Imagine if Iran — or any other country — did a fraction of what American and Israel do at will. It is not easy to escape from one’s skin, to see the world differently from the way it is presented to us day after day. But it is useful to try. Let’s take a few examples. The war drums are beating ever more loudly over Iran. Imagine the situation to be reversed. Iran is carrying out a murderous and destructive low-level war against Israel with great-power participation. Its leaders announce that negotiations are going nowhere. Israel refuses to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty and allow inspections, as Iran has done. Israel continues to defy the overwhelming international call for a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the region. Throughout, Iran enjoys the support of its superpower patron.
Category: Specials
Supranational ASEAN is Super Folly for Southeast Asia. US reveals ASEAN as neo-imperial consolidation as Clinton calls on bloc to present a “united front” against China. In the literary classic “Gulliver’s Travels,” the protagonist, Lemuel Gulliver, finds himself shipwrecked on an island of tiny people called, “Lilliputians.” While he slept, the Lilliputians used their tiny rope and stakes to tie Gulliver down. When he awoke, though many times larger than any one of the Lilliputians, he was immobilized and at their mercy. This analogy is important because it represents the precise example used by Wall Street-London corporate-financier interests in producing policy for the containment of China. In 1997, a very different world from today, where the idea of a multipolar world order uprooting Anglo-American hegemony was still a fanciful notion, Western policy makers literally used this analogy to describe their strategy of encircling and containing China.
A special operation to flush out rebel fighters holed up in the eastern suburbs of Damascus will be over within the next few days, Syrian military officials said on Tuesday. Fighting continues in two villages outside…
Recent developments in the Middle East had a considerable impact on the standing of Turkey, a country deeply involved in the unfolding Syrian tragedy. It currently appears that Turkey’s neighbors – Iran and Iraq – are…
Last July, I visited the US on an academic tour and, as a part of my stay, participated in a Tucson, Arizona, conference of the type that would not fit with the expectations of a…
Thursday morning, June 14, Jerusalem The artist Joe Sacco and I are driving up through the Jerusalem Hills to Beit Agron, the government-run press building. Beit Agron was the first place I visited in 1988,…
The U.S. claims that Ulji Freedom Guardian joint military exercises (UFG) are regular and routine activities. This is a hackneyed trick to cover up its nature as a harasser of peace and stability in the…
The New York Times Op-ed piece Which of the following countries does not guarantee its citizens the right to vote? Is it: (A) Iran (B) Libya (C) The United States (D) All of the above….
The Unbearable Speed of Modern Times There aren’t many reasons for praising the violent epoch we live in; the most violent states in human history claim being egalitarian and kind, while in fact they persecute…
People are driven to war by conflicting ideologies, especially when they take a fanatical form – for example, when you believe that a certain piece of land was given to you by God, or that your country has a special mission, like exporting human rights and democracy, preferably by cruise missiles and drones. It is both sad and ironical that an idea that is largely secular and liberal, the one of human rights, has now been turned into one of the main means to whip up war hysteria in the West. But that is our present situation and a most urgent and important task is to change it.