Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Arab Barometer in partnership with the BBC has interviewed a weighted sample of 25,000 people in the Arab world. One of the survey’s findings is the rapid decline in self-reported religiousness. About 30% of Tunisians say they are “not religious” in 2019, nearly doubling since 2013. The youth are […]
Erdogan’s Agony: Has Istanbul just begun saving Turkish Democracy?
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Istanbul has clapped back for democracy big time, electing as mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu of the secular Republican Peoples Party. İmamoğlu had already won once, last May, with a margin of 15,000 votes. The increasingly dictatorial president, Tayyip Erdogan, of the center-right pro-Islam Justice and Development Party (AKP), argued that the […]
Dear Trump: Iran doesn’t Have a Military Nuclear Program and Gave up Bomb-Making Potential
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Julian Borger at The Guardian reports that Trump said Saturday to reporters, “They’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. We’re not going to have Iran have a nuclear weapon. When they agree to that, they’re going to have a wealthy country. They’re going to be so happy, and I’m […]
Trump cites “Proportionality” in Iran pullback, though He has often Violated It
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump in an interview Friday with Meet the Press attributed his decision not to go ahead with a strike on Iran to concerns about proportionality. He said he asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff just before the strike was to have been set in motion about the likely Iranian casualties. […]
Back from Iran War Brink: Trump wants to Walk back Iran Crisis that He created with Severe US Sanctions
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The warmongers on Trump’s national security team apparently convinced him to set in motion an aerial strike against Iran Thursday in retaliation for the downing of a US drone over waters claimed by Iran. Then at the last minute, Michael D. Shear, Eric Schmitt, Michael Crowley and Maggie Haberman at […]
Yes, Liz Cheney, AOC is right that US is Running Concentration Camps for Refugees
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been under fire for an Instagram message she sent out in which she characterized the holding facilities for refugees and other undocumented entrants into the US run by ICE and by private companies (for which it is a $2 billion a year industry) as “concentration camps.” Human […]
Kushner’s Bahrain conference collapsing–No Palestine, Israel Officials, charges of attempting to Buy off Palestinians
BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) — US Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt has stated that next week’s Bahrain economic workshop is the first part of the United State’s peace plan known as “Deal of the Century.” Greenblatt has also emphasized to the Israeli news agency “i24NEWS” that the workshop will be concidsered as “apolitical” due to the Palestinian […]
Solar Growing by leaps and Bounds in India, fueling Irrigation and Jobs
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Solar energy is one of the fastest-growing energy sectors in the world, and has the great advantage of producing no carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that is raising the average surface temperature of the earth. India is now for the first time in history investing more in solar energy than […]
Alleging False Flag, Iran Speaker accuses US of Gulf of Oman Tanker Attacks
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Iran’s speaker of parliament, Ali Larijani, said Monday that he believed that the United States might have staged the attack on two oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman last week. Larijani said that such an attempt to frame Iran would be consistent with current US policy, which is to […]