Mark Suster

For people not really following the 'regime erosion' element of the Iran War: - Israel has been killing Basij (internal paramilitary/gestapo) at their checkpoints, headquarters, etc. - This was causing notable erosion in checkpoints and attendance - Reza Pahlavi requested that Iranians celebrate Chaharshanbe Suri, kind of a Persian New Years Eve type celebration, which has historically been a time of protest against the regime (and has pre-Islamic/Zoroastrian roots that may be considered heretical by mullahs). - It is possible that a bunch of the top remaining guys in basij/IRGC (Larijani was between main govt and IRGC...) gathered together to discuss how to deal with this. They got bombed. Whoops. - There was chatter about how the Israelis were asking for this but that it would be a slaughter. No such thing happened. - While a couple people were shot, there were apparently celebrations throughout many large cities, and Israel sent drones to harass any squads of Basij forming up to interfere. In my -uninformed- view this was a test run of erosion of command and control, morale, organization. Throughout all this Israel has been calling Basij commanders on their cellphones and, well, threatening to kill them. Next: Pahlavi has requested that tomorrow, people go to the graves of the 'Lion and Sun' martyrs. This is, I think, a next test. My expectation is we will continue to see these eroding steps taken to see how much Basij and IRGC command and control have been broken down. Completely uninformed except reading Persian and diaspora twitter quite a bit the last couple weeks.

The New Middle East starts NOW. FIRM. Unshakable. No Islamist force. No Islamic regime. Will stand. GAME OVER. The UAE leads and the future follows.

A very special night in Tehran.🇮🇷 In the morning you will understand why.⌛️

Quick lessons from the Iran war so far: - The Islamist regime is weaker than its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. The regime bet everything on proxy warfare and let its Washington enablers build its aura of military invincibility. It was caught off guard in June. When it tried to catch up, Israel started finishing the job. - Closing the Strait of Hormuz hurt Iran's non-Western friends and forced Tehran to let their ships through, weakening its chokehold on global oil prices and the economy and taking away its only leverage. - Europe is powerless; its role has vanished on the global stage, whether in Ukraine or the Middle East. Its social welfare programs consumes all its budgets and attracts non-Western populations whose votes further paralyze European foreign policy and make it as useless as the UN. - Israel is the fastest-rising global power. - India and Pakistan are also rising (judging by how they deployed ships to Hormuz while Europe stayed shy and hidden). - Islamist Iran hates the Gulf more than anything else. The six GCC countries belong to the Western capitalist system and have no place in the East, BRICS, Iran, or China. The GCC's natural allies are America and Israel. - If Trump is Reagan, Netanyahu is Thatcher. The Trump-Netanyahu duo is projecting as much Western power on the global stage as Reagan and Thatcher did in the 1980s.

Strait of hormuz right now

Lord, grant me patience on discussion of the Michigan synagogue attack