Middle East

( Tomdispatch.com) – Ever since 2007, when I first started writing for TomDispatch, I’ve been arguing against America’s forever wars, whether in Afghanistan, Iraq, or elsewhere. Unfortunately, it’s no surprise that, despite my more than 60 articles, American blood is still being spilled in war after war across the Greater Middle East and Africa, even […]

Featured

Iraqi Crowds Erupt in Joyous Celebrations as PM, elected under Bush Constitution, Offers to Resign

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – AFP Arabic reports that Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdulmahdi said Friday he would tender his resignation this weekend after five weeks of massive protests throughout Iraq. Huge crowds of demonstrators throughout Baghdad broke into raucous celebrations at the news, the local stringers for AFP report. Some interviewees among them, however, […]

Israel/ Palestine

In Search of Mideast Empire? Why is Russia Cozying up to Hamas?

Middle East Monitor

By Adnan Abu Amer | @adnanabuamer1 | – Hamas and Russia have in recent months have shared a remarkable series of official visits and telephone calls, which led observers to conclude that the two sides are strengthening their relations. Russia’s rapprochement with Hamas shows the latter’s need for Moscow, being a major capital in the […]

Donald Trump

Trump and Israel’s Netanyahu: How the Far Right Subverts Democracy Globally

H. Scott Prosterman

San Francisco (Special to Informed Comment) – The trajectories and political fortunes of Israeli PM Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu and President Donald Trump are so closely aligned that there’s no irony it. They invested heavily in one another and may be experiencing parallel falls from “grace,” which was never a defining trait of either man. The […]

Displaced and Refugees

Syrian Kurds, abandoned by Trump, Face War Crimes, Ethnic Cleansing at Hands of Turkey’s Fundamentalist Proxies

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Human Rights Watch reports that the fundamentalist Arab fighters Turkey brought with it to the Kurdish regions of northeast Iraq are guilty of war crimes. In the area Turkey has militarily occupied, which it is pleased to call a “safe zone,” the Arab fighters stand accused of shooting down civilian […]

Israel/ Palestine

Could Trump’s Coddling of Israeli far Right Hasten Collapse of Apartheid Regime?

Middle East Monitor

By Asa Winstanley | @AsaWinstanley | – (Middle East Monitor) – Last week US President Donald Trump’s administration made a notable move. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the US is reversing previous policy which basically accepted that Israel’s colonial settlements in the occupied West Bank are a violation of international law. This is […]

Israel/ Palestine

Israel v. Palestine in Age of Trump: Annexation is the Highest Stage of Settler Colonialism

Ramzy Baroud

( The Middle East Monitor ) – It is hardly a major surprise that the US government has finally decreed that illegal Jewish settlements built in defiance of international law are somehow “consistent” with the said law. US foreign policy has been edging closer towards this conclusion for some time. Since moving into the White […]

Iraq

Kurdish Yazidi Survivors of ISIL Massacre, Female Enslavement, Demand Justice

The Conversation

By Tutku Ayhan and Güneş Murat Tezcür | – It’s been five years since the Islamic State killed 3,100 Yazidi people in Iraq – mostly men and the elderly – forced 6,800 women and children into sexual slavery, marriage or religious conversion and sent hundreds of thousands fleeing. The Islamic State saw the Yazidis as […]

Israel/ Palestine

Stateless, Occupied Palestinians can’t vote in Next Israeli Election, but Have the Greatest Stakes

Middle East Monitor

By Adnan Abu Amer | @adnanabuamer1 | – With the declaration of the leaders of Israel’s two major parties, Likud led by Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue-White led by Benny Gantz, about their failure to form the next government, despite the expiry of the deadline allocated to them, Israel seems to soon head towards holding a […]