Veterans for Peace president Mike Ferner responds to President Obama’s rebranded occupation of Iraq. A veteran’s perspective makes it clear that two major points must be made in response to President Obama’s announcement regarding combat troops leaving Iraq. First, there is no such thing as “non-combat troops.” It is a contradiction in terms. It is […]
Geography Archives: Middle East
Challenging Islamophobia: An Assessment of the “Ground Zero Mosque” Debate
Depending on the poll one consults, anywhere from 54 percent to 61 percent, and as many as 68 percent of Americans, oppose the building of an Islamic community center two blocks from “Ground Zero,” the site of the World Trade Center. Polls, of course, are notoriously inaccurate measures of public opinion. Depending on the framing […]
Iran’s Nuclear Program
Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was published in his blog on 5 January 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. | Print
Israel/Palestine and the Apartheid Analogy: Critics, Apologists and Strategic Lessons (Part 2)
I. Apartheid of a Special Type In the previous section I made a distinction between historical apartheid (unique to South Africa) and apartheid in its generic form — a structured system of political exclusion and social marginalization on the basis of origins (including but not restricted to race). I concluded that Israel is different from […]
Iran’s Proposal to Russia: Enrichment Is Still Key
August 26, 2010 Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said today that the Islamic Republic has proposed to Russia that the two countries create a joint consortium to fabricate fuel for the Bushehr reactor and other nuclear power plants that Iran plans to build in the future. Salehi reportedly […]
Karzai and Zardari
Uncle Sam tries to batter down the door to the Taliban stronghold . . . by banging the heads of Karzai and Zardari, not his own, against it. Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was published in his blog on 24 August 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. The text […]
The Parent Company Trap
Fox News accuses the Kingdom Foundation, which has funded (State Department-approved) Imam Feisal “I-Am-a-Supporter-of-the-State-of-Israel” Abdul Rauf of the Cordoba Initiative (dubbed “Ground Zero Mosque” and even “Terror Mosque” by the nutty Right) in the past, of also funding “radical madrasas all over the world.” But it fails to mention that the Kingdom Foundation is a […]
Paltry Aid to Pakistan
Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was published in his blog on 22 August 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. | Print
Photos, Representation, and the “Banality of Oppression”
“The peace movement, sexist as it was, expressed disenchantment with violence, super-technology and imperialism.” — Adrienne Rich, Of Woman Born; Motherhood as Experience and Institution Pictures of former Israeli soldier Eden Abargil posing in front of blindfolded and handcuffed Palestinian prisoners have caused some controversies in the media. Abargil did not think she had done […]
Just Like Bushehr, Iranian Enrichment Is No Threat
In recent days, a good deal of attention has been focused on Iran’s first nuclear power plant at Bushehr, still in its final stages of development. We believe that there are some important lessons to be learned from the Bushehr experiences that could help move U.S. policy on the Iranian nuclear issue in a much […]
Israel/Palestine and the Apartheid Analogy: Critics, Apologists and Strategic lessons (Part 1)
I. Introduction In the last decade, the notion that the Israeli system of political and military control bears strong resemblance to the apartheid system in South Africa has gained ground. It is invoked regularly by movements and activists opposed to the 1967 occupation and to various other aspects of Israeli policies vis-à-vis the Palestinian-Arab people. […]
Palestinian Factions Reject US/Zionist Pressure for Direct Negotiations
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine joined with Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and 7 other Palestinian factions to issue a joint statement in Damascus in opposition to the resumption of negotiations, direct or indirect, with Israel on August 15, 2010. The joint statement, read at a […]
The Return of the Damascenes
Christa Salamandra. A New Old Damascus: Authenticity and Distinction in Urban Syria. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2004. x + 199 pp. $21.95 (paper), ISBN 978-0-253-21722-6; $49.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-253-34467-0. Christa Salamandra’s A New Old Damascus: Authenticity and Distinction in Urban Syria is a thought-provoking analysis of one segment of the Syrian elite’s […]
Dead Iraqis Linked to Energy Crisis
(PU) Twelve Arab civilians, dressed in native garb and riddled with bullet wounds, caused a massive power outage in the nation’s capital today when they suddenly appeared on the Ellipse in Washington, DC. Silent and unmoving, each held a large color photo of Bradley Manning, the Army Specialist charged with sending the whistleblower website WikiLeaks […]
Two-State Solution
As the driver of the “settlement” bulldozer removes the ground beneath his feet while blowing “two-state solution” soap bubbles, Mahmoud Abbas daydreams about a “sovereign Palestinian state.” Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was published in his blog on 24 June 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. The text above […]
Adam Jones on Rwanda and Genocide: A Reply
Like Gerald Caplan’s hostile “review” of our book, The Politics of Genocide, Adam Jones’s aggressive attack on our response to Caplan can be explained in significant part by Jones’s deep commitment to an establishment narrative on the Rwandan genocide that we believe to be false — one that misallocates the main responsibility for that still […]
Waiting for Peace
Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was published in his blog on 8 August 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. | Print
The Atlantic’s Iran Debate . . . or Echo Chamber?
As we anticipated, Jeffrey Goldberg’s article in The Atlantic, “The Point of No Return,” laying out the neoconservative case for attacking Iran, is attracting a lot of attention and comment. We are pleased that, as of this afternoon, our response to Goldberg is the top-ranked “Most Commented” piece on the Foreign Policy website and the […]
Left Think Tank Mystifies Iran-Saudi Tensions
No one should be surprised when The Economist or another controlled opinion source misrepresents tensions in the Persian Gulf as religious rivalry while overlooking decades of U.S. and Israeli success in stoking them for imperial gain. The so-called mainstream press typically repeats unsubstantiated charges to pretend that Arab client states of Washington buy tens of […]
The Campaign to Turn Iran into an “Existential Threat”
There is an old saying: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” Many of the same writers, thinkers, political actors, and organizations that persuaded the American people and others to support invading Iraq in 2003 are now working to build public support for the United States to initiate a war […]
