The United States, Europe, and Saudi Arabia seek regime change in Syria, but Russia does not want to see another country wrested from its orbit.
Is Libya a “False Analogy” (in Hillary Clinton’s Words) to Syria?
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Human Rights
Timoney Time in Bahrain
Bahrain’s Interior Ministry has hired John Timoney, the former police chief of Philadelphia and Miami, noted for his heavy-handed policing of demonstrations.
Israel’s War on Democracy (and Why Americans Should Be Concerned)
Right-wing legislators, militant settlers, and a growing religious divide in the Israeli army threaten to silence internal opposition to the Netanyahu government.
Does U.S. Believe Arms Deal With Bahrain Will Encourage Human Rights?
A $53 million U.S. arms sale, put on hold in November pending an investigation into Bahraini security forces human rights violations, is being pushed forward by the Obama Administration despite opposition by Congress and human rights observers.
A Year after Tahrir
The Arab revolts that began in December 2010 have immediate, material causes. But their deeper wellspring has been the determination of Arab peoples to reclaim their historical agency from both the condescension of outsiders and the mind-numbing repression of Arab rulers.
Pit of Pits: Los Alamos Proposed Plutonium Facility
The United States nuclear-weapons program, stockpiled with nuclear-warheads, need not concern itself with manufacturing them for a generation, if ever.
U.S. Legal Justifications for Nuclear Weapons Fall Flat on Their Face
The case that the United States makes for possession and potential use of nuclear weapons is legalistic to the extreme.
The West Judges Iran by Not One, But Two Double Standards
When it comes to nuclear weapons and assassinations, Iran is judged by a different standard from the West.
Will the GOP Own Its Position on Israel-Palestine?
The Republican National Committee unanimously adopted a resolution disavowing the party’s previous commitment to a two-state solution for Israel-Palestine and endorsing the Israeli annexation of the Palestinian territories.
Egypt and the Islamists
The Egyptian electoral results, as in similar elections in Tunisia, Palestine, Iraq, and Turkey, suggest that in any fair and transparent elections in the Islamic world, Islamist parties and their affiliates can easily win at least 40 percent of the votes. In fact, in the case of Egypt, Islamist parties together won over 77 percent of the seats. These results can be used as predictors of future elections in other Arab and Islamic countries in the area. The question, then, is no longer whether Islamists can win a majority in elections, but which strain of Islamism and by how much.