Human Rights

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Henry Kissinger’s death at 100 is an opportunity to consider the ways in which his lawlessness helped undermine International Humanitarian Law, the laws of war that responsible leaders attempted to erect to prevent the horrors of WW II from recurring. In his single-minded calculation of supposed “national” interest, which he […]

Authoritarianism

The Israeli Government turns Screws on Haaretz Newspaper to Cease Critical Coverage of War

The Conversation

By Colleen Murrell, Dublin City University | – The Israeli government is putting pressure on the left-leaning newspaper Haaretz to line up in support of the government in its conduct of the war in Gaza. The communications minister, Shlomo Karhi, has suggested financial penalties be applied to the paper accusing it of “lying, defeatist propaganda” […]

Displaced and Refugees

Israel’s Sustained Bombing Created Massive Gaza Disease Risk: Overcrowded Shelters, Dirty Water and breakdown of Basic Sanitation

The Conversation

By Yara M. Asi, University of Central Florida | – (The Conversation) – After more than a month of being subjected to sustained bombing, the besieged people of the Gaza Strip are now confronted with another threat to life: disease. Overcrowding at shelters, a breakdown of basic sanitation, the rising number of unburied dead and […]

Displaced and Refugees

The Humanitarian Paradigm and the Normalization of Ethnic Cleansing

Middle East Monitor

by Ramona Wadi ( Middle East Monitor ) – The despicable diplomacy which is allowing Israel to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians from Gaza is spoken of mainly in terms of the humanitarian pause, the new catchphrase that allows the international community to pretend it is invested in Palestinians’ humanitarian well-being. The US keeps voting against […]

Donald Trump

Speaker MAGA Mike Johnson is the Face of the Republican Party: Election Denialist, Forced Birth Enforcer, Homophobe and Christian Zionist

Dan Dinello

Chicago (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Disguised as a mild-mannered Clark Kent, Mike Johnson is a raging theocrat under his tailored suit, who believes his ascension to the speakership was ordained by God. The formerly invisible but now made manifest Christian Nationalist from Louisiana was elevated to power unanimously, following three weeks of vindictive, […]

Anti-intellectualism

Columbia University’s Suspension of Jewish Voices for Peace and Students for Justice in Palestine is Arbitrary and Wrong

Committee on Academic Freedom

Committee on Academic Freedom of the Middle East Studies Association. Minouche Shafik President, Columbia University officeofthepresident@columbia.edu Provost Dennis Mitchell dml48@cumc.columbia.edu . . . Dear President Shafik and colleagues: We write on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA) and its Committee on Academic Freedom to express our concern […]

Featured

Axis War Crimes against Hospitals in the 1930s and 1940s led to our Int’l Humanitarian Law, which Israel Ignores

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Rome Statute underpinning the International Criminal Court, which went into effect in 2002, lists among “War Crimes” “ix) Intentionally directing attacks against buildings dedicated to religion, education, art, science or charitable purposes, historic monuments, hospitals and places where the sick and wounded are collected, provided they are not military […]

Israel/ Palestine

The Nuremberg Charter and the War on Gaza

Richard Drake

( Counterpunch ) – “In preparation for the Nazi war crimes trials in 1945, representatives of Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and the United States met to discuss the legal basis of the proceedings. They produced on August 8, 1945, the London Charter of the International Military Tribunal, a document that subsequently became known as […]

censorship

The University of Pennsylvania must Defend its Faculty’s Right to Condemn War Crimes

Committee on Academic Freedom

Committee on Academic Freedom of the Middle East Studies Association University of Pennsylvania Liz Magill President, the University of Pennsylvania president@upenn.edu John Jackson Provost, the University of Pennsylvania provost@upenn.edu . . . Dear President Magill and colleagues: We write on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA) and its […]