From Dr. Maalouf (hattip Prof. Jerry Coyne):
"Two Iranian women have been sentenced to death by the lslamic regime for advocating for women’s rights. Bakhshan and Sharifa were found guilty of ‘spreading corruption’ and are now going to be hanged by the Islamic regime."
Polish foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorsky:
"The division of tasks should be such that both the United States
and the European Union help Ukraine achieve a better negotiating
position for potential future negotiations, which should be encouraged
and forced on the aggressor, not the victim."
From FT through Obozrevatel:
"It uses them as "targets": Russia trains drone operators on Ukrainian civilians – FT
The Russian occupation army is using Ukrainian civilians as "targets " to train UAV operators. This terrorist practice of the Russians leads to a large number of civilian casualties and injuries.
At the same time, the invaders are targeting cars, bicycles, and even pedestrians. This is stated in the Financial Times article.
Residents of Kherson suffer the most from enemy drone attacks. Since mid-summer, the population of the regional center has reportedly been the target of an experiment that has no precedent in modern European warfare. Russia is trying to devastate the city by harassing its residents with attack drones. At the same time, Putin's troops are honing the skills of UAV operators by using civilians as targets.
In just six months, Kherson and neighboring villages along the right bank of the Dnipro River have been subjected to more than 9,500 attacks using small drones, killing at least 37 people and injuring hundreds.
The Eyes on Russia project of the Center for Information Resilience (CIR), a London-based nonprofit organization dedicated to exposing human rights abuses and war crimes, has analyzed and confirmed 90 such attacks on Ukrainian civilians.
The analysts found that the vast majority of attacks were directed at moving or stationary vehicles, targets that are "difficult to replicate in a test environment." Russian drones mostly target vulnerable everyday places: crowded markets, gas stations, cafes, post offices, and humanitarian aid centers.
As a reminder, on December 1, the
Russian occupiers attacked public transportation in Kherson from a
drone. In the afternoon, they dropped explosives on a bus in the
regional center."
From AP / Yahoo!News:
"After Trump's win, Russian disinformation aims to drive a wedge between the US and Ukraine
David Klepper
As President Joe Biden uses his final days in office to boost Ukraine's defenses, Russia is playing a different game: spreading disinformation aimed at eroding U.S. support for Ukraine before Donald Trump's return to the White House next month.
Since the U.S. election on Nov. 5, the Kremlin has used state-run media and its networks of fake news sites and social media accounts to push divisive narratives about the war and America's Republican president-elect. Analysts say the content, translated into English for American audiences, is intended to turn sentiment against Ukraine at a pivotal time, with the hope of reducing U.S. military assistance and ensuring a Russian victory.
Recent examples include fake videos supposedly showing Ukrainian soldiers burning effigies of Trump or his supporters. One clip depicts soldiers saying Trump must not be allowed to take office and should "never be president again.” Multiple researchers have debunked the video, noting telltale signs of digital manipulation.
A different video claims to show Ukrainian soldiers firing at a mannequin wearing a red “Make America Great Again” hat and a Trump campaign shirt. That video was analyzed and determined to be fake by private analysts and Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation, a government agency that tracks Kremlin propaganda.
Other versions — just as fake — depict Ukrainian soldiers burning Trump's books or calling him a coward. In the weeks after the election, the clips spread far beyond Ukraine and Russia, circulating among Trump supporters and believers in QAnon, the conspiracy theory that claims Trump is fighting a war against a Satanic cabal of powerful world leaders.
It's part of Russia's continued push to divide Americans over the nearly 3-year war in Ukraine and paint Ukrainians as unreliable, dishonest allies, according to analysts who have tracked Russian disinformation and propaganda since the war began. By discouraging American support for Ukraine, the Kremlin is hoping to cut off the most vital source of military assistance that has kept Ukrainian hopes alive since Russia invaded in February 2022.
Early in the war, Russian propagandists portrayed Ukrainian leaders as corrupt and self-serving. Russian state media claimed Ukraine’s leaders held Nazi sympathies — even though President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is Jewish — or were involved in clandestine bioweapons research that Moscow sought to tie to the COVID-19 pandemic. Each false claim was used to justify Russia’s invasion.
“It’s planted by the Russians, this idea that ‘Ukraine is so corrupt it shouldn’t even be a state, and we are the right people to be running this place,’” said Rupert Smith, a retired British general and former NATO deputy supreme commander who now leads a Brussels-based consulting firm called Solvo Partners. "Now this is being used as an excuse for not supporting Ukraine.”
The fake video claiming to show Ukrainian soldiers firing on the Trump mannequin spread on platforms such as X, Telegram and YouTube, getting an early boost from pro-Kremlin news sites before migrating to ones popular with Americans, according to an analysis by researchers at NewsGuard, a firm that tracks disinformation.
Some versions of the video were created long before the election but were passed off as more recent. Within days, the video was receiving hundreds of thousands of views and had been translated into several languages besides Russian and English, including German, Chinese and Polish, NewsGuard found...
In the time it has left, the Biden administration has urged Ukraine to quickly increase the size of its military by drafting more troops and has stepped upweapons shipments while forgiving billions in loans provided to Kyiv. So far, the White House has pushed more than $56 billion in security assistance to Ukraine and expects to send billions more before Biden leaves office on Jan. 20, 2025.
It’s easy to understand Russia’s motives in trying to cut off that supply of aid, said Joshua Tucker, a New York University professor and Russia expert who studies online disinformation. What’s harder to gauge, he said, is the effectiveness of Russian disinformation, especially on social media platforms already crowded with false, bizarre and debunked claims.
One reason that Russia may persist with disinformation targeting Americans is the relative ease and affordability of such operations compared with diplomatic or military alternatives.
Russia likely sees disinformation as part of a long-term effort to undermine America's global leadership by dividing its people and undermining support for its institutions, Tucker said..."Timothy Ash, Kyiv Independent:
"Opinion: JD Vance’s neutrality pitch for Ukraine is a shortcut to Putin’s next invasion
October 10, 2024
Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance might consider himself a genius for proposing “neutrality” for Ukraine as the centerpiece of his plan to end Russia’s war. For Vance, this appears to be a true eureka moment.
Unfortunately, the concept of neutral status for Ukraine is not new. Vance may not realize it, but Ukraine effectively had neutral status in 2014. Until Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its initial invasion of Donbas that year, Ukraine maintained a non-aligned status, which implied neutrality.
This neutral, or non-aligned, status failed to protect Ukraine. Instead, its military weakness and neutrality were a green light for Russian President Vladimir Putin to annex and invade Ukrainian territory. It’s hard to imagine such a status would deter Putin from attacking again. The only assurance against further Russian aggression is a strong defense, ideally in alliance with Western partners.
The obsolescence of neutrality in Europe is underscored by Finland and Sweden – previous supporters of neutral status – joining NATO after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Before the war, this shift seemed impossible. Unlike Vance’s starry-eyed view of Putin, Swedes and Finns have a clear-eyed understanding of the threat Russia poses to European security. History has proven that neutrality provides no defense, and it would offer Ukraine zero assurance that Russia wouldn’t attack again.
Vance also suggests that Ukraine can appease the threat from Russia by forgoing any ambition to join Western structures – presumably NATO and the European Union. It’s important to remind Vance that Ukraine had no real prospect of joining NATO in 2014 when Crimea was annexed. Opinion polls showed single-digit support for NATO membership, and NATO itself had little appetite for Ukraine’s accession. Russia understood this but invaded anyway – not out of fear of future NATO enlargement, but because Putin saw an opportunity to exploit Ukraine's weakness in a pure imperial land grab.
Putin has since openly stated that his invasion was about his refusal to accept Ukraine as a sovereign state or Ukrainians as distinct from Russians. For Putin, Russia and Ukraine are the same people and should be united. His invasion wasn’t about NATO enlargement, which was never a reality – it was about imperialism.
Only in response to Russian aggression has Ukrainian support for NATO grown, out of necessity and a recognition that non-aligned status failed. Rejecting Ukraine’s desire to join NATO, as Vance suggests, would bow to Russian bullying and reward aggression. It would likely encourage more expansionist policies from Russia. Ukrainian membership in NATO not only assures Ukraine's security but also strengthens Europe’s defense. Ukraine’s enhanced military capability, proven in battle, would be an asset to NATO.
As for EU accession, if Vance also seeks to block Ukraine’s membership, it reveals a deep misunderstanding of recent Ukrainian history. His plan seems rooted in outdated thinking – that Ukraine’s best position is to remain a bridge between East and West, as it did before 2014. Vance may have a romantic vision of a golden age of Ukrainian neutrality, but in reality, that status failed. It invited Russian aggression and stunted Ukraine’s economic development, leaving it vulnerable to state capture by oligarchs, particularly those with ties to Russia.
A key statistic Vance should consider is Ukraine’s per capita GDP compared to Poland and Russia in 1991 – around $3,000 for all three. By 2013, Poland and Russia had grown to nearly $14,000, while Ukraine remained stuck at just over $3,000. Poland chose the EU, Russia relied on commodities, and Ukraine was caught in a no-man’s-land of corruption and stagnation. This instability led to two revolutions – the Orange Revolution in 2004 and the Euromaidan in 2013-14. By 2013, Ukraine had to choose: East or West. Ukrainians opted for the West, and Putin couldn’t accept that, leading to war.
Vance may not comprehend this, but Ukrainians do – and I would argue Putin does as well. Returning to neutrality or non-alignment is a recipe for failure. Ukraine’s economy would collapse, it would be unable to sustain a defense against Russia, and Vance’s plan would pave the way for another Russian invasion. Economic failure would likely lead to political and social instability, creating risks for Europe. Imagine tens of millions of Ukrainians fleeing west, while Ukraine’s military and security forces become destabilized. How would Europe confront such a security threat?
Vance seems desperate to avoid a Russian defeat in Ukraine – so much so that he’s willing to offer Putin a win. But in doing so, he fails to grasp the consequences of his appeasement: future security risks to Europe and a weakening of the Western alliance, which even Vance should recognize as vital in the looming battle for hegemony with China."
From the Hill / Yahoo!News:
Opinion - With Trump taking over the US military, it’s time to finally change course on Ukraine
For much of the last decade, Joe Biden and Donald Trump took turns lamenting America’s “forever wars,” with each advocating a rapid end to the 20-year U.S. involvement in Afghanistan’s civil conflict.
In February 2020, Trump negotiated a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban. Unfortunately, it was done without the participation or even the knowledge of the Afghan government, and without consulting other U.S. allies fighting alongside Afghans and Americans.
For its part, the Taliban did not honor its commitment to consult with the Afghan government regarding the future of the country. Now that it was clear the U.S. was intent on pulling out, the Taliban simply overran the government in Kabul. The agreement was fatally flawed in relying on the Taliban’s nonexistent good faith.
Yet despite Biden’s demonstrated willingness to reverse and unwind scores of Trump policies and executive actions, he made no effort to correct any of the plan’s deficiencies through either renegotiation or unilateral action. He explained later that, had he tried, the Taliban would have resumed the attacks against Americans it had suspended to get the favorable Trump deal.
Instead, Biden plunged rashly ahead, exploiting the opportunity to get out of Afghanistan and blame any ill consequences on his predecessor. His decision, rejecting the unanimous advice of his military commanders that he follow Trump’s plan to retain 2,500 troops in Afghanistan and keep control of Bagram Air Force Base, created the tragic and humiliating debacle of August 2022, which Trump aptly called “the most embarrassing moment in U.S. history.”
Now, with Trump and Biden again reversing the roles of predecessor and successor, Trump threatens to create an even more grievous American embarrassment in Ukraine.
The president-elect is inheriting a deeply flawed U.S. approach to Russia’s ongoing invasion that has become America’s latest forever war, albeit a proxy conflict since no U.S. forces are fighting on the ground there. The Ukrainians have never requested the presence of any foreign troops — only the arms for their own fighters to repel and reverse Russia’s criminal occupation.
The U.S. and NATO allies have responded by providing Kiev with billions of dollars’ worth of weapons and munitions, but the Biden administration has consistently denied transfer of the most effective systems needed to defeat the Russians. Even now that Biden has grudgingly allowed delivery of some advanced weapons, he has vetoed many of Ukraine’s requests to utilize them in the most productive ways. Biden’s persistent fear that more successful Ukrainian resistance will trigger Vladimir Putin’s dangerous escalation has paralyzed Ukraine’s initiative from the start of the war and created a debilitating strategic stalemate that plays into Russia’s war of attrition.
Just as he warned he would do in the campaign, Trump is pressing to have the Ukraine war ended even before he takes office in January. The goal is certainly laudable from a humanitarian and economic perspective, but the manner by which Trump intends to achieve it is morally wrong — and geostrategically misguided.
According to media reports, Trump intends to push some kind of freeze-in-place ceasefire that would pressure Ukraine to permanently surrender most or all of its sovereign territory that Russia illegally invaded in 2014 and still occupies. Trump’s plan will reward Putin’s aggression and would ratify the Obama-Biden administration’s passive acquiescence to Russia’s invasion of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, after then-President Obama assured Putin in 2012 that he would be “more flexible” after his reelection.
Trump needs to show how a strong American president, unlike Obama and Biden, responds to threats and bullying. In addition to warning Putin against further escalation, he should tell him to start withdrawing from Ukraine, send North Korean forces home, and demand that China start sending no-strings financial assistance to help Ukraine rebuild its country.
If Putin refuses to follow these measures, Trump should tell him that he will remove all restrictions on Ukraine’s use of Western weapons except for civilian structures and historical and cultural sites, such as the Kremlin’s iconic onion domes. He should also threaten to increase the supply of long-range missiles to Ukraine until Russia stops bombing Ukrainian cities and infrastructure, and say he will work with NATO to accelerate Ukraine’s admission to the alliance. Further, Trump should also significantly increase sanctions on China for helping Russia conduct its aggression.
Finally, he should tell Putin and Xi Jinping that since Russia’s 10-year invasion of Ukraine has clearly emboldened Beijing to step up its own aggression against Taiwan, he is declaring formally and officially, with the full consent and approval of Congress, that America will unconditionally defend Taiwan against any form of aggression.
Since neither Russia nor China wants an actual war with the United States, these steps by Trump showing U.S. resolve would go a long way toward preventing China’s strategic miscalculation and assuring peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific. Maintaining the present course, much less making further concessions to either U.S. adversary, will inevitably bring disastrous conflict.
Trump’s decision now will indelibly mark his place in history."
From the Hill / Yahoo!News:
"Opinion - Biden finally shows backbone in the face of Putin’s threats
Dov S. Zakheim
On Nov. 17, after nearly two months of internal soul-searching that resulted in what can only be termed unnecessary delay, President Joe Biden finally agreed to permit Ukraine to employ long-range ATACMS missile systems against Russian targets, initially in the Kursk region that Ukraine seized earlier this year...
Whatever his motives, Biden’s decision to grant the Ukrainians the ATACMS that they have long sought may signal that, at long last, with his term of office waning, the president has decided to no longer deter himself out of fear of a Russian nuclear threat that has not materialized. It is tragic that the White House took so long before it decided not to “go wobbly,” as Margaret Thatcher put it to George H.W. Bush on the eve of the 1991 Iraq War.
Had
Washington shown a couple of years ago the spine it is showing today in
the face of Putin’s hollow nuclear threats, the war in Ukraine might
well be long over. And Ukraine would have avoided so much of the massive
death and destruction that it continues to suffer."
