Some key members of the 34-nation anti-IS coalition announced by Saudi Arabia have a fundamental question: just what is it? Indonesia apparently did not know it was going to be a military alliance, which it does not want to join. A senior Pakistani lawmaker, meanwhile, only learned the …

Hezbollah party leader Samir Kuntar was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Damascus early Sunday, the Lebanese group and Syrian government sources said. Israel welcomed his death, but stopped short of confirming responsibility for the strike that killed him. Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim group, said Kuntar was “martyred” …

Abdel Bari Atwan Saudi Defence Minister Prince Mohammed bin Salman Bin Abdel Aziz surprised everybody with a sudden announcement that a new 34-nation military alliance of Moslem countries had been established and that its HQ is to be in Riyadh. Pakistan was astonished to find it was named as …

Joseph Waters Propaganda is a deadly poison, as Andre Vltchek bemoans: “How do we achieve victory? How do we convince the masses, those billions of people? How do we open their eyes and make them see that the Western regime is dishonest, toxic, poisonous and destructive? Most of …

Nikolas K. Gvosdev President Vladimir Putin engaged in his traditional end-of-year marathon press conference this week with some 1,300 journalists attending in Moscow. As is his wont, Putin used the event to reassure Russians that despite the hardships of the last year, the economy has turned a corner, …

Mike Whitney Would you be willing to defend your country against a foreign invasion? That’s all Putin is doing in Syria. He’s just preempting the tidal wave of jihadis that’ll be coming his way once the current fracas is over. He figures it’s better to exterminate these US-backed maniacs in Syria now than face …

Turkish and Ukrainian media have reported that President Erdogan has met with two of the organizers of the so-called Crimean blockade. Earlier this week, another of the masterminds behind the failed ‘food’ and ‘electricity’ blockades promised that the radicals would organize a ‘naval blockade’. Is a provocation imminent? …

Washington should avoid committing more US ground troops in the latest Middle Eastern conflict, CIA veteran Paul R. Pillar notes, adding that the exploitation of the Daesh (IS/ISIL) issue by American politicians is likely to continue. While the majority of the US presidential candidates are banging war drums over the …