Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli newspaper Arab 48 reports that Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will dissolve parliament and go to new elections. His government has lacked a majority in parliament for some time and recently lost an embarrassing vote on applying Israeli law to squatter-settlers in the Palestinian West Bank. Theirs will be […]
Archives for June 2022
Diplomacy, not total Victory, will in the End Settle the Ukraine War
Russia’s attack on the Ukraine certainly violated international law and Vladimir Putin should be charged as a war criminal for Russia’s indiscriminate bombing of hospitals, schools, apartment buildings and the like, in which innocent civilians were killed or injured for life, both physically, emotionally, and mentally. The decision of the Biden administration to wage total […]
Interview: How Israel’s Travel Ban Crushes the Dreams of the Palestinians of Gaza
By Paul Aufiero, Omar Shakir, and Abier Almasri | – ( Human Rights Watch ) This month marks the 15th anniversary of the Israeli government’s closure of the Gaza Strip, which effectively confines more than 2 million people into a 40-by-11-kilometer (25-mile by 7-mile) strip of land. Israeli authorities’ sweeping restrictions on the movement of […]
Greenwashing: how Ads get you to think Brands are greener than they are – and how to avoid falling for it
By Morteza Abolhasani, The Open University; Gordon Liu, The Open University; and Zahra Golrokhi, The Open University | – Ads are ubiquitous in many people’s lives, whether on billboards across our cities or on our phones as we’re tracked across the internet. That’s a huge amount of power and influence. For example, ads which appeal […]
Greens return to French Parliament in Left Coalition, as Neoliberal Macron loses Majority
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – France’s parliamentary elections witnessed an upset, with centrist President Emmanuel Macron’s party, La République En Marche and its Ensemble coalition losing its absolute parliamentary majority. A majority requires 289 seats, and Macron’s party gained 245 seats. Among the beneficiaries are the Left and the Greens, who joined together in the […]
New Identity: Religion, Nationalism and Foreign Policy in Turkey (Review)
Review of Filiz Çoban Oran, Religion, Nationalism and Foreign Policy: Discursive Construction of New Turkey’s Identity. London: I.B. Tauris, 2022. Tuebingen (Special to Informed Comment) – In 2009, US President Barack Obama advised Europe to welcome what was then called Turkey into its fold and benefit from the country’s “diversity of ethnicity, tradition and faith.” […]
Why Keeping Workers Poor Is actually Bad for Business
( Otherwords.org) – CEOs at America’s biggest low-wage employers now take home, on average, 670 times what their typical workers make. But we don’t just get unfairness when a boss can grab more in a year than a worker could make in over six centuries. We get bungling and inefficient businesses. Management science has been […]
Lutheran Church Denounces Killing of Abu Akleh, Calls for end of Israeli Occupation of Palestinian Territories
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Lutheran World Federation Council has called for an end to the Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian Territories (Gaza and the West Bank). The statement said that “The Council is deeply concerned by the continued Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and the recent escalation of violence, including the killing […]
German Gov’t Dedicates 2% of Country’s Land Area to Onshore Wind
By Kerstine Appunn | – ( Clean Energy Wire ) – More areas in Germany are going to be designated to onshore wind energy, with state governments ways of interfering being limited by new federal rules. German states will have to actively look for areas that can be designated for wind farm construction in order […]