From the CrimethInc. collective (11/03/2026)
A Lebanese Perspective on the War on Palestine, Lebanon, and Iran
The war that the United States and Israel are waging in the Middle East is not solely directed at Iran. In addition to occupying the entirety of Palestine as well as the Golan Heights and other parts of Syria, Israeli troops are currently occupying parts of Lebanon while Israeli airstrikes pummel the country from above. At least 800,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in Lebanon since the beginning of March. Left unchecked, the Israeli government will reduce Lebanon to uninhabitable wreckage, just as it has Gaza.
To understand the consequences for people in Lebanon, we reached out to Elia Ayoub, who previously spoke to us about the uprising that took place in Lebanon in October 2019 against the sectarian rule of warlord oligarchs. How should we understand the latest round of hostilities in the context of the last several decades? How does this assault shape the prospects for Lebanese movements for liberation?
Elia Ayoub is an anti-authoritarian historian and researcher from Lebanon. He hosts The Fire These Times podcast, runs the Hauntologies newsletter, and hosts online classes on modern Lebanese history. You can donate to support people displaced by Israeli attacks on Lebanon here.
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Gleichschaltung : The normalisation of contemporary authoritarianism
From lundimatin #511, 10/03/2026
In this article, sociologist Michalis Lianos analyses both the conditions and the deployment of this new form of authoritarianism that is spreading across the world. On the one hand, representative democracy is dying, and on the other, extreme individualisation allows everyone a degree of freedom, provided that its framework is never challenged. And this is the paradox of our time: that fascism is accompanied by the highest level of normalisation of our existences.
In Nazi terminology, Gleichschaltung, meaning “synchronization” or “coordination”, was the process of Nazification by which Adolf Hitler—leader of the Nazi Party in Germany—established a system of totalitarian control and coordination over all aspects of German society. (Wikipedia)
Authoritarianism generates regimes that are expansive in nature, both socially and geopolitically.
This is not the direct consequence of an ambition to dominate, but of a set of values that considers the ordering of the world to be the essential prerequisite for a healthy society. The tragic situation, in which we find ourselves, with the three major world powers under authoritarian regimes and several European societies also tempted by authoritarian culture, is evidence of a socio-political isomorphism initially caused by the lower classes’ loss of control over social space. Between those who manage to establish their discursive influence in the public sphere and those who feel marginalised as a conservative rearguard, rivalry is turning into a dichotomy of perspectives. To succeed in silencing or even humiliating, your opponent with your eloquence leads them to think of other means than speech.
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