For once, the views of the New York Times editorial board and Focal Points align perfectly. From an op-ed today: Despite the pumped-up threats and quickening military preparations, President Obama has yet to make a convincing legal or strategic case for military...
For almost a century, the Kurds—one of the world’s largest ethnic groups without its own state—have been deceived and double-crossed, their language and culture suppressed, their villages burned and bombed, and their people scattered. But because of the U.S. invasion...
Syrian President Assad insists that the apparent chemical-weapon attacks that have left upwards of 1,000 people dead in his country were committed by “terrorists,” as he calls the opposition. That’s his story and Russia and Syria are sticking to it. Meanwhile, Reuters...
The latest round of border tensions along the Line of Control (LOC) separating India and Pakistan began with the ambush of 5 Indian soldiers earlier this month, which has now expanded to heavy exchange fire along the LOC and heightened tensions. Now the real question...
Like a mirage, whenever it seems within reach nuclear disarmament recedes further into the distance. But, at least nuclear hawks no longer feel comfortable speaking on the record about nuclear “warfighting.” In fact, to keep the money flowing into the industry, they...
So Much for Drones’ Redeeming Qualities Larry Lewis, a principal research scientist at the Center for Naval Analyses, a research group with close ties to the US military, studied air strikes in Afghanistan from mid-2010 to mid-2011, using classified military data on...
Cross-posted from JohnFeffer.com. John is currently traveling in Eastern Europe and observing its transformations since 1989. The “case of the 13 imams” sounds almost mythic. But the current case the Bulgarian government is prosecuting against 13 imams from the area...
This past week, as many of you have probably noticed, FPIF rolled out a brand-new redesigned website. We're still in the process of transitioning a few things, but it's my great pleasure to show you what we've done so far. Foremost of all, we've modernized our front...
The taxi driver was excited. Driving through the busy streets of Cairo a little more than a year ago, he wanted us to see his most prized token from the revolution that brought Egyptians to the streets in 2011.He passed his cell phone to the back seat to share a YouTube video of his children were singing the Egyptian national anthem—backwards. Backwards, he explained, because that was how former President Hosni Mubarak was ruling the nation. “We want Egypt to be for all Egyptians—Christians, Jews, and Muslims,” he declared, smiling broadly.
There are serious differences between Egypt’s latest upheaval and the 2011 revolution, and major dangers. This time, the deposed president was Egypt’s first democratically and popularly elected president in several generations.