Geography Archives: Middle East

  There is an embarrassing giddiness in the religious studies world today.  With our new mantra in hand — the new “salience” of religion — we, both scholars of religion and other self-appointed spokespersons for religion, feel licensed to instruct the world on the importance of religion.  We are suddenly relevant again.  Or so we […]

I would like to welcome the honorable guests who have gathered here.  It is a pleasure for the Islamic Republic of Iran to be the host of the International Conference on Nuclear Disarmament today.  I hope this occasion will be an opportunity to yield enduring and important results from your dialogues and discussions for the […]

  EA: You are one of the leading theorists trying to develop the notion of the public sphere.  In what ways has globalisation affected the public sphere?  Has the public sphere become more transnational? NF: Today, the flow of public political discourse does not respect borders, but is often transnational.  The result is a serious […]

Iran’s UN ambassador Mohammad Khazaee calls on the United Nations Security Council and other UN bodies to oppose the US President’s nuclear policy and his threat against an NPT signatory which does not have nuclear weapons.  Below is a letter that Khazaee sent to UN Security Council President Yukio Takasu, UN General Assembly President Ali […]

The Israeli government’s recent announcement of Army Order No. 1,650 was just the latest act of provocation in a series of calculated measures to derail any possible resumption of peace negotiations.  Under this new draconian measure, anyone who doesn’t have a “permit” to be in the West Bank is to be considered an “infiltrator” and […]

  About one month after the beginning of the new Iranian calendar year (21 March 2010), and following the international recognition of Norouz by the United Nations General Assembly, Iran is facing new challenges.  Some of the challenges are domestic, while others emanate from Iran’s regional and international policies as well as international pressures put […]

  Iran will be holding a nuclear disarmament conference with the motto “nuclear energy for all, nuclear weapons for none” on 17-18 April.  Iranian Diplomacy has interviewed Ramin Mehmanparast, spokesperson for Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to ask him about the objectives of the conference. You have told the press that the UN Secretary General […]

  Sunday, April 18, 2010 from 1:30 PM to 5:30 PM University of Chicago, Ida Noyes Hall Limited Seating, Registration Required at chicagohearing.eventbrite.com Live Webcast from a link at www.chicagohearing.org The Chicago Hearing is modeled after a Congressional Committee fact-finding meeting.  It will bring together witnesses to tell seldom-heard stories from Israel-Palestine that raise critical […]

Being a part of the tremendous coalition effort to pass a divestment bill at Berkeley was quite simply an ecstatic experience.  As my colleague Sydney Levy said, “The movement grew by an enormous leap today.” First, the vote itself: after the UC Berkeley Student Senate originally voted on March 18, by a margin of 16-4, […]

The United States and China seem to have reached an agreement with regard to the exchange rate between their two currencies.  The agreement is that the U.S. government will stop yelling about it, and China will do whatever it wants to do, which will probably include some modest rise in the renminbi some time in […]

We have argued that the Obama Administration’s approach to Iran sanctions is, truly, a “dead end” policy and that the only way out of this dead end “is to get serious about nuclear diplomacy with Iran — first of all, by reaching agreement on a plan to refuel the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR).”  Although the […]

The events of September 11 laid the basis for the emergence of a vicious form of Islamophobia that facilitated the U.S. goals of empire building in the 21st century.  This form of Islamophobia focused on the enemy “out there” against which the U.S. supposedly had to go to war to protect itself, from Afghanistan to […]

  Norman G. Finkelstein: Israel would not be so up in arms about the Goldstone Report, would not be so upset by it, were it not for the fact that, yes, they are very vulnerable to the public opinion, and they know very well the limits beyond which it may not express itself against them, […]

  Listen to the Interview: Flynt Leverett: I think that the Nuclear Posture Review that came out earlier this week needs to be seen as a very imperfect and, in some important respects, very badly flawed product of an effort which originally had, I think, a very positive intention, namely, an intention on the part […]

  The president of Brazil brings a firm message to the summit on nuclear security. “I’m going to ask President Obama: what is the significance of your recent accord with Medvedev on the deactivation of nuclear warheads [of the United States and Russia]?  Deactivation of what?  If we are talking about deactivating the warheads that […]

In the midst of its Nuclear Security Summit and in the wake of President Obama’s bilateral meeting with China’s President Hu yesterday, the Obama Administration is vigorously spinning the U.S. and Western media that it has won Chinese support for new sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear activities.  To say the least, this […]

  Maryam Panah.  The Islamic Republic and the World: Global Dimensions of the Iranian Revolution.  Pluto Press, 2007.  232 pp.  ISBN: 978-0-7453-2622-1, ISBN10: 0-7453-2622-6. Review of The Islamic Republic and the World Maryam Panah offers a refreshingly different and powerful account of the causes and consequences of the Iranian Revolution.  Drawing on recent developments within […]

Just how dangerous is the World Bank and its neo-conservative president, Robert Zoellick, to South Africa and the global climate? Notwithstanding South Africa’s existing $75 billion foreign debt, last Thursday the bank added a $3.75bn loan to Eskom for the primary purpose of building the world’s fourth-largest coal-fired power plant, at Medupi, which will spew […]

Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. See, also, Amira Hass, “IDF Order Will Enable Mass Deportation from West Bank” (Haaretz, 11 April 2010). | | Print

As we noted last week, the Obama Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review, issued last Monday, included a provision asserting a U.S. prerogative to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapons states that Washington deems not be in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).  Following the release of the Nuclear Posture Review last week, both President Obama and […]