IVP607 - August 2025

“When citizens see the state not as an enforcer but as a guarantor of rights, Lebanon will have moved from asserting sovereignty to constructing it.”

THE TRAJECTORY WAS always clear to anyone who was paying attention, and knew how to filter out the noise of Donald Trump’s empty threats of “severe sanctions to destroy Russia’s economy,” let alone 500% tariffs on Russia’s oil customers, if there weren’t an “immediate cease-fire” in the Ukraine war.

““Alaska’s history teaches us the devastating cost of imperialism and fascism. From the Russian occupation of our lands to Putin’s war in Ukraine and the ongoing oppression in Palestine, we see the same pattern of violence and erasure. We stand with all who resist, because true freedom is collective—none of us are free until all of us are free.” – Enei Begaye, Executive Director Native Movement ”

We’re seeing an alarming revival of archaic gender role ideas, from the manosphere’s remasculinization crusade to trad wives’ rejection of public life. Veteran historian of gender roles Stephanie Coontz explains the moment’s deep economic undercurrents.

What attitudes should socialists and trade unionists have to war?

A different view on the DSA convention.

“The challenge for revolutionary Marxists is to build a Marxist center of DSA that can lead in the direction of principled mass work and national visibility of DSA in broader movements against Trump, in labor, and in social movements.”

“Hypocritical cries of condemnation have risen, warning Netanyahu that this project will lead to massive displacement and a large number of deaths, as if the genocide and displacement perpetrated by the Zionist army over the past 22 months, and supported during several months by the same Western governments that are blaming Netanyahu today, were not already worse than what he is promising now.”

“Some of those arrested were in their nineties and could barely walk to the police vans. Some were in wheelchairs and one was blind. All you had to do to get arrested was to write on a blank placard: “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action”. The location of the protest was well chosen. It took place in Parliament Square, in front of the statues of Gandhi and the suffragist Millicent Fawcett who took forms of non-violent direct action.”

“The last bus awaits in the camp’s parking lot. Young people, most of whom didn’t know each other a week before, exchange phone numbers, social media, and hugs. Here and there, tears flow, as if to prolong the downpours that punctuated the week.”