World News Insights: Opinion Articles

My granddaughter Sara who follows my work, especially my writing on Palestinian issues, and I only write about other matters every so often, asked me: “Why does Yasser Arafat occupy a central role in every book you have written? Even when you wrote about Mahmoud Darwish, Moscow, and the station.” …

A year ago, the course of the pandemic changed, thanks to the first safe and effective vaccines against Covid-19. Today, after administering 7.3 billion doses and preventing countless deaths, we have more data than ever to justify that early enthusiasm — and the need to keep jabbing. On top of…

Republican dysfunction just keeps getting worse. The latest? A movement to strip the 13 House Republicans who voted for the infrastructure bill of their committee seats. Let’s go to Congress scholar Josh Huder: This is legitimately insane. These kinds of punishments are normally reserved for…

The Republican Party, you may have heard by now, has a lot of news to celebrate after last week’s elections. In Virginia, a state that President Biden won by 10 points last year, it took back the governor’s mansion, a feat it hadn’t managed in over a decade. Republicans also came within striking…

The world may be going crazy over digital currencies, but tiny Singapore is swimming against the tide. The central bank has decided against offering a paperless version of the city-state’s legal tender — at least for now. Not because an electronic version of cash may flop, but because it’ll most…

There can be no doubting that this year's highly anticipated United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) carries immense implications. Its significance has earned it a billing as the World’s “Moment of Truth”, serving as a five-year progress report on nations' commitments to the targets set…

When Lebanese people say “the Movement” (haraka in Arabic), they are referring to the Amal Movement led by Nabih Berri. For there are no other political groups that use this word to describe themselves; if they are found, they are regional, like the “Independence Movement,” which is only active in…

What a joke. The world’s biggest car markets and automakers won’t commit to a deal to eliminate new vehicle emissions over the next two decades. Volkswagen AG, BMW AG and Toyota Motor Corp. are unlikely to get on board with an emissions pledge that’s expected to be unveiled at the COP26 climate…

Americans everywhere remain concerned about getting past what feels like a never-ending litany of Covid-19-induced economic problems, from out-of-stock products to inflation and continued fears of exposure to illness when going out. When will it finally end? Professional economic forecasters are…

Who created the Constitution we have today? As a law professor, I’ve always thought the best answer was the framers: James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and the other delegates who attended the Philadelphia convention in the summer of 1787. The Constitution they drafted has since been amended many…

I have never had much interest in faith versus science debates. They simply did not resonate with me. I believe God created the world, but I never felt the need to nail down the details or method of creation. I went to a fairly conservative evangelical seminary (founded by Billy Graham himself),…

To the fast-growing army of cryptocurrency believers, from Matt Damon to Twitter’s @Jack, we are at the dawn of a new age. But Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler sees something else entirely: a “Wild West” of money creation that urgently needs a crackdown. With billions at…