https://znetwork.org/category/place/middle-east/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Sat, 14 Feb 2026 18:46:41 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/category/place/middle-east/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-israel-is-eroding-life-for-palestinians-in-the-west-bank/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-israel-is-eroding-life-for-palestinians-in-the-west-bank/#respond Sat, 14 Feb 2026 17:14:33 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294735 Today, a quiet transformation is advancing in the West Bank. It isn’t the same spectacular form of violence that once commanded the global news cycle in Gaza, but it is more methodical and durable — and more difficult to interrupt. It unfolds in three seemingly unrelated processes: financial warfare against Palestinian economic life, state-backed settler terror, and [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-israel-is-eroding-life-for-palestinians-in-the-west-bank/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-gaza-to-cuba-how-canada-remains-the-worlds-most-tactful-bystander/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-gaza-to-cuba-how-canada-remains-the-worlds-most-tactful-bystander/#respond Sat, 14 Feb 2026 17:04:56 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294729 The world is witnessing yet another manufactured humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in plain sight in Cuba. This crisis is not the result of any internal collapse or mismanagement. It is the deliberate outcome of United States policy, a policy of collective punishment designed to impose economic suffocation on an entire population to extract political change. President [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-gaza-to-cuba-how-canada-remains-the-worlds-most-tactful-bystander/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-3-local-bds-campaigns-won-the-divestment-of-millions-in-israeli-bonds/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-3-local-bds-campaigns-won-the-divestment-of-millions-in-israeli-bonds/#respond Fri, 13 Feb 2026 19:30:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294699 On Nov. 19, 2025, members of Break the Bonds NC, a coalition of Palestine Solidarity organizations, spoke at a North Carolina Investment Authority board meeting to demand the state pension fund divest from all Israeli government bonds. Immediately after the meeting, the state treasurer’s office emailed a link of the pension’s holdings to Ari Rosenberg, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-3-local-bds-campaigns-won-the-divestment-of-millions-in-israeli-bonds/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/citizen-resistance-swiss-lawyers-take-their-own-foreign-minister-to-the-icc-over-alleged-gaza-war-crimes/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/citizen-resistance-swiss-lawyers-take-their-own-foreign-minister-to-the-icc-over-alleged-gaza-war-crimes/#respond Fri, 13 Feb 2026 19:17:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294700 “Resistance is futile,” Fintan O’Toole wrote in The New York Review of Books, referring to countries in the Western Hemisphere forced to accept U.S. hegemony. But is resistance really futile today?  “At the moment, there are so many moving pieces that doing something for the sake of doing something could be a massive waste of [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/citizen-resistance-swiss-lawyers-take-their-own-foreign-minister-to-the-icc-over-alleged-gaza-war-crimes/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-destroyed-gazas-hospitals-now-its-banning-doctors-without-borders/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-destroyed-gazas-hospitals-now-its-banning-doctors-without-borders/#respond Fri, 13 Feb 2026 19:15:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294701 On January 1, the Israeli occupation revoked the licenses of 37 international and local humanitarian organizations operating in Gaza, and it has now warned they must “must complete the cessation of their activities by March 1, 2026.” These organizations provide essential services to civilians: delivering food aid to the poor, supplying clean drinking water, supporting [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-destroyed-gazas-hospitals-now-its-banning-doctors-without-borders/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/first-gaza-then-the-world-the-global-danger-of-israeli-exceptionalism/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/first-gaza-then-the-world-the-global-danger-of-israeli-exceptionalism/#respond Fri, 13 Feb 2026 18:18:38 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294685 While many nations occasionally resort to a “state of exception” to deal with temporary crises, Israel exists in a permanent state of exception. This Israeli exceptionalism is the very essence of the instability that plagues the Middle East. The concept of the state of exception dates back to the Roman justitium, a legal mechanism for [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/first-gaza-then-the-world-the-global-danger-of-israeli-exceptionalism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-global-campaign-against-the-uaes-war-in-sudan/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-global-campaign-against-the-uaes-war-in-sudan/#respond Thu, 12 Feb 2026 16:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294649 Last November, the RSF militia committed a heinous massacre in Elfashir; thousands were killed in one day, including patients at a hospital, women, and children, who were lined up and shot to death. Satellite images explain that the militia put the victims in a mass burial to hide its crime. This massacre was indeed enabled [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-global-campaign-against-the-uaes-war-in-sudan/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-just-started-legalizing-its-annexation-of-the-west-bank-heres-what-that-means/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-just-started-legalizing-its-annexation-of-the-west-bank-heres-what-that-means/#comments Wed, 11 Feb 2026 18:02:33 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294602 Israel just erased Palestinian existence from the West Bank by law, and it’s not an overstatement.  It has so far been commonplace to say that Israel’s annexation of the West Bank exists in all but name, since a state of de facto annexation was being established on the ground even though the West Bank was [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/israel-just-started-legalizing-its-annexation-of-the-west-bank-heres-what-that-means/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-government-sanctioned-persecution-of-leqaa-kordia/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-government-sanctioned-persecution-of-leqaa-kordia/#respond Wed, 11 Feb 2026 17:53:07 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294599 The last Columbia University protester’s hospitalization and subsequent disappearance are just the latest bad omens amid worsening conditions in confinement. As her time in confinement approaches a full year, Columbia protester and Palestinian human rights advocate Leqaa Kordia, 33, was missing in ICE custody for over 72 hours following a medical episode last Friday. On [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-government-sanctioned-persecution-of-leqaa-kordia/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/leading-papers-call-for-destroying-iran-to-save-it/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/leading-papers-call-for-destroying-iran-to-save-it/#respond Wed, 11 Feb 2026 17:25:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294611 The United States has no right to wage war on Iran, or to have a say who governs the country. The opinion pages of the New York Times and Washington Post, however, are offering facile humanitarian arguments for the US to escalate its attacks on Iran. These are based on the nonsensical assumption that the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/leading-papers-call-for-destroying-iran-to-save-it/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/the-war-hasnt-ended-palestinians-in-gaza-still-face-israeli-attacks-disease-medical-neglect/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/the-war-hasnt-ended-palestinians-in-gaza-still-face-israeli-attacks-disease-medical-neglect/#respond Tue, 10 Feb 2026 17:00:00 +0000 The partial reopening of Gaza’s southern Rafah crossing with Egypt has been marked by chaos and severe restrictions imposed by Israel, as tens of thousands of Palestinians continue to wait for medical evacuation to receive urgent care outside the Gaza Strip. According to U.N. data, only 36 Palestinians in need of medical treatment were allowed [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/the-war-hasnt-ended-palestinians-in-gaza-still-face-israeli-attacks-disease-medical-neglect/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/u-s-secretly-deporting-palestinians-to-west-bank-in-coordination-with-israel/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/u-s-secretly-deporting-palestinians-to-west-bank-in-coordination-with-israel/#respond Mon, 09 Feb 2026 18:12:54 +0000 The United States is quietly deporting Palestinians arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to the occupied West Bank by private jet, with two such flights taking place in coordination with the Israeli authorities since the beginning of this year — part of a secretive and politically sensitive operation revealed through a joint investigation by [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/u-s-secretly-deporting-palestinians-to-west-bank-in-coordination-with-israel/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/steadfast-resistance-under-occupation-from-minneapolis-to-palestine/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/steadfast-resistance-under-occupation-from-minneapolis-to-palestine/#respond Mon, 09 Feb 2026 16:55:59 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294513 Two images, from opposite sides of the world, are seared into our minds:  Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos in his blue knit bunny hat, carrying his Spiderman backpack, being snatched from the streets and detained by ICE.  Five-year-old Hind Rajab’s voice, tiny and terrified, crying out for help from the car as her family members’ dead bodies lay next [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/steadfast-resistance-under-occupation-from-minneapolis-to-palestine/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-historical-blockage-to-radical-rupture-the-ontological-revolution-of-socialism/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-historical-blockage-to-radical-rupture-the-ontological-revolution-of-socialism/#respond Mon, 09 Feb 2026 16:44:12 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294509 ​The intellectual framework of new socialism gains meaning through the transcendence of the three main pillars of modernity: statism, industrialism, and hierarchical rationality. These three pillars have been reproduced in different forms throughout history. Capitalism reinforced them through the dogmas of growth, competition, and the market. Traditional socialism, on the other hand, preserved these three [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-historical-blockage-to-radical-rupture-the-ontological-revolution-of-socialism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/syrias-anti-kurdish-offensive-suits-israeli-strategy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/syrias-anti-kurdish-offensive-suits-israeli-strategy/#respond Sun, 08 Feb 2026 15:53:41 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294502 On January 6, Israeli and Syrian leaders met in Paris for US-sponsored talks which saw Syria’s Islamist president Ahmed al-Sharaa reach a tentative agreement aimed at a lasting security accord with Tel Aviv. That same day, the first shots were fired in a blitzkrieg offensive that has seen al-Sharaa’s forces seize 80 percent of the territory formerly [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/syrias-anti-kurdish-offensive-suits-israeli-strategy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-jury-were-right-to-acquit-the-palestine-action-defendants-heres-why-2/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-jury-were-right-to-acquit-the-palestine-action-defendants-heres-why-2/#respond Sun, 08 Feb 2026 15:48:03 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294499 Even before the trial began, the British government had done its utmost to prejudice the proceedings against six Palestine Action activists. It declared that they belonged to a terrorist organisation and that they were engaged in a terrorist enterprise in breaking into an Israeli weapons factory in Filton, Bristol – one, British officials avoided mentioning, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-jury-were-right-to-acquit-the-palestine-action-defendants-heres-why-2/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/after-rojava/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/after-rojava/#respond Sat, 07 Feb 2026 16:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294484 The ceasefire deal agreed between the Syrian government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) last week – hailed by the US as a ‘historic milestone in Syria’s journey toward national reconciliation’ – represents a major victory for Damascus. It also spells the end of Rojava as a Kurdish-run autonomous enclave in the country’s northeast. Talks [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/after-rojava/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indonesias-diplomatic-double-talk-on-gaza/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indonesias-diplomatic-double-talk-on-gaza/#comments Sat, 07 Feb 2026 16:45:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294400 On Feb. 1, 2026, Indonesia condemned Israel’s latest airstrike on Gaza after at least 32 civilians were killed. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs warned that “unilateral violations of the ceasefire agreed in October 2025 not only exacerbate the suffering of Gaza civilians but also undermine trust and directly hinder efforts to achieve stability and a [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indonesias-diplomatic-double-talk-on-gaza/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peyman-viyan-the-people-have-no-patience-left-for-the-regime/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peyman-viyan-the-people-have-no-patience-left-for-the-regime/#respond Sat, 07 Feb 2026 02:52:43 +0000 Protests that erupted across Iran and Eastern Kurdistan (Rojhilat) have now entered their second week, marked by mass participation. In cities across the country, people remain in the streets day and night. On the previous night, millions took to the streets in dozens of cities across Iran and Eastern Kurdistan, including Tehran, Isfahan, Shiraz, Qazvin, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peyman-viyan-the-people-have-no-patience-left-for-the-regime/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/zionist-israel-the-scourge-of-our-times/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/zionist-israel-the-scourge-of-our-times/#comments Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294425 The investment of American governmental and corporate forces (systems) in defending and/or downplaying Israeli genocide has numbed the conscience and accelerated ferocity in a nation fully steeped in a violent reality; a reality playing out on its streets today.   Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian territories, effectively expressed what many are feeling about [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/zionist-israel-the-scourge-of-our-times/feed/ 2 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-menu-how-the-middle-powers-sacrificed-gaza-to-save-themselves/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-menu-how-the-middle-powers-sacrificed-gaza-to-save-themselves/#respond Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294427 Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney sounded more like a populist leader than a former central banker during his address at the World Economic Forum in Davos on January 20. Bemoaning the “fading” of the rules-based order, Carney delivered a surprisingly blunt speech. “The old order is not coming back,” he declared. “We are in the midst of [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-menu-how-the-middle-powers-sacrificed-gaza-to-save-themselves/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/filton-acquittals-demolish-starmer-and-cooper-lies-about-palestine-action/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/filton-acquittals-demolish-starmer-and-cooper-lies-about-palestine-action/#respond Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:53:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294443 As the trial finished at Woolwich Crown Court of the six Palestine Action activists who entered the Filton factory to destroy Israeli killer drones, Starmer, Cooper, Lammy and Mahmood are left bereft of a single guilty verdict in the case on which they relied heavily to label Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation. I could [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/filton-acquittals-demolish-starmer-and-cooper-lies-about-palestine-action/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-recent-agreement-between-damascus-and-the-kurdish-administration/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-recent-agreement-between-damascus-and-the-kurdish-administration/#respond Fri, 06 Feb 2026 16:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294465 How should we interpret the recent agreement between the Syrian Kurdish movement and the new Syrian government? Does it mark the end of a decade of Kurdish self-administration in northeastern Syria? Or is it merely a temporary arrangement, destined to join the long list of Middle Eastern agreements announced as final, only to collapse shortly [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/on-the-recent-agreement-between-damascus-and-the-kurdish-administration/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vindication-uk-jury-clears-palestine-action-protesters-who-admitted-to-elbit-break-in/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vindication-uk-jury-clears-palestine-action-protesters-who-admitted-to-elbit-break-in/#respond Thu, 05 Feb 2026 16:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294399 “These verdicts are a huge blow to government ministers who have tried to portray Palestine Action as a violent group to justify banning it under badly drafted terrorism legislation,” said one campaigner. In what one campaigner called a “huge blow” to the UK government’s efforts to crush Palestine Action, a London jury on Wednesday cleared six members [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vindication-uk-jury-clears-palestine-action-protesters-who-admitted-to-elbit-break-in/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-a-non-un-conflict-resolution-framework-feasible-desirable-trumps-board-of-peace-is-an-obstacle-and-warning/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-a-non-un-conflict-resolution-framework-feasible-desirable-trumps-board-of-peace-is-an-obstacle-and-warning/#respond Thu, 05 Feb 2026 16:53:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294416 [Prefatory Note: Initially framed as questions responding to Middle East journalist, Mohamed Abd Elaziz, raising question about Stage II of the Trump Plan for Gaza, inaugurating the Board of Peace at the Davos World Economic Forum this January. The questions raises some key issues. My assessment is that the Board of Peace deserves to fail. [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-a-non-un-conflict-resolution-framework-feasible-desirable-trumps-board-of-peace-is-an-obstacle-and-warning/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/mouin-rabbani-on-whats-happening-now-in-palestine/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/mouin-rabbani-on-whats-happening-now-in-palestine/#respond Thu, 05 Feb 2026 16:53:00 +0000 This week on Talk World Radio we’re speaking about Western Asia with Mouin Rabbani. He is a Middle East analyst specializing in the Arab-Israeli conflict and Palestinian affairs. He is the co-editor of the book Aborted State? The UN Initiative and New Palestinian Junctures. He has written for numerous publications and regularly posts writing and videos [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/mouin-rabbani-on-whats-happening-now-in-palestine/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/gaza-teaches-us-that-only-some-lives-are-worth-talking-about/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/gaza-teaches-us-that-only-some-lives-are-worth-talking-about/#respond Thu, 05 Feb 2026 16:49:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294409 Since the so-called ceasefire came into effect in Gaza, Israel has killed over 500 Palestinians. But these lives – according to western media and politicians – are not worth talking about. You probably won’t have heard about Zaina, Menna and Maryam Al-Atbash. On Saturday, the remains of these young sisters were found on the street by [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/gaza-teaches-us-that-only-some-lives-are-worth-talking-about/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-over-20-mediterranean-ports-coordinate-action-on-6-february-to-oppose-war/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-over-20-mediterranean-ports-coordinate-action-on-6-february-to-oppose-war/#respond Wed, 04 Feb 2026 19:12:45 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294357 Workers in more than 20 Mediterranean ports are preparing for an international day of action on 6 February to oppose the growing militarization of transport infrastructure, as well as port management’s and governments’ complicity in the genocide in Gaza. “If we don’t take this step, all our other demands will be crushed under war,” Francesco [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/workers-in-over-20-mediterranean-ports-coordinate-action-on-6-february-to-oppose-war/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/human-rights-watch-israel-palestine-team-quits-over-blocked-report-on-right-of-return/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/human-rights-watch-israel-palestine-team-quits-over-blocked-report-on-right-of-return/#respond Wed, 04 Feb 2026 19:10:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1294379 Two Human Rights Watch employees—the group’s entire Israel-Palestine team—resigned after senior staffers blocked a report calling Israel’s denial of Palestinian refugees’ right of return to their homeland a crime against humanity. Jewish Currents’ Alex Kane reported Tuesday that HRW Israel-Palestine team lead Omar Shakir and assistant researcher Milena Ansari are stepping down over leadership’s decision [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/human-rights-watch-israel-palestine-team-quits-over-blocked-report-on-right-of-return/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/newly-released-epstein-files-reveal-further-ties-to-israel/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/newly-released-epstein-files-reveal-further-ties-to-israel/#respond Wed, 04 Feb 2026 18:57:00 +0000 The release of more than 3 million new files connected to the late Jeffrey Epstein reveals further connections between the convicted sex criminal and the state of Israel. Ehud Barak, the former Israeli prime minister, is mentioned numerous times in the files, with him and his wife seemingly maintaining a close relationship with the financier [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/newly-released-epstein-files-reveal-further-ties-to-israel/feed/ 0