National Catholic Reporter, March 27, 2013
This month marks the 10th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, which has resulted in the deaths of up to half a million Iraqis, mostly civilians, and the displacement of millions of others. Sectarian and ethnic tensions remain high and violence and terrorism — despite being less pervasive than a few years ago — are endemic. The current Iraqi government is notoriously corrupt and repressive, guilty of widespread torture and extrajudicial killings of opponents. A whole new generation of Islamist terrorists radicalized by the invasion and insurgency is now active worldwide. Almost 4,500 Americans were killed and thousands more received serious physical and emotional injuries…
Category: US Middle East Policy
Interview: Yemen (audio)
China International Radio February 28, 2013
[The source link and recording for this item are
no longer available. Find best related links.]
The No State Solution (video)
Alternative Focus video September 10, 2012
The No State Solution is the latest contribution from Alternate Focus to examine the Israeli-Palestine conflict. This 28-minute video first explores political barriers to any solution, and then possible resolutions. The video features interviews with Dr. Stephen Zunes (Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of San Francisco), Miko Peled (author of “The General’s Son”), and Jeff Warner (Jewish peace activist in Los Angeles and author of this review), interleaved with the filmmakers narrative are abundant modern and archival clips… [Also at YouTube]
Syrian Government and Rebels Up the Ante, While US Raises Implications of Chemical Weapons (audio)
Uprising Radio December 10, 2012. The source link and recording for this item are no longer available. Find best related links.
Behind the Headlines: the CIA and Post 9/11 National Security with NY Times Reporter Eric Schmitt (audio)
NPR/The Commonwealth Club November 19, 2012; Podcast & MP3
Stephen Zunes moderates this lively exchange with Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times senior writer Eric Schmitt on military, terrorism and national security challenges in the post-9/11 world.
Can U.S. Citizens End Israel’s Legal Impunity?
YES! Magazine November 21, 2012. Republished by Baltimore Nonviolence Center, Common Dreams, Transcend.org and Transnational.org: The great wish of the early Zionist leader Theodor Herzl was that Israel would be treated like “any other state.” Were that the case, there might be more rational and productive discourse regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which is particularly critical in light of Israel launching yet another devastating attack against civilian-populated areas.
The Rift Between the U.S. and Israeli Governments Regarding Iran (video)
Source is no longer available online. See related links.
Interview: The Palestine / Israel Conflict: The Root Causes of the Occupation and the US Involvement (audio)
KPFA Pacifica Radio: Letters and Politics
Source is no longer available online. Find more Zunes Radio interviews and other related links.
The Case Against War: Ten Years Later
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies, Sept. 11, 2012.
By Stephen Zunes. Republished by: Common Dreams, Transnational.org, The American Bear, and Promised Land Museum.
“Ten years ago, I wrote a series of articles for the Foreign Policy in Focus website, in which I put forth a series of arguments against the Bush administration’s push for a U.S. invasion of Iraq prior to the fateful congressional vote authorizing the illegal, unnecessary, and ultimately disastrous war. At the request of the editors of The Nation – the oldest continually published weekly magazine in the United States – I wrote a version entitled “The Case Against War,” which appeared on their website September 12, 2002, and as the cover story of the September 30 issue. It became one of the most widely circulated articles in the magazine’s 147-year-old history. Every congressional office received multiple copies. In the articles, I correctly predicted that an invasion would result in sectarian violence, terrorism, Islamist extremism, and a bloody counterinsurgency war that would be the most elaborate and expensive deployment of U.S. forces since the Second World War…”
U.S. Shares Responsibility for Rachel Corrie’s Death
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies, August 30, 2012. by Stephen Zunes; Republished by Antiwar.com, Common Dreams, Eurasia Review, Transnational.org, and others. On August 28, an Israeli court rejected a civil lawsuit against Israeli occupation forces for the 2003 murder of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old American peace activist killed in the Gaza Strip, upholding a severely flawed internal Israeli military investigation. Amnesty International strongly condemned the decision…
Interview: US intervention in Syria could lead to ‘Messy Situation’ (audio)
Source is no longer available online. See related links.
Interview: Arab Revolutions, U.S. Middle East Policy, Iran, and Israel-Palestine (audio)
KPFT Pacifica: Arab Voices Radio July 11, 2012
Dr. Stephen Zunes’ segment begins at 14 minutes.
Interview: U.S. Mid-East Policy in Relation to the Ongoing Uprising in Bahrain (audio)
Source is no longer available online. See related links.
U.S. in No Position to Condemn Alleged Russian Transfer of Helicopter Gunships to Syrian Regime
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies, June 13, 2012.
Republished by National Catholic Reporter & ZNetwork
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has claimed that “there are attack helicopters on the way from Russia to Syria,” though the Russian government denies the accusation. If true, it would be highly disturbing, given the Syrian regime’s widespread use of such weapons against unarmed civilians. Amnesty International and other human rights groups have called for an immediate end of arms transfers to the Syrian regime, particularly of weapons that have been used to target civilians… Thousands of Salvadoran civilians are believed to have been killed by U.S.-supplied helicopter gunships during the 1980s…
Congress Pushes for War with Iran
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies June 13, 2012.
Republished by National Catholic Reporter & ZNetwork
In another resolution apparently designed to prepare for war against Iran, the U.S. House of Representatives, in an overwhelmingly bipartisan 401–11 vote, has passed a resolution (HR 568) urging the president to oppose any policy toward Iran “that would rely on containment as an option in response to the Iranian nuclear threat…” Indeed, the rush to pass this bill appears to have been designed to undermine the ongoing international negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program…
Iraq: Remembering Those Responsible
Truthout Published 1 January 2012: Also at Common Dreams, Transnational.org, Peace and Justice Post and ZNetwork
The formal withdrawal of US troops from Iraq this month has led to a whole series of retrospectives on the invasion and the eight and a half years of occupation that followed as well as a host of unanswered questions.. of critical importance at this juncture is that we not allow the narratives on the war to understate its tragic consequences or those responsible for the war — both Republicans and Democrats — to escape their responsibility…
U.S. policy undermines moderate Palestinians
National Catholic Reporter October 28, 2011
The Palestinians declared an independent state back in 1988, which has been recognized by more than 130 of the world’s nations. The Obama administration, however, insists that it is still too early for Palestine to be admitted into the UN.
Congress and Its Colonialist Agenda
Truthout & Salem News (Oregon) July 15. 2011
Up until the mid-20th century, Western attitudes regarding national freedom essentially went like this: the independence of white Western nations (Great Britain, France, the United States etc.) was a given. Independence for nonwhite, non-Western nations (such as those in Africa, the Middle East and Asia), however, could only be under conditions granted by the occupying powers. The time at which these nations could be free, their specific boundaries and the conditions of their independence could only be reached through negotiations between the colonial occupiers and representatives
On Obama’s Middle East Speech (audio)
Source link and recording are no longer available. Find related links.
Obama’s Mideast Speech: Two Steps Back, One Step Forward
Foreign Policy In Focus /Institute for Policy
Studies May 20, 2011 & Huffington Post
President Barack Obama’s May 19 address on U.S. Middle East policy… failed to consistently assert principled U.S. support for human rights, democracy, or international law…