Global

For my father's generation, Gamal Abdel Nasser wasn't just another Arab leader; he set the standard by which all others have been measured, and none have quite reached it.

For the Arab masses, and Palestinians in particular, Nasser was an icon. His heroic image, in the eyes of Palestinians, took hold in Al-Faluja, a key pocket of resistance against the Zionist takeover of historic Palestine in 1948.

Back in 2016, I was convinced that, had Bernie Sanders won the Democratic presidential nomination, he would have beaten Donald Trump because he would have taken some of Trump’s White working-class voters.

America desperately needs a united front to restrain the wrecking ball of the Trump regime. While outraged opposition has been visible and vocal, it remains a far cry from developing a capacity to protect what’s left of democracy in the United States.

With the administration in its fourth month, the magnitude of the damage underway is virtually impossible for any individual to fully grasp. But none of us need a complete picture to understand that the federal government is now in the clutches of massively cruel and antidemocratic forces that have no intention of letting go.

thank you sammy roth for this important piece.

it's horrifying to see apostles of hate like vance, trump, bannon et al trashing the vital humanitarian creed for which this great pope worked in such good faith. it's clear that if jesus himself came back to preach the loving gospel he created, the MAGA hordes would have him again crucified. 

it's also horrifying to see the ecological nightmare california's utilities have imposed on us. the fires that ravaged pacific palisades were clearly climate induced, then sparked by their incompetent in ability to safely maintain power lines. 

had los angeles been rightfully covered in solar panels, connected with micro-grids, as would best be for our economy and much more, those fires would never have happened.

One might well ask how a group composed of little more than 3% of the US population has managed to gain control of the nation’s foreign policy, its legislature and executive branches, its media, its entertainment industry, its financial institutions, and its elite universities while also making the United States subservient to the wishes of a monstrous small state located seven thousand miles away and composed of its coreligionists? Well, it helps to have a great deal of money liberally applied to corrupt the existing political and economic systems, but that is not necessarily a good place to start as one might reflexively be accused of wielding a trope much favored by antisemites when discussing Zionist Jews, the group of which we are speaking. Alternatively perhaps, one might take an oblique approach by observing how the highly privileged and protected Zionists in question get rich living in America while having true loyalty to apartheid Israel, something that normally might be considered untenable if not borderline treasonous.

"Rights are granted to those who align with power," Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student, eloquently wrote from his cell. This poignant statement came soon after a judge ruled that the government had met the legal threshold to deport the young activist on the nebulous ground of "foreign policy".

To conquer a place is to fundamentally subdue its population. This must be clearly differentiated from 'occupation', a specific legal term that governs the relationship between a foreign "occupying power" and the occupied nation under international law, particularly the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The world mourns Pope Francis, a good, loving man who brought the Holy Mother Church back to the people and made his native Argentina proud.

Francis was a welcome change after the orthodoxy and rigidity of former Pope Benedict XVI who sent an icy chill through Catholicism. Francis did a lot to soften the image of Catholicism despite the many sexual and financial scandals that beset the church.

For me, a non-Catholic, the most important thing about the late pope, born Jose Bergoglio in Argentina, was his choice of papal name: Francisco in the Latin tongues.

He modeled himself after Saint Francis of Assisi, born in 1182, one of the most important and majestic figures in Catholic history. St. Francis was among the first spiritual leaders to call for the protection of the environment and humane treatment of and respect for all animals. The Franciscan Order was created in tribute to his teachings. St. Francis’ famous prayer for peace:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;