Featured

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – When running for office, Joe Biden pledged that the federal government would not ban hydraulic fracturing or fracking. This environmentally disastrous method of extracting petroleum and natural gas from shale rock beneath the earth involves pumping water down there under enormous pressure to break up the rocks and release the […]

Featured

Israeli Police injure 12 Palestinians in Continued Iron Fist Crackdown on Jerusalem Ramadan Crowds

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment)- Arab48 reports that Israeli security forces on Saturday night attacked Palestinian worshipers at Damascus Gate in Jerusalem with batons and teargas, leaving 12 Jerusalemites wounded, according to the Palestinian Red Cross. Damascus Gate or Bab al-Amoud in Arabic is the major entrance way to the Old City of Jerusalem, which is […]

astronomy and outer space

Palestinian NASA Scientist Elbasyouni: Easier to Fly a Helicopter on Mars than to Visit Home in Gaza

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Long time readers may know that I am a science buff and a science fiction fan. I have therefore been geeking out since February about the Perseverance rover on Mars. This week there was even more to marvel at, as the Ingenuity helicopter that accompanied the rover managed a couple […]

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Syrian Missile strikes Near Israel’s Nuclear Facility at Dimona, Which could have Turned into a Dirty Bomb

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli site i24 reports that on early Thursday morning, a Syrian missile slammed into the desert very near to the Israeli nuclear reactor at Dimona, which Israeli authorities have used to produce an arsenal of an estimated two hundred nuclear bombs. Air raid sirens sounded in southern Israel. Explosions […]

Climate Crisis

A big Effing Deal: On Eve of Climate Summit, news that Biden will cut US C02 Emissions 50% by 2030

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – ( Matthew Daly at the Associated Press reports that President Biden will announce at Thursday’s virtual international Climate Summit that the US will commit to reducing its annual carbon dioxide emissions by half of the 2005 peak by 2030. Joe Biden famously used an expletive to describe the passage of […]

African-Americans

Systemic Racism won’t End with One Trial, But Biden-Harris can enlist Government in addressing Economic Inequality at its Root

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – African-Americans face aggressive policing in part because, on average, they lack resources. Household wealth allows a family to donate to political campaigns, to ensure a good education for their children, and to join influential civic clubs and organizations. The Center for American Progress reports that in 2019, before the distortions […]

Featured

Why the Founding Fathers would have approved of Biden banning phrase “Illegal Alien”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Biden administration has announced that it will no longer use the phrase “illegal alien” and will replace it with “undocumented noncitizen.” Biden will also drop “assimilation” in favor of “integration.” These changes are long overdue and necessary for human dignity. For one thing, human beings cannot be “illegal.” They […]

Afghanistan

US spent $2.261 Trillion on Afghanistan War, in which ~240,000 Have Died; We could have Greened Half the Grid Instead

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Costs of War Project at Brown University has just brought out a new report on Afghanistan. The September 11, 2001 attacks were launched from Khost and Qandahar in Afghanistan by al-Qaeda, though it is not clear that this organization of Arab expatriates informed their Taliban hosts of what they […]

Displaced and Refugees

Biden to reverse Trump’s White Supremacist, Sadistic near-ban on Refugees, but US still Lags, Sweden, Germany other OECD Countries

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – About one quarter of one percent (0.25 percent) of the US population consists of refugees — some 838,000. This minuscule number was too much for the white supremacist Trump administration, which drastically cut back refugee admissions from an average of 70,000 to 80,000 per year earlier in this century to […]