World roundup: December 5 2023
Stories from Israel-Palestine, Guinea-Bissau, El Salvador, and elsewhere
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TODAY IN HISTORY
December 5, 1757: At the Battle of Leuthen, Prussian King Frederick II (“the Great”) wins one of the most impressive victories of his storied military career, using a diversionary attack and a sophisticated oblique maneuver to rout an Austrian army under Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine that was twice the size of his force. Fully a third of the 66,000 man Austrian army was killed, wounded, or captured. Frederick’s victory enabled him to move on to besiege the city of Breslau (Wrocław) in mid-December. Breslau’s fall left Prussia largely in control of Silesia and all but ensured its victory in the Third Silesian War, one of the many conflicts within the larger Seven Years’ War.
December 5, 1941: The Red Army under Georgy Zhukov begins a major counteroffensive against the Nazi Wehrmacht in the Battle of Moscow. The combination of the Soviet military and a brutally cold Russian winter crippled the German forces, and the offensive ended on January 7, 1942 with the exhausted Red Army having driven the Nazi line back some 150 miles from the Soviet capital.
MIDDLE EAST
ISRAEL-PALESTINE
Israeli military (IDF) chief of staff Herzi Halevi told reporters on Tuesday that “our forces are now encircling the Khan Younis area in the southern Gaza Strip.” The IDF is a couple of days into the Khan Younis phase of its Gaza operations and the aim seems to be to do to that city what it did to Gaza City during the previous phase—i.e., surround and obliterate it. Dozens of Palestinians have reportedly been killed over the course of the day, though it’s hard to put much stock into those figures at this point given the impossibility of counting casualties under these conditions. Civilians have been fleeing south to Rafah, which is still under IDF bombardment and will likely be the focus of the IDF’s next ground phase. Even in peacetime Rafah wouldn’t be able to accommodate this influx of people, but under these circumstances the city will be completely overwhelmed. There hasn’t been much time to dwell on the potential for serious illness but at this point disease is perhaps as great a looming threat to Gazan civilians as future IDF activity.
In other news:
The IDF is besieging another hospital in northern Gaza, Kamal Adwan, for reasons that are unclear apart from the fact that it’s a hospital and this is what the IDF does. I haven’t seen this mentioned outside of Al Jazeera, possibly because most attention is now focused on southern Gaza or possibly because Western media already did the “Hospital Standoff” story and has moved on to the next episode. Also getting relatively little attention has been the IDF’s systematic destruction of Gazan public buildings, many of them presumably containing vital records that may now no longer exist. Whether intentional or not—and given that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is talking like he wants to reoccupy Gaza again, so it may well be intentional—the destruction of these buildings (which doesn’t have any obvious military justification) could make it impossible for any Palestinian administration to resume governing Gaza. It definitely destroys the history of Gaza and that part seems pretty obviously intentional.
US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters on Tuesday that “the level of assistance that's getting in [to Gaza] is not sufficient” and said that the Biden administration has “made that clear to the government of Israel.” The amount of aid that’s entering Gaza since the expiration of the ceasefire appears to be greater than what was entering the territory prior to the ceasefire, but it’s much less than was getting in during the ceasefire, and the lack of fuel coupled with the resumption of hostilities has made it significantly harder to distribute the aid after entry. Miller’s language was a bit more pointed with respect to the Israeli government than the administration has typically used but it’s all part of a concerted effort to appear to care about Gaza’s civilian population.
Similarly, US Agency for International Development head Samantha Power flew to Egypt on Tuesday. She brought with her some $21 million in aid and a vague promise to set up a US field hospital inside Gaza with no indication where, when, or how that might be done. The aid is dwarfed by the billions in military assistance the US is providing and is planning to provide to Israel, but it’s the optics that are important here from the administration’s perspective.
Building upon this theme, the Biden administration announced on Tuesday that it intends to begin putting Israeli settlers found to be involved in violence against Palestinians in the West Bank on a visa blacklist. The impact of this is much more symbolic than practical. Many West Bank settlers are US citizens and aren’t subject to a visa ban, and even Miller in his Tuesday press briefing talked about “dozens” of potential targets. It’s important to note here that the administration is taking this step because it does not believe these settlers will be brought to justice by the Israeli government—the same government that’s nevertheless getting billions of dollars in US weapons and munitions.
The French government on Tuesday froze the assets of Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s political leader in Gaza. It turns out that Sinwar doesn’t have any assets that are under French jurisdiction, but Paris is hoping to get the ball rolling on a Europe-wide asset freeze that could impact Hamas’s fundraising operations.
YEMEN
The United Nations World Food Program announced on Tuesday that it’s suspending operations in rebel-controlled northern Yemen. This decision comes one day after the WFP announced it’s ending its Syrian operations, and the rationale here is similar—it’s out of money. In this case, though, the WFP also cited disagreements with rebel officials, apparently over a proposal to downscale but not completely eliminate its operation, as part of the problem. The agency is still running smaller programs in northern Yemen and is maintaining its full operations in government-held areas.
LEBANON
The Lebanese military said that Israeli shelling killed one of its soldiers and wounded three others on Tuesday. That’s the first time the IDF has killed a Lebanese soldier since it began exchanging fire with Hezbollah amid the conflict in Gaza. Israeli forces appear to have been responding to a new round of Hezbollah attacks and struck an army outpost, I assume mistakenly.
ASIA
AFGHANISTAN
If Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government is hoping to normalize relations with China it’s apparently going to have to undertake some political reforms. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin responded to a question about the possibility of recognizing the Afghan government on Tuesday by saying that “we hope that Afghanistan will further respond to the expectations of the international community, build an open and inclusive political structure (and) implement moderate and stable domestic and foreign policies.” It’s unclear exactly what Wang meant by “expectations,” but the those comments suggest one of them could be reversing the Taliban’s decision to ban Afghan women from all aspects of public life.
No government has recognized the Afghan government since the Taliban retook power in 2021. But given the group’s cordial relationship with Beijing and China’s economic interests in, e.g., Afghanistan’s mineral resources, if any major world power is going to recognize the Taliban’s legitimacy it will likely be China.
PAKISTAN
A roadside bomb wounded at least five people, four of them children and two of those critically, in the Pakistani city of Peshawar on Tuesday. There’s no indication as to responsibility but the location suggests jihadist militants, either Pakistani Taliban or Islamic State.
AFRICA
GUINEA-BISSAU
African Union chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat said on Tuesday that he “notes with concern” Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embaló’s decision to dissolve that country’s parliament following a National Guard uprising last week that Embaló has characterized as an “attempted coup.” Mahamat also said that he “strongly condemns” that incident. Former Guinea-Bissau Prime Minister and current speaker of the dissolved parliament Domingos Simões Pereira criticized the dissolution order as a “constitutional coup d’etat.” Embaló has also assumed control of the country’s defense ministry and its interior ministry—which oversees the National Guard—both of which would normally report to the prime minister. It sounds like he’s left the rest of the cabinet untouched so far.
NIGERIA
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu says he has ordered an investigation into the apparently mistaken drone strike his military carried out in Kaduna state on Sunday night, which was meant to target bandits but at latest count killed at least 85 civilians. The Nigerian army has taken responsibility for the incident, with commander Taoreed Lagbaja saying that it was “based on the observation of some tactics usually employed by bandits.”
UGANDA
The Biden administration announced on Monday that it’s expanding a visa blacklist for Ugandan officials and creating a new blacklist for officials of the Zimbabwean government. In both cases the administration says it’s targeting individuals accused of undermining civil society and mistreating minority groups. In Uganda’s case that especially means the LGBTQ+ community, which has been struggling under the draconian morality law the Ugandan government adopted earlier this year. The administration began imposing visa restrictions in the wake of that move but widened that program on Tuesday. As far as Zimbabwe is concerned, this was the administration’s response to President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s reelection in August, in a vote that was roundly dismissed as fraudulent by international observers.
EUROPE
RUSSIA
The Biden administration also expanded its Russia-related blacklist on Tuesday, adding a Belgian businessman and a related network of five other individuals and nine entities accused of helping Moscow obtain banned military-use electronics. In addition to the sanctions the administration also unsealed two indictments against said businessman, Hans De Geetere. And it blacklisted an unrelated group of eight individuals and 11 entities with ties to the Belarusian government over a variety of allegations including support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Meanwhile, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters on Tuesday that the Russian government recently rejected a “significant proposal” from Washington that would have secured the release of two US nationals in Russian custody on spying allegations—Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former US Marine Paul Whelan. Miller didn’t go into detail. Russian officials have maintained that they will not trade Gershkovich until after he stands trial, but they also keep delaying the onset of a trial for unknown reasons.
UNITED KINGDOM
UK Home Secretary James Cleverley flew to Rwanda on Tuesday to sign a new treaty in hopes of reviving the refugee deportation scheme that the UK Supreme Court struck down last month. There’s no word yet on exactly what the accord includes but presumably it tries to address the court’s concerns around the principle of non-refoulement—or, in other words, some language barring the Rwandan government from re-deporting asylum seekers after the UK deports them to Rwanda. The Rwandan government referred to the possibility of a “joint tribunal,” including Rwandan and UK judges, that would oversee asylum cases and ensure that rights are protected—though deporting these people to Rwanda in itself probably violates those rights. UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is desperate to turn Rwanda into the UK’s asylum detention facility in an effort to discourage refugees from trying to enter the UK at all and in order to appease his Conservative Party’s xenophobic wing.
Elsewhere, a new analysis from the climate NGO Friends of the Earth estimates that Sunak’s government—and this is a real shocker, so I hope you’re sitting down—has the UK on track to miss its 2030 carbon reduction pledge. The group says that under current policies, the UK will have reduced its emissions by 59 percent from 1990 to 2030, just a bit shy of the 68 percent reduction to which it is committed. Sunak, in another naked political gambit, has been walking back emissions reduction plans while insisting that the UK is still meeting its international obligations.
AMERICAS
VENEZUELA
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said in televised remarks on Tuesday that his government is going to start issuing “operating licenses for the exploration and exploitation of oil, gas and mines” in Guyana’s Essequibo region, following this past weekend’s referendum regarding Venezuela’s claim over that territory. This is unsurprisingly causing some alarm in Guyana but it’s unclear how Maduro intends to actualize what he’s treating like a binding annexation even though the vote didn’t actually involve anybody living in the Essequibo region. Certainly this is a situation to monitor but I’m just not sure what Maduro’s actual next step is here, and it’s possible he really just wants to use the possibility of annexation as a political rallying cry heading into next year’s election.
EL SALVADOR
Amnesty International issued a report on Tuesday asserting that the human rights situation in El Salvador is as bad under current President Nayib Bukele as it has been at any time since the 1980-1992 Salvadoran Civil War. Bukele’s crackdown on gangs and/or his political opponents has involved tens of thousands of arrests, many of the arbitrary variety, and allegations of systematic brutality by law enforcement. It’s also made Bukele extremely popular (specifically with respect to the gang piece), so popular that he’s going to waltz to another term in office next year even though Salvadoran presidents are legally prohibited from running for reelection.
UNITED STATES
Finally, Inkstick’s Chloe Shrager reports on the toll that US nuclear testing is still taking, decades later, on the people of the Marshall Islands:
Tucked away in the azure waters of the Northern Pacific halfway between Hawai’i and New Zealand, the remote chain of tropical islands, islets, and ring-shaped coral atolls seemed the ideal proving grounds for the United States’ Cold War-era nuclear testing program. Between 1946 and 1958, a total of 67 nukes were exploded in the Marshall Islands — the equivalent of dropping 1.6 Hiroshima bombs every day for a dozen years.
The twelve-year bombing campaign vaporized entire islands and dotted lagoons with radioactive bomb craters, forever displacing generations of Marshallese from their paradisaical home turned nuclear wasteland.
Islanders received direct exposure to poisonous fallout, starved in exile on too-small islands with inadequate food supplies, and were later temporarily moved back to their irradiated homes to be unknowingly used as test subjects in human radiation experiments. Now, the resulting cancers and mysterious birth defects have been passed on to the children of nuclear victims.
After decades of cover-up and secretly withheld information about radiation exposure, the United States still has not recognized the extent of the nuclear program’s impacts or paid out full compensation to its victims.
This year provided the Marshallese an opportunity to finally seek justice in the form of an apology and total financial reparation. Certain economic provisions of the Compact of Free Association — the key international treaty that determines the compensatory relationship between the Marshall Islands and the US — expired at the end of September. Its renegotiation gave room to rewrite the details of that relationship.
Both parties signed to renew the Compact and two other related agreements on Oct. 16, all of which are now slated for congressional approval. But according to Marshallese officials I spoke to, the new deal doesn’t satisfy the conditions of justice. They say that the new deal does not compensate the victims adequately, and it does not issue a formal recognition of and apology for the nuclear legacy. What began as a chance to address the Compact’s past failings has become nothing more than a reinforcement of them, and the Marshall Islands’ nuclear issue has fallen between the cracks yet again.