Europe

By Elif Selin Calik | @CalikSelin | – ( Middle East Monitor ) – Last December, Robert Malley, president and CEO of the International Crisis Group, penned an article for the Foreign Affairs magazine, addressing the topic: “The Unwanted Wars: Why the Middle East Is More Combustible Than Ever.” Today, at the peak of the […]

Featured

Has Trump lost Iraq to Russia over his Drone Strike on Baghdad Airport?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Iraqi establishment is interested in strengthening its military cooperation with Russia, as Baghdad seeks an alternative to the United States military after Trump bombed Baghdad airport and killed a high ranking Iraqi military commander. Al-Bawwaba reports that that the Chief of Staff of the Iraqi Army, Lieutenant General Othman […]

Eastern Europe

Britain got its Brexit, but will it also Get an Economic Depression and Lose Scotland and N. Ireland?

John Feffer

By John Feffer | – Edinburgh, Scotland (Foreign Policy in Focus) – If I were the European Union, I’d be wiping my hands, sighing in relief, and slamming the door after the United Kingdom’s long-delayed departure. Britain had been a noisy, pushy houseguest for 47 years, and it was only growing ruder. It spent the […]

Climate Crisis

Coalxit? Germany, 4th Largest Economy, Officially Approves Phase-Out of Coal

Clean Energy Wire

By Benjamin Wehrmann | – ( Clean Energy Wire) – The German government has officially approved the end of coal-fired power production in Germany. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cabinet adopted a law detailing plant shutdowns and compensation payments for coal companies, confirming a commission proposal made last year to end coal no later than 2038. The […]

Antisemitism

Auschwitz 75 years on: preserving survivors’ voices and listening to those of their children

The Conversation

By Sara Jones | – In December 2019, four people were shot dead at a kosher market in New Jersey, a horrific knife attack was perpetrated at a rabbi’s home in a New York suburb, and antisemitic graffiti was daubed on a synagogue and several shops in north London. Despite what many might think, antisemitism […]

Donald Trump

The Trump Organized-Crime Style: Bullying Europe, Bullying Iran and Impeached for Bullying Ukraine

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – I was for my sins watching CNN the other evening and as I remember I saw Chris Cuomo on a panel say that what Trump did in withholding $400 million in congressionally appropriated military aid from Ukraine was not technically a crime. I was astonished, since Cuomo is usually a […]

Donald Trump

The European Union must Stop Mimicking Trump on Iran: DiEM25 should call on Brussels to live up to its own Responsibilities

Arturo Desimone

Amsterdam (Special to Informed Comment) – In the spirit of what the EU calls “de-escalation’’ German government spokeswoman Ulrike Demmer recently asserted an official belief that Iranian general Qassem Soleimani masterminded the 2019 Yemeni attacks on Saudi Aramco oil fields in Abqaiq —necessitating US retaliation. Demmer denied the Yemeni origin of the guerrilla response to […]

Russia

Is Russian Imperialism in Syria, with its Vast Human Toll, a Vanity Project for Vladimir Putin?

Middle East Monitor

Radwan Zyada | – (Middle East Monitor) – Russian President Putin made a surprise visit to Damascus [on January 7], during which he met Bashar Al-Assad, not at the Rawda Palace or the People’s Palace, where the latter customarily receives his guests, but rather at the headquarters of the Russian forces in Damascus. This is […]

United Kingdom

We Can Do it: In 10 Years, even Tory Britain Dumped Coal and went to 21% Wind

The Conversation

By Grant Wilson, Iain Staffell and Noah Godfrey | – In 2010, Great Britain generated 75% of its electricity from coal and natural gas. But by the end of the decade*, these fossil fuels accounted for just 40%, with coal generation collapsing from the decade’s peak of 41% in 2012 to under 2% in 2019. […]