Middle East

By Nancy Bird, UCL | – Pre-colonial African history is alive with tales of civilisations rising and falling and of different cultures intermingling across the continent. We have now shed more light on some of these societies using the science of genetics. In a study published in Science Advances, my co-authors and I used DNA […]

Featured

Assault on Religious Freedom: Violent Crackdown by Israeli Police on Christian Worshipers in Jerusalem

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Arabic press is reporting violent assaults Saturday evening by Israeli police against Palestinian Christian worshipers in Jerusalem attempting to make their way to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher for the “Saturday of Light” commemoration. The police attacks took place at the entrance to the Church of the Holy […]

Authoritarianism

Heavy Fighting Breaks out in Sudanese Capital, Imperiling Revolution

Middle East Monitor

( Middle East Monitor ) – Clashes erupted Saturday between the conventional Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), formerly known as the Janjaweed militias, in the capital Khartoum. The RSF had been deployed in 2019 by the military junta against the civilian revolutionary movement that overthrew dictator and war criminal Omar […]

Featured

US in Eclipse: 240,000 Palestinians worship at al-Aqsa in Jerusalem as Iran, Lebanon, Show Solidarity on Jerusalem Day

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Quds (Jerusalem) Day is commemorated on the last Friday of Ramadan, and was held yesterday. “Al-Quds” is the Arabic name for Jerusalem, meaning “the Holy.” Revolutionary Iran established this custom, and some of the biggest Quds Day crowds gathered in Tehran. Demonstrations were held, however, all over the Muslim world. […]

Iran

A Renewed Yemen Truce Is No Substitute for Justice

Peter Certo

By Peter Certo | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus ) – The news that Saudi officials, who have been leading a bombing campaign in Yemen for eight years, met with the Houthi officials who control much of the country on April 9 to possibly renew a truce that ended in October is positive. But […]

Featured

Christian Archbishop slams Israel’s Restrictions on Worship at the ‘Festival of Lights’ as “Racist”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On the Saturday before Orthodox Easter, which falls a week later than in the Western churches, typically 10,000 worshipers gather at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, waiting for the holy fire [to phos) to emerge. It is said to derive from the tomb in which Jesus was initially buried […]

Israel/ Palestine

Most Palestinians in East Jerusalem are sitting out Israeli Protests – but they are still Concerned about Plan to weaken Courts

The Conversation

By Derek Lief, University of Michigan | – (The Conversation) – Israeli protesters have been demonstrating against the Netanyahu government’s controversial efforts to radically overhaul the judicial system for nearly three months. And while the protests regularly bring out more than 100,000 people to the streets across Israel, few Arab faces have appeared among the […]

Israel/ Palestine

Israel’s Extremist Ben-Gvir slams ban on Squatters from Al-Aqsa until end of Ramadan

Middle East Monitor

( Middle East Monitor ) – Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir slammed an Israeli government decision to ban non-Muslims, including illegal settlers, from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound until the end of Ramadan, Army Radio reported. Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque Ben-Gvir said that the decision to prevent settlers from entering […]

Israel/ Palestine

How Israel’s Protests actually Assist Israeli State Propaganda

contributors

by Yoav Litvin ( Counterpunch) – Benjamin Netanyahu, in collaboration with Kahanist Itamar Ben-Gvir and a cohort of other fascists, has been executing a judicial coup which guts so-called Israeli democratic institutions and threatens liberal reforms. Many Israelis are infuriated. They’ve always viewed Israel as either part of Europe or the United States’ 51st state. […]