A Machiavellian fiasco: How ‘centrist’ Gantz resurrected Netanyahu, Israel’s right
April 22nd, 20200 It was intended to be a Machiavellian move, but the decision by Benny Gantz, leader of Israel’s Kahol Lavan (Blue and White) coalition, to join a Benjamin Netanyahu-led government is likely to destabilize the political fabric of Israeli society for years to come. In a surprising move, Gantz has entered into precarious political...
How Congress has changed
April 22nd, 20200 If you feel like Congress has become less productive, less functional and more partisan… you’re right. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how it’s changed over the years since I served there in the ‘60s to the ‘90s, and several issues help explain why it often struggles to get things done. Heightened partisanship may...
Making America safe again starts with humility and selflessness
April 16th, 20200 As a nurse who practiced end-of-life care, helping families and hospitals negotiate medical ethics, I am appalled by the lack of competence and courage in the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. Our piecemeal strategy lacks the humility to effectively adapt as the virus evolves. It fails miserably in empowering and protecting...
Outdated regulations hamper charitable giving when the world needs it most
April 16th, 20200 Americans generously donate more than $427 billion annually to charities—a powerful driver of positive impact as communities across the country, including in Michigan, respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Charitable giving plays a vital role in supporting high-need communities, both at home and abroad. Religious faith often plays a role...
Spreading the virus of occupation: Spitting as a weapon in the hand of colonial Israel
April 15th, 20200 Spitting at someone is a universal insult. In Israel, however, spitting at Palestinians is an entirely different story. Now that we know the deadly coronavirus can be transmitted through saliva droplets, Israeli soldiers and illegal Jewish settlers are working extra hard to spit at as many Palestinians, their cars, doorknobs and so...
Staying home is our only weapon against COVID-19
April 15th, 20200 I’m accustomed to fighting violent crime, arresting career criminals and implementing police policy to positively impact the lives of others. But COVID-19 is not a problem that one person alone can tackle. If we’re going to beat this deadly virus we must do it together. I desperately urge every Michigander to use unity as our weapon...
Coronavirus: Can business owners that are forced to close or limit operations recover their income losses?
April 2nd, 20200 By Rabih Hamawi, JD Over the past week, I have received many calls from business owners asking if they may recover business income losses because they have been forced to temporarily suspend or limit their business operations due to COVID-19. The answer is simple: It depends. It depends on the language in the insurance policy,...
‘Zionist’ Biden in his own words: ‘My name is Joe Biden, and everybody knows I love Israel’
March 18th, 20204 "I am a Zionist. You don't have to be a Jew to be a Zionist," current Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden, said in April 2007, soon before he was chosen to be Barack Obama’s running mate in the 2008 elections. Biden is, of course, correct, because Zionism is a political movement that is rooted in 20th century nationalism...
‘The Donald Trump I know’: Abbas’ U.N. speech and the breakdown of Palestinian politics
February 25th, 20200 A precious moment has been squandered, as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had the chance to right a historical wrong by reinstating Palestinian national priorities at the United Nations Security Council on February 11, through a political discourse that is completely independent from Washington and its allies. For a long...
Crisis and opportunity: The ‘Deal of the Century’ challenge for Palestinians
February 5th, 20200 After several postponements, President Trump has finally revealed the details of his Middle East plan, dubbed “Deal of the Century”, in a press conference in Washington on January 28. Standing triumphantly beside Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must have surely understood that the timing of the announcement, only...
Trump’s Israel-Palestine “peace” plan violates international law
February 1st, 20200 By Stephen Zunes, Truthout Donald Trump’s long-awaited “deal of the century” between Israel and Palestine essentially gives Israel’s far right coalition government everything it wanted. This Middle East “peace” deal allows Israel to annex vast stretches of the Palestinian West Bank (which has been under...
The newly formed Lebanese cabinet deserves a chance
January 24th, 20200 By Ghassan Michel Rubeiz* A popular uprising forced the resignation of the Lebanese prime minister and his cabinet last October. But a strong self-serving government and a very unpopular parliament are still operating with full force. The uprising has a long way to go to achieve its aspirations for a radical change in the political...
The jeopardy of media bias against Palestine
January 22nd, 20200 Jeopardy! is an American television game show that has been on the air for decades, with nearly 8,000 episodes to date. It is a trivia competition that quizzes contestants on general knowledge, and they receive cash rewards for each correct response. In a recently broadcasted episode recorded a few months ago, one question asked...
A third choice for the Lebanese crisis
January 16th, 20200 How did Lebanon end up on the brink of financial collapse? A country that many have called in the past the Switzerland of the Middle East and the birthplace of Khalil Gibran and Kamel Al-Sabbah. With the third largest shipping company (CMA-CGM) in the world belonging to a Lebanese family, the country benefits from one of the richest...
Fixing the system is up to all of us
January 15th, 20200 You no doubt remember the old line attributed to Ben Franklin when he was asked what kind of government the Constitutional Convention had created: “A republic, if you can keep it!” Well, I’ve noticed an interesting thing in recent years: It’s got bi-partisan appeal. Last fall, for instance, within a few weeks of each other,......
It’s never been more important for every Michigander to be counted in the U.S. Census
January 15th, 20200 The census impacts everyone from seniors to students, kids and parents and our local businesses and neighborhoods. Participating in the census is a civic duty as important as voting to our democracy. To help get the word out, the state of Michigan has launched the Be Counted campaign to communicate the importance of completing the...The assassination of Soleimani reflects U.S. desperation in the Middle East
By Ramzy Baroud & Romana Rubeo By killing top Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani, American and Israeli leaders demonstrated the idiom “out of the frying pan into the fire.” President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are both politically and legally embattled — the former has just been impeached......
Local physician disgusted by president’s attacks on healthcare
December 12th, 20190 By Dr. Maissa Hider As a physician who has dedicated her career to helping the sick and those in need, I’m disgusted by Donald Trump’s attacks on healthcare and his failure to take action on prescription drug prices. While this president promised healthcare for all and lower prescription drug prices, the only thing we’ve...
Money, power and turf: Winning the Middle East media war at any cost
December 11th, 20190 It is hardly surprising to see Middle Eastern countries at the bottom of the World Press Freedom Index, as the worst violators of freedom of the press. But equally alarming is the complete polarization of public opinion as a result of self-serving media and, bankrolled by rich Arab countries, whose only goal is to serve their specific,...
How do we keep our democracy healthy?
November 20th, 20190 Representative democracy is based on a simple premise. It’s that ordinary citizens can make satisfactory judgments on complex public policy and political issues — or at least grasp them well enough to decide who should be dealing with them. But the significance of that premise isn’t simple at all. It means that our country’s...
How Western media bias allows Israel to get away with murder in Gaza
November 20th, 20190 An Israeli attack on Gaza was imminent and not because of any provocations by Palestinian groups in the besieged, impoverished Gaza Strip. The Israeli military escalation was foreseeable because it factors neatly in Israel’s contentious political scene. The war was not a question of “if”, but “when.” The answer came on......
A lesson for the Palestinian leadership: Real reasons behind Israel’s arrest and release of Labadi, Mi’ri
November 13th, 20190 The release on November 6 of two Jordanian nationals, Heba al-Labadi and Abdul Rahman Mi’ri, from Israeli prisons was a bittersweet moment. The pair were finally reunited with their families after harrowing experiences in Israel. Sadly, thousands of Palestinian prisoners are still denied their freedom, still subjected to all sorts of...
Microsoft should not fund Israeli spying on Palestinians
November 6th, 20190 The act of Palestinian activists covering their faces during anti-Israeli occupation rallies is an old practice that spans decades. The masking of the face, often by Kufyias — traditional Palestinian scarves that grew to symbolize Palestinian resistance — is far from being a fashion statement. Instead, it is a survival technique,......
She deserves our support: Betty McCollum wants the U.S. to stop subsidizing torture of Palestinian children
October 23rd, 20190 In December 2018, a 17-year-old Palestinian teen, Ayham Sabah, was sentenced by an Israeli military court to 35 years in prison for his alleged role in a stabbing attack targeting an Israeli soldier in an illegal Jewish settlement in the West Bank. Sabah was only 14-years-old when the alleged attack took place. Another alleged...
The last lifeline: The real reason behind Abbas’ call for elections
October 16th, 20190 The call by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for elections in the occupied territories is a political ploy. There will be no true, democratic elections under Abbas’ leadership. The real question is: Why did he make the call in the first place? On September 26, Abbas took on the world’s most important political......
