Medea Benjamin – The Execution of Nimr Al-Nimr: One More Reason to Re-evaluate the Toxic U.S.-Saudi Alliance

The brutal Saudi execution of Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr Al-Nimr has led to protests around the globe, as well as the burning of the Saudi Embassy in Tehran, followed by the Saudi severing of relations with Iran. This exacerbation of Sunni-Shia tensions is the result of the reckless Saudi action against a popular, nonviolent Shia leader. Also reckless is the …

Robert Fisk – Saudi Arabia’s Mad Head-Choppers

Saudi Arabia’s binge of head-choppings – 47 in all, including the learned Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr Baqr al-Nimr, followed by a Koranic justification for the executions – was worthy of Isis. Perhaps that was the point. For this extraordinary bloodbath in the land of the Sunni Muslim al-Saud monarchy – clearly intended to infuriate the Iranians and the entire Shia …

Hidden Origins of Syria’s Civil War By Jonathan Marshall

Since the Syrian civil war began in 2011, nearly a quarter million people have perished and fullyhalf of the country’s inhabitants have been forced from their homes, creating the worst refugee crisis in the past quarter century. Meanwhile, the continuing advance of brutal Islamist factions — which a leading CIA officer in 2013 termed the “top current threat to U.S. national security” — makes the …

Did Affluence Spur the Rise of Modern Religions? By Bret Stetka

About 2,500 years ago something changed the way humans think. Within the span of two centuries, in three separate regions of Eurasia, spiritual movements emerged that would give rise to the world’s major moral religions, those preaching some combination of compassion, humility and asceticism. Scholars often attribute the rise of these moral religions—Buddhism, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and Christianity included—to population …

Splitting Up Iraq – MIKE WHITNEY

“Iraq’s fate was sealed from the moment we invaded: it has no future as a unitary state … Iraq is fated to split apart into at least three separate states…This was the War Party’s real if unexpressed goal from the very beginning: the atomization of Iraq, and indeed the entire Middle East. Their goal, in short, was chaos – and that is …

Syrian Rebels Caught in ‘False-Flag’ Kidnapping of NBC Correspondent – Robert Parry

In December 2012, Syria’s U.S.-backed “moderate” rebels pulled off a false-flag kidnapping and “rescue” of NBC’s chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel and his crew, getting the crime blamed on a militia tied to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a propaganda scam that NBC played along with despite having evidence of the truth. On Wednesday, Engel, who had blamed an Assad-linked Shiite militia …

Yemen – the Big Picture. US Sponsored Civil Wars

Yemen is a patchwork of tribes, the result of former colonies, therefore made vulnerable for conflicts; easily ignitable conflicts. A situation left behind on purpose by the old British colonial masters, today servants to the Washington Empire. That’s the name of the game throughout the Middle East – and eventually throughout the world. Divide and rule,  – by Zionist-Anglo-Saxon organized and never-ending …

Deciphering the Mideast Chaos

Few Americans seem to comprehend what is unfolding in the Middle East – with the latest conflict involving Saudi airstrikes against the Houthi rebels who now control Yemen’s capital of Sanaa. In this swirl of regional wars, it’s often not clear where the U.S. government stands and how American interests are affected. The reason for the confusion is simple: Many key …