Speaking at the the AIPAC policy conference recently, Sen. Chuck Schumer gave one of the most reprehensible speeches on the Israel/Palestine conflict I've heard outside of the rabid racism espoused by the current Israeli government. According to Schumer, the Palestinians have ...read more
If you're not already aware of it, on Tuesday Trump announced that he's going to move the United Stated embassy to Jerusalem and officially recognize the city as the capital of Israel. This is the diplomatic and religious equivalent of a nuclear first strike, intended to incite ...read more
If you didn't vote for Hillary Clinton in the general election because she was supposedly corrupt/a war monger/anti-marijuana/"just as bad" as Trump etc, etc. take a moment to absorb what the Trump administration is about to do to the Middle East. From the New York Times: ...read more
Having failed to enact every single major pledge he made on the campaign trail in his first 100 days in office, Donald Trump is now claiming that he could facilitate peace in the Middle East because it is "not as difficult as people have thought". In a meeting with Palestinian ...read more
In the days leading up to the 2016 election, I became aware of a chilling rationale that powered support for Donald Trump among active military members that went way beyond the old chestnut that Republicans quickly lose their religion on deficits when it comes to defense ...read more
Donald Trump is about to be sworn into office as the least politically experienced president in American history. In and of itself that lack of experience isn't particularly worrisome. There have been several recent presidents who were not Washington insiders. But in the case of ...read more
It was a cute story: A male teen in Saudi Arabia spent a few weeks flirting with an American girl from California and eventually joked about marrying her. But this kind of flirting is strictly forbidden in his country so he was arrested by the morality police (yes, that's a real ...read more
WARNING: The following article contains disturbing and graphic content. On Friday night's Real Time with Bill Maher, and just a few days prior to International Women's Day, moderate Islamic journalist Raheel Raza noted that more than 500,000 girls are at risk for what's known as ...read more
If you've followed Matt Taibbi's career for the past decade, you have probably come to wait with bated breath for the latest installment of his epic Tom Friedman takedowns -- and his latest does not disappoint. While Taibbi is a first rate investigative journalist, his uncommon ...read more
If you want to understand the type of thinking progressives forces are up against in the eternal struggle for America's sanity, look no further than Sarah Palin - the country's greatest example of banal mediocrity and willful ignorance. Palin isn't completely stupid, she's just ...read more
Let's see if you can spot the difference between these two statements that were made four days apart: I would have [authorized the invasion], and so would have Hillary Clinton, just to remind everybody. And so would almost everybody that was confronted with the intelligence they ...read more
(Image: a Jewish settler in Hebron throws wine on a Palestinian woman) The election of Benjamin Netanyahu to his fourth term as prime minister of Israel has solidified what many have already known about the state of Israel: it is a racist, colonial state that cannot be ...read more
If you thought that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had hit rock bottom with his warmongering speech to Republicans in Congress, then rest easy. Somehow, Bibi has reached a new low. On the eve of Israeli elections, with poll numbers flagging and his coalition ...read more
We've covered Benjamin Netanyahu's horrendously ill judged speech before Congress a fair bit here at the Banter, discussing the political implications of the speech and 'Bibi's' serial lies about the threat Iran poses to the Middle East and the rest of the world. A more ...read more
This speech wasn’t Bibi Netanyahu’s fault. It was Speaker John Boehner’s idea to set up the Israeli prime minister’s address to Congress in retaliation for President Obama’s refusing to strengthen sanctions on Iran. If anything, Netanyahu’s visit says more about the dysfunction ...read more
With Republicans rallying around the man they hope will be the third American president from the Bush family, Republicans are opening up exciting new possibilities for regime change the world over. Jeb, like his brother George, is a man who goes by his gut and isn't afraid to ...read more
Not long ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu probably thought he was pretty clever. He'd reached a secret deal with Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner to address Congress in March, intended to push moderate representatives and senators into passing more ...read more
(Image credit: FrontPage Mag) If the Middle East is a region we can neither fix nor ignore, what’s left? I’m for “containment” and “amplification.” - Tom Friedman, NYTimes Earlier this month, Tom Friedman solved the problem of the world being 'fast' through cushioning, ...read more
As the U.S. ceaselessly moves towards yet another large-scale conflict in the Middle East, hawks in Congress are already screeching that the current U.S. strategy to destroy Islamic State just isn't bold enough. Instead of planes and air-to-surface missiles, they insist, Obama ...read more
Liberals, including myself and Daily Banter editor Michael Luciano, were taken slightly aback last month by a temporary moment of clarity in which Glenn Beck admitted he was wrong about the Iraq war. Don't worry, though. Whatever produced that fleeting epiphany has since ...read more
A British schoolboy was stranded in Abu Dhabi for 18 months because of a paralyzing fear of flying. Twelve-year-old Joe Thompson had to be hypnotized so that he could finally get back on a plane and go home to Somerset, England. Thompson's family had moved to Abu Dhabi four ...read more
A one act gchat play by Donny Potter, a Washington D.C. based satirist, musician, misanthrope and non-profit employee. Barry: Hey bro, how fucking awesome was last night?!?! Sent at 2:06 PM on Saturday me: ha yeah, last night was pretty crazy Barry: dude, I can’t even ...read more
Whether you agree or not, Noam Chomsky's view on the Syrian crisis is certainly interesting. From an interview with Ceasefire Magzine: Syria is descending into suicide. It's a horror story and getting worse and worse. There's no bright spot on the horizon. What will probably ...read more
We've been back and forth on the issue of Syria here at the Banter for several weeks now with readers and contributors split as to what the US should (or shouldn't do). As the Obama administration gets closer and closer to unilaterally attacking the Assad government, one ...read more
You know how they say that generals always fight the last war? Well it seems many liberals are still fighting the “last” last war. The way some folks on the left have been screeching about President Obama’s proposal to punish the Syrian regime for its use of chemical weapons ...read more
In a piece published yesterday regarding the dire situation in Syria, the senior editor of Daily Banter (both a friend and colleague) Ben Cohen made some claims that I want to address. Cohen begins by referring to President Bashar Assad as a “ruthless despot with little regard ...read more
It looks like we're set for another showdown in the Middle East - this time a probable arial assault on Syria led by the US, France and Britain. According to reports from the group 'Doctors Without Borders' President Bashar Assad's government was responsible for a chemical ...read more
If you lie to Congress, it is a crime. It’s called perjury. You may remember that when Roger Clemens did it, he barely escaped two counts of it. And you should remember that the official reason President Bill Clinton was impeached was because of perjury (you know, it had ...read more
President Barack Obama delivers remarks to the Israeli people at the Jerusalem International Convention Center on March 21, 2013. By Lawrence Davidson It is said that the devil has about him the smell of fire and brimstone (sulfur). Evil deeds are often described as “most ...read more
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad before a poster of his late father, Hafez Assad. By Ivan Eland: The U.S. government recently designated the Syrian opposition group Jabhat al-Nusra Front a foreign terrorist organization. The move was designed to build Western support against ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From Reuters: Syria's chemical weapons could be used at "a moment's notice" and the international community should not accept any assurances from Syrian officials that they will not be used, U.S. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers ...read more
By Michael Grabell, Dafna Linzer and Jeff Larson, ProPublica: Iraq has shut its airspace to four Syrian flights scheduled to pick up attack helicopters that had been repaired in Russia, the spokesman to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said Tuesday. Syria has failed ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From NBC News: The military has loaded the precursor chemicals for sarin, a deadly nerve gas, into aerial bombs that could be dropped onto the Syrian people from dozens of fighter-bombers, the officials said. As recently as Tuesday, officials ...read more
By Ben Cohen: Regardless of whose side you take in the Israeli Palestinian crisis, there is no denying that the Jewish state has been far better at the public relations game than the Palestinians have ever been. There are many well funded pro Israel groups in the US that have ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From Huff Post: The White House and its allies are weighing military options to secure Syria's chemical and biological weapons, after U.S. intelligence reports show the Syrian regime may be readying those weapons and may be desperate enough to ...read more
Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, speaking with journalists in 2009. (Photo credit: Trango) By Paul R. Pillar: What is one of the first things Hamas does when it is fresh off standing up against an Israeli assault and widely perceived to have gained ground politically at the ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From Reuters: The 193-nation U.N. General Assembly on Thursday overwhelmingly approved the de facto recognition of the sovereign state of Palestine after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on the world body to issue its long overdue ...read more
By Paul R. Pillar: The recently suspended round of organized violence in the Gaza Strip has a depressing familiarity, being similar to other rounds between Israelis and Palestinians. The physical harm inflicted has been as usual enormously disproportionate, with the ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From AP: JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli authorities arrested an Arab Israeli on Thursday on accusations he planted a bomb on a bus in Tel Aviv that wounded 27 people and threatened to sabotage efforts to broker a cease-fire to end the fighting in ...read more
The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From AP: JERUSALEM (AP) — A diplomatic push to end Israel's nearly weeklong offensive in the Gaza Strip gained momentum Tuesday, with Egypt's president predicting that airstrikes would end within hours and Israel's prime minister saying his ...read more
Andrew Sullivan decries Israel's self harming policies that he believes will eventually lead to its demise: Without diplomacy toward a two-state solution, we are looking at a lifetime of constant Israeli warfare against all of its neighbors, deeper isolation in the region (with ...read more
By Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett: As President Obama signaled renewed interest last week in a “diplomatic resolution to the problem” with Iran, liberal advocates of soft regime change are again coming out of the woodwork to profess their support for engaging Tehran. ...read more
A supply helicopter approaches Forward Operating Base Salerno in Afghanistan’s Khowst province on Nov. 5, 2012. (Photo credit: U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Abram Pinnington) By Paul R. Pillar: After a campaign and election in which, at least as much as in most other election ...read more
The US military is now taking Israel's increasingly belligerent rhetoric against Iran more seriously and is directly warning it not to take any action. The delicate and volatile situation puts the United State's interests in the area in jeopardy and it is now calculating that ...read more
By Paul R. Pillar: As this year’s presidential campaign turns to debates about certain foreign conflicts and controversies with the potential for sucking the United States into war, here is an anniversary-based fact that does not seem to have received notice — certainly nothing ...read more
By Lawrence Davidson: On Aug. 1, I posted a piece entitled History on a Billboard, reporting on the placement, in the northern suburbs of New York City, of informational billboards with maps of Palestine showing the steady growth of Israeli confiscated territory and the ...read more
By Ray McGovern: If you prefer charade to reality, inquisition to investigation, trees over forest – the House Government Oversight Committee hearing last Tuesday on “Security Failures of Benghazi” was the thing for you. The hearing was the latest example of the myopic ...read more
By Paul R. Pillar: Many realities of foreign policy do not lend themselves to clear, coherent positions in an election campaign. The reasons for this go beyond the fact that in most election years far more votes are to be won or lost on domestic issues than foreign ones, even ...read more
By Robert Parry: While it’s true that all politicians play games with the facts, it is actually rare for a politician to be an inveterate liar. But Mitt Romney is one of that rare breed on matters both big and small. And with some polls showing his surge toward victory on Nov. ...read more
