Author Archives: Tony

Three ‘Rabbis’ for Israel’s Independence Day

Continuing my series on the 50 “rabbis” (teachers) who most influenced my understanding of being Jewish in the world, I offer up three more to coincide with Israel’s Independence Day . 9. Avraham Burg Former Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg was … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 30 Comments

Aux Armes, Etcetera…

Listen to Lillian Thuram Looking at the political choices facing voters in France, today, I’m glad I’m not French — although I guess I would be if the Catholic Church hadn’t driven France’s Jews out in the 14th century, starting … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 29 Comments

Rabbi Rollout #2: Amira Hass

By way of further preview to my personal “50 Most Influential Rabbis” (i.e. people who taught me something about being Jewish in the world), following Sunday’s salute to Primo Levi, it is timely to introduce Amira Hass, if only because … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 10 Comments

Salute Primo Levi, My Favorite Rabbi

I’ve been slowly at work, for weeks now, on a project spawned by Newsweek’s decision idiotic to publicize a rather silly list of America’s 50 most influential rabbis according to a couple of corporate executive types. (Sorry, Gary, but it’s … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 67 Comments

There’s hostages, and there’s hostages

The Iran-Britain standoff looks to be over with Iran’s announcement that it will send the 15 captive Britons home. And it’s not surprising that Tehran is claiming victory: It has used the incident to sound a warning to the U.S. … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 49 Comments

Birthpangs of a Post-Bush Middle East

Not now, Condi, we’re busy I’ve marveled for some time now at the abundance of unmistakable evidence to the contrary, so much of the mainstream media in the U.S. appears to feel dutybound to parrot Condi Rice’s giddy fantasies about … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 53 Comments

West Africa/East Africa

Downtown in Arusha, Marcello’s new home Cronies seem to be showing up all over the Mother Continent. It was when she went off to see the Teranga Lions thrash the hapless national team of Tanzania in an African Cup of … Continue reading

Posted in Shameless Cronyism | 10 Comments

Iran’s ‘Tonkin’ Moment in the Gulf?

Update: I wrote the following in a piece earlier today on TIME.com: But the outcome of the standoff may well depend on the strategic calculations of the Iranian leadership. Seizing the British troops a day before the U.N. Security Council … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 10 Comments

Safe Posturing on Iraq

Kudos to David Rieff for making clear that all the retrospective posturing on Iraq by the Democrat frontrunners is meaningless — safe, even — and is made nonsense of by the fact that all of them hold positions on Iran … Continue reading

Posted in Situation Report, Unholy War | 3 Comments

What’s Iraq About Now?

Four years into the Iraq war — “hard to believe,” eh, Mr Wolfowitz? — don’t expect the U.S. media to dwell on the conceptual foundations of this catastrophe. That may be because the media was rather complicit in laying those … Continue reading

Posted in Featured Analysis, Situation Report | 42 Comments