Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Some 94% of Palestinians reject the Kushner Plan for Palestine, and two thirds of Palestinians ,according to a recent opinion poll, support the way in which President Mahmoud Abbas has tackled it. Abbas has cut off diplomatic relations and security cooperation with Israel and the United States. In fact, 82 […]
Will the new, Left-led Ireland Recognize Palestine and Boycott Israeli Squatters?
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – That the Left has swept to power in Ireland may position that country to play an important role in the Israel-Palestine conflict. The European Union member states sometimes rail against their irrelevance on foreign policy. Despite Europe’s enormous population (pop. 445 million vs. 320 million in the U.S.) and a […]
Trump Supports Turkey against Putin-backed Russo-Syrian Campaign to Finish off Rebels in Idlib
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump called Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday and appeared to back Turkey against Russia and Syria with regard to the current Syrian Arab Army campaign in west Aleppo province and the province of Idlib. The Turkish press said that Trump thanked Erdogan for his efforts to avert a humanitarian […]
Rockets slam into US Embassy Compound in Iraq, as Base with US Troops also Comes under Fire
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Agence France Presse Arabic is reporting that early Sunday morning several rockets or mortars slammed into the area around the US Embassy in Baghdad. Warning sirens sounded, and fighter jets began patrolling the skies. Reuters reports an American military officer as saying that a base at which US troops are […]
Engel: Trump gave out False Justification for Whacking Soleimani, Nearly starting a war with Iran
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Dan Mangan at CNBC reports that Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., is attacking Trump over his justification for assassinating Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani on January 3. The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee pointed to the Trump administration’s report to Congress on the drone strike at Baghdad International Airport, which […]
Israel’s Netanyahu boasts of having Destroyed US 1st Amendment and Free Speech
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Israeli caretaker prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who has been indicted for corruption and is facing an election soon, just boasted that his ministry of strategic affairs has managed to undermine first amendment protections for free speech in the United States by lobbying state legislatures to pass laws forbidding the boycott […]
AirBnB, Expedia, Tripadvisor Named by UN as Collaborators with Apartheid Israeli Squatter Settlements on Palestinian West Bank
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on Wednesday released a long-awaited list of 112 companies that do business with Israeli squatters on the Palestinian West Bank. These squatters have most often been covertly sent in by the Israeli government itself to steal Palestinian land, build on […]
“Swiss Cheese” or “Frankenstein’s Monster?” Arab Leaders Struggle to Describe the Kushner Apartheid Plan
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Trump administration’s plan for Palestine is so nightmarish that Arab leaders (who rejected it out of hand at a recent Arab League meeting) are having to resort to purple prose to describe it. Senior Saudi prince Turki al-Faisal, who served for two decades as minister of intelligence and also […]
Rattled by Trump’s Erratic Violence, Senate to vote on Forbidding War on Iran without its Approval
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Senate will take up a measure to forbid Trump to go to war with Iran without Congressional approval, writes Daniel Flatley at Bloomberg. Republican senators Mike Lee, Susan Collins and Rand Paul are joining with Democratic senator Tim Kaine in sponsoring the bill. With the support of those Republicans, […]