Middle East

Iran: 1988 Mass Executions Evident Crimes Against Humanity: Senior Officials Implicated Should Be Investigated, Fairly Prosecuted (HRW)

Human Rights Watch — (Beirut) – Overwhelming evidence shows that the Iranian authorities’ mass execution of thousands of political prisoners in 1988 amounts to crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said in an in-depth question-and-answer document released today. In 1988, Iranian authorities, acting on the orders of then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, summarily and extrajudicially […]

Featured

Israel’s Crisis in Parliament is a Crisis for its Apartheid in the Palestinian West Bank

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Monday evening, the government of Naftali Bennett in Israel failed to pass a crucial law in parliament, according to the Israeli newspaper Arab 48. The failure, which strikes at the foundations of Bennett’s far right vision of an expanding Greater Israel that forever forestalls any Palestinian state, exposed the […]

Iran

‘New Phase Of Assassinations’: Mysterious Death Of Iranian Aerospace Engineer Fuels Speculation

Golnaz Esfandiari

( RFE/RL ) – When Iranian aerospace engineer Ayoob Entezari died on May 31, authorities handed his family a letter of appreciation in which they referred to him as a “martyr,” suggesting that he had been killed. Soon after, authorities in the central city of Yazd backtracked, saying the wording in the letter was a […]

International Criminal Court

Libya: Russia’s Far Right Wagner Group set Landmines, Booby Traps near Capital, Tripoli

Human Rights Watch

International Criminal Court Must Investigate

Israel/ Palestine

Why does the world allow Israel to continue its oppression of Palestinians?

Middle East Monitor

By Mohammad Makram Balawi | – ( Middle East Monitor) – Thirty-one-year-old Ghofran Warasnah was shot dead by the Israeli occupation forces located at the entrance of Al-Arroub Palestinian refugee camp near Hebron. Ghofran was a Palestinian journalist who was heading to work. According to reports paramedics were barred from reaching her for 20 minutes […]

Israel/ Palestine

Even CNN concluded that Israeli Snipers Targeted Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh; But this Tactic is Routine

Ramona Wadi

( Middle East Monitor ) – Israel’s public relations and diplomacy may be running into a few pitfalls, as US mainstream media outlet CNN explicitly called out Israel’s responsibility in the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. During a recent phone conversation with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid […]

Human Rights

Absolute Monarchy United Arab Emirates: Sweeping Legal ’Reforms’ Actually Deepen Some forms of Repression

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch – (Beirut) – Wide-ranging legal changes introduced by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in late 2021 fail to address the longstanding and systematic restrictions on citizens’ and residents’ civil and political rights, Human Rights Watch said today. The new laws maintain previous provisions and include new ones that pose grave threats to […]

Houthi

The mobilization for Yemen is a powerful Model for Today’s Peace Movement

Waging Nonviolence

By Sarah Freeman-Woolpert | – ( Waging Nonviolence ) – From the brutal war in Ukraine to the devastating school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, aggression and mass atrocities seem to define today’s world. Yet, even as we navigate this trauma and tragedy, there are glimmers of hope to be found in the lesser-known stories of […]

Authoritarianism

Biden Reverses himself on Saudi “Pariah,” needing Riyadh’s Oil to Punish Putin for Ukraine

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – President Joe Biden ran on making Saudi Arabia a “pariah,” given that the CIA accused Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of authorizing the murder in 2018 of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the Istanbul Saudi consulate. Biden and a bipartisan majority in the US Congress were also upset about […]