Kareem Shaheen writes: As the US prepared to invade Iraq in the winter of 2003, my father and I were in Mecca, taking part in the annual hajj pilgrimage. We surged with a great mass of humanity in the millions to pray atop Arafat, the mountain of mercy. We slept under the open sky on the pebbles strewn throughout Muzdalifa, a plain near the holy city. Before the hajj we had taken evening strolls in Medina, the Prophet Muhammad’s city,…
The New York Times reports: The first grader was a good student and beloved by her classmates, but she was inconsolable, and it was no mystery to her teacher why. “The most heartbreaking thing is that the girl is often slumped over on the table alone and crying,” he wrote on his blog. “When I asked around, I learned that it was because she missed her mother.” The mother, he noted, had been sent to a detention camp for Muslim…
The New York Times reports: The Navy SEALs showed up one by one, wearing hoodies and T-shirts instead of uniforms, to tell investigators what they had seen. Visibly nervous, they shifted in their chairs, rubbed their palms and pressed their fists against their foreheads. At times they stopped in midsentence and broke into tears. “Sorry about this,” Special Operator First Class Craig Miller, one of the most experienced SEALs in the group, said as he looked sideways toward a blank…
Bloomberg reports: The leveraging of a giant social-media presence, a catchy tune about a family of sharks and a burgeoning collection of junkyards are just a few of the curious ways that helped make 2019 a fertile year for fortunes to blossom around the world. Kylie Jenner became the youngest self-made billionaire this year after her company, Kylie Cosmetics, signed an exclusive partnership with Ulta Beauty Inc. She then sold a 51% stake for $600 million. It has been almost…
Politico reports: Suddenly, Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign is being taken seriously. For months, the Vermont senator was written off by Democratic Party insiders as a candidate with a committed but narrow base who was too far left to win the primary. Elizabeth Warren had skyrocketed in the polls and seemed to be leaving him behind in the race to be progressive voters’ standard-bearer in 2020. But in the past few weeks, something has changed. In private conversations and on social…
The New York Times reports: The voters at campaign events for Joseph R. Biden Jr. here in Iowa and across the country aren’t just shopping for a candidate for themselves. As they jostle to take pictures with the former vice president and listen to him preach about national unity, they are often thinking about someone else — a dad, a neighbor or a colleague. They consider the political leanings of people close to them who are uncomfortable with the most…
Lama Mourad and Kelsey P. Norman write: Last December, the United Nations General Assembly formally endorsed the Global Compact on Refugees, which was supposed to help people driven from their home country to find shelter elsewhere in the world. The ability to flee threats of violence and persecution is recognized as a fundamental human right, and some countries embrace their duty to provide a haven. Other countries, however, largely turn refugees away as an economic drain or security threat. The…
Ephrat Livni writes: It’s no secret that a presidential impeachment trial in the US Senate, whatever evidence is or is not presented, will end with Donald Trump’s acquittal. Republican majority leader Mitch McConnell has promised it. But if the vote were conducted in secret, it seems, 30 or more Republican senators would find the president’s dealings with Ukraine violated the Constitution. Or so said former Arizona senator Jeff Flake in September. Former GOP senator @JeffFlake at #TribFest19 – "I heard…
The Washington Post reports: The new Russia adviser at the White House — the third in just six months — has no meaningful background on the subject. The only expert on Ukraine has never spoken with President Trump, only been mocked by him publicly. The U.S. Embassy in Kyiv will soon be without its highest-ranking diplomat for the second time in a year, as another ambassador departs after being undermined by the U.S. president and his personal attorney. The CIA…
Adam Gopnik writes: Dictatorship has, in one sense, been the default condition of humanity. The basic governmental setup since the dawn of civilization could be summarized, simply, as taking orders from the boss. Big chiefs, almost invariably male, tell their underlings what to do, and they do it, or they are killed. Sometimes this is costumed in communal decision-making, by a band of local bosses or wise men, but even the most collegial department must have a chairman: a capo…
Jonathan Chait writes: Tulsi Gabbard has been slowly edging toward leaving the Democratic Party and, it now seems more likely than not, launching a spoiler candidacy to peel disaffected left-wing votes away from the Democrats. Her “present” vote on impeachment, followed by a disavowal of what she called the “zero-sum mind-set the two political parties have trapped America in,” sets the stage for Gabbard to play the role of 2020’s Jill Stein. Left-wing anti-anti-Trumpism played an important role in the…
Katrina vanden Heuvel writes: The selection of 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg as Time magazine’s Person of the Year seemed to trigger many on the political right, led by President Trump, who called the choice “ridiculous” and mocked Thunberg for supposedly having an “Anger Management problem.” The episode was a disgraceful yet fitting end to a year that saw bold new ideas to fight climate change meet with inaction, ignorance and worse. This month, world leaders held global climate talks…
The Guardian reports: A new wave of mercenaries from Sudan is fighting in Libya, deepening concerns that the conflict in the north African state has descended into an intractable international war that could destabilise much of the region. Leaders of two different groups of Sudanese fighters active in Libya have told the Guardian that they had received hundreds of new recruits in recent months. Both groups were fighting with the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by General Khalifa Haftar against…
NBC News reports: Rudy Giuliani says he’s “more of a Jew” than liberal billionaire George Soros, who survived the Nazi occupation of Hungary as a teen. In a remarkable interview with New York magazine, Giuliani, President Donald Trump’s lawyer, painted Soros as a puppet master who has secretly been pulling the strings in Ukraine. Soros is a frequent target of conspiracy theories about Jews controlling the world. “Don’t tell me I’m anti-Semitic if I oppose him,” Giuliani said. “Soros is…
The Hill reports: Sen. Elizabeth Warren has spent her presidential campaign railing against the donor class, making it known she doesn’t want their help. She has publicly bashed millionaires, has sworn off high-dollar fundraisers and has refused large checks from Democratic bundlers. But behind the scenes in recent months, former President Obama has gone to bat for Warren (D-Mass.) when speaking to donors reluctant to support her given her knocks on Wall Street and the wealthy. And if Warren becomes…
Josh Rogin writes: As the Assad regime slaughters its way to victory on the ground in Syria, its partner Russia is using the United Nations to try to cut off crucial humanitarian aid to millions of innocent Syrians still living outside the government’s control. The Trump administration is trying — but so far failing — to stop Moscow’s sinister plan. Last Friday, Russian and China vetoed a U.N. Security Council Resolution that would partially renew international authorization for cross-border routes…