Tag: israel

War Is Realizing the Israelizing of the World

As US-driven wars plummet the Muslim world ever deeper into jihadi-ridden failed state chaos, events seem to be careening toward a tipping point. Eventually, the region will become so profuse a font of terrorists and refugees, that Western popular resistance to “boots on the ground” will be overwhelmed by terror and rage. Then, the US-led empire will … Continue reading “War Is Realizing the Israelizing of the World”

Medical Care for Terrorists Will Get You Bombed by the US… Unless You’re Israel

U.S. and Afghan officials have tried to justify the recent U.S./NATO bombing of a Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) hospital in Afghanistan (which killed 22 people) by claiming that it was housing Taliban fighters. Glenn Greenwald recently wrote of the: “…long-standing tension between the Afghan military and this specific MSF hospital, grounded in the … Continue reading “Medical Care for Terrorists Will Get You Bombed by the US… Unless You’re Israel”

Remaking the World in Greater Israel’s Image

However they want to address the issue, most people are horrified at the refugee crisis now besetting Europe, with its scenes of chaos, conflict, and desperation. Yet in Israel, at least one high official sees in it not horror, but hope. As Rania Khalek has reported : “Dore Gold, director general of the Israeli foreign … Continue reading “Remaking the World in Greater Israel’s Image”

Burning Babies and Stabbing Gays in Messianic Israel

Terror struck twice in Israel this Thursday. First, an ultra-Orthodox zealot went on a slashing rampage at the Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade, stabbing six, and fatally wounding a 16-year-old girl. Then, extremist Jewish settlers firebombed the house of a Palestinian Arab family in the West Bank village of Duma, critically wounding three, and burning an … Continue reading “Burning Babies and Stabbing Gays in Messianic Israel”

Clean Break to Dirty Wars

To understand today’s crises in Iraq, Syria, and Iran, one must grasp their shared Lebanese connection. This assertion may seem odd. After all, what’s the big deal about Lebanon? That little country hasn’t had top headlines since Israel deigned to bomb and invade it in 2006. Yet, to a large extent, the roots of the bloody … Continue reading “Clean Break to Dirty Wars”

Spartan Israel and its Palestinian Helots

Amid the 1948 war that would establish the State of Israel and dispossess the Palestinians (celebrated by Israel as its War of Independence and mourned by Palestinians as al Nakba, or “the catastrophe”), the great German-Jewish political philosopher Hannah Arendt warned that a Jewish state established in this way would “degenerate” into a “Sparta.” She … Continue reading “Spartan Israel and its Palestinian Helots”

Gazans Dying to Enter Israel

Israel’s crippling blockade of the coastal territory of Gaza is pushing desperate young Palestinians to ever more extreme measures in the search for livelihoods, despite an agreement granting Gazans greater access to their agricultural land. In search of work, some Gazans try to enter Israel by jumping the fence that separates it from Gaza. Others … Continue reading “Gazans Dying to Enter Israel”

Israel, Iran, and the Nuclear Freight Train

Has a weapon ever been invented, no matter how terrible, and not used?  The crossbow, the dreadnought, poison gas, the tank, the landmine, chemical weapons, napalm, the B-29, the drone: all had their day and for some that day remains now.  Even the most terrible weapon of all, the atomic bomb, that city-buster, that potential … Continue reading “Israel, Iran, and the Nuclear Freight Train”

Boycott Israel?

The recent decision by renowned physicist Stephen Hawking to boycott the fifth Israeli Presidential Conference, co-sponsored by Shimon Peres and Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, is being touted by the Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement as a great victory. Yet the bitter irony of this “victory” was underscored by Greg Scoblete, who points to this reaction … Continue reading “Boycott Israel?”