Featured

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Just as Good Friday is a time for sober reflection and grief at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, so Easter Sunday is a time for blissful celebration at his rising from the dead and his ascension into heaven to sit at the right hand of God the Father. In keeping […]

Featured

Israeli Police Raid Sacred al-Aqsa Mosque during Ramadan, Wound 158 Palestinians

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli newspaper Arab 48 reports that at dawn prayers on Friday Israeli security forces mounted an assault on the worshipers at the holy al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the third holiest site in the Muslim religion, in the midst of the Muslim Lent or fasting month, Ramadan. They injured some […]

Featured

Zelensky warns against Russian “Blood Oil;” In fact, buying any Oil is paying Blood Money

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The BBC reports that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, during an interview, accused Germany and Hungary of paying “blood money” for Russian petroleum. Russia could earn $320 billion from energy exports in 2022, fueling Moscow’s war machine. Zelensky is perhaps making an analogy to blood diamonds, an issue Aryn Baker explained […]

Climate Crisis

Hearkening Back to Ancient Glory, Greece opens Largest double-sided solar farm in Europe

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Maeve Campbell at Euronews/ Reuters reports that Greece has brought online the continent’s largest double-sided solar facility, which will generate enough electricity to power 75,000 homes. There are about 4.5 million households in Greece, a country of 10.7 million. So this one facility covers 1.6 percent of them. While Greece […]

Featured

Is Joe Biden Right that the Russians are committing Genocide in Ukraine?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Kevin Liptak reports for CNN that on a visit to Iowa President Biden talked to reporters about Russian actions in Ukraine and for the first time called it “genocide.” Last week, the president and spokesmen for his administration had avoided using that term. Biden said, “I called it genocide because […]

Corruption

Why did the Saudis invest $2 bn with Jared Kushner?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Sunday, David D. Kirkpatrick and Kate Kelly of the New York Times got a big scoop — they gained access to internal documents of the board that vets investments for the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund, called the Public Investment Fund. These memos demonstrate that the board argued against […]

European Union

Could Europe/ NATO become Israel-Palestine if Putin Occupies parts of Ukraine for the Long Haul?

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) | – We have to begin asking the question of what will happen if Russia succeeds in implementing a long-term occupation of the Donbass region and of other Ukrainian territories down to the port of Odessa, making a land bridge to Crimea. Such a Russian occupation of land claimed by a […]

Donald Trump

Republicans dislike Biden more than Putin by over 2-to-1: No Rallying around the Flag

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – A new opinion poll by Shibley Telhami and Stella Rouse at the University of Maryland finds that Republicans dislike President Joe Biden more than Vladimir Putin by a margin of more than 2 to 1. You heard that right. Respondents were asked to name two world leaders they most disliked, […]

African-Americans

Ketanji Brown Jackson joins a Court that once Ruled Black Women had no Rights at All

Juan Cole

Revised. Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – An unprecedented ceremony at the White House on Friday celebrated the confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. She noted in her remarks, “It has taken 232 years and 115 prior appointments for a Black woman to be selected to serve on the Supreme […]