Truthout, June 25, 2013: No one in the organization’s leadership could explain anything objectionable in the paper, which they had not actually read, but were apparently convinced by a right-wing campaign that I was “anti-Israel” and “anti-American.”
Category: Middle East
Middle East Overview
US policy weakens Iran’s pro-democracy movement
[Santa Cruz Sentinel & Transnational.org, Also National Catholic Reporter,
May 31, 2013, updated Sept. 11, 2018
While there are contending factions vying for the country’s relatively weak presidency, the narrow ideological spectrum within which candidates are allowed to run offers little hope for change.
Despite Horrific Repression, the U.S. Should Stay Out of Syria
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies May15, 2013
[Republished by Common Dreams, Huffington Post and Truthout]
The desperate desire to “do something” has led to increasing calls for the U.S. to provide military aid to armed insurgents or even engage in direct military intervention…
Israel, Syria and the United States
Truthout May 13, 2013: Zunes’s review of the last decade of Israel, Syria and US relations — culminating in Israel’s latest bombing raid on Syria — details cross-purposes and missed opportunities.
More Zunes Syria articles.
More Zunes Syria articles.
Interview: On Syria (audio)
KPFA Pacifica Radio, Stephen Zunes on Syria
On Sojourner Truth Radio May 7, 2013
Interview: Scope of Syrian War Widens Following Deadly Israeli Strikes on Damascus (audio)
Free Speech Radio News May 6, 2013
Last week’s Israeli airstrikes [killed] least 100 Syrian soldiers… a UN human rights commission investigating the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria said it had “no conclusive findings.” Read Stephen Zunes’s article, “The US Has No Credibility Dealing With Chemical Weapons”
Last week’s Israeli airstrikes [killed] least 100 Syrian soldiers… a UN human rights commission investigating the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria said it had “no conclusive findings.” Read Stephen Zunes’s article, “The US Has No Credibility Dealing With Chemical Weapons”
Syria: U.S. involvement could make things even worse
May 3, 2013: The source is no longer available. More Syria articles.
The U.S. and Chemical Weapons: No Leg to Stand On
Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies, May 2, 2013
[Republished by Alternet, Ander Niews Week (Netherlands), Common Dreams, Greanville Post, Huffington Post and the Middle East Institute]
Interview: Egypt: Election and IMF Loan (audio)
The source link and recording for this item are
no longer available. Find best related links.
Syria and Chemical Weapons (audio)
The source link and recording for this item are no longer available. Find best related links.
Don’t Blame the Iraq Debacle on the Israel Lobby
Santa Cruz Sentinel March 29, 2013 | UPDATED: Sept. 11, 2018
[Republished by Foreign Policy In Focus/Institute for Policy Studies and Truthout] This month’s 10th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq raised the question why the U.S. made such a tragic choice. As many of us argued in the lead-up to the war, claims that Iraq possessed “weapons of mass destruction” the Iraqi government had operational ties to al-Qaida were false. Similarly, the corrupt and repressive sectarian government the U.S. helped establish in Baghdad has undermined any pretense the war was about promoting democracy.
10 years after the Iraq invasion, Washington still hasn’t learned
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…
Democrats Share the Blame for Tragedy of Iraq War
Truthout.org March 17, 2013: On this tenth anniversary of the Iraq War, it is important to remember the 4,500 Americans killed, the far larger number permanently wounded, the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed and millions maimed or displaced, the trillion dollars of US taxpayers’ money squandered (and the resulting cutbacks through sequestration), the continued costs of the war through veterans’ benefits and interest on the national debt, and the anti-American extremism in reaction to the invasion and occupation which has spread. All could have been avoided if the Democratic-controlled Senate hadn’t voted to authorize this illegal and unnecessary war and occupation.
The Arab Spring, Two Years Later (video)
March 12, 2013: DU Center for Middle East Studies Professor Stephen Zunes discusses the current state of the Arab world in the wake of the 2011 uprisings, the strength and successes of non-violent sociopolitical movements in the region, and the corresponding shifts now required of U.S. foreign policy. [YouTube link]
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.]
Anti-Iraq War Speech on C-SPAN (video)
C-Span January 23, 2013. The source link and recording are no longer available. Find best related links.
Israel’s settlements outside official border flout international law
National Catholic Reporter January 19, 2013
In mid-December, Israeli officials approved plans for the construction of more than 2,600 new homes to be built on Givat Hamatos, a hill on the outskirts of Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem. This settlement would be the first major new Jewish neighborhood in Jerusalem outside of Israel’s internationally recognized borders since 1997…
Supporting Nonviolence in Syria
Foreign Policy December 20, 2012, by Stephen Zunes
[Also at Truthout.org and International Center for Nonviolent Conflict]
While a growing number of people are calling for increased military aid to armed insurgents or even direct military intervention, as the French government has said it will consider, to support the armed opposition would likely exacerbate the Syrian people’s suffering and appear to validate the tragic miscalculation by parts of the Syrian opposition to supplant their bold and impressive nonviolent civil insurrection with an armed insurgency…
U.S. policy on Gaza crisis rife with contradiction
National Catholic Reporter December 19, 2012
The Obama administration’s reaction to last month’s Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip is emblematic of its policy contradictions.
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]