'Just World News' with Helena Cobban

When is an act of war not an act of war?

The inimitable Matt Duss has a great post on Wonk Room today in which he notes that recent polling data from CBS News and Vanity Fair "indicates pretty strongly that...

23% of Israelis ready to leave Israel at any hint of problems?

In the latest issue of the always informative journal Middle East Policy, University of Pennsylvania prof Ian Lustick expresses the notable observation that, Last year, a poll by David Menashri...

Obama reining in anti-Iran militarists?

David Ignatius had an extremely important piece in today's WaPo, in which he reported on a small-group interview in which Pres. Obama spoke about Iran in a way that seemed...

Is an attack on Iran really more 'do-able' now?

Time magazine's often well informed Joe Klein has a significant piece on their website today, tellingly titled An Attack on Iran: Back on the Table. He argues there that Defense...

Clumsy US disinfo on Saudi Arabia?

Several people have sent me a copy of this article in today's London Times, in which journo Hugh Tomlinson breathlessly "reports" that, Saudi Arabia has conducted tests to stand down...

China's confused role on Iran sanctions

China Hand has a great post today about the notably muddled-looking role that China's been playing on the Iran sanctions issue. CH notes that while it's understandable (given the exigencies...

Davutoğlu replies to Hillary (and Barack)

Turkish FM Ahmet Davutoğlu today made clear his resentment about the tepid reaction most western governments had toward the deal his government and Brazil concluded with Iran yesterday on a...

Obama cool toward 'mid-size states' deal

Pres. Obama's spokesperson Robert Gibbs was yesterday extremely cool toward the agreement that Turkish PM Rejep Tayyip Erdogan and Brazil's Prez Luiz Ignacio Lula Da Silva reached with Iran concerning...

Livni shows a little real vision on the Iran issue?

I just read this account, from the BBC's Tim Franks, of what looked like some kind of cross between a 'war-game' and a panel discussion about Iran's nuclear program, held...

Midsize, non-nuclear powers enter world stage

Treading where the U.S. and its European allies have failed to make any significant headway, the leaders of Turkey and Brazil have now engaged personally in dealing with the globally...

Pro-Israel warmongers preparing the next war

The experienced former U.S. officials Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett had an important op-ed in Politico yesterday titled The Slippery Slope to Strikes on Iran. In it they warned...

Ray Takeyh's nonsense on Iran-Palestine

Ray Takeyh, an Iranian-American expert on Iran at the Council on Foreign Relations, had an oped in today's WaPo that makes the nonsensical claim that, The notion that the incumbent...

Malley & Harling on M.E. regional dynamics

Further to what I blogged here (and here) yesterday about the ever-shifting dynamics within the Middle East, Rob Malley and Peter Harling have an elegant op-ed in the WaPo today...

Iran "calling" Israel's nuclear-related blackmail?

Speculation is reportedly rife among Washington insiders over why, a couple of weeks ago, the Iranian authorities moved nearly all their stockpile of low-enriched uranium from its previous, deep-underground bunker...

Leveretts on Israeli-Iranian 'proxy war'

Shortly after I published this post earlier today about the Spy Wars underway between the Israeli team and the pro-Iranian team, I saw this post that Flynt Leverett and Hillary...

Spy Wars heat up!

The long-simmering Spy Wars between Israel on the one hand, and Iran and its allies in the Jebhat al-Mumana'a (Blocking Front) on the other, have been heating up a lot...

Dan Halutz's 'recipe' for success... against Iran?

Why does it so frequently seem as if members of Israel's political elite have no shame? Case in point: Dan Halutz, the former IDF chief of staff who was last...

Hillary's war-drums on Iran; Russia unwilling?

Hillary Clinton was on Capitol Hill today, telling US lawmakers that, "Iran has left the international community little choice but to impose greater costs and pressure in the face of...

Fareed Zakaria calls it right on Iran, Israel

Thank goodness for Fareed Zakaria's voice of sanity on Iran, at the WaPo today! Zakaria strongly criticizes Sarah Palin and those many other influential voices in the US who are...