Nayib Bukele may be Palestinian, but the dictatorship he has built in El Salvador is very much made in Israel. From arming his security forces to supplying him with weapons and high-tech surveillance tools, MintPress explores the Israeli influence helping to prop up the man who calls himself “the world’s coolest dictator.”
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Trump, Gaza, and the Network State: Tech Colonialism Rises + Cuba
There has never been a US presidential visit to the Middle East like this one.
This week, success will be measured not in conventional diplomacy, peace deals, or arms sales, although Donald Trump did make some news by lifting sanctions on the Syrian leadership, urging Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to join the Abraham Accords by normalizing relations with Israel, and agreeing to a $142 billion weapons package for Riyadh.
Trump’s remarkable Middle East tour is all about striking megadeals and outfoxing China
Officials are reportedly looking at the Coalition Provisional Authority as a model
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Hardline neoconservative think tank Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, or JINSA, and the Vandenberg Coalition released a plan last year — with similar contours to what Reuters reported — that called for the creation of a private entity, the “International Trust for Gaza Relief and Reconstruction” to be led by “a group of Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates” and “supported by the United States and other nations.”
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Read More »The Yemen Hidden Agenda: Behind the Al-Qaeda Scenarios, A Strategic Oil Transit Chokepoint
The Oil chokepoint and other oily affairs
The strategic significance of the region between Yemen and Somalia becomes the point of geopolitical interest. It is the site of Bab el-Mandab, one of what the US Government lists as seven strategic world oil shipping chokepoints. The US Government Energy Information Agency states that “closure of the Bab el-Mandab could keep tankers from the Persian Gulf from reaching the Suez Canal/Sumed pipeline complex, diverting them around the southern tip of Africa. The Strait of Bab el-Mandab is a chokepoint between the horn of Africa and the Middle East, and a strategic link between the Mediterranean Sea and Indian Ocean.” [9]
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US ‘just about’ ready to lift Ukraine intel freeze, Trump says ahead of Saudi meet
The U.S. is “just about” ready to lift its freeze on intelligence sharing with Ukraine, President Donald Trump said Sunday, as American and Ukrainian negotiators prepare for bilateral talks in Saudi Arabia intended to move toward a peace deal to end Russia’s three-year-old invasion.
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The U.S. delegation in Saudi Arabia will include Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Mike Waltz. The Ukrainian team will be led by Andriy Yermak, the head of Zelenskyy’s presidential office. The U.S. side is expecting Ukraine to show willingness to make peace, Trump suggested on Sunday.
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Trump and his top officials have said that both Ukraine and Russia will be expected to make concessions in pursuit of a peace deal to end Moscow’s invasion, which itself is only the latest chapter in more than a decade of cross-border aggression.
Trump last week suggested in a post to Truth Social that he was “strongly considering large-scale sanctions” and tariffs on Russia until a deal is reached, adding that Moscow “is absolutely ‘pounding’ Ukraine on the battlefield right now.” Trump also told a joint session of Congress he had received “strong signals” that Russia is ready to make peace.
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The Kremlin has also cited a September 2022 Ukrainian decree in which Zelenskyy declared negotiations with Putin “impossible,” after Moscow claimed to have annexed four partially-occupied Ukrainian regions.
On Monday, Peskov told journalists that Russia’s read on this week’s meeting “is not important.”
“What is important here is what the United States expects at various levels,” he continued. “We have repeatedly heard statements that the U.S. expects the Ukrainians to demonstrate their desire for peace. That’s probably what everybody is waiting for. Whether the members of the Zelenskyy regime really want peace or not. Of course, this is very important and it is necessary to decide.”
Una oleada de pesimismo (Google Translate)
“Keep calm. Hasty emotions are unnecessary today,” wrote yesterday Mykhailo Podolyak, one of the most belligerent members of the Ukrainian government, reacting to the wave of pessimism and, at times, hysteria that spread across the European continent throughout the day yesterday, focusing on analyzing the implications of the telephone conversation between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump and the subsequent statements by the president of the United States. “The Trump-Putin conversation reduces tension, but at the expense of Ukraine,” stated the British BBC before the political spin managed to create a continental crisis from an initial conversation whose only agreement is to continue talking. Because despite the adjectives that are being used to describe the contact between the two presidents or the way in which it occurred, the result of the call was the mutual reaffirmation of the importance of peace and the implementation of the mechanisms to schedule a meeting between the two leaders, which will presumably be in Saudi Arabia, and begin a negotiation process.
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China continues to strengthen its military capabilities, combining rapid growth in conventional power with readiness to counter U.S. asymmetrical strategies.
Chinese Military Might vs Washington’s Asymmetrical Tools of Empire (archived)
Previously:
US proxy groups capture Rakhine State in Myanmar
US Greenland-Panama Ambitions Aimed at War with Russia-China
Hot spots where war may break out or escalate in 2025: Balochistan
The collapse of the Syrian government in mid-December 2024 represents a pivotal moment for U.S. geopolitical strategies in the Middle East and beyond.
I love reading Pamphlets’ Twitter timeline for the laughs, but I love proving him wrong even more. Don’t slander Daddy Stalin! 🤭
I listened to an interview with Bernard-Henri Lévy. I’ve never actually listened to him before. The woman who interviewed him worked for Radio Farda (the Iranian branch of the US government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty). I suspected that the channel (Iran International English) was run by an Iranian opposition group. Daniel Davis interviewed one of the hosts earlier this week.
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Tehran Designates London-Based Iran International News A ‘Terrorist’ Organization
Ofcom examining TV network over interview praising attack in Iran
Gunmen attack Iran military parade, killing civilians and troops
My previous posts on Bernard-Henri Lévy.
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 
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