2022

Criticizing Israeli Policies is not Antisemitism, and Arizona Teachers Shouldn’t be deprived of 1st Amendment Rights

Committee on Academic Freedom, Middle East Studies Association: Letter Protesting proposed adoption of flawed IHRA definition of antisemitism for Arizona institutions of higher education by the Arizona assembly. Dear Representatives Udall, Parker and Grantham: We write to you on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA) and its Committee on Academic […]

Featured

What Israel is doing to Palestine just as Bad as what Russia is doing to Ukraine, but US doesn’t Care

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The US government has been accused of hyping the crisis between the Russian Federation and the Ukraine, where some 120,000 Russian troops have been massed on Ukraine’s borders. US intelligence says Russia has plans to invade imminently, while Ukrainian leaders say they do not see any such signs. Joe Biden […]

European Union

How to Avoid War: Why it is time for a Neutral, Demilitarized Eastern Europe

Arnold Oliver

Tiffin, Oh. (Special to Informed Comment) – Europe has been a flash point for war among both great and small powers for centuries. Conflicts beginning there have been known to spill over outside Europe, sometimes encompassing nearly the entire planet. These wars have unleashed untold human suffering and death, destroyed entire societies and produced campaigns […]

Authoritarianism

The Disloyalty to the United States of Trump and the Republican National Committee

Scott Corey

Berkeley, Ca. (Special to Informed Comment) – On February 4, the Republican National Committee voted to censure two party members. The charge was that investigating the January 6 attack on Congress is, “persecuting individuals engaged in legitimate political discourse that had nothing to do with the attack.” RNC thereby asserts that only the rioters are […]

Education

Crisis in the Schools: A Return to a Normal That Was Never Good Enough

Belle Chesler

( Tomdispatch.com ) – It feels odd to admit this, but I miss the stillness of the first few disorienting and terrifying weeks of the pandemic, when the noise and hustle of my world quieted down. In March and April of 2020, spring somehow seemed more riotously colorful and gratuitously lush. Choruses of birds replaced […]

Climate Crisis

Egypt announces Plan to Get 42% of Electricity from Renewables, become Solar Energy Hub for Europe via Greece

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Ghada El-Gendy, the Executive Director of the Arab Renewable Energy Company, said Friday that Egypt has plans to increase the share of renewables in its electricity production to 42 percent by 2035. At the moment, most of Egypt’s power plants run on methane gas or petroleum, and only 12.5 percent […]

Germany

German State Plans Hundreds of Artificial Energy Islands to Deploy North Sea Wind

Clean Energy Wire

By Jessica Bateman | – The northernmost German state of Schleswig-Holstein has announced it wants to help push forward the energy transition by building artificial power islands in the North Sea, newspaper Die Zeit reported. Tobias Goldschmidt, the state’s energy secretary, said the energy produced on “hundreds” of offshore plants could be bundled and then […]

Natural Gas

How Russia hooked Europe on its oil and gas – and overcame US efforts to prevent energy dependence on Moscow

The Conversation

By Ryan Haddad | – The Biden administration hopes its threat of “severe economic consequences” deters Russia from invading Ukraine – an event Americans officials say could be imminent. In response, the U.S. said it may ban the export of microchips and other technologies to critical sectors like artificial intelligence and aerospace and freeze the […]

Afghanistan

Biden Seeks to Seize Afghanistan’s Assets

Human Rights Watch

By John Sifton | Asia Advocacy Director | – ( Human Rights Watch ) – The Biden administration has decided to recommend directing $3.5 billion of Afghanistan’s $7 billion in foreign currency reserves in the United States to a trust fund for humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, while agreeing to release another $3.5 billion to families […]

Archives for 2022