By Pintu Kumar Mahla, University of Arizona (The Conversation) – Farmers in South Asia rely on the summer monsoon’s rainfall, but extreme monsoon rains in recent years have been destructive and deadly. Since July, flooding during the 2025 summer monsoon has killed more than 700 people in Pakistan as water and mud swept through settlements […]
Archives for August 2025
Türkiye Bans Israeli Ships, Goods at its Ports, Halts Cargo Overflights, Declares Gaza a Genocide
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan announced Friday that his country would completely cut economic relations with Israel, blocking Israeli ships from docking at Turkish ports and denying Israeli aircraft that might be carrying weapons overflight rights over Türkiye. The latter step imposes extra costs on Israeli cargo flights, which will have […]
Host, Bully, Hypocrite: The US’s Shameful Gatekeeping of the United Nations
by Ranjan Solomon ( Middle East Monitor ) – The United States is once again demonstrating that it is unfit to serve as host of the United Nations Headquarters. Reports that Washington may deny a visa to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for an upcoming UN encounter evoke bitter memories of 1988, when Yasser Arafat […]
Trump’s Immigrant Gulags: A Bonanza For Private Prison Corporations
Gainesville, Fl. (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – When it comes to for-profit, private corporate incarceration of immigrants, making lots of money is like drinking salt water, the more they drink, the thirstier they get. Roman proverbs say that the more money a rich man has, the more driven and addicted he becomes to accumulating […]
“The Bird is on the Wing”: FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám 1:7
Stanza 7 of the first edition of Edward FitzGerald’s translation of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám talks about how little time we have here on earth, and the urgency for us to enjoy life. “Repentance” is a luxury we can’t afford, the poetry affirms: VII. Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring […]
The price of genocide: How US Funding sustains an unraveling Israeli Economy
( Middle East Monitor ) – In an important step toward the economic isolation of Israel due to its genocide in Gaza, Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global has decided to divest from yet more Israeli companies. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund is the world’s largest, with total investments in Israel once estimated at $1.9 billion. The […]
Risking Regional Chaos: The US-Israeli Plan to End UN Peacekeeping in S. Lebanon
By Vanessa Newby, Monash University and Chiara Ruffa, Sciences Po (The Conversation) – The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) is seen by many as an essential peacekeeping buffer between Israel, Lebanon and Hezbollah. But Israeli pressure, US doubts over Unifil’s cost-effectiveness and the fragile state of Lebanon’s politics means there is a risk […]
Russia, China, reject attempt of E3 to Reimpose Sanctions on Iran over Nuclear Program
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – France, the United Kingdom and Germany (the “E3”) on Thursday sent a formal letter to the UN Security Council asking for snap back sanctions on Iran over its nuclear enrichment activities, which they maintain breach the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) or nuclear deal. The joint letter of […]
Hossein Asgari’s Desolation speaks powerfully of the Destructiveness of War and the Hope that lies in Fiction
By Michelle Hamadache, Macquarie University (The Conversation) Hossein Asgari’s Desolation tells the story of Amin, an Iranian man whose life and family are shattered when the USS Vincennes shoots down an Iranian passenger plane in 1988. The plane was carrying 290 passengers as well as crew, all of whom were killed. Among the dead was […]
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