As a graduate of the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, I was distressed to learn that one of its students dropped out of a postgraduate program due to what he claimed was a “toxic antisemitic environment” on campus. I studied at SOAS, a world-renowned institution, from 1969 to 1970, completing an […]
An eight-minute music video starring an Israeli and a Tunisian has caused a backlash in Tunisia. Peace Between Neighbors was released last week by the Arab Council for Regional Integration, an organization dedicated to promoting a culture of coexistence and a spirit of partnership between Israelis and Arabs in the Middle East. The video, featuring […]
With just a few days remaining in the year, I think it’s safe to say that absolutely no one on this beautiful planet will miss 2020, which forever will be synonymous with the dread, burden and grief of the coronavirus pandemic. This contagion started in the Chinese city of Wuhan last December or January and […]
Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, the British-born Islamic fundamentalist charged with masterminding the abduction of American newspaper correspondent Daniel Pearl in 2002, was released from prison by a court in Pakistan several days ago. It’s a disappointing, morally repellant verdict that the international community should not accept with indifference or silence. Understandably enough, the judgment stunned and […]
The specter of fascism haunts Germany. Seventy five years after the ignominious defeat of Adolf Hitler’s racist regime in World War II, far-right extremism remains a gnawing problem in contemporary Germany. Thomas Haldenwang, the director of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency — the Office for the Protection of the Constitution — said recently that right-wing extremism […]
The Jonathan Jay Pollard affair, a highly contentious episode in Israel’s bilateral relationship with the United States, has reached one of its final chapters after 35 years of acrimony. On November 20, the U.S. Justice Department allowed Pollard’s parole restrictions to expire, enabling him to remove the wrist monitor that tracked his movements and permitting […]
Foreign affairs analyst Christiane Amanpour stumbled into a minefield by comparing Kristallnacht, the Nazi pogrom in Germany, to the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass, was orchestrated by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime. A moment of infamy, it erupted on November 9, 1938. The nation-wide violence lasted for two days […]
The United States was on the cusp of a new era on November 7 after Joe Biden was declared the winner of the contentious U.S. presidential election. Having triumphed in Pennsylvania, his home state, and having increased his lead in Nevada, Arizona and Georgia, Biden and his vice-presidential running mate, Kamala Harris, the first woman […]
Britain’s left-of-center Labour Party continues to be haunted and torn apart by the checkered record of its former leader, Jeremy Corbyn, in confronting the specter of antisemitism within its ranks. Jonathan Ashworth, the party’s current shadow health secretary, was exactly right when he described Corbyn’s handling of it as “a shameful period in our history.” As […]
During his second and final televised debate with Joe Biden last month, President Donald Trump claimed to be ignorant about QAnon, an unfounded American conspiracy theory that fosters racial and religious prejudice and poses a potential terrorist threat, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “I hate to say that I know nothing about it,” […]