World roundup: November 20 2024

Stories from Israel-Palestine, Burkina Faso, Russia, and elsewhere

TODAY IN HISTORY

November 20, 1910: This is the date that Mexican politician Francisco I. Madero set in his “Plan of San Luis Potosí” manifesto for the start of a revolution against the government of President Porfirio Díaz. While Madero may have been hoping for a mass uprising, the day saw a few local rebellions break out primarily in northern Mexico. However, when Mexican authorities were unable to stem those initial rebellions the movement began to expand, eventually forcing Díaz to resign and flee to Europe in May 1911. This date is now considered the start of the Mexican Revolution and is commemorated annually in Mexico as “Revolution Day.”

November 20, 1979: A group of Salafi extremists seizes the Grand Mosque in Mecca, taking a number of hostages in the process. The gang, which traced its ideological and in some cases genealogical roots back to the 1928-1930 Ikhwan Revolt, managed hold on to the holiest site in Islam for about two weeks and repulsed several Saudi attempts to dislodge them. A final and indiscriminately violent operation on December 4 forced the remaining militants to surrender, after which they were beheaded. Officially the Saudi government puts the death toll from this incident around 250; unofficially it may have been considerably higher. The seizure terrified the Saud family, which decided to give freer rein to the more extreme elements of the kingdom’s Wahhabist religious community in order to forestall any more unrest.

MIDDLE EAST

ISRAEL-PALESTINE

There is a push in the US Congress to cut off arms to Israel for reasons that by now should not require much explanation. It is nearly certain to fail (UPDATE: it has failed). Even so, according to HuffPost’s Akbar Shahid Ahmed, the Biden administration has decided to respond to this effort by accusing the people involved in it of supporting terrorism:

The Biden administration is aggressively pushing senators to bless continued U.S. weapons shipments for Israel ahead of a first-of-its-kind vote in Congress on the policy, HuffPost has learned ― and administration officials are suggesting lawmakers who vote against the arms are empowering American and Israeli foes from Iran to the militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah, which the U.S. treats as terror organizations.

HuffPost obtained a copy of talking points the administration is circulating on Capitol Hill ahead of a Wednesday vote on several tranches of military equipment that President Joe Biden wants to send Israel. The White House sent the document to multiple Democratic Senate offices on Tuesday, a Senate aide who requested anonymity to speak frankly told HuffPost.

If the administration actually thought that a group of Democratic US senators was providing aid and comfort to Hamas and Hezbollah it would probably do something a bit more robust than circulating a list of talking points. It’s just throwing these accusations around to obfuscate its ongoing support for the genocide.

Elsewhere: