Category: Human Rights

The Religious Element of Terrorism

The history of religions especially monotheistic ones such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam are rife with examples of cruelty, war and even genocide done in God’s name. So should people avoid the phrase “Islamic terrorism,” asks William Blum.

The Terror from the Gun

On the campaign trail and the cable networks, it’s all ISIS all the time as Americans react with fear and fury over the San Bernardino massacre. But the U.S. crisis of gun violence goes way beyond the few cases of…

The Incredible Shrinking President

Exclusive: Trying to soothe American fears about “terrorism,” President Obama glossed over the dangerous contradictions in his own policy, particularly the fact that Saudi Arabia, Turkey and other “allies” have been helping Al Qaeda and ISIS, notes Daniel Lazare.

The Tricky Definition of ‘Terrorism’

The classic definition of terrorism as violence against civilians to make a political point may make sense but the term’s elastic use even applied to attacks on U.S. soldiers operating in foreign lands has transformed the word into an epithet…

Obama’s Credibility Crisis

Exclusive: Inside Official Washington’s bubble, the Important People believe their “group think” is the envy of the world, but the truth is that their credibility has collapsed to such a degree that their propaganda can’t even match up with the head-chopping videos…

PBS Joins the MSM’s Syria-Russia Bias

Mainstream U.S. media systematically excludes points of view on world affairs that deviate from Official Washington’s “group think.” With no lessons learned from the Iraq-WMD debacle, the MSM only lets on establishment or right-wing pundits with conformist points of view on crises with Syria and Russia, notes…

Suffering from Global Warming First

Indigenous people who live close to the land are seeing the effects of global warming sooner and more alarmingly than many urban dwellers and thus are demanding a strong voice in the Paris Climate Summit, as Native and Indian leader…

What to Do about the ISIS ‘Caliphate’

While the first necessity in dealing with a threat like ISIS is to finally get Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar to cut off its financial and military life lines, the terror group’s claim to a territorial caliphate presents a unique…

A Way Forward on Israel-Palestine

Prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace have rarely looked dimmer with Prime Minister Netanyahu unwilling to make concessions and President Obama incapable of applying pressure, but one option would be to abandon the so-called Quartet and embrace the Arab Peace Initiative, says Alon Ben-Meir.

Learning to Love the ‘Drone War’

The mainstream U.S. news media is so in the tank on the “war on terror” that it ignores critical information that the American people should know, such as the public complaint from four former Air Force drone operators that the…