Some two thousand angry youth in Port Said attempted to block ferries and sent speedboats into the canal zone, aiming at disrupting shipping in the Suez Canal on Saturday (they failed), while in Cairo soccer ruffians angry about a court verdict set fire to the HQ of the Egyptian Soccer Federation and to a nearby […]
Humanitarian Catastrophe in Syria: Why don’t We Hear More, Do More?
Oxfam says that the Syrian refugee crisis is ‘spiraling out of control’; Amy Christian reports: The Real News Network interviews Omar Dahi on this humanitarian catastrophe in Syria, with 70,000 dead, a million displaced abroad, and two million displaced internally. Dahi is scathing on the lack of reporting on the direness of the refugee situation […]
Two Bombings Kill 18 As Hagel Arrives in Afghanistan
The Taliban appear to have strategized embarrassing new Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel. As he arrived in Kabul on his first visit to Afghanistan, a suicide bomber on a bicycle detonated his payload in front of the Ministry of Defense, killing nine civilian bystanders. This was obviously a purely symbolic act, since it did no […]
Overcoming Woman-Hatred in Afghanistan: 3 Stories
In honor of International Women’s Day, here is a short documentary on women in Afghanistan, focusing on three women who have achieved something in recent years, after Taliban rule was overthrown. The Taliban state was perhaps the most misogynistic in world history, which is fancy way of saying that they absolute hate women.
Lebanese Soccer Team, Coach Assault Referees after Penalty Called (Video)
A Lebanese soccer/ football referee is quitting after having been assaulted for a call he made on the field at a match last weekend in a game between al-Nahda and Al-Salam Zgharta. He says he felt his life was in danger, and is resigning in an attempt to force Lebanese sports authorities to put in […]
Obama & Brennan Brought GOP Filibuster on themselves by Extreme Secrecy on Drones
John O. Brennan was confirmed as head of the Central Intelligence Agency yesterday, after the confirmation was held up for 13 hours by a filibuster by Rand Paul and other Senate libertarians or tea partiers. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas gave as his reason for the attempt to delay the vote his concerns that the […]
Did the Man who Tried to buy our Presidential Election Get rich by Bribing Communist China? (Engelberg)
Stephen Engelberg writes at ProPublica Last week’s admission by Sheldon Adelson’s casino company that it had “likely” violated provisions of the federal law barring U.S. companies from bribing foreign officials raises some intriguing questions. Chief among them: Which transactions by Las Vegas Sands and its far-flung subsidiaries are at issue? Adelson, one of the world’s […]
Mission Accomplished: Iraq as America’s biggest Blunder (Van Buren)
Peter van Buren writes at Tomdispatch.com I was there. And “there” was nowhere. And nowhere was the place to be if you wanted to see the signs of end times for the American Empire up close. It was the place to be if you wanted to see the madness — and oh yes, it was […]
Syrian Rebels capture UN Troops, face Raqqah bombings, are pledged UK Armored Trucks
The Syrian civil war heated up on several fronts on Wednesday. UK Foreign Secretary William Hague on Wednesday painted a horrific picture of the situation in Syria and went on to pledge armored vehicles and body armor for the Syrian rebels, as a ‘humanitarian’ measure. Russian media accuse the US, Western Europe and Jordan of […]