In Baghdad, gunmen killed a finance commission official. A contractor was shot dead as he was driving his car in Mahaweel. In Mosul, gunmen killed a staff member working for the oil ministry. A bomb targeting a Sahwa member in Hawija wounded two bystanders. A...
Four years ago, President Barack Obama quoted the beloved 13th century Persian poet Sa’di in his first Nowruz message to the Iranian people. The address, with its veneer of peace and diplomacy, was a well-received gesture to both civil society and the leadership in...
Tunisian families have begun to dread knocks on their doors, or late-night phone calls, fearing that the messenger will bear the news that their son has been smuggled out of the country to join the “jihad” in Syria. Families here told IPS that they have no way of...
“At least we are not treated like dogs and made to feel so uncomfortable,” Amjad Samara, 30, a labourer from Nablus in the northern West Bank told IPS as he and a group of Palestinians waited at the checkpoint near Qalqilia to cross into Israel for their day job....
No doubt exists that North Korea’s recent belligerent and irresponsible rhetoric is kinda scary. The question, of course, is how to respond to it. The usual response of a superpower, which conducts an overly militarized foreign policy, is counter-threats and...
The sun was setting over Capitol Hill as we took up our positions. All entrances were covered: those were the orders coming down from on high, and who were we – mere pawns in the game – to question why, or (heaven forfend!) disobey? We did what we were told. And we...
It started from the first moment. The President of the United States came to Ramallah. He visited the Mukata’a, the “compound” which serves as the office of the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. One cannot enter the Mukata’a without noticing the...
