Jonathan Cook

As Israel unleashed a surprise wave of air strikes on Gaza last Friday, the two remaining Conservative politicians vying to replace disgraced Prime Minister Boris Johnson publicized letters vowing fealty to Israel. Their timing underscored the degree to which British politicians on both sides of the aisle have now joined their American counterparts in making … Continue reading “In Britain, Contenders for Boris Johnson’s Crown Stress Fealty to Israel”

In what should have been an extraordinary television confession this month, John Bolton, national security adviser in the previous administration of President Donald Trump, admitted to CNN in passing that he had helped to plot the overthrow of foreign governments while in office. Dismissing the idea that Trump had attempted a coup at the Capitol … Continue reading “How the Pentagon Dictates Hollywood Storylines”

As the saying goes, if you only have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. The West has the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a self-declared “defensive” military alliance – so any country that refuses its dictates must, by definition, be an offensive military threat. That is part of the reason why NATO issued … Continue reading “NATO: By Making China the Enemy, the Alliance Is Threatening World Peace”

The New York Times published this week the conclusion of its investigation into the killing of the Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. It was the fourth major US news organization to look in detail at what happened to Abu Akleh during an Israeli army raid into the Palestinian city of Jenin last month. The New … Continue reading “Shireen Abu Akleh: US Media Probes One Killing but Not Countless Other Israeli Crimes”

Here is a puzzle. What did Israel Katz, an Israeli legislator and until recently a senior government minister, mean when he threatened Palestinian students last month with another “Nakba” if they continued to wave the Palestinian flag? He urged them to “remember 1948” and speak to their “grandfathers and grandmothers.” “If you don’t calm down,” … Continue reading “Israel Calls the Nakba a Lie. So Why Do Its Leaders Threaten a Second One?”

It was apparently a “gaffe” of the kind we had forgotten since George W Bush stepped down from the US presidency in early 2009. During a speech in Dallas last week, he momentarily confused Russian President Vladimir Putin’s current war of aggression against Ukraine and his own war of aggression against Iraq in 2003. Bush … Continue reading “Russia-Ukraine War: George Bush’s Admission of His Crimes in Iraq Was No ‘Gaffe’”

The Israeli government has been trying to keep as low a profile as possible over the war in Ukraine, but Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, seems determined to drag Israel on to center stage. Zelensky made a direct appeal to the Israeli parliament last month, ostensibly asking for weapons, especially the Iron Dome interception system … Continue reading “Why Zelensky’s Dream of Ukraine Becoming ‘Big Israel’ Makes Moscow Nervous”

Three separate, deadly Palestinian attacks in Israeli cities in a week have elicited a predictable response. The Israeli army has drafted large numbers of extra soldiers into the West Bank and around Gaza, Palestinian territories already under decades of brutal military occupation. But the fact that, unusually, two of the attacks were carried out by … Continue reading “Israel Is Stoking a Civil War Against Its Palestinian Citizens”

Did US President Joe Biden say the quiet bit out loud at the weekend when he indicated that Washington wanted regime change in Moscow? It may well have looked that way to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. Earlier this month, Biden accused Putin of being a “war criminal”, even though the charge drips with hypocrisy. … Continue reading “Joe Biden Has Confirmed to Russia That the US Really Wants Regime Change”

Obituaries of Madeleine Albright, the first woman to be appointed US secretary of state, in 1997 by President Bill Clinton, could not have been more gushing. With the news of her death aged 84, western politicians and media united in lauding her as “a trailblazer," “a champion of democracy” and “a force for freedom." Hillary … Continue reading “Putin Is a War Criminal – and So Was Madeleine Albright”