need to curb the resistance factions in Syria and Iraq, and neutralize their weapons."

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI) coalition, made up of Iraqi resistance factions who banded together in October last year, began attacking US bases in Iraq and Syria following the start of the war in Gaza. US efforts to reinforce its forces illegally occupying Syria follow attacks carried out by five Iraqi resistance factions against US bases in Syria during the month of August.

On 10 August, a drone attack on the Kharab al-Jir base in northeastern Syria injured several US and coalition personnel. In late August, resistance factions targeted a US patrol consisting of six vehicles with direct gunfire on the eastern bank of the Euphrates River in the Deir Ezzor countryside. The Syrian army controls territory in the same area on the western bank of the river.

Despite the attacks, US Assistant Deputy Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and the official in charge of the Syrian file at the US State Department, Ethan Goldrich, said on 5 September that "US forces will not withdraw from Syria." When asked whether there was a timetable for the withdrawal of these forces, he said: "Currently, our focus is on the goal, which is to prevent ISIS from reappearing."

US forces in Syria rely on support from US forces in neighboring Iraq for support and resupply. The US has used the presence of ISIS in eastern Syria and western Iraq as a pretext to maintain troops in both countries despite having covertly supported the terror group in its blitzkrieg conquest of territory in 2014.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani has stated multiple times this year that ISIS is no longer a threat to Iraq and has been leading negotiations with Washington for the withdrawal of the US troop presence in Iraq.

However, Washington has been reinforcing its presence in Iraq, including in oil-rich Kirkuk, and recently suspended negotiations with Baghdad over the US troop withdrawal, amid the ongoing possibility of a regional war between the US and Israel on the one hand, and Iran and the Axis of Resistance, on the other.

[darkmaga-retard]

Turkiye’s interior minister announced on 30 August that police detained 99 suspected ISIS members in recent raids across the country.

The suspects were captured in the center, east, and south of Turkiye, including in the cities of Ankara and Izmir, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya stated on the social media site X.

“99 suspects have been arrested in the GURZ-4 operations over the past three days,” Yerlikaya said.

“We will not tolerate any terrorist,” he added.

Turkish authorities also arrested 147 alleged ISIS members in an operation announced in March.

After those arrests, Yerlikaya said police had detained a total of 2,919 people suspected of links to the extremist group.

On 24 August, ISIS claimed responsibility for a knife attack in Solingen, Germany, that killed three people and wounded eight others, according to the group’s Amaq news site.

Turkiye has claimed to fight ISIS in recent years despite strongly backing the terror organization during the US, Israeli, Gulf, and Turkish-backed regime change war against the Syrian government starting in 2011.

Columbia University’s Program on Peace-building extensively documented Turkish support for ISIS during the Syria war, including providing military equipment, medical care, and satellite imagery, purchasing oil from the group, and allowing fighters to freely cross the Turkiye–Syrian border, including during the ISIS assault on the city of Kobani in September 2014.

The remnants of ISIS regularly conduct hit-and-run attacks against the Syrian army and Iran-backed pro-government armed groups in the Syrian governorates of Deir Ezzor, Homs, and Raqqa.

The ISIS presence has provided a pretext for US forces to remain in Syria.

[workersolidarity]

🇮🇶⚔️🇺🇸 🚨

💥ISLAMIC RESISTANCE IN IRAQ STRIKES TARGETS ON ILLEGAL U.S. BASES IN SYRIA💥

The official Syrian Arab News Agency is reporting the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has launched strikes on two illegal U.S. occupation bases in Syria: "Green Village" base and another in the Koniko Oil field in Deir Ezzor Province in the east of Syria.

In a statement, the Iraqi resistance said that "in continuation of our resistance against the forces of the American occupier in Iraq and the region, and in response to the massacres of the Zionist entity against our people in Gaza, resistance fighters targeted with drones the American bases in the 'Green Village' and the Koniko oil field in Syrian territory."

Yesterday, it was reported that Iraqi resistance forces ordered drone strikes targeting the Ain al-Assad airbase in Western Iraq.

#source

@WorkerSolidarityNews

[ritchiepage2001newaccount]

Project2025 #CorpMedia #Oligarchs #MegaBanks vs #Union #Occupy #NoDAPL #BLM #SDF #DACA #MeToo #Humanity #FeelTheBern

JinJiyanAzadi #BijiRojava Şehîd Namirin [UPDATES]

RELATED UPDATE: British volunteers preparing for 'bloodbath' fighting Isis in Raqqa as offensive on Syrian stronghold looms

RELATED UPDATE: YPJ: We dedicate the Raqqa victory to AP0 and all the women

RELATED UPDATE: Syria: SDF launches assault on ISIS remnants in Hajin

RELATED UPDATE: SDF fighters: We are developing new strategies against Turkish attacks

RELATED UPDATE: About the People’s Defense Units (YPG)

https://ypgrojava.org/about-us

RELATED UPDATE: Activists in Marseille will today celebrate 12th anniversary of the Rojava Revolution

RELATED UPDATE: "Resistance flag will remain fluttering under the slogan of Jin Jiyan Azadî"

RELATED UPDATE: Kurdish Detainee from "Woman, Life, Freedom" Movement Re-Arrested by Iranian Security Forces in Mahabad

RELATED UPDATE: Kongra Star on Qamishlo attack: No one can defeat the will of free women

[libertariantaoist]

https://libertarianinstitute.org/news-roundup/news-roundup-9-27-2023/

Here is your daily roundup of today's news:

News Roundup 9/27/2023

by Kyle Anzalone

US News

Senator Robert Menendez denied the allegations levied against him by the Department of Justice. Last week, a grand jury indicted the powerful Senator on bribery charges. Investigators found hundreds of thousands of dollars said to be payments to access the Senator’s influence. The Institute 

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced the US would increase its military ties with Kenya. Washington agreed to provide additional security assistance to Kenya after Nairobi agreed to lead a UN mission to Haiti. The Institute

Russia

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday that the first batch of US-made Abrams tanks have arrived in Ukraine, which are armed with toxic depleted uranium (DU) ammunition. AWC

The Biden administration on Monday announced a $2 billion loan for Poland that will go toward modernizing Warsaw’s military. AWC

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said Budapest was ending support for Kiev on international issues due to a 2017 Ukrainian law that limits the rights of Hungarians. The announcement comes as Ukraine’s support in Eastern Europe wanes, with Poland halting all weapons transfers to Kiev after President Volodymyr Zelensky criticized Warsaw. The Institute

Four American advanced fighter jets arrived in Romania and will begin conducting patrols over the Black Sea region, according to NATO. The deployment comes as Washington wages a proxy war against Moscow in Ukraine that has stretched into the Black Sea. The Institute

The commander of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet attended a Russian Defense Ministry video conference on Tuesday, a day after Ukraine claimed he was killed in a September 22 missile strike on the fleet’s headquarters in Sevastopol, Crimea. AWC

A senior US official told The Washington Post that the Biden administration is not pressuring Ukraine to hold elections, while some Western officials do want to see a wartime vote. AWC

A report from 60 Minutes that aired Sunday detailed how US taxpayer dollars are not only funding weapons in Ukraine but are also subsidizing small businesses and paying first responders salaries, among other things. AWC

Senate leaders on Tuesday announced they reached a deal on a stopgap funding bill that needs to be passed by September 30 to avert a partial government shutdown. The bill includes $6.2 billion for Ukraine and $6 billion for natural disasters. AWC

On Tuesday, the Kremlin said US-provided Abrams tanks in Ukraine will not impact Russia’s operations and will “burn” like other Western armored vehicles. AWC

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Tuesday that the Turkish parliament will ratify Sweden’s NATO membership as long as the US follows through on its plans to sell Turkey F-16 fighter jets. AWC

China

President Biden is hosting Pacific Island leaders for a second annual summit in Washington that’s part of his administration’s strategy to counter China in the Asia Pacific. AWC

The Philippines is taking steps to retake Scarborough Shoal, a disputed chain of rocks and reefs in the South China Sea that has been effectively controlled by China since 2012. AWC

Middle East

Israeli Tourism Minister Haim Katz arrived in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday for a UN conference, making him the first senior Israeli official to publicly visit the Kingdom, which comes as the US is pushing for a Saudi-Israeli normalization deal. AWC

After weeks of clashes between the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Arab tribesman aligned with Deir Ezzor Military Council (DEMC), the SDF has imposed a curfew following a resumption of fighting on Monday. These ethnic tensions are boiling over in eastern Syria’s Deir Ezzor province, illegally occupied by the US and its SDF partners, as the Arab majority resists Kurdish rule. The Institute

Read More

[dougielombax]

Also this.

Feel free to reblog.

[warningsine]

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. fighter jets launched airstrikes early Friday on two locations in eastern Syria linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Pentagon said, in retaliation for a slew of drone and missile attacks against U.S. bases and personnel in the region that began early last week.

The strikes reflect the Biden administration’s determination to maintain a delicate balance. The U.S. wants to hit Iranian-backed groups suspected of targeting the U.S. as strongly as possible to deter future aggression, possibly fueled by Israel’s war against Hamas, while also working to avoid inflaming the region and provoking a wider conflict.

Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said Friday that the strikes near Boukamal by F-16 and F-15 fighter aircraft targeted a weapons storage facility and ammunition storage facility used by the IRGC and affiliated groups. “Both facilities were destroyed,” he said. “We currently assess there were no casualties in the strikes.”

A senior U.S. military official said there had been Iranian-aligned militia and IRGC personnel on the base and no civilians. The official would not say how many munitions were launched by the jets.

A senior defense official said the sites were chosen because the IRGC stores the types of munitions there that were used in the strikes against U.S. bases and troops. The two officials briefed reporters after the strikes on condition of anonymity to provide details on the mission that had not yet been made public.

Syrian opposition activists confirmed the U.S. strikes in Syria’s eastern province of Deir el-Zour. Omar Abu Layla, a Europe-based activist who heads the Deir Ezzor 24 media outlet, said the main target was an area known as “the farms” outside the town of Mayadeen. He said it is an important transit site where weapons from Iran are stored before being shipped to Lebanon.

He said the second strike hit an area known as the “green belt” in the Boukamal area that borders Iraq. According to Abu Layla, some people were evacuated before the strikes because the retaliation was expected. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said ambulances were seen rushing to the area but it wasn’t clear if there were casualties.

Meanwhile Friday, an Iranian semiofficial news agency, Tasnim, said gunmen in east Syria fired 10 rockets on a base housing American troops in retaliation for the U.S. airstrikes. A U.S. official confirmed the rocket attack and said there were no reported casualties.

And the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group for several Iran-backed groups, said fighters attacked al-Assad airbase in western Iraq with a suicide drone. U.S. officials said it was shot down a few kilometers away and did not hit the base.

According to the Pentagon, as of Friday there had been at least 20 attacks on U.S. bases and personnel in Iraq and Syria since Oct. 17. Ryder said 21 U.S. personnel were injured in two of those assaults when drones targeted al-Assad airbase in Iraq and al-Tanf garrison in Syria.

In a statement, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the “precision self-defense strikes are a response to a series of ongoing and mostly unsuccessful attacks against U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed militia groups that began on October 17.”

In a letter sent Friday to congressional leaders, President Joe Biden wrote: “The strikes were intended to establish deterrence and were conducted in a manner to limit the risk of escalation and avoid civilian casualties. I directed the strikes in order to protect and defend our personnel, to degrade and disrupt the ongoing series of attacks against the United States and our partners, and to deter Iran and Iran-backed militia groups from conducting or supporting further attacks on United States personnel and facilities.”

The senior defense official told reporters that the airstrikes will have a significant impact on the ability of Iranian proxy groups to continue to attack U.S. forces. Asked what groups were targeted, the official said there are several that can have different names, but the U.S. holds Tehran responsible for funding, arming, equipping and directing the proxies. The official said the airstrikes were not designed to expand the conflict in the region, but to compel Iran to direct the militia groups to cease the attacks on American bases and personnel.

The Biden administration has not accused Iran of having a direct role in the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel and has said it appears so far that Tehran was not aware of it beforehand. But the U.S. has noted that Iran has long supported Hamas and has raised concerns that Iran and its proxies could turn the conflict into a wider war.

Austin said the U.S. does not seek a broader conflict, but if Iranian proxy groups continue, the U.S. won’t hesitate to take additional action to protect its forces.

According to the Pentagon, all the U.S. personnel hurt in the militant attacks received minor injuries and all returned to duty. In addition, a contractor suffered a cardiac arrest and died while seeking shelter from a possible drone attack.

The retaliatory strikes came as no surprise. Officials at the Pentagon and the White House have made it clear for the past week that the U.S. would respond, with Ryder saying again Thursday that it would be “at the time and place of our choosing.”

The latest spate of strikes by the Iranian-linked groups came in the wake of a deadly explosion at a Gaza hospital, triggering protests in a number of Muslim nations. The Israeli military has relentlessly attacked Gaza in retaliation for the devastating Hamas rampage in southern Israel nearly three weeks ago, but Israel has denied responsibility for the al-Ahli hospital blast and the U.S. has said its intelligence assessment found that Tel Aviv was not to blame.

The U.S., including the Pentagon, has repeatedly said any strike response by America would be directly tied to the attacks on the troops, who are focused on the fight against Islamic State militants in the region. They said the strikes are not connected to the war between Israel and Hamas.

Such retaliation and strikes against Iranian targets in Syria after similar attacks on U.S. bases are routine.

In March, for example, the U.S. struck sites in Syria used by groups affiliated with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard after an Iranian-linked attack killed a U.S. contractor and wounded seven other Americans in northeast Syria. American F-15 fighter jets flying out of al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar struck several locations around Deir el-Zour.

U.S. officials have not publicly tied the recent string of attacks in Syria and Iraq to the violence in Gaza, but Iranian officials have openly criticized the U.S. for providing weapons to Israel that have been used to strike Gaza, resulting in civilian death.

[kramlabs]

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[mariacallous]

Some conservatives in the United States have recently developed a bizarre tendency to uncritically consume foreign military recruiting propaganda. In 2021, Sen. Ted Cruz circulated Russian propaganda in an attempt to malign U.S. military recruiting efforts, and Fox News host Tucker Carlson is on the record complaining that the U.S. military is “more feminine” in comparison to the Chinese military’s “more masculine” nature. Most recently, Sen. Marco Rubio picked out an officer’s brief participation in a shipboard spoken word event as evidence that the U.S. Navy’s internal priorities are misplaced while the People’s Liberation Army Navy trains for war.

In an attempt to score points in a culture war, a select group of pundits and politicians—very few of whom have served themselves—appear to be interpreting these propaganda videos as indicators of combat effectiveness. Whether the videos feature shirtless men doing pushups or glowering paratroopers dropping from the skies, there’s a desire to see the United States emulate these warped displays of apparent masculine prowess—but this would be a mistake.

Anyone consuming these videos needs to understand what they actually are: a farce. Much like the U.S. Marines who slew a lava monster and battled chess pieces in recruiting commercials in the 1980s and ’90s, the soldiers in these videos are almost certainly paid actors. The real Russian military is a mostly conscript force typified by abuse, sexual assault, and working conditions that would make Upton Sinclair faint. Meanwhile, its fellow authoritarian, “no limits” partner, China, has a military that is rife with corruption, hidebound with Communist Party-driven structures that preclude original thought or tactical creativity, and that hasn’t seen actual fighting since 1986—and no full-scale war since 1979. In combat, many of its soldiers will die for the simple reason that they are not allowed to think.

This is not license to ignore the threat posed by either military, but it should be clear that neither is an organization that any Western force should look to emulate. Whatever faults the U.S. military may have, its training is envied, sought after, and emulated (often poorly) around the world. China and Russia rely on scripted training with limited combat value. Much of their training is used to repress their own people.

For U.S. politicians to hold them up as superior is to favor political point-scoring in a facile culture war over U.S. military effectiveness. This not only is dangerous to U.S. national security but also actively undermines Americans who have sworn an oath to support and defend the Constitution and do so with dignity and respect for their fellow service members.

So-called emasculation features heavily in popular far-right criticisms of the U.S. military—in spite of the fact that women have served in and alongside the military since the founding of the United States, flown combat aircraft since 1993, and been formally allowed in ground combat roles since 2013. Thousands of women have earned Combat Action Badges during combat operations in America’s wars, and hundreds have been decorated for valor under fire.

I have personally served with women who flew into the hottest battles of Iraq to evacuate wounded Marines, tracked Chinese submarines in the Pacific Ocean, and conducted some of the most sensitive and dangerous intelligence missions in recent history. I have deployed with transgender shipmates who did their duty day in and day out in demanding and dangerous environments. I am not unique in knowing remarkable service members who are not heterosexual men; gay men, in particular, have been training and serving in the U.S. military since its founding.

The only time Russian forces have faced U.S. combat troops since 1920 was in a 2018 battle near the city of Deir Ezzor in Syria. A combined group of 500 soldiers, composed of Russian and Syrian combat troops and backed by tanks and three dozen other vehicles, advanced on a U.S. outpost containing less than one-tenth of their total strength. Over the course of a four-hour battle, which brought together the full spectrum of U.S. capabilities, from ground forces to electronic warfare and uncrewed weapons to combat aircraft, U.S. forces eliminated several hundred of the attackers without suffering a single loss of their own.

Strangely, the ability to do shirtless pushups or jump though flaming hoops did not decide the battle. Rather, professional and highly trained personnel of all states, communities, sexual orientations, and genders came together to form a devastatingly lethal response and kill their enemies.

We have seen this again in Ukraine, which has wisely taken in volunteers from all walks of life and diverse backgrounds to form a military capable of defending its interests. Again, some American observers elect to criticize the Ukrainians for releasing videos of young personnel dancing on social media while falling over themselves to praise the so-called manly Russian military and its cultural values. For starters, the idea that a force typified by mass crimes against humanity, including slaughtering mothers and infants in hospitals and waging campaigns of terror, rape, and murder in occupied zones, could be culturally admirable is shocking and should be rejected with disgust by every American.

In terms of combat effectiveness, Russia has again been shown to be shockingly inept. The Russian paratroopers slavered over by far-right pundits have suffered incredible losses in exchange for very few gains. The Russian government now deploying armor fit for a Cold War museum to fight against a diverse force of Ukrainian baristas, IT professionals, and poets who have embarrassed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s forces so completely as to shock the entire world. Neither heterosexuality nor the XY chromosome is an indicator of combat effectiveness or strategic acumen.

To recruit from a diverse population, the military needs to highlight that its culture accommodates and celebrates diversity. U.S. service members deserve to be proud of who they are. Their identities matter. We should not allow them to become embroiled in this absurd culture war, by either side. Politicians do not need to engage in saccharine “thank you for your service” hero worship, but they do owe those in uniform respect for their basic human dignity and for their willingness to serve.

Members of the military should not be held up as objects of derision, nor should they be singled out to highlight the imagined superiority of regimes actively pursuing genocidal campaigns against minorities and mass murder of noncombatants. Using the military like this is a gross abuse of power, taking advantage of the fact that active-duty personnel cannot publicly push back against this malign treatment by members of government.

It may shock some to learn that many of the most vociferous critics of an inclusive military never elected to serve themselves. It is hard to imagine that individuals who feel so strongly about who serves in the military somehow never managed to find their way to a recruiting office during the past two decades of ongoing conflict. Instead, this chickenhawk caucus prefers to spend their taxpayer-funded time tweeting feverishly about how letting women and LGBTQ+ personnel serve their country has somehow made the United States weaker.

Not only is this approach a poor cultural critique, but it is also a facile argument that ignores empirical evidence. The fact is, a more inclusive U.S. military has made the United States better. A modern military defined not only by physical strength but also by technical acumen and mental agility—including a diversity of viewpoints, backgrounds, skills, and abilities—makes the United States’ all-volunteer force the deadliest military in the world. Elected officials should have more important things to deal with than fetishizing authoritarian militaries, but if they must do it, they should leave U.S. service members out of it.

If there is something making U.S. forces less ready, it is the lack of ready platforms and materiel needed to face a peer military challenger—an issue squarely within Congress’s remit to rectify. Politicians should spend more time thinking about real war and less about culture war.

[athena5898]

SYRIA (Al-Akhbar) — Field sources confirmed to Al-Akhbar that "the United States mobilized its bases in Conoco and Al-Omar oil field [in light of escalating resistance options], while the SDF (https://t.me/PraxisRedacted/7838) carried out a campaign of raids and arrests in the eastern countryside. They seek, the sources noted, “to suppress any attempt to threaten the US presence by land and deal firmly with any new danger in the region that threatens US military land movements, whether in Hasakah or in Deir Ezzor." The sources revealed that "in the last month, the Americans brought 22 batches of weapons and equipment to their bases in Hasakah and Deir Ezzor, including 19 batches that arrived by air to Kharab al-Jir, al-Shadadi, Conoco and al-Omar, and three batches that arrived by land through the illegal al-Waleed crossing with Iraq.” The sources indicated that "the transferred weapons are mostly surveillance and monitoring systems, in addition to equipment designed to counter close air targets such as drones and medium and short-range missiles." The sources pointed out that "the US bases used laser-based systems for the first time in surveillance, monitoring and targeting of drones and rocket missiles," and that "the coalition carried out more than 15 live training exercises on the use of these weapons and testing their readiness, most of which were at the Omar field and Conoco oil field bases." The sources believe that "these unprecedented movements in Syria, at least in terms of intensity, reveal US intentions to strengthen Washington's military presence in Syria," adding that "there is a great emphasis on the need to curb the resistance factions in Syria and Iraq and neutralize their weapons." They also emphasized that "the recent exercises focused on the mechanism of countering drones, which was demonstrated by launching several drones in the air and focusing on targeting them to test the effectiveness of the newly transferred weapons, especially after resistance drones penetrated US bases."