Last week’s links are here.
General
Adam Baczko and Gilles Dorronsoro in Le Monde:
In a theater where states are unitary actors who defend the self-evident national interest, societies are reduced to scenery, and military power becomes the ultimate measure of the political. This vision, in its simplicity, dispenses with understanding societies, the social embeddedness of armed groups, and the transnational flows that nevertheless shape contemporary wars.
Sahel and West Africa
Cambridge University: “AI Tool for Mapping Smallholder Crops Proves Itself in Senegal.”
Two Mauritanian parliamentary deputies received a presidential pardon after being arrested in April over controversial public statements on social media, but have been stripped of their membership in parliament following their convictions.
Amnesty International has a new report: “‘No One is Spared’: War Crimes Committed by the Malian Army and Foreign Allied Forces along the Mauritanian Border.”
Exiled Burkinabè activists have published a list of 86 alleged state kidnappings of dissidents under Captain Ibrahim Traoré.
Reuters’ Maxwell Adombila: “Ghana Bill Would Give State Special Share Rights in Mining Firms, Draft Shows.”
Jeune Afrique’s Kent Mensah on a precarious calm in Bawku, northern Ghana.
Peter Rice at the Global Observatory: “The Transition of Aid Coordination in Nigeria Is a Major Test for the Humanitarian Community.”
Horn of Africa
Faisal Ali et al. at Mada Masr: “How a War in Tigray Could Set Off a More Complex Fight.”
Ken Opalo at An Africanist Perspective:
Those beating the war drums the loudest in Ethiopia — and who’ve trashed the Pretoria Agreement — are convinced that Ethiopia can only be well governed if they are in charge. Nearly all are motivated by maximalist demands and are quick to weaponize legitimate historical grievances for parochial ends. The leading characters involved are (mostly) men out to settle decades-old scores and who prefer to go out fighting rather than accept political defeat by their perceived inferiors. These same characters have been able to mobilize fighters under the banner of uncompromising primordislist ethno-nationalism and commitments to their respective ethno-states.
International Crisis Group’s Alan Boswell interviews Yousra Elbagir on the war in Sudan.
Ahmed Ismat Ahmed in Jacobin:
An arms embargo addresses a supply problem — the flow of weapons — while the political economy of militia recruitment is a problem of demand.
The UAE is not just one supplier among others. It is the buyer of last resort for Sudanese gold and the logistics node for the air bridge into Darfur. Dubai’s refineries process the metal, and the same financial infrastructure enables the flights.The profit is not incidental to the war. A force paid from the mine, through Dubai, does better when the country is in pieces.
UN News: “Somali Families Face Renewed Violence amid Worsening Hunger Crisis.”
Christina Okello for RFI: “In Somalia, al-Shabab Uses the Environment to Reinforce Their Power.”
Middle East and North Africa
Al Jazeera: “Morocco’s King Mohammed VI has named Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri as prime minister, making the 50-year-old the first woman to hold the role in the kingdom and the third woman to serve as prime minister in the Arab world.” I wrote a bit about the recent election results here.
Elisabetta Povoledo for the New York Times: “3 Egyptian Officials Convicted of Kidnapping Slain Italian Student.”
At Equator, Jonathan Shainin interviews Akbar Shahid Ahmed:
Your book is about impunity, but it’s also about complicity. How do the people you’ve written about – whether dissenters or policymakers – think about complicity, American or European, in Gaza?
I come up against a consistent desire to avoid acknowledging the consequences of American policy. People told themselves: ‘this is Netanyahu’s doing, the Israelis’ doing, we’re not really part of it.’ They tried very hard to sustain that alienation. I reported that, in November 2024, there were new intelligence assessments that suggested – in greater detail than before – that the Israelis were knowingly committing war crimes in Gaza, discussing this among themselves. This was so serious that it went all the way up to Biden, because the lawyers and intelligence officials were saying this is more alarming than what we’d seen previously.
And it prompted new discussions, at the highest level – Biden, Blinken, McGurk, Sullivan, the US ambassador to Israel – about complicity, what in a legal sense is called ‘aiding and abetting’. Can American officials be held liable on a personal basis for what’s happened? But after extremely heated discussions, top officials walked away assured they would not be held personally liable, with a kind of clean legal chit.
Lama Rabah et al. at Wired: “How Israeli Checkpoints Choke Palestinian Life in the Occupied West Bank.”
Beth Oppenheim at the European Council on Foreign Relations: “The Ideas of Israel.”
Alhakam Shaar at Hidden Cities: “Home Again in Aleppo.”
Malaika Tapper for FT: “Syria’s Free-Market Experiment.”
Most of Syria’s growth “is induced by international support, not by domestic recovery”, said Karam Shaar, a Syrian political economist.
Alongside trade liberalisation and increased privatisation, the government has slashed subsidies on energy and bread. Those policies have contributed to a cost-of-living crisis that sparked widespread demonstrations this month following a sharp rise in fuel prices, economists say.
“Their extreme focus on deregulation, on lifting subsidies and so on did not take into account the downtrodden,” said Shaar.
Alissa Rubin for the New York Times: “What I Saw as the U.S. Debacle in Iraq Unfurled.” I would differ with Rubin on some her interpretations of American behavior - I think there was not only an intellectual failure or a misunderstanding, but also often arrogance, callousness, and outright cruelty at play.
Jeremy Scahill, Murtaza Hussain, and Reza Sayah at Drop Site: “Massacre at Minab: The School That Became a Grave.”
Pablo Elias for DW: “Why Can’t the Saudis Defeat the Houthis?”