Middle East
Today Gaza, Tomorrow Iran?
Aug/11/2014
As again a ceasefire comes and goes between Hamas and Israel, “to be followed by negotiations,” one cannot evade the feeling of déjà vu. It is not only the ritual announcements but the modus operandi of the war that comes across as already experienced. During this month-long war, as in 2008-2009, the aggression began with a pretext and unfolded with brutal force against civilian targets. First Gaza was cordoned off (for 18 months back in 2008, this time for 7 years), its border closed, its people penned up inside what Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino from Justitia et Pax in the earlier conflict called a “concentration camp”; then the assault began.Read Further...
Mubarak, Morsi, and then?
Jul/10/2013
In his famous novel Animal Farm, George Orwell satirized the outcome of the Bolshevik revolution and Stalinism. His allegorical tale showed how a gang of animals had risen up against the exploitative farmer and seized power, only to reproduce the political structures they had sought to eliminate. Something similar may be unfolding in Egypt...Read Further...
Peace and the “Power of Poetry”: In Defense of Günter Grass
Apr/20/2012
It should come as no surprise that from Germany – the “land of poets and thinkers”—a most powerful message warning of threats to world peace should appear in the guise of a poem. Nor should anyone marvel at the fact that this poem has created a political earthquake. Günter Grass, a famed Nobel Prize writer who is best known for his novel, The Tin Drum, published a poem on April 4, 2012 in the Süddeutsche Zeitung warning of an Israeli first strike against Iran and its consequences. The piece, entitled, “What must be said,” provoked a barrage of criticism on one side and just as loud a chorus of applause on the other.Read Further...
Una fantasia orientale: la rivoluzione in Israele-Palestina
Sep/19/2011
19 Sep 2011 – Le strade di Tel Aviv sono inondate da dimostranti che stanno sventolando la bandiera della Palestina, le sue insegne sovrastano un mare indistinto di altre bandiere, alcune di queste con la stella di Davide.
Al culmine di mesi di proteste di massa, anche qui, come in altre città israeliane e in tutta la Striscia di Gaza e nella Cisgiordania da tanto tempo sotto occupazione, Israeliani, sia arabi sia ebrei, uniscono le loro mani con i rifugiati Palestinesi liberati dai campi, per festeggiare la nascita della nuova Palestina.MRead Further...
Al culmine di mesi di proteste di massa, anche qui, come in altre città israeliane e in tutta la Striscia di Gaza e nella Cisgiordania da tanto tempo sotto occupazione, Israeliani, sia arabi sia ebrei, uniscono le loro mani con i rifugiati Palestinesi liberati dai campi, per festeggiare la nascita della nuova Palestina.MRead Further...
An Oriental Fantasy: Revolution in Israel-Palestine
Sep/12/2011
The streets of Tel Aviv are overflowing with demonstrators, who are waving the Palestinian flag, its insignia dominating a blurred sea of other flags, including some with the star of David. At the culmination of months of mass protests here as well as in other Israeli cities and across the Gaza Strip and the formerly occupied West Bank, Israelis, both Arab and Jewish, join hands with Palestinian refugees released from the camps, to celebrate the birth of new Palestine.Read Further...
The Birth of the New Egyptians
Feb/15/2011
The victory of the Egyptian revolution has not only forced out a hated regime but has ushered in a new culture for the nation and the region. Whatever develops now politically in the transition to democratic rule, it is important to examine the subjective factors in the process, to try to go inside the mind of those who organized the demonstrations nation-wide, and also penetrate the mindset of President Mubarak and his cohorts. In this way one can grasp the reason why there is no way of bridging the gap between the two, and can appreciate the profound revolution in thinking that has taken place.
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Revival of a Military Option: Israel's Covert War Against Iran Is On
Jan/26/2011
After talks in Istanbul between Iran and the West on its nuclear program broke down on January 22, the danger of revival of a military option looms large. It may not come in the form of a direct, conventional US and/or Israeli strike against Iran’s nuclear installations, but rather in the guise of the warfare of the future, with cyber-weapons and terrorism. Political forces opposed to such an escalation in the Iran conflict would do well to examine the reasons why dialogue on the nuclear issue has failed thus far, and reshape their approach to dealing with the Islamic Republic. Read Further...
Palestinian Statehood on the Agenda
Dec/29/2010
The alacrity with which a lame duck U.S. Congress passed legislation against Palestinian aspirations to independence should cause alarm bells to ring, and loudly. That this Congress would so openly endorse the position of Benjamin Netanyahu’s intransigent government is not surprising. What is surprising is the message that the hastily passed bill sent regarding profound changes in the attitude of the “international community” towards an increasingly rogue state Israel. For, the Congress was not putting forward an objective statement regarding the Mideast conflict, it was reacting – hysterically -- to the threat of punitive actions by powerful institutional forces against Israel. Increasingly, leading factors on the world political scene are signaling that they are fed up with Israel’s continuing sabotage of negotiations and are preparing to introduce corrective action if it continues.Read Further...
Judicial Scandal: A Test Case for Turkey
Dec/17/2010
Is Turkey making progress in the democratization process? Has the September referendum led to reform of the judiciary? Who really rules Turkey? These are some of the questions raised, albeit implicitly, by a recent court case in Istanbul which has become a cause célèbre.The case of Turkish-born German citizen, Dogan Akhanli.Read Further...
America's "Justice" in Occupied Iraq:
Why Tariq Aziz Should Be Released
Sep/16/2010
The appearance on August 5 of an interview with former Iraqi diplomat Dr. Tariq Aziz in the Guardian was a minor bombshell, whose repercussions were to be felt worldwide. Like an underground explosion, the interview sent waves throughout international waters, rocking many boats and reaching far distant shores. It was not only what the former top Iraqi diplomat said -- although his brief statements were of utmost relevance -- but the mere fact that he was allowed to speak out in public, which sent eerie signals across international diplomatic circuits.Read Further...
Imprisonment of Human Rights Activist Puts Turkish Establishment on the Dock
Sep/02/2010
When Turkish authorities seized Dogan Akhanli on August 10 on his arrival from Frankfurt at the Istanbul airport and threw him into prison, they may have thought they could proceed unhindered, with the law on their side. But they miscalculated utterly. As soon as the news circulated, human rights activists, intellectuals, and political figures denounced his arrest and demanded his immediate release.Read Further...
Israel’s Insane War on Iran Must Be Prevented
Aug/15/2010
Israel’s attack on a humanitarian aid ship headed for Gaza may prove to be the greatest strategic error the government has ever made. Like the Soweto riots in South Africa in 1976, or Bloody Sunday – the American civil rights march on March 7, 1965, in Selma, Alabama, where police opened fire and killed civilians – the Mavi Marmora affair crossed a red line. It has triggered an international wave of condemnation, expressing a shift in attitude toward Israel. The hope is that this international outrage, flanked by growing anti-government dissent inside the country, will provoke an identity crisis among the elite and people of Israel, shake up the political kaleidoscope and allow for a viable pro-peace force to emerge. Unless this occurs, new Israeli aggression, including against Iran, will remain high on their immediate agenda.Read Further...
The Historical Reconciliation of Armenians and Turks
May/27/2010
Germany, the same nation allied in World War I with the Young Turk regime which sought to exterminate the Armenian population, is emerging today as the stage on which the two formerly adversary communities are extending their hands in dialogue aimed at understanding and reconciliation.Read Further...
Preparations for a Hit against Iran: Stopping Israel’s Next War
Mar/20/2010
Israeli political and military leaders have been broadcasting their bellicose intentions loudly enough for the deaf to hear. “A new war in the region is inevitable.” This is the pronouncement made by Mohammad Seyyed Selim, political scientist and professor at the universities of Cairo and Kuweit. Prof. Selim delivered his forecast on February 13, in a program on Nile TV’s “Cairo Watch,” in which I also participated. The moderator, Mohamed Abdel-Rahim, started off by asking what crisis situations in the region were most acute; Iran and the Arab-Israeli conflict were the obvious answers.Read Further...
Gaza One Year After. The World Has Changed
Jan/01/2010
In this holiday season, we celebrate the birth of Christ, and the message of brotherly love, compassion, and forgiveness. This year we also commemorate the first anniversary of Israeli’s punitive aggression against the civilian population of Gaza, a conflict that left 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead, and thousands wounded. The toll taken in economic, social, and psychological terms on the victim population has yet to be adequately tallied.Read Further...
The Target is Iran: Israel's Latest Gamble May Backfire
Jan/12/2009
The aerial war against Gaza launched by Israel just after Christmas, and the ground offensive, with which it rang in the New Year, were shocking in their brutality, but should constitute no surprise, if viewed from the standpoint of long-term Israeli strategic aims. The Israelis have argued that the offensive was launched in response to eight years' of relentless attacks by Hamas rockets into Israel. But then, one asks: why now? Why should they wait eight years?Read Further...
Iranians Float an Offer the West Should Not Refuse
Jun/29/2008
If there were any substance to Condi Rice's repeated assertions, that the strife over Iran's nuclear program could, and preferably should, be solved through diplomatic means, then one would expect the U.S. Secretary of State to seize on recent offers made by Iranian figures, designed to facilitate the start of talks. Read Further...
Iran Opens War Avoidance Flank
May/05/2008
As threats of military action against Iran continue to issue from various spokesmen of the war party in the U.S., the Islamic Republic has launched an ambitious initiative aimed at preventing war, based on a comprehensive package of economic, political and security measures on a vast regional plane. The package includes proposals to settle remaining questions related to Iran's nuclear energy program, but is not limited to that.Read Further...
Iraq War. Failure of the US Sponsored Assault: Learn The Lessons of Basra
Mar/31/2008
If it is true, that political forces in Iran did contribute to preventing the explosive conflict in Basra from careening totally out of control, then that means that prevailing attitudes and preconceptions in Washington have been shown to be totally bankrupt. If cooler heads exist in Washington, especially among the military, they must draw the lessons from the last week's events, and seek to finally introduce an element of rationality into U.S. foreign policy for the region. The lesson, to put it in a nutshell, is that Iran can play a key role in stabilizing Iraq, and therefore the region. If forces in the U.S. were to acknowledge this fact, a lot of precious human lives could be spared, and a perspective for finally ending this God-awful war, could be realized.
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Iran On Eve Of Elections
Mar/02/2008
Muriel Mirak-Weissbach was in Tehran in late February and had the opportunity to talk to political figures, intellectuals, journalists, and the all-too-important "man on the street." The picture that emerged from this brief visit clashes fundamentally with the line promulgated by the international press, and, therefore, might be worth considering. Muriel Mirak-Weissbach brings us this exclusive report.Read Further...