No Power in Gaza
New pressures on Hamas signal a realignment of political forces in the Middle East — and may foreshadow another summertime assault on Gaza.
New pressures on Hamas signal a realignment of political forces in the Middle East — and may foreshadow another summertime assault on Gaza.

The protest movement convulsing Iraq is a heroic revolt powered by unemployed, precarious, and informal workers. Their aim is to overturn the entire political system, which has produced nothing but violence and poverty for the vast majority of Iraqis.

From Afghanistan to Yemen, we have to acknowledge the full extent of the Obama administration’s war crimes.

If you’re a US ally looking at Israel’s bombing of the Iranian consulate in Syria and Ecuador’s raid on its Mexican consulate, you’re probably thinking, “I can get away with something similar because the most powerful country in the world will let me do it.”

The 2003 invasion of Iraq has been swept to the margins of collective memory. We must refuse to forget it — and seek to understand what led to it, who benefited, who suffered, and how it transformed the world.

The Soviet Union’s collapse created opportunities for nationalist elites. Azerbaijan's current campaign of ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh has been enabled by both this instability and regional jostling for influence by Russia, Turkey, and others.

Joe Lieberman was a fairly unremarkable Washington politician who managed to get famous by becoming a particularly enthusiastic, inveterate warmonger and corporate marionette within the Democratic Party.

Europe’s far-right parties have long boasted about putting their own countries’ interests first but now slavishly support the latest US-Israeli war. While they opt for vassalage, antiwar forces have turned out to be the real defenders of sovereignty.

From censoring a report on CIA domestic surveillance to running cover for the Contra War to helping launch the war on terror, Dick Cheney dedicated his life to making sure the US national security state could kill, spy, and torture with few checks.

Some observers are hoping that Tulsi Gabbard, as Donald Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence, will be a counterweight to warmongering “neocons” in his administration. But a sober look at her record doesn’t inspire much confidence.

US democracy has been degrading for years. Donald Trump has the motive, the disposition, and the political and legal infrastructure to simply circumvent it, especially with such low approval ratings and midterm elections around the corner.

The Biden administration is entertaining the idea of pursuing a US-Saudi mutual defense pact. How does the prospect of risking lives for the Saudi monarchy sound?

Caught off guard by new proposals to halt the war in Ukraine, European leaders have rejected the idea of Kyiv giving up territory. What’s less clear is how they imagine making their red lines into a reality.

Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has sealed a $1.4 billion deal to redevelop Albania’s largest island. Long a protected area, now it’s set to be paved over to build a luxury resort.

Responses to the expansion of BRICS ping-ponged from dismissal to fearmongering. But there’s not much reason to fear for the US-led world order quite yet — and we shouldn’t fear the multipolar one BRICS wants to build.

In Karla’s Choice, Nick Harkaway takes up his father John le Carré’s most enduring creation, returning George Smiley back to the Cold War’s morally gray trenches. The novel reminds us that clever tradecraft can’t fix what cowardly leaders break.

Faced with criticism of the war in Gaza, Israeli leaders cynically ask why the world worries about the Palestinians and not the Kurds. Israel’s supposed pro-Kurdish stance is empty posturing — and risks damaging the Kurdish fight for liberation.

Both US and Chinese leaders play down the prospects of a new Cold War — but they never sound convincing. Vast shifts in the world economy are driving a new imperialist rivalry, for which a series of regional wars are creating dangerous flash points.

Joe Biden has continued Donald Trump's Middle East policies — ignoring Palestinian demands for justice and sealing an alliance between Israel and Gulf state dictatorships.

Yet more evidence emerges that the so-called Havana Syndrome caused by a “microwave weapon” in US diplomats and intelligence personnel was a psychosomatic illness. Maybe it's time for national security reporters to stop letting anonymous officials make wild claims to stoke conflict and inflate their budgets.