Expert Analyst: International Politics, Middle East & Nonviolent Action
Source Links to these are no longer available. Al Jazeera, August 15, 2026: with Dr. Setareh Sadeqi, on Trump’s threats Al Jazeera, August 15, 2026: Trump said he’ll declare the Strait of Hormuz a US territory Al Jazeera, August 15,…
Al Jazeera Media View, July 28, 2026, 8 mins.Relations with Israel weaken as negotiations on hold while US reassesses Iran War and related policy.
Wyoming Star, July 28, 2026: Zunes traced the roots of the current impasse back to Trump’s original strategic error: “Unlike the 2015 nuclear deal – which was extremely detailed, enforceable, and left no room for ambiguity – Trump’s Memorandum of…
Zunes quoted in Wyoming Star, April 10, 2026, by Joe Yans: “Despite US and Israeli claims to the contrary, Pakistani mediators and others have confirmed that the agreement for a two-week halt to the fighting and the reopening of the…
BBC Television, September 6, 2025, (4 mins.). Zunes’s analysis of latest developments in Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria.
In These Times, September 4, 2025, by Stephen Zunes Nearly two years in to the U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza, there are clear signals the Democratic Party’s base is moving far away from supporting the Israeli government and its war machine.…
KTVU Television, August 18, 2025, a Bay Area network affiliate, immediately following the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska a week and a half ago. Zunes’s segment starts at the 1:30 mark.
The Progressive June 19, 2025 and June 21 at PeaceandJustice.org & SmirkingChimp.com asTrump (and Biden) Could Have Forestalled War With Iran If They Wanted.How the war on Iran isn’t really about containing Iran’s nuclear program, since staying in the 2015…
Americans for Middle East Understanding, April 27, 2025The Trump administration will certainly take a more hardline policy in support of Israel’s right-wing leadership and in opposition to Palestinian rights. Given President Biden’s strident support for Netanyahu’s wars on Palestinian and…
Serf City Times included this transcript of Dr. Zunes’ speech at a rally in Santa Cruz protesting U.S. Rep. Jimmy Panetta’s strident support for Israel’s far right government, placing him further right than even the Biden administration — and the…
This Inter Press Service article quotes Dr. Stephen Zunes, Nov. 8 2024 by Thalif Deen. “This initiative reflects the view of the vast majority of the world’s governments and peoples and is consistent with imperatives of international humanitarian law, but…
Dr. Zunes speaks for the first seven minutes on U.S. policy then briefly again at the 1:11:30 mark [source]
Twelve more interviews on KPFA Evening News aired Sundays on KPFA-FM and Pacifica Radio Network affiliated stations October 7, 2023 through July 2024
“Flashpoints” on KPFA-FM and affiliated stations (20-minute interview begins at the 13:15 mark): Dr. Zunes contrasts blatant censorship and violent police suppression of Gaza War campus protests with anti-apartheid protests of the 1980s.
The Progressive, March 1, 2022: There’s No Justification for Russia’s Aggression, But U.S. Double Standards on Illegal War Are Hard to Stomach: Nothing can excuse Putin’s invasion, but the hypocrisy could hardly be more striking. Al Jazeera quotes Zunes March…
The recently announced deal for the United States to provide Israel with 20 new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jets marks yet another blow for arms control advocates and those who had hoped the Obama administration would resist continuing with the Bush administration’s policy of further militarizing the Middle East. Once again rejecting calls from the peace and human rights community to link arms transfers to adherence to human rights and international law, the $2.75 billion deal is one of the largest arms procurements by the state of Israel. This is the first part of a series of US taxpayer-funded arms transfers to Israel that is expected to total more than $30 billion over the next decade.
The Pentagon has announced a $60 billion arms package to the repressive family dictatorship in Saudi Arabia, the largest arms sale of its kind in history. Rejecting the broad consensus of arms control advocates that the Middle East is too militarized already and that the Saudis already possess military capabilities well in excess of their legitimate security needs, the Obama administration is effectively insisting that this volatile region does not yet have enough armaments and that the United States must send even more.
President George W Bush announced during his recent Middle East trip that he is formally serving notice to Congress of his administration’s decision to approve the sale of bomb-guidance kits to Saudi Arabia. This announcement follows notification on five other arms deals to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait that are part of a $20 billion package of additional armaments over the next decade to the family dictatorships of Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf emirates announced by President George W. Bush last summer….
THE timid opposition in Congress to the Bush Administration’s announced sale of 72 highly sophisticated F-15E jet fighters to Saudi Arabia shouldn’t have come as a surprise to anyone.