After six times, does Iraq's 11 November elections matter?
What are the stakes? What are the outcomes? Shia parties are likely to retain control of parliament. The main competition is between rival Shia groups, especially the Coordination Framework and its opponents. This contest will influence Iraq's political future and shape its direction. Sunni groups such as Taqaddum hope to rebuild Mosul and Anbar. They want to bring stability and new opportunities to2025-11-11 | MENA
Congressional Republicans Must Stand Up to the President on Venezuela!
I recall when then-President Barack Obama was planning to send troops to enforce his “Assad must go” policy in Syria, many Republican US Senators passionately argued that the US President must come to Congress for approval before sending US troops into combat overseas. At the time, they portrayed themselves as brave defenders of the US […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Congressional Republicans Must Stand Up to the President on Venezuela!
I recall when then-President Barack Obama was planning to send troops to enforce his “Assad must go” policy in Syria, many Republican US Senators passionately argued that the US President must come to Congress for approval before sending US troops into combat overseas. At the time, they portrayed themselves as brave defenders of the US […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Honor Veterans by Ending Wars
One of my family’s favorite regular getaways is Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri. The roller coasters are top notch, the shows are fun, and everyone is in a constant state of joy; it’s great. It’s also a veteran’s hangout. Every day when the park opens they honor all the veterans. We line up, march […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Honor Veterans by Ending Wars
One of my family’s favorite regular getaways is Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri. The roller coasters are top notch, the shows are fun, and everyone is in a constant state of joy; it’s great. It’s also a veteran’s hangout. Every day when the park opens they honor all the veterans. We line up, march […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Will the Taiwan Issue Stay Quiet During Trump’s Term?
President Trump professed to be extremely pleased with the results of his recent summit meeting with Xi Jinping in South Korea. Indeed, with his typical hyperbole, he rated it “a 12 out of 10.” Trump expressed special satisfaction with the conclusion of new trade agreements that significantly eased bilateral economic tensions between the United States […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Will the Taiwan Issue Stay Quiet During Trump’s Term?
President Trump professed to be extremely pleased with the results of his recent summit meeting with Xi Jinping in South Korea. Indeed, with his typical hyperbole, he rated it “a 12 out of 10.” Trump expressed special satisfaction with the conclusion of new trade agreements that significantly eased bilateral economic tensions between the United States […]2025-11-11 | Uncategorized
Israel's bill to kill Palestinian prisoners terrifies families
No accountability The concern towards the proposed law is also shared widely among Palestinians in the occupied territories. According to a recent poll conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Public Opinion (PCPO), a 74.4% of Palestinians "believe the law would completely or partially eliminate peace prospects", 42.2% believe the death penalty bill aims to intensify racial discrimination against Palestinians, and 46.4% also think it2025-11-10 | MENA
Tony Blair Gaslighting Gaza’s Future
The Quest for Gaza’s Energy, Part 3 Read part 1 here Read part 2 here As the U.S.-mediated ceasefire is taking hold of Gaza, the Trump administration is pushing its peace plan, which is premised on post-genocide opportunities for infrastructure and property development. In this quest, Tony Blair is the public face; Jared Kushner, the […]2025-11-10 | Uncategorized
Tony Blair Gaslighting Gaza’s Future
The Quest for Gaza’s Energy, Part 3 Read part 1 here Read part 2 here As the U.S.-mediated ceasefire is taking hold of Gaza, the Trump administration is pushing its peace plan, which is premised on post-genocide opportunities for infrastructure and property development. In this quest, Tony Blair is the public face; Jared Kushner, the […]2025-11-10 | Uncategorized
America’s ‘Ceausescu Moment’
Revolutions are funny things. They start out almost imperceptible. The final straw itself may be as inconsequential as a single voice in the crowd whose words unleash a tidal wave that sweeps aside the seemingly intractable old order forever. Even as the cracks in the Eastern Bloc began to materialize in 1989, starting in June […]2025-11-10 | Uncategorized
America’s ‘Ceausescu Moment’
Revolutions are funny things. They start out almost imperceptible. The final straw itself may be as inconsequential as a single voice in the crowd whose words unleash a tidal wave that sweeps aside the seemingly intractable old order forever. Even as the cracks in the Eastern Bloc began to materialize in 1989, starting in June […]2025-11-10 | Uncategorized
Thebe Ikalafeng releases his second book Rooted & Rising — Africa’s Voice, Unapologetically Heard
A Manifesto for Cultural Confidence As is often the case with Ikalafeng, the messaging matters. And as with the launch of his first book, this launch was another spectacle before a full house at Constitution Hill, a site that once confined freedom fighters and now celebrates liberty. This book is very much a philosophy, an attitude, a movement. Each chapter draws2025-11-07 | Events
Washington’s Double Standard on Terrorism Betrays the Spirit of Liberty
The U.S. government says its “war on terror” protects freedom. In practice, every new intervention narrows the perimeter of freedom at home. The language of confronting evil abroad has become a cover for expanding state power, channeling public money to defense contractors, and normalizing surveillance that would have been unthinkable a generation ago. The pattern […]2025-11-07 | Uncategorized
Is Saudi drawing a line through its NEOM futuristic megaproject?
Even the logistical elements inside the city appear to need revisiting, with a train starting at the airport to the other end of The Line taking only 20 minutes - but this would require no stops and carriages would not have space for luggage, meaning passengers would have to leave their suitcases outside their apartments to be picked up, up2025-11-06 | Economy
Somerset as Stand-In: Making the Team – Michael Jordan & Jack Kerouac
About eight innings ago (several decades in non-Baseball years) there was an Elementary School Carnival. To properly clinch the pennant requires strategy…i.e., you either need to impress the girls by winning prizes or you need to impress your pals by also winning prizes. Given it was a tad early to have interest in little ladies, I went with — The Baseball Hat2025-11-06 | Opinion
America Pushes for Treaty on Russian Tactical Nukes as Tensions Rise
The United States wants to establish a new treaty with Russia to limit its tactical nuclear arsenal, according to written responses submitted by Robert Kadlec, President Donald Trump’s nominee for Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear Deterrence Policy. The statements were part of a 115-question Senate review ahead of Kadlec’s confirmation hearings. Washington Targets Moscow’s Tactical Nuclear Edge Kadlec described Russia’s2025-11-06 | World
The Nobel Committee Should Revoke Venezuelan Warmonger’s 2025 Nobel Peace Prize
War is the opposite of peace. When the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner, María Corina Machado, calls for the United States to take military action against Venezuela, we should ask the question: does someone who calls for war deserve such a prize? The answer should be self-evident. However, the Nobel Committee has a different view. […]2025-11-06 | Uncategorized
RIP Dick Cheney: The Ghost Who Still Haunts America
Nancy O'Brien Simpson Dick Cheney is dead — finally gone from all halls of power — and already the whisper campaign begins: the historians, the talking heads, the opportunists trying to whitewash a legacy built on deceit and cruelty. “A great vice president,” they say. “A stabilizing force.” “A patriot.” But patriotism is not measured in bombed cities, stolen lives, and2025-11-05 | Opinion
Russia Urgently Prepares for Possible Nuclear Tests in Response to U.S. Actions
Preparations for potential nuclear testing can be completed swiftly, as the test site on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in Arkhangelsk Region is fully ready, Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov told President Vladimir Putin during a Security Council meeting, according to the Kremlin press service. Defense Ministry Calls for Swift Readiness Belousov proposed initiating preparations for nuclear testing in response to U.S.2025-11-05 | Russia
Migrant workers reveal exploitation in Jordan's textile industry
Dissipated dreams Denial of leave Lower than minimum wage Translation tricks Weak inspections Shurooq Alnsour is an investigative and data journalist based in Jordan with a focus on underreported social and environmental issues Huda Alhanayfah is an independent investigative journalist from Jordan specialising in human rights and environmental issues. She is the founder of the Kayf? podcast and a member of the Marie Colvin Journalists' Network. She previously worked at ARIJ and Free2025-11-05 | Society
Turkish-Armenian normalization process on the right path: Pashinyan
A normalization process between Armenia and Türkiye is proceeding on the right path, with the establishment of diplomatic ties and the opening of sealed borders only a matter of time, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has said, underlining the importance of the continued will to reach regional peace and stability.2025-11-05 | Türkiye
Ukrainian Financing at Risk as Europe Debates Frozen Russian Assets
Europe is seeking ways to reduce financial support for Ukraine as the country faces mounting funding needs. According to The Economist, Ukraine requires $400 billion in foreign funding over the next four years to continue the war, with $60 billion needed next year alone. With the United States unwilling to cover the costs, European countries face increasing pressure to provide2025-11-04 | World
Forbidden City, Topkapı Palace to form cultural bridge between Türkiye and China
China and Türkiye are preparing to take steps toward a major cultural collaboration by linking two of the world’s most iconic palace museums — Beijing’s Forbidden City and Istanbul’s Topkapı palace — in a move to strengthen cultural ties between the two nations through mutual exhibitions that bring together treasures from both imperial legacies.2025-11-04 | Türkiye
Curious About Caracas? The Venezuela Military Buildup Explained.
Throughout history, whether Populist or Potentate, there was always one way for a politico to get himself out of trouble on the Homefront…kill some people overseas. (Preferably impoverished, frequently blameless.) Naturally, we in America have reached a far more enlightened view of things in Current Year. Therefore, we no longer send our Soldiers out to die on a whim. Rather, we use2025-11-03 | Opinion
Trump’s Yokosuka Spectacle: The Pageantry of Power and Japan’s Hidden PFAS Crisis
When President Donald Trump strode onto the flight deck of the USS George Washington at Yokosuka, Japan, it looked like a campaign scene, perhaps choreographed for his unconstitutional 3rd term bid. The imperial president, flanked by sailors and television cameras, praised the might of the U.S. armed forces and declared that “America is respected again.” […]2025-11-03 | Uncategorized
The Turkish Path
Imagine a country that has historically found itself as the epicenter of all that comes as a blessing and a curse. A country that has hosted many emperors, civilizations, kings and khalifates. A country that has blended, maintained and carried culinary traces, anthropological expressions and hosts thousands of years of architectures from the birth of civilizations to the modern society2025-11-01 | Economy
3I/ATLAS Interstellar Visitor Might Be Using the Sun for Gravitational Maneuver
On October 29, the unique interstellar object 3I/ATLAS, discovered only four months earlier, approached the Sun. Scientists and the public alike are watching closely. Ever since Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb suggested that 3I/ATLAS might be an alien spacecraft, the object has become a subject of fascination and controversy. Loeb suspects the body may have an artificial origin and could even2025-10-31 | Science
Whitewashing the Gaza Gas Exploration
The Quest for Gaza’s Energy, Part 2 Read part 1 here In 2019, UNCTAD (the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) reported that the occupied territories lie above sizeable reservoirs of oil and natural gas wealth in Area C of the occupied West Bank and off the Gaza Strip. However, as UNCTAD warned, the […]2025-10-31 | Uncategorized
Rethinking Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge (QME A Policy Past Its Prime
In business, an edge is earned. In U.S. diplomacy, it is handed out – nepotism with a human cost. Corporate America calls it a “sustainable competitive advantage,” the factor that separates market leaders from the rest, reflecting a company’s key competencies. In American foreign policy, however, winning can be guaranteed – and the price is […]2025-10-31 | Uncategorized
Syrians must reckon: Assad regime was not the root of all evil
Targeting Arab unity During secret meetings, my father spoke of Arab unity, analysed documents, and smuggled into Syria copies of al-Hurriya, the ANM’s newspaper. Back then, people would share political ideas and be heavily involved in activism. “We thought that it was only a matter of time before Arabs would regain their rightful place in world politics,” my father would say. What about2025-10-30 | Narrated
Norwegian Peace Council Rejects Peace Prize Winner
Norway’s largest peace organization, the Norwegian Peace Council, has announced that it would forego its traditional torchlight procession for the Nobel Peace Prize winner this year after widespread dissatisfaction with the Nobel Committee’s selection of Venezuelan politician María Corina Machado as this year’s laureate. Eline H. Lorentzen, Chairwoman of the Peace Council, explained that: We […]2025-10-30 | Uncategorized
Israel home destruction amid truce points toward Gaza annexation
"Calm isn’t measured by statements, but by the silence we need to catch our breath," said Rahma Saadallah, 42, displaced from Gaza City’s Shuja’iyya district. "The children wake up terrified, and I can’t reassure them. How can I explain that the war is over when they hear explosions every night?" Abu Shaaban now gathers local children for informal lessons after months without schooling.2025-10-29 | MENA
Peace in Gaza Depends on Palestinians’ Right to Remain – and Return
Amid some extremely cautious optimism for peace following a tenuous and incomplete ceasefire in Gaza, any hope for Gaza’s future depends significantly on a little-noticed point in President Donald Trump’s original 20-point peace plan. The plan’s twelfth point says, “No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be […]2025-10-29 | Uncategorized
The Post-Gaza Rebalancing in the Middle East
On October 9, when the Gaza ceasefire took effect, it was regarded as the first phase of a 20-point peace plan drafted by the White House. Neither Israel nor Hamas liked the full plan. But the former was pressured by Trump and the latter by a set of Arab states, particularly Qatar, Egypt and Turkey. […]2025-10-29 | Uncategorized
The Rubio Doctrine: Neocons Are Back!
According to several recent news reports, the two major Trump foreign policy shifts last week are the handiwork of Marco Rubio, the President’s Secretary of State and (acting) National Security Advisor. As with all neocon plans, they will be big on promises and small on delivery. First up, according to Bloomberg it was Rubio who […]2025-10-28 | Uncategorized
The Neocons Have Finally Found a Way Into MAGA Hearts
“Neocon” may have become a dirty word, but after a few years, their agenda is back in play. And no doubt many of their players, too. After being banished to the wilderness for plunging the nation into a 20-year war, the neocons fell flat with the Trump base in Ukraine and lost the thread with […]2025-10-27 | Uncategorized
US contractor on how Israel, US forces killed Gaza aid seekers
What is your professional background? What were you doing in Gaza during this time? What did you do when you realised this? What was the overall framework? Who was in control? You have spoken publicly about the involvement of contractors in killing Palestinians. Could you clarify further details? What was the moment you decided to resign from the company and speak out publicly? Did you see2025-10-26 | MENA
A Trumpian Headache
President Donald Trump’s use of the U.S. military to kill persons on speed boats in international waters, or in territorial waters claimed by other sovereign nations – all 1,500 miles from the U.S. – has posed grave issues of due process. The Constitution’s guarantee of due process requires it for every person, not just Americans. […]2025-10-24 | Uncategorized
The Irreversible Tides: Israel’s Isolation and the Gaza Genocide
The escalating global antipathy toward Israel, increasingly visible in cultural concepts like concerts, cinemas and sports events, underscores a profound international shift. This trend raises critical questions: How has Israel’s image been irrevocably damaged by the Gaza genocide? What are the implications of Israel becoming the most internationally reviled state? How is this deep isolation […]2025-10-23 | Uncategorized
Israeli Scramble for Gaza’s Gas Reserves
The Quest for Gaza’s Energy, Part 1 As the Second Intifada was about to begin in September 2000, PLO leader Yassir Arafat celebrated a natural gas discovery in a fishing vessel about 30 kilometers off the Gaza Strip. “This will provide a solid foundation for our economy, for establishing an independent state with holy Jerusalem […]2025-10-21 | Uncategorized
A Warning from Lebanon
In not quite one year since the ceasefire deal in Lebanon, Israel has broken the ceasefire 4,600 times. It has killed hundreds of people, including infants, demolished tens of thousands of homes and annexed five areas of Lebanon. It was supposed to withdraw completely. This situation is being replicated in detail in Gaza. In particular, […]2025-10-20 | Uncategorized
Israeli minister hosts UK anti-Islam figure Tommy Robinson
Jewish condemnation Several British Jewish organisations, including the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council, both of which are pro-Israel, condemned Robinson’s visit. Criminal Record and Incitement Robinson has a long criminal history, having been imprisoned five times over the past two decades for offences including fraud, contempt of court, and drug crimes. Most recently, he served seven months for contempt of2025-10-16 | MENA
Which Arab teams have qualified for the World Cup so far?
Who could still qualify The UAE or Iraq could still make it through to the finals, but only one has a chance with the two Arab teams facing each other over two legs in November. The winner of that clash will then play an intercontinental play-off, so it is a rocky road for both sides.2025-10-15 | MENA
Somaliland’s war on the press deepens
“This conviction of a journalist sadly illustrates the increased repression facing news professionals in Somaliland, where around twenty journalists have been arrested or detained since the beginning of the year. The Somaliland government must absolutely put an end to their repression of independent journalism, which has intensified since it came to power in December 2024. We call on the government2025-10-15 |
Iraq's new offshore pipeline to dramatically boost oil exports
— وزارة النفط العراقية (@mediaofficeoil) October 11, 2025 ">ceremony that the project is "one of the most important strategic undertakings" in Iraq’s export network and is designed to modernise the country’s southern oil infrastructure. Abdul Ghani said the project includes several important facilities, such as a 48-inch-diameter pipeline that runs 70 kilometres with 61 kilometres offshore and nine kilometres onshore. The minister added that2025-10-14 | Energy
Evaluating Trump’s Claim that Ukraine Can Win the War
“Ukraine,” U.S. President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social on September 23, “is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back.” He came to this completely revised conclusion apparently having been briefed on battlefield and economic conditions by U.S. officials, including Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellog and Mike Waltz, who served […]2025-10-14 | Uncategorized
The Defeat of Israel and the Rebirth of Palestinian Agency
For decades, the prevailing notion was that the ‘solution’ to the Israeli occupation of Palestine lay in a strictly negotiated process. “Only dialogue can achieve peace” has been the relentlessly peddled mantra in political circles, academic platforms, media forums, and the like. A colossal industry burgeoned around that idea, expanding dramatically in the lead-up to, […]2025-10-13 | Uncategorized