Arab World

James Henderson | (The Conversation) | – – When Saudi Arabia led an OPEC decision to end a restraint put on oil production in November 2014, it marked the beginning of a new era in oil economics. It has given us a tumbling oil price, prompted huge losses and job cuts at oil firms like […]

Climate Change

“Ai Weiwei Will Not Let You Forget About Europe’s Refugee Crisis (AJ+)”

Nicholas Kolenda

Al Jazeera+ reminds the world about the ongoing refugee crisis sparked by a mass exodus of peoples from Syria…

Afghanistan

Iran Dragooning Thousands of Undocumented Afghans as Cannon Fodder in Syria

contributors

Human Rights Watch | – – (New York) – Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has recruited thousands of undocumented Afghans living there to fight in Syria since at least November 2013, Human Rights Watch said today, and a few have reported that Iranian authorities coerced them. Iran has urged the Afghans to defend Shia sacred […]

Featured

ISIL kills 70 in bombing of Shiite Area, Damascus, in bid to derail Talks

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Daesh (ISIS, ISIL) claimed responsibility Sunday for bomb attacks in the Syrian capital of Damascus that seem likely to have aimed at derailing the tentative talks in Geneva. First, a Daesh agent set off a car bomb next to a bus transporting Shiite fighters for the […]

Displaced and Refugees

Not just Madaya: A million people under Food Sieges in Mideast

contributors

By Nadia Prupis, staff writer | ( Commondreams.org) | – – Despite international laws prohibiting the use of starvation against civilians, forces on all sides preventing aid from reaching blockaded towns in Syria, Yemen, and Iraq As crises in the Middle East escalate, food has become a weapon of war. A new Associated Press analysis […]

Syria

World can Bomb Syria but Can’t negotiate end to War

contributors

By Simon Mabon | (The Conversation) | – – International talks meant to help resolve the Syrian Crisis are due to commence in Geneva, but a range of impossible problems still stand in the way. Now nearly five years old, the conflict has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced around 11m people. Other […]

Saudi Arabia

Will Yemen be the Graveyard of the new Saudi Empire?

contributors

By Helen Lackner | ( OpenDemocracy) | – – Those deciding for war in March 2015 gave little thought to Yemeni realities, military, logistic, topographic, social or political, human cost, or an exit strategy. But questions are being raised. Defence Minister Prince Mohammad Bin Salman, April 2014. Wikicommons/Mazen AlDarrab. Some rights reserved.In 1934 the newly […]

Featured

Top 5 Ways Putin has won big in Syria and why Europe is embracing him

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Russia is so far winning big in Syria, and making Moscow’s projection of force in the Middle East a reality that the other great powers have to recognize. As Russia has emerged as a major combatant against Syrian al-Qaeda and against Daesh (ISIS, ISIL), it is […]

Arab Spring

Tahrir 5 Years Later: The Hurdles to Democratization & Arab Youth Revolts

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – A frequently met-with Western political and often journalistic narrative of the 2011 youth revolts in the Arab world is that idealistic young people came out into the streets and managed to overthrow four dictators, but then the essential Arab nature (violent, fanatical, tribal and sectarian) came […]