War

By Michael Scollon | (RFE/RL) – Yemen is at the center of a proxy war between regional heavyweights Iran and Saudi Arabia. It's the source of fears of a broader Sunni-Shi'ite conflict. And it has implications far beyond its borders. Here is a look at the stakeholders in the fight. The Playing Field […]

Featured

Lebanon’s Shiite Hizbullah slams Saudi attack on Yemen

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) – Hasan Nasrallah, the secretary-general of Hizbullah, Lebanese Shiite party-militia, weighed in on Friday on the Saudi intervention in Yemen. The Saudis put together a Sunni coalition against the Shiite Houthis and have bombed Zaidi Shiite population centers like Sa’adeh. I discussed their motives in my just-published piece in […]

al Qaeda in the Arabian Penisula

As Yemen crumbles, civilians brace for the worst

contributors

By Almigdad Mojalli | – SANA’A (IRIN) – Abdu Hasan Dabwan is not willing to let it happen again. Twice before, the 54 year-old says, he waited too long, refusing to flee in the hope that the tensions in his home country would not tip over into chaos. Twice he was wrong. The first time […]

al-Qaeda

Syria: Signs of Popular Backlash Against al-Qaeda

contributors

By Robert S. Ford and Tony Ghazal Mouawad | (Informed Comment) As the Syrian civil war drags into its fifth year, the al-Qai’da linked Nusra Front [Support Front] has a reputation as being among the toughest fighters and has consolidated its position on the Syrian scene. At the same time, there are hints that many […]

Displaced and Refugees

Satellite Imaging Shows 4/5s of Lights across Syria have gone out

contributors

By Josh Butler | – UNITED NATIONS (IPS) – A single image can be more powerful, more descriptive and more potent than an entire essay – ‘ a picture says a thousand words,’ as the cliché goes. So it is in Syria, where despite the undoubted millions of words penned about atrocity after atrocity, bombing […]

Bashar al-Assad

Climate Change helped Provoke Syrian Conflict & it won’t be the Last

contributors

By Thalif Deen | – UNITED NATIONS (IPS) – Was the four-year-old military conflict in Syria, which has claimed the lives of over 200,000 people, mostly civilians, triggered at least in part by climate change? A new study by Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory says “a record drought that ravaged Syria in 2006-2010 was likely […]

Apartheid

Gaza’s Food Insecurity made even worse by Environmental Damage of Israel’s War, Blockade

contributors

By Mel Frykberg BEIT LAHIYA, Northern Gaza Strip (IPS) – Extensive damage to Gaza’s environment as a result of the Israeli blockade and its devastating military campaign against the coastal territory during last year’s war from July to August, is negatively affecting the health of Gazans, especially their food security. Safa Subha and three-year-old Rahat […]

Iran

180 Frmr Israeli Security Officials to PM Netanyahu: Cancel US Speech, which pushes Iran toward Bomb

contributors

RT | – More than 180 former leaders from Israel’s security apparatus urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cancel his planned speech to Congress on Tuesday, fearing it may bring Iran closer to developing a nuclear weapon and damage US-Israeli relations. The group of senior commanders from the IDF, Mossad, Shin Bet, and the Israeli […]

Apartheid

5 Surprising Ways Iran is better than Israel

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) I think I’m one of the few Americans who has been to both Iran and Israel. I like both countries and have a lot in common with thinkers in both. I love What I know of Tel Aviv’s cafe culture and the searing honesty and high ethics of the […]