International Politics

The Religious Right Loves Vladimir Putin More Than Donald Trump Does

One of the most notable but mostly uncovered political developments in recent years has been how enthusiastically many Religious Right leaders have embraced Russia’s anti-democratic president, former KGB official Vladimir Putin. It seems even more remarkable that the Republican Party’s presidential nominee has been lavishing praise on Putin even as Russia maneuvers to diminish America’s influence in the world. As president, Putin has consolidated his power through attacks on the independent media, the persecution of political opponents, and restrictions on civil society. He has annexed…

Emails Show Newsmax Publisher Getting State Department Help After Big Clinton Foundation Donation

Newly released emails show that a Clinton Foundation adviser asked one of Hillary Clinton’s top State Department aides to provide “‘air’ support” for a Clinton Foundation donor who sought to set up a meeting with the U.S. ambassador to Panama to help with a legal dispute. Emails released on Thursday by Judicial Watch show that Clinton Foundation adviser Doug Band forwarded an email to Hillary Clinton deputy chief of staff Huma Abedin from Christopher Ruddy, the CEO of Newsmax, a conservative online publication. Despite his ideological bent,…

American Jews’ Opinions Toward Israel Shifted As Netanyahu Embraced the GOP

Gradually but inexorably, the nature of the American Jewish attachment to Israel began to change, to become more and more the province of the Orthodox. I do not begrudge the Orthodox their dominance. They didn’t steal Zionism from anyone. To a certain degree, non-Orthodox Jews have abdicated it. Regardless, the net effect is clear. Survey data tells us that Orthodox Jews in this country are twice as likely as Conservative Jews, four times as likely as Reform Jews, and eight times as likely as unaffiliated…

Arab Rulers Have No Use for Their Young Adults

Arab countries are full of young people frustrated by a lack of jobs; questioning traditional authority; bittersweet about the West, its liberties and its power; and plugged-in enough to know that their lot is worse than that of many of their peers around the world. “Young people just want to live and not make trouble, but they are unable to break into the political, social, economic systems of their countries,” says Rami Khouri of the American University of Beirut. “They have to create parallel universes…

What Does ISIS Want? The Group Has Released a Manifesto to the West

Editor’s note: The following essay was released by the self-described Islamic State in its English-language online magazine, Dabiq, around July 25, 2016. As it is not available in text form, we are reprinting it for educational purposes. Shortly following the blessed attack on a sodomite, Crusader nightclub by the mujahid Omar Mateen, American politicians were quick to jump into the spotlight and denounce the shooting, declaring it a hate crime, an act of terrorism, and an act of senseless violence. A hate crime? Yes. Muslims…

Like It or Not, Genetically Modified Food Can Prevent Starvation

There’s a food crisis looming over India. Farmers in the country currently lose some Rs50,000 crore ($5 billion) every year to pests and diseases. Droughts, coupled with a lack of irrigation facilities, are exacerbating the problem. Prices for pulses—a category of grains that includes lentils and chickpeas, which are staples for Indians—have been rising lately. The situation may only worsen as the United Nations estimates that the country’s population, currently at 1.2 billion, will reach 1.8 billion by 2050. Scientists already have a solution: genetically…

Foreign Governments Have a History of Intervening in American Elections

Something quite remarkable happened this morning. Donald J. Trump, the Republican nominee for president, beseeched the government of Russia, a foreign and quasi-hostile country, to hack the private email account of Hillary Clinton, his Democratic opponent. “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” he told a room of flummoxed reporters. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.” For those few readers who aren’t up to speed, let’s back up a step. It…

‘Communist’ China Is Going to Ban Ad Blocking Software

There are apparently 159 million people who block ads on their mobile devices in China. Desktop numbers are relatively low by comparison. All of them, though, are going to have a fundamental right snatched from them come September, when their government will take away their right to block ads. That’s because just last week China issued its Internet Advertising Interim Rules, Article 16 of which will place a ban on ad blocking. Aside from the oppressive part, the new regulations will seek to define what…

The Beginning of the End for House Saud

Between the crash in the price of oil and the Kingdom’s flailing war with the neighboring Houthis, the Saudi’s fortunes have taken a precipitous turn for the worse. Both crises have been handled with the impressive ineptitude, long trademarked by the House of Saud. Their scheme to bankrupt their geopolitical and economic rivals, Russia and the U.S. fracking industry respectively, via flooding the oil market with cheap crude, has backfired gloriously. The war in Yemen has likewise become an unmitigated disaster, an enormous economic drain on…

The Israeli Left Has Essentially Collapsed

Some research reveals an interesting pattern in Israeli history compared to other industrialized Western nations: the complete and utter collapse of the Israeli Left since the founding of Israel, and the steady ascendancy of the Israeli Right – and not an Anglophone-style milquetoast Right, but a nationalistic and religiously-inclined Right descended from militiamen and terrorists. Here’s my attempt to numerically chart the collapse of the Israeli Left: Israel’s proportional representation system has wrought a litany of factional, religious, regional, and ethnic parties since the country’s founding,…

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