I’ve got a break between family celebrations, so a quick post about the war that I guess Republicans and their allied media are pretending is over, which manifestly isn’t.
This is from yesterday’s Al Jazeera live feed:
Millions of people have attended funeral prayers for Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the four members of his family killed in a US-Israeli air strike on his compound on February 28.
Iranians carry red flags symbolising a call for revenge as chants “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” ring out outside Tehran’s largest mosque.
[…]
A four-month-old Palestinian boy died after Israeli forces blocked his urgent medical transfer through a military checkpoint at the entrance to the village of Deir Ammar, west of Ramallah.
Two people were killed in an Israeli drone attack in the al-Samar area east of Gaza City.
The toll from Israeli attacks in Lebanon since March 2 rose to at least 4,304 people killed and 12,203 wounded.
R Po sent in this oil tracker, and it’s as good as any. After watching too much What’s Going on With Shipping, one thing I know is that it’s hard to track ships through the Strait because ships will turn off their electronic tracking, so perhaps there are a few more ships than noted here, but certainly nothing like a year ago (which is the grey moving average line).
It seems like where this is going is the oil markets whistling past the graveyard until reserves run out in a lot of countries. Add to that, years and years of Iranian retaliation, in ways large and small. These are not the words of a defeated people:
Holding Iranian flags and pictures of their martyred leader, and waving red flags symbolising vengeance the crowds were vastly larger and more militant than on Saturday, the first day of this elaborately conceived funeral designed to impress on the world that Iran has social resilience and determination to preserve its independence.
“From now on the shroud is our garment. I swear by your blood; Trump’s murder is our responsibility,” Mohammad Rasouli, a poet, said at a poetry recitation immediately before the prayer reading at the farewell ceremony. He asked: “Why is the most bastard man in the world still alive? The world is no longer a good place for Trump. Why should we not kill the man who killed our imam? It would be a disgrace if we did not.”
His scripted and authorised remark led to a mixed reaction, but most cheered enthusiastically.
