A respected human rights activist has spoken repeatedly against the US-Israeli aggression on Iran. She recognizes the illegality of the war and does not shy away from condemning it in clear terms. Yet, almost invariably, she feels compelled to qualify her position,...
According to Israel’s new death penalty law, Palestinian children, like adults, could, in practice, find themselves facing the gallows. This might take some by surprise, or even be dismissed as an exaggeration. Sadly, it is neither. The death penalty law, passed by...
In the Middle East, the perception of ordinary Americans has long followed a familiar script: detached, uninformed, inward-looking, and politically shallow – a society of ‘gas guzzlers’, with little grasp of global realities beyond their immediate geography. This...
A ceasefire in Lebanon was announced on Thursday by US President Donald Trump, but its reality tells a very different story. The ceasefire was not the product of American diplomacy, nor Israeli strategic calculation. It was imposed – largely as a result of sustained...
The knives are out – and this time, they are not aimed at Tehran, but at Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu. Even the ever morally flexible Chris Christie moved quickly. The former New Jersey governor and longtime Republican insider, speaking on CNN, did not merely...
Israel’s latest war on Lebanon is not only being waged from the air. It is being reinforced politically from within, as Beirut moves in step with US-Israeli efforts to isolate Hezbollah and weaken Iran’s negotiating position. In a previous article, we examined the...
“Israel must immediately release Gazan doctor Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya,” UN experts said in a recent statement, in unequivocal terms. Dr. Abu Safiya was “subjected to torture and other cruel and degrading treatment,” they said. His health condition is “dire.” Many are...
Those who had the misfortune of growing up in a war zone require no explanation. War is hell, it is true – but for children, it is something else entirely: a confusing, disorienting fate that defies comprehension. There are children who live only briefly, experiencing...
The origins of chess are contested, but few dispute that while the game began in India, it was the Sassanian Persian Empire that refined it into a recognizable strategic system. It was Persia that codified its language, symbolism and intellectual framework: the shah...
The wording is familiar. The urgency is always absolute. The implication is unmistakable: Israel is not choosing war. It is forced into it. For many, the claim is inherently contradictory. How can a state initiate war – and in Gaza’s case, sustain a genocide – while...
