Amman's Refugee Waiting Game The Time Bomb on Jordan's Border

Amman's Refugee Waiting Game

The Time Bomb on Jordan's Border

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/jordan/2017-05-24/ammans-refugee-waiting-game?cid=nlc-twofa-20170525&sp_mid=54141869&sp_rid=bWljaGVsZXRrZWFybmV5QGdtYWlsLmNvbQS2&spMailingID=54141869&spUserID=MjEwNDg3NjAxODc2S0&spJobID=1164228084&spReportId=MTE2NDIyODA4NAS2

Atoms for Pyongyang Let North Korea Have Peaceful Nuclear Power By Richard Rhodes and Michael Shellenberger

Atoms for Pyongyang

Let North Korea Have Peaceful Nuclear Power

By Richard Rhodes and Michael Shellenberger

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/north-korea/2017-05-23/atoms-pyongyang?cid=nlc-twofa-20170525&sp_mid=54141869&sp_rid=bWljaGVsZXRrZWFybmV5QGdtYWlsLmNvbQS2&spMailingID=54141869&spUserID=MjEwNDg3NjAxODc2S0&spJobID=1164228084&spReportId=MTE2NDIyODA4NAS2

Iraq and Afghanistan: The US$6 trillion bill for America's longest war is unpaid

Iraq and Afghanistan: The US$6 trillion bill for America's longest war is unpaid

The Prisoners’ Dilemma

http://carnegieendowment.org/sada/index.cfm?fa=70082&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWkRkallqVTRaalJqT0RrNCIsInQiOiJcL2hYcDJGTCt0dkJ2eGEwTnR5WXg0am1WNGJqdThDTmpRazJoU1c1MHU5Y2pIYXNGUnAxZXpvYXBCa3NpcFNvbWtGR2plZ0ZES1lRcUpNQ29PN1dRSHB6TWYyUStFVEZ6a3J4eGo3NE5lQTlnQzBzVnlKUHIxeU9tR2FUa05EU28ifQ%3D%3D

A Further Perspective Trump’s Middle East Strategy Takes Shape

A Further Perspective

Trump’s Middle East Strategy Takes Shape

https://spectator.org/trumps-middle-east-strategy-takes-shape/

Legality of Presidential Disclosures, Continued

Posted on May.26, 2017 in classification, Leaks, Trump Administration by Steven Aftergood

“There is no basis” for suggesting that President Trump’s disclosure of classified intelligence to Russian officials was illegal, wrote Morton Halperin this week. To the contrary, “senior U.S. government officials in conversations with foreign officials decide on a daily basis to provide them with information that is properly classified and that will remain classified,” wrote […]https://fas.org/blogs/secrecy/2017/05/legality-disclosures/

Legality of the Trump Disclosures, Revisited

Posted on May.18, 2017 in classification, Leaks, Russia, Trump Administration by Steven Aftergood

When President Trump disclosed classified intelligence information to Russian officials last week, did he commit a crime? Considering that the President is the author of the national security classification system, and that he is empowered to determine who gets access to classified information, it seems obvious that the answer is No. His action might have […]https://fas.org/blogs/secrecy/2017/05/trump-disclosures-revisited/

‘Getting Trump’ with the New McCarthyism – Consortiumnews

‘Getting Trump’ with the New McCarthyism – Consortiumnews

The Senate Can’t Pass Health Care Without This Man - Bloomberg

The Senate Can’t Pass Health Care Without This Man - Bloomberg

Single-Payer Health Care Is Less Expensive—Deal With It

Single-Payer Health Care Is Less Expensive—Deal With It

'Horrific' Increase in Worldwide Displacement, Shows New Report

'Horrific' Increase in Worldwide Displacement, Shows New Report

Down the Memory Hole: Living in Trump’s United States of Amnesia | naked capitalism

Down the Memory Hole: Living in Trump’s United States of Amnesia | naked capitalism

Trump at Taormina: The Odd Man Out

Imagining a G7 world, where the United States now is the rogue nation at the table, like Russia was at the G8 table!

https://www.theglobalist.com/donald-trump-at-taormina-the-odd-man-out/

After the Confederates, Who’s Next?

http://buchanan.org/blog/confederates-whos-next-127112

The Ascension of Our Lord | The Great Adventure Catholic Bible Study

The Ascension of Our Lord | The Great Adventure Catholic Bible Study

Why Jesus Had to Ascend to Heaven: Answers from Scripture and Aquinas | The Great Adventure Catholic Bible Study

Why Jesus Had to Ascend to Heaven: Answers from Scripture and Aquinas | The Great Adventure Catholic Bible Study

The intelligence leaks are not a Trump problem – the UK should have reconsidered this relationship long ago | The Independent

The intelligence leaks are not a Trump problem – the UK should have reconsidered this relationship long ago | The Independent

The intelligence leaks are not a Trump problem – the UK should have reconsidered this relationship long ago | The Independent

The intelligence leaks are not a Trump problem – the UK should have reconsidered this relationship long ago | The Independent

Tomgram: Rebecca Gordon, Those Who Do Not Remember History... | TomDispatch

Tomgram: Rebecca Gordon, Those Who Do Not Remember History... | TomDispatch

Iran: Rouhani's Re-Election Is Not the Key to the Country's Economic Recovery

by Mohammad Amin  •  May 25, 2017 at 4:00 am

• The true culprit in Iran's economic failure is Iran itself, whose internal barriers make a flourishing economy a pipe-dream. These include: the absence of free-market competition, due mainly to the monopoly of conglomerates affiliated with Ayatollah Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards over a huge sector of the country's economy, which affects at least half of its GDP; the precariousness of the rule of law; the deterioration of human rights; and the exorbitant cost of military intervention in Syria, Yemen and Iraq, as well as the bankrolling of the Lebanon-based Shiite terrorist organization Hezbollah and other regional proxies.

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani. (Photo by Sergey Guneev/Host Photo Agency/Ria Novosti via Getty Images)

The clear victory on May 19 of incumbent Iranian President Hassan Rouhani over his key rival, Ebrahim Raisi -- the candidate supported by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – indicated that voters were concerned above all with the economy. Raisi, an extremist and isolationist like Khamenei, was the candidate who represented hardline power politics and Middle East hegemony.

It was during Rouhani's first term in office that the nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was signed between Iran and six world powers. This not only led to the lifting of crippling international sanctions from the regime in Tehran, but seemed to signal an effort to renew diplomatic and commercial ties the West.

Continue Reading Articlehttps://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10396/iran-rouhani-election

The World Needs to Drive Out Destructive Fantasies

by Shireen Qudosi  •  May 25, 2017 at 4:30 am

• The Palestinians and other powers such as the OIC, the UN and domestic interest groups do not get a veto over reality.
• If we are going to "reset" the Middle East, we need to reset our thinking as well, starting with accepting that Israel has a right to exist. Israel exists, and Israel has a legitimate claim to Jerusalem. Further, the Jewish people have proven themselves as more capable custodians of Jerusalem than their Muslim neighbors, who are already burdened by challenges in their own territory.
• Alongside us, the world must drive out the fantasy that Jerusalem is not Israel's capital. Jerusalem is the heart and soul of Israel. To deny Jerusalem as a part of Jewish and Israeli identity is the same as denying Mecca as inherent to Muslim identity.

U.S. President Donald Trump's visit to the Western Wall in Israel was the most iconic moment of his recent visit to the Middle East. (Illustrative photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images)

The most iconic moment of President Donald Trump's visit to the Middle East was not his "speech on Islam"; it was his visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

The Western Wall is a contested space, and that controversy has bled outside Israel's borders. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson recently reignited the debate, mentioning the Wall as being in "Jerusalem", instead of in Israel. It is a play on language often used to deny Israeli sovereignty over a space that clearly belongs to the Jewish people, as the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, quickly rectified in response.

How we talk about religion matters. If we want to be effective in moving forward, it is important to be truthful. The truth is that Israel won the Six Day War, thereby liberating eastern Jerusalem from Jordan, which had seized it illegally when it attacked Israel in 1948-49 and expelled all Jews from eastern Jerusalem.

Continue Reading Articlehttps://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/10420/destructive-fantasies