Rockets land on base hosting U.S. forces before pope’s visit to Iraq, contractor dead from “cardiac episode”
March 3rd, 20210 BAGHDAD — At least 10 rockets landed on Wednesday at Iraq’s Ain al-Asad air base that hosts U.S., coalition and Iraqi forces, the Iraqi military said, two days before Pope Francis is due to visit the country. Wednesday's attack is the second rocket attack in Iraq this month. The attack caused no significant losses, Iraqi’s...
Yemenis reel from poverty, hunger as U.N. pleads for funds and war’s end
March 1st, 20210 SANAA — Unable to find work, Ahmed Farea has sold everything, including his wife’s gold, to feed and house two young daughters in one small room. Elsewhere in Yemen’s capital Sanaa, widow Mona Muhammad has work, but struggles to buy anything more nutritious than rice for her four children amid high prices. And in a nearby...
Genome study reveals Arab specific genetic risks
February 27th, 20210 DOHA, QATAR — A new study can help with future research into the genetic risk factors that are specific to the Arab population, including those that are shared with other ethnicities. A group of researchers at the Qatar Foundation (QF) have reported the first and largest genetic association study in the Middle East, published...
Pentagon: U.S. carries out airstrikes against Iraqi militia facilities in eastern Syria
February 26th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. – On Thursday, President Biden ordered U.S. military airstrikes in eastern Syria, on the border with Iraq, against facilities belonging to what the Pentagon described as "Iran-backed militia", in a calibrated response to recent rocket attacks against U.S. targets in Iraq. The strikes appeared to be limited in scope,...
Vaccines begin showing results, new COVID-19 cases decline and flatten
February 26th, 20210 With a third COVID-19 vaccine around the corner, current vaccination efforts have already begun proving effective in curbing the pandemic in the U.S. and the world. A peer-reviewed Israeli study of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine showed the vaccine to be highly effective in preventing symptomatic coronavirus infections under real-world...
Dingell, dozens of law makers ask Biden for more transparency on U.S. involvement in Yemen war
February 25th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Dearborn) is joining dozens of lawmakers in urging transparency from the Biden administration regarding U.S. involvement in the Saudi/UAE-led coalition’s war in Yemen as the U.S. ends its support for "offensive" operations. In a letter expressing their strong support for President...
Yemenis in the San Joaquin Valley: The embodiment of pride, duty and loyalty
February 22nd, 20210 By Nikhil Misra-Bhambri Most visitors to California, “The Golden State”, are unfamiliar with the large swath of barren farmland covering the state’s entire interior. Among the hardy immigrant laborers working the farms in the interior are a group of men from Yemen who started arriving in the 1950s to flee their nation’s...
Europe will redefine itself despite political shift in the U.S.
February 20th, 20210 Despite the long-awaited political change in Washington as Democratic President Joe Biden has officially become the 46th president of the United States, Europe is unlikely to resume its previously unhindered reliance on its trans-Atlantic partner. The four years of Donald Trump were rife with tension and strife between the U.S. and...
Lebanese court removes investigator who charged politicians over Beirut blast
February 19th, 20210 BEIRUT — On Thursday, a Lebanese court dismissed a judge who had charged top politicians with negligence over last year’s Beirut port explosion, infuriating families of victims who said it showed that the state would never hold powerful men to account. Judge Fadi Sawan had led the investigation into one of the largest non-nuclear...
Biden ready to return to Iran nuclear deal; lifts Trump-era sanctions
February 19th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Biden administration, through Secretary of State Antony Blinken, affirmed on Thursday it is willing to come to the negotiation table with Iran over a return to a nuclear accord, if Tehran came into full compliance with the deal. The Iran Nuclear Deal, first struck in 2015, is aimed at preventing the country...
Israel indicates it may not engage with Biden on Iran nuclear deal
February 16th, 20210 TEL AVIV — The Biden administration and Israel seem to have embarked on an uncertain and rocky relationship, in contrast to what the country's right-wing government enjoyed with former President Trump. More friction arose this week, with Israel throwing cold water on U.S. hopes to engage with the country on the topic of Iran and its...
No phone call: Some speculate Netanyahu “ghosted” by Biden
February 12th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — Though it took former President Trump a mere two days after his inauguration to call Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu, President Biden is yet to do so. Biden has called many world leaders in the first three weeks of his presidency, including leaders of Russia, China, France, Japan and more. Israeli diplomats and...
UAE’s Hope Probe enters orbit in first Arab Mars mission
February 12th, 20210 DUBAI — The United Arab Emirates’ first mission to Mars reached the red planet and entered orbit on Tuesday after a seven-month, 494 million-km (307 million-mile) journey, allowing it to start sending data about the Martian atmosphere and climate. The Mars program is part of the UAE’s efforts to develop its scientific and...
Blinken stops short of endorsing Trump’s recognition of the Golan Heights as Israel
February 12th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Monday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken stopped short of endorsing the Trump administration’s recognition of the occupied Golan Heights as part of Israel, instead noting that the territory was important for Israel’s security. Former President Trump officially granted U.S. recognition of the Golan as Israeli...
“Freedom is never voluntarily given”: Palestinian boycott of Israel is not racist, it is anti-racist
February 11th, 20210 Claims made by Democratic New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Yang in a recent op-ed in the Jewish weekly, “The Forward”, point to the prevailing ignorance that continues to dominate the U.S. discourse on Palestine and Israel. Yang, a former Democratic presidential candidate, is vying for the Jewish vote in New York City.......
Our mutual fight: The case against Pakistani normalization with Israel
February 6th, 20210 The Pakistani government should never, under any circumstances and no matter the pressure, normalize with Israel. Doing so is not only dangerous — as it will embolden an already vile, racist, violent apartheid Israel — but it would also be considered a betrayal of a historic legacy of mutual solidarity, collective affinity and...
International Criminal Court rules it has jurisdiction over Palestinian Territories
February 5th, 20210 AMSTERDAM - The International Criminal Court ruled on Friday that it has jurisdiction over war crimes or atrocities committed in the Palestinian Territories, paving the way for a criminal investigation, despite Israeli objections. Judges said their decision was based on jurisdictional rules in the Hague-based court’s founding......
Lebanese filmmaker and Hezbollah critic Lokman Slim shot dead
February 5th, 20210 BEIRUT — Activist, publisher and filmaker Lokman Slim was found dead in a car in Southern Lebanon on Thursday. Slim died from four bullets in the head and one in the back. Slim’s sister Rasha al-Ameer suggested he had been murdered because of his ardent criticism of Shi’a Hezbollah. He was last seen after visiting a poet...
Biden seeks to raise refugee cap to 125,000
February 4th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Thursday, President Biden said he seeks to raise the annual refugee cap to 125,000, an increase that will take place in the beginning of October. Biden made the announcement during a speech at the U.S. State Department. Biden also said he would approve an executive order that would restore the U.S. refugee...
Biden ends U.S. support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen, says war “has to end”
February 4th, 20210 WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Thursday, President Biden declared a halt to U.S. support for a Saudi Arabia-led military campaign in Yemen, demanding that the more than six-year war, widely seen as a proxy conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, “has to end.” Biden also named veteran U.S. diplomat Timothy Lenderking as the U.S. special...
U of M doctor brings cystic fibrosis awareness to Egypt
January 31st, 20210 ANN ARBOR — Doctors in Egypt weren’t aware of the prevalence of Cystic Fibrosis (CF) in their country until the efforts of a University of Michigan professor brought the disease to light. CF is genetic disease that causes chronic and fatal lung infections and interferes with digestion. Doctors have been testing newborns for CF......
The “insurrection” and its discontents: “American exceptionalism” revisited
January 31st, 20210 History is being written in the United States today. Even the most pessimistic about the prospects of American democracy have rarely ventured out this far while offering a bleak analysis of America’s future, whether in terms of political polarization at home or global standing abroad. As shocking and, certainly, telling as the images...
U.N. chief to foreign forces: ‘Leave the Libyans alone’
January 30th, 20210 NEW YORK — On Thursday, the U.N. Security Council and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for thousands of foreign fighters and mercenaries to immediately leave Libya, with Guterres demanding that they “leave the Libyans alone.” Libya has been divided since 2014 between the internationally recognized Government of National......
Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine is 66 percent effective globally
January 29th, 20210 Johnson & Johnson said its single-dose vaccine was 72 percent effective in preventing COVID-19 in the U.S., but a lower rate of 66 percent was observed globally in the large trial conducted across three continents and against multiple variants. In the trial of nearly 44,000 volunteers, the level of protection against moderate and...
In locked-down Lebanon, protester killed in night of unrest
January 28th, 20210 TRIPOLI — A man was killed in the Lebanese city of Tripoli on Thursday in clashes between security forces and protesters angry over a strict lockdown that has cut off livelihoods in a collapsing economy. Omar Taybah, 30, was hit by a bullet overnight, according to a local hospital that treated him, a security source and......
