As victors of World War II in 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union immediately began preparing for a new conflict that would pit the two superpowers against one another in a struggle for global supremacy. Realizing the need for oil and a base of operations in the Middle East, the United States cultivated … Read more
Several weeks ago, an unnamed senior official from the Obama administration caused a stir when, in an interview with The Atlantic’s Jeffery Goldberg, he said of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit”. Most commentators, Goldberg included, took it as a sign of the growing tensions between Netanyahu and … Read more
It’s taken until now—in the wind chill of late October—for me to come to terms with the fact that it’s not summer anymore. I’m usually not subject to delusions about when one season ends and another begins—we have solstices and equinoxes to make easy work of that—but for the first time in 22 years, I … Read more
HPR writers weigh in on the response of the United States and the international community to ISIS. Image source: Business Insider Australia
“We know how to deal with them,” said Vice President Joe Biden on the issue of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant earlier this month at the Harvard Institute of Politics. The United States has dealt with many terrorist organizations in the past, and ISIL is merely the latest iteration, he said. Though … Read more
The United States is supporting, funding, and arming “terrorists.” Not through back channels, middlemen, Swiss bank accounts or CIA covert operations, but openly and publicly. The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) was designated as a foreign terrorist organization on October 8, 1997 by the U.S. Department of State after thirteen years of insurgency, including bombing attacks … Read more
[BIL’IN, WEST BANK] Every Friday, locals of this run-down Palestinian village in the West Bank gather with international human rights activists and the rare Israeli to protest the wall built to separate Bil’in from the adjacent Jewish settlement of Modi’in Illit. A Swiss ambulance stands by to treat protesters hit with tear gas or rubber … Read more
My father originally came to the United Kingdom, and later, the United States, as a refugee of Saddam Hussein’s campaign against the Kurds. Several days ago, he took us to the house of one of the only other Kurdish families in the state. The dinner was sprawled out on a colorful Persian rug that … Read more
June 20 is the United Nations’ World Refugee Day, an effort to commemorate and recognize the millions of human beings across the globe that have been pushed out of their homes as a result of various conflicts and wars. This year’s World Refugee Day serves as a grim reminder of the numerous ongoing political and … Read more
Iraq isn’t South Vietnam, but some of the same dynamics are driving U.S. policy A relentless enemy, thought vanquished, returns with a devastating offensive. An American-trained security force splinters and collapses with embarrassing swiftness. The threatened government pleads for U.S. intervention to save the day. This was South Vietnam, April of 1975. After a whirlwind … Read more