Saudi Arabia

another 80 people died in violence in Egypt on Friday, as Muslim Brotherhood crowds protested the military crackdown on their sit-ins that cost hundreds of lives this week. Some of the violence resulted fro police heavy-handedness, some from an armed Brotherhood attack on a police station. The continued unrest upped the pressure on the Obama […]

Saudi Arabia

Defecting Saudi Prince: Royal Family in Panic at Arab Revolts, Thousands imprisoned

Juan Cole

Russia Today got a scoop on Monday with an interview with a defecting Saudi prince: “In recent weeks Saudi Arabia has launched an offensive against anti-regime activists arresting many and sentencing some to years in jail. Total number of political prisoners has now surpassed 40 thousand according to some reports. The crackdown has even forced […]

Arab Spring

Middle East Regional Contention over Egypt’s New Government

Juan Cole

The change of government in Egypt produced starkly different reactions in various Middle Eastern countries, which tells us something about the situation there. With the exception of maverick member Qatar, the Gulf Cooperation Council, grouping six conservative Gulf oil monarchies, cheered loudest for the military coup made by Brig. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi against elected […]

Environment

Greening of Saudi Arabia: NASA Photos Show Kingdom Tapping non-renewable Aquifers for Farming

Juan Cole

The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration last year published a series of photos over past decades showing expansion of farming in Saudi Arabia’s Syrian Desert, using underground aquifers as a water source. This fossil water is a non-renewable resource and will be gone, at this rate in 50 years. NASA writes: “In this series […]

Israel

America’s Guns, at Home and Abroad (Engelhardt)

Juan Cole

Tom Engelhardt writes at Tomdispatch.com Given these last weeks, who doesn’t know what an AR-15 is? Who hasn’t seen the mind-boggling stats on the way assault rifles have flooded this country, or tabulations of accumulating Newtown-style mass killings, or noted that there are barely more gas stations nationwide than federally licensed firearms dealers, or heard the renewed debates over the […]

Afghanistan

How America is Filling up itself and the World With Guns

Juan Cole

The American obsession with guns and violence is not unique, but it is distinctive. The US ranks 12th in the world for rate of firearm-related deaths. El Salvador, Colombia, Swaziland, Brazil, South Africa, the Philippines and some others are worse. But that is the company the US is in– not, say, relatively peaceful places like […]

Iran

Syria crisis Shakes Lebanon, Iraq, Saudi Arabia as Cease-Fire Crumbles

Juan Cole

The inability of the Syrian government to crush an 18-month-old revolutionary movement is putting increasing pressure on its neighbors. Not only have hundreds of thousands of refugees from Syria poured into Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq, but political forces in each of those countries are having to choose sides and to reevaluate their choices over […]

Egypt

Panetta Slams Israeli Isolation; Is Israeli Policy Destabilizing US Allies?

Juan Cole

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta , on a visit to Israel and Palestine before heading to Egypt, publicly upbraided the Likud government of Israel for having become isolated diplomatically in the Middle East in the wake of the Arab Spring, and warned direly that brute military force would not be enough to provide for Israel’s […]

Saudi Arabia

Saudi Women’s Vote: Does it Go Far Enough?

Juan Cole

The surprise announcement on Sunday by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia that women will be allowed to vote in and run for office in the municipal elections scheduled in four years is another sign of the pressure the kingdom is under to reform. Although this announcement wasn’t anticipated, it comes as a result in part […]