Geography Archives: Iraq

The United Nation’s watchdog on torture has criticized Israel for refusing to allow inspections at a secret prison, dubbed by critics as “Israel’s Guantanamo Bay” and demanded to know if more such clandestine detention camps are operating. In a report published on Friday, the Committee Against Torture requested that Israel identify the location of the […]

A colleague of mine who now works as an editor at a large German daily newspaper told me about an experience he had while enroling in Jewish Studies.  Since the main currents of Judaism and Islam both flow through the same cultural space with a strong Arab influence, he thought it would be wise to […]

Essayist, thinker and professor in the Department of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley, Butler is best known for her studies of gender and sexuality, in which she examines the question of what it means to remake, to resignify, the restrictive normative concepts of sexual life and gender. Is it possible to establish any […]

The Citizenship and Entry in Israel Law (Temporary Order), enacted in 2003, is a racist law that bans family unification between Palestinian citizens of Israel and Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as any citizen from the following states defined by Israel as “enemy” states: Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. Adalah […]

Pope Benedict XVI upset the schedule on his first day in Israel by leaving an interfaith meeting in Jerusalem early on Monday night after a leading Muslim cleric called on him to condemn the “slaughter” of women and children in the recent assault on Gaza. The pontiff walked out, a spokesman noted, because Sheikh Tayseer […]

  Tariq Ali says in an interview with Der Standard: To continue its war in Afghanistan, the US accepts the risk of destabilizing Pakistan.  But only a regional diplomatic approach can help. STANDARD: How would you evaluate the danger often invoked today that Pakistan is collapsing and its nuclear weapons may fall into the hands […]

DUBAI, 10 May 2009 (IRIN) — The Iranian government is seeking greater assistance from international NGOs to meet the needs of hundreds of thousands of refugees, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).  Some international NGOs already work with refugees in Iran, but several left the country earlier this decade because of difficult working conditions. […]

One may have more or less sympathy for the new US president, more or less believe in his words, more or less value the change in the US government’s tone when handling its differences with other governments.  But there is a limit when it comes to judging the character of a president and a government.  […]

“Nawi is not a typical rights activist.  A member of Ta’ayush Arab-Jewish Partnership he is a Jewish Israeli of Iraqi descent who speaks fluent Arabic.  He is a gay man in his fifties and a plumber by trade.  Perhaps because he himself comes from the margins, he empathises with others who have been marginalised — […]

The wave of pressures exercised by Washington on Israel could signal the beginning of a new era in the relations between the US and Israeli governments.  The administration of US President Barack Obama has reiterated the requirement that a Palestinian state be created, a key issue, which is not supported by the new right-wing government […]

The current relation between the U.S. and Iran is not pretty; in fact, it is like a roller-coaster ride.  This is bad news for Muslims in America and abroad. Iran is bitter over its billions of dollars in frozen assets still in U.S. banks for the last three decades, following the takeover of our embassy […]

During the Vietnam War, Stanford students succeeded in banning secret military research from campus.  Last weekend, 150 activist alumni and present Stanford students targeted Condoleezza Rice for authorizing torture and misleading Americans into the illegal Iraq War. Veterans of the Stanford anti-Vietnam War movement had gathered for a 40th anniversary reunion during the weekend.  The […]

  Remarks delivered at the Thomas Foley Institute, Washington State University,, Pullman, Washington, April 18, 2009 Recently appointed Attorney General Eric Holder, whose parents hail from the Barbados, aroused instant ire when he remarked last February 18 that the U.S. remains a “nation of cowards” for not talking enough about things racial.  But is this […]

  Earlier this month, the jury in Ward Churchill‘s civil trial against the University of Colorado found, in his favor, that the university had fired him because of critical remarks he made after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.  While Churchill awaits a hearing on his ongoing employment at the university, this victory is […]

The brutal murder of three nationalist leaders of Balochistan and the ensuing crisis has brought the issue of the Baloch national struggle to the forefront once again, only to be met with feigned surprises and arrogant dismissals by a major part of the rest of Pakistan.  We in Pakistan — and particularly those of us […]

  The president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, attended the conference to condemn the Israeli government’s brutal and repressive policy against the Palestinians.  The European delegates walked out when he called the government of Israel “racist,” but the Latin Americans stayed.  The United States and eight other countries boycotted the event. The Israeli government’s stance against […]

  Conor Foley, The Thin Blue Line: How Humanitarianism Went to War, Verso, 2008. All is not well within the world of humanitarian aid organisations.  In his new book, The Thin Blue Line, Conor Foley, an experienced aid worker, discusses many of the problems associated with the burgeoning relationship between contemporary aid organisations and recent […]

Barack Obama hopes to be received differently at the summit in Trinidad and Tobago: he can talk about the crisis, his administration’s new positions on Iraq and Iran, and any number of other things, but he can’t escape the fact that what matters most is his position on Cuba. The imperial vision of the United […]

1.  The title of this note is intentional.  Over the past twenty years, the Western powers in a military alliance (NATO) have arrogantly cast themselves as representatives of the “international community” and thus marginalized the United Nations, the only institution qualified to speak in its name. This attitude is now systematic, and, in all international […]

  Part 1: Afghanistan + More Troops = Catastrophe Part 2: Pakistan: “The Most Dangerous Country” Part 3: Cost of War Anand Gopal, Afghanistan Correspondent, Christian Science Monitor: The United States has only forces to go and control certain urban areas. . . .  They don’t have the troop size, nor could they conceivably ever […]