Middle East | GlobalPost

Opinion: The war Israelis and Palestinians are really planning

Matt Beynon ReesApril 4, 2010 10:08Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

JERUSALEM — There’s an old Arab aphorism: “A man with a plan takes action; a man with two plans gets confused.” Apply that to the Israelis and to the Palestinians, and the nonsensical sequence of recent events in the Middle East starts to fall into a comprehensible pattern. It’s not a pleasant pattern, because it leads to war. First, before we get to the fireworks, let’s recap all the nonsense.

StreetLife: Dubai's abandoned pet problem

Christopher Booker and Tom HundleyMarch 31, 2010 07:32Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

Opinion: Democracy and depleted uranium

R. B. StuartApril 16, 2010 08:32Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

NEW YORK — When my sister, 101st Airborne Army Capt. Chaplain Fran E. Stuart, returned from Iraq, she was forever changed. Not only had the desert sand, gun blasts and heat penetrated her psyche during her one-year deployment, but a carcinogen had made its way into her body as well. Unbeknown to her, the carcinogen was making a home in my sister's body, along with the Anthrax vaccine, depleted uranium, burn pit smoke and contaminated water dished up at every meal.

Opinion: If at first you don't succeed, try sanctions again

Bennett RambergApril 1, 2010 07:56Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

LOS ANGELES — Having failed to talk Iran out of its nuclear program the Obama administration has ramped up efforts to get the Security Council to endorse a new round of sanctions. These new sanctions would freeze the international financial lifelines of the Revolutionary Guards and other elites, expand the list of Iranian companies and individuals facing travel bans, blacklist shipping companies and curb arms, oil equipment and gasoline exports to the revolutionary regime.

Presidential candidacy by Facebook page ... Egypt's ElBaradei tests the method

Jon JensenMarch 29, 2010 16:37

Mohamed ElBaradei can say he’s not running for president in Egypt. But with everything he does resembling calculated campaign moves, it’s getting harder and harder to believe him.

Analysis: Defining "Iraqracy"

Deborah AmosMarch 29, 2010 11:30Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Iraq's dramatic election was a prelude to the real test: the political wrangling to determine the country's next prime minister. This is the way it goes in “Iraqracy,” as Gen. David Petraeus dubbed the county’s unique political system. In the weeks to come, Iraq’s flaws, strengths and identity will be revealed as the country’s fragile rule of law is strained, perhaps to the breaking point, to determine the outcome of the vote.

Poking fun, US-style, in Egypt

Laura Kasinof March 29, 2010 06:47Updated May 30, 2010 13:27

CAIRO, Egypt — In Egypt, where the government keeps a close eye on the media and most other forms of expression — an alternative has emerged: fake news.

Afghanistan's newest graduating class

Iason AthanasiadisMarch 31, 2010 07:06Updated May 30, 2010 13:26

Demise of a modern-day pharaoh

Jon JensenMarch 26, 2010 06:26Updated May 30, 2010 13:26

CAIRO, Egypt — Stocks in Egypt tumbled when anxiety-ridden investors heard the news. President Hosni Mubarak had checked into a hospital in Germany for a minor surgery, but on the streets of Cairo, there was speculation he was seriously ill, maybe even dead. It wasn’t Mubarak’s first health scare, but with no successor named for their aging president, Egyptians begged the question: Who will take over if he dies?

Opinion: Israel takes it to the limit one more time

Michael Goldfarb March 25, 2010 08:43Updated May 30, 2010 13:26

LONDON, U.K. — Britain's Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, was invited Tuesday to a ceremony marking the re-opening of Israel's embassy in London following extensive renovations. Instead, he went to the House of Commons and announced the British government was expelling an Israeli diplomat, reported to be Mossad's top man in Britain. The British papers have universally described the incident as marking the lowest point of relations between the two countries in 25 years. The back story: