World News Insights: Opinion Articles

It is difficult to understand developments on the two burning fronts of Lebanon and Gaza in isolation from the outcomes of Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington. The visit is unlikely to generate magical solutions to these deeply complex crises, but it could determine whether the growing…

How difficult it is to wait in Gaza; hungry children wait for meals and mothers wait for a let up from the wind that has uprooted tents and rainwater that has spread diseases. Fathers are helpless as they wait on weak pledges and face the cruelty of the enemy. How difficult it must be to have…

You are watching the 2016 Republican primary campaign, trying to figure out if Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio can stop Donald Trump from winning the Republican nomination. A man from the future steps out of a shimmering portal and informs you that the winner of the primary campaign will go on to be the…

The conclusion Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli religious and nationalist Right drew from the October 7th operation is that “strength is the only thing Arabs understand," and that Hamas’s operation had provided them with an opportunity to act on this principle. This conclusion was not an epiphany…

The Sydney attack that targeted Jewish Australian citizens that everyone condemned, Arabs and non-Arabs, Eastern and Western alike, and was denounced even by the staunchest supporters of the Palestinian cause because it assaulted civilian citizens solely because of their Jewish faith, after a…

Lebanese equivocation is a chronic existential threat engendered by successive periods of subjugation and occupation. These factors have generated two discourses: both considered “patriotic” by those who espouse them but irreconcilable. Together they encapsulate Lebanon’s divisions over major and…

I was pleased to take part in The eleventh Global Forum of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) held in Riyadh this week, a capital of alliances and coexistence, in the presence of the United Nations Secretary-General Mr. António Guterres; Prince Faisal bin Farhan, Saudi Minister of…

Some events may seem insignificant, yet it is precisely their insignificance that gives them importance. I am referring here to the “Arab Socialist Baath Party” in Lebanon changing its name to the “Hezb Al-Raya Al-Watani” (National Banner Party). As for the first reason for its importance, it is…

The latest haggling over ending the war in Ukraine appears to be focused on three elements two of which could be labelled “promissory” and one “instant delivery." The instant delivery bit concerns an agreement to let Russia keep the chunk of Donbas it has conquered. That is what US President…

The trajectories of every country that underwent what came to be known as the “Arab Spring,” deviated radically from initial aspirations. In most cases, the result was the nightmare of war and fragmentation, from Syria to Yemen, Libya and finally Sudan. Sudan joined late but did not escape this…

Every now and then, we find, despite everything that has happened and continues to happen, someone getting up to deride Lebanon’s “sectarian system” and hold it responsible for the condition of the devastated country. The “sectarian system” is not something one can defend, nor can it be absolved…

It’s a perilous moment for creative life in America. While supporting oneself as an artist has never been easy, the power of generative A.I. is pushing creative workers to confront an uncomfortable question: Is there a place for paid creative work within late capitalism? And what will happen to our…