Mere hours before Trump's 8pm Tuesday deadline yesterday, Pakistan's government contacted Iran with a US-written proposal for a two-week ceasefire, explicitly stated to also include Lebanon, during which they would negotiate a permanent end to the war on the basis of Iran's 10 Points. Among other things, these points include 1) maintaining strict control (joint with Oman) over Hormuz, complete with a toll; 2) the end of sanctions on Iran; 3) keeping their enriched uranium; 4) a withdrawal of US forces from the Middle East [stated by the Supreme Leadership Council but not in the 10 Points, so who knows], and 5) some plausible guarantee that Iran would never be attacked again. I've heard rumors that China may have prodded Iran to accept these terms.
In theory, these are relatively confident and maximalist demands. In practice, Iran has already achieved military and economic control over Hormuz and the withdrawal of many US troops and bases from the region, so at least a few of Iran's demands are, to a greater or lesser extent, already achieved, and with little hope for an increasingly exhausted US to undo these achievements short of nukes.
A couple hours after the ceasefire, the Zionist entity began a wave of airstrikes in Lebanon, killing hundreds of civilians, as well as flying drones into Iranian airspace. This was a strange move to make even if you assume - very sensibly - that the US is completely agreement non-capable: why not agree to the ceasefire and simply pretend to negotiate for two weeks while regrouping/repairing what assets you can and then start hitting Iran again?
One theory is that the Zionists are testing to what degree Iran is actually willing to have solidarity with Lebanon and Hezbollah. While the Resistance has been relatively united since October 7th, the formation of separate peaces instead of negotiating terms as a united front has been a major exploitable weakness. Alternatively, it's been proposed that the US didn't even consider using the ceasefire to regroup and deceive Iran, and that Trump merely wanted a way to chicken out of his threat on Iran's electrical grid - the fact that US officials have since stated that Iran's 10 Points were not the same ones they agreed to is a point supporting this, I suppose. If the conflict resumes and Trump does not deliver another 48 hour deadline (and/or makes it something silly like a month from now) then this could be the explanation.
From Iran, I am getting the sense that a lot is happening behind the scenes. Statements from top officials like Araghchi have stated quite plainly that there will be no ceasefire and no negotiations unless the Zionists stop attacking Lebanon, but as of ~24 hours after the ceasefire began, there has been no significant military response from Iran yet. There have apparently been phone calls between Araghchi and numerous regional officials, but it is unknown to what end. All the while, the global economic situation continues to deteriorate. Over the next week or two, the last tankers that left Hormuz before it closed will arrive at their destinations. If the missile exchanges begin once more, then the West, much like most of the rest of the world, will be experiencing all sorts of fuel, energy, food, and product shortages while trying to justify why they broke the ceasefire to kill more Lebanese civilians.
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The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists' destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
I genuinely don't understand this. I understand the market manipulation but there's a hard commodity underwriting this number and that commodity is going to be more scarce given the recent destruction.
What no materialism does to a mother fucker. These people live in a in world where everything is commensurate with the all-mighty dollar. Simply being willing to pay enough makes things accessible according to their logic, and all is right in the world when the cash can flow.
It's genuinely delusional. It's why the US still thinks it can somehow arm itself and maintain an aggressive position in the world despite having little to no manufacturing capacity. That's not a supply chain issue, a matter of technical knowledge that can't be bought, a matter of capital investment over years if not decades: it's all just an accounting problem to these freaks.
"Wow, number in my bank account high- I must be really rich! I could buy anything!"
No you bug eating radlib Karen freak! You're only as free as your market is! And it's constrained by actual material reality!
This is the opposite of being able to pay enough gets you anything. This is someone saying "i will give you the promise to sell you oil by x date at some price, you would be a fool to pay more than that" and the other guy going "he seems trustworthy, even if he makes a loss I win more money"
This causes shortages for people who would otherwise would be able to pay extra, like the japanese, occupied Koreans or countries in Europe, etc.
One thing to remember is that WTI Crude is a futures trade, so they were betting on the ceasefire lowering oil prices in 1-2 months, or whenever it's dated for. Still shortsighted and irrational, but not quite as bad as it looks.
Yep look at dated brent
https://www.cnbcafrica.com/2026/european-african-crude-oil-prices-hit-records-on-supply-disruptions-despite-ceasefire
Also, the oil futures market is still in heavy backwardization ie spot prices are much higher than futures prices implying supply constraints and everyone wanting oil now. The markup is due to "convenience yield."
Edit: and this backwardization doesn't happen much with financial asset futures ie foreign currencies and bonds (see CIP) , stocks and some commodities like gold and bitcoin. With those, futures>spot because the main cost is financing. You don't need a stock or a bond NOW (these are electronic entries which can always be transferred and you will almost always find traders for) in the way you need crude oil as a refiner (immediate use value).
WTI midland physical deliveries even more highly priced (at least in europe). Is WTI vs Brent premium related to sour/sweet/heavy/light differences of other logistics that mean they could get the WTI slight faster?
10-15% drop in prices after 2 ships go through based on a flimsy ceasefire is impressive. I supposed the "rational market" explanation would be people didn't think USrael/Iran would even be willing go to a negotiation table for a while, so them taking steps in that direction mean they were overestimating the constraint this war would have? As far as shortages, price go up until some people are priced out of it and that's efficient markets! Surely it'll be just wasteful processes, like luxury products and AI, and not things like people's heating to get through Winter that the S. hemisphere is about to enter...
the supply shocks for fertilizer and plastics are going to cause enormous disruption. and diesel is going to increase cost for everything
Well, the market will efficiently handle that too. We'll
use grain that was going to feed cows and just feed people insteadjust let people starve.Not sure how bad the sulfur shocks will be, but that's also used for making a lot of metals like copper. There's also the aluminum that was disrupted and most smelting still uses fossil fuels AFAIK.