Middle East 4 ChangeGhosts in the Land
Friday, May 28, 2021
Adam Shatz on the war in Israel-Palestine On 21 May Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire after eleven days of fighting, but the days of ‘quiet’ – as the New…
Stench of Zionist colonialism
Thursday, May 20, 2021
Moshé Machover The Zionist colonisation regime spreads a nauseating stench – literally. I am referring to an Israeli invention, appropriately named ‘Skunk’ and described as a “non-lethal weapon…
Two Poems of Palestine by Rafeef Ziadeh
Monday, May 17, 2021
Her poem ‘We Teach Life, Sir’ – an impassioned attack on media misrepresentation of the Palestinian cause – went viral within days of its release. We teach life,…
Without US Aid, Israel Wouldn’t Be Killing Palestinians En Masse
Thursday, May 13, 2021
Noam Chomsky and CJ Polychroniou Successive Israeli governments have been trying for years to push Palestinians out of the Holy City of Jerusalem, and the latest round of…
‘We are witnessing a crime against humanity’: Arundhati Roy on India’s Covid catastrophe
Saturday, May 1, 2021
During a particularly polarising election campaign in the state of Uttar Pradesh in 2017, India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, waded into the fray to stir things up even…
The COVID-19 Catastrophe in India Keeps Growing
Monday, April 26, 2021
Vijay Prashad It is difficult to overstate the grip of COVID-19 on India. WhatsApp bristles with messages about this or that friend and family member with the virus,…
10 years of the Syrian conflict: a time to act and not merely to remember
Monday, April 12, 2021
Samer Jabbour, Jennifer Leaning, Iman Nuwayhid and others The health needs in Syria after 10 years of conflict are vast, ranking third after food and protection needs.22 There…
US Drug Lobby try to prevent delivery of low-cost vaccines to poorer counties
Sunday, March 7, 2021
Lee Fang President Joe Biden’s administration is being asked to punish Hungary, Colombia, Chile, and other countries for seeking to ramp up the production of Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutics without…
Quick Thoughts: Nazan Üstündağ on the Protests at Turkey’s Boğaziçi University
Saturday, February 20, 2021
Nazan Üstündağ Academics and students at Boğaziçi University responded with protest when President Erdoğan appointed Melih Bulu as the new rectorate. The protests of students were repressed violently…
Fearing the Palestinian Narrative: Why Israel Banned ‘Jenin Jenin’
Thursday, January 21, 2021
Ramzy Baroud On January 11, the Israeli Lod District Court ruled against a Palestinian film-maker, Mahmoud Bakri, ordering him to pay hefty compensation to an Israeli soldier who…
Funding crisis threatens Palestinian refugee agency
Monday, November 30, 2020
Sharmila Devi UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East says that a $300 million shortfall is threatening health services. The UN Relief and…
More than ever, the struggle for justice unites the Middle East and the world
Monday, November 16, 2020
Jade Saab “A spectre is haunting Europe…” This is how Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels opened their Communist Manifesto, written on the eve of several uprisings on the continent…
Iranian writers Association and PEN protest at imprisonment of writers and repression in Iran.
Friday, November 6, 2020
The protest by the Iranian Writers Association in Exile and Iranian PEN Association in Exile against the arrest and long prison sentence by the Islamic Republic on three…
The Syrian Mercenaries Fighting Foreign Wars for Russia and Turkey
Saturday, October 31, 2020
Elizabeth Tsurkov “They sent us directly to the front lines. The situation is terrible. Terrible. There is fighting every day. We are charged with storming. There is no…
Digital Democracy: The Tools Transforming Political Engagement
Monday, September 21, 2020
Julie Simon, Theo Bass, Victoria Boelman, Geoff Mulgan This paper shares lessons from Nesta’s research into some of the pioneering innovations in digital democracy which are taking place…
Falling Behind: COVID, Climate Change, and Chaos
Saturday, August 8, 2020
Multiple Crises, Multiple Obstacles Mel Gurtov COVID-19 and the protests for racial justice have drawn attention away from the mostly bad news about the environment. Yes, the skies…
Indian Muslims facing ‘genocidal climate’ amid pandemic
Monday, June 22, 2020
Arundhati Roy India’s coronavirus lockdown, which began in March, has been one of largest and strictest in the world. It has left tens of millions without work prompting…
Coronavirus in the Middle East: A perfect storm
Wednesday, June 10, 2020
Marco Carnelos The impacts of coronavirus have been tremendous everywhere, but in the Middle East, the situation seems to be assuming the features of a perfect storm. In…
Rojava: statelessness in a time of pandemic
Saturday, May 23, 2020
Anya Briy The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), commonly known as Rojava, has illuminated the plight of the stateless—even though statelessness in the AANES’s case…
How Economic Misery Helped Fuel the Syrian War: Book review
Friday, May 15, 2020
Louis Proyect Ever since the civil war began in Syria in early 2011, the left has largely ignored the social and economic circumstances that led to a conflict…
The Coronavirus pandemic, ecological catastrophe and global capitalism: an interlocking phenomenon
Thursday, May 14, 2020
Mehdi Kia The Covid-19 pandemic has unravelled the close structural links between the climate crisis and the global capitalist mode of production.[1] See John Bellamy Foster and Brett…
The Viral Emergency in Palestine
Saturday, April 25, 2020
S.C. Molavi and Eyal Weizman Over a dozen states, including Hungary, Ethiopia, Japan, Canada, and Botswana, have recently declared a “state of emergency” giving governments sweeping powers to…
Arundhati Roy: ‘The pandemic is a portal’
Thursday, April 23, 2020
Who can use the term “gone viral” now without shuddering a little? Who can look at anything any more — a door handle, a cardboard carton, a bag…
“Between the rock of the occupation, and the hammer of coronavirus”
Monday, April 20, 2020
The Coronavirus and the Conditions of Palestinian Workers G.N. Nithya “Colonialism is not a thinking machine, nor a body endowed with reasoning faculties. It is violence in its…
Coronavirus: Global academia gets a taste of the Palestinian lockdown
Friday, April 17, 2020
Emile Badarin The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic has obstructed the education of students globally. But this is hardly new to Palestinian students and academics, whose educational life…
All Prisoners Are Political Prisoners: Rethinking the Campaign to #FreeThemAll Beyond Borders and Beyond COVID-19
Monday, April 13, 2020
Golnar Nikpour In late February, amid the catastrophic spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in the Islamic Republic of Iran, relatives of several of Iran’s prisoners of conscience…
Technology of Death: The Not-So-Shocking Report on Israeli Weapons Exports
Sunday, March 29, 2020
Ramzy Baroud The Middle East region, battered by wars and adjoining humanitarian crises that have left millions of people stateless, hungry and diseased, is in urgent need for…
Israel’s elections: Decline of secular Zionism
Friday, March 13, 2020
Tony Greenstein Israel’s third general election in a year has shown a decisive shift to the Zionist right, but whether it will be sufficient to enable Binyamin Netanyahu…
Can China’s COVID-19 strategy work elsewhere?
Sunday, March 8, 2020
Kai Kupferschmidt, Jon Cohen Chinese hospitals overflowing with COVID-19 patients a few weeks ago now have empty beds. Trials of experimental drugs can’t find enough eligible patients. And…
There’s Little Chance for Change in Lebanon, Except for More Suffering
Thursday, February 27, 2020
Robert Fisk The freezing Mediterranean squalls that slash across downtown Beirut and the seafront to the west may give the impression this week that Lebanon is lapsing back into its…