AboutArticles by Michael Jansen

The long race

11 Jan 2024

While President Joe Biden has belatedly entered the November race for the White House, his one-term rival Donald Trump has never stopped campaigning for re-election ever since Biden won in...

The killing of Saleh Arouri was predictable

07 Jan 2024

Saturday’s salvo of Hizbollah rockets targeting the Meron Israeli military surveillance base on Mount Jarmaq in northern Israel was the initial response for Israel’s assassination in Beirut last week of...

Dangerous dances

04 Jan 2024

A 70-year-old provincial fishmonger has challenged a ban on singing and dancing imposed Iran’s conservative clerics and won. Dressed in a white suit Sadegh Bana Motejaded dances in the market...

Globally dominant West has failed to stop wars

31 Dec 2023

In his brief 2024 New Year message UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres summed up the sorry state of the world during the past 12 months. He stated, “2023 has been...

Failing efforts

28 Dec 2023

Where is Cindy McCain? She became the director of the World Food Programme (WFP) in April but is rarely seen trying to raise awareness of the rapidly growing number of...

Gaza war shuts down Bethlehem, Jerusalem

24 Dec 2023

The little West Bank town of Bethlehem has cancelled all but religious observances this Christmas. The tall evergreen tree near the Church of the Nativity where tradition holds Jesus was...

Targeted artifacts

21 Dec 2023

A shake up of senior staff of the British Museum was completed with last week’s departure of deputy director Sir Jonathan Williams. Director Hartwig Fischer resigned in August after a...

Lebanon’s economic and social crises target children

17 Dec 2023

Lebanon’s overlapping political, economic and social crises continue to target the country’s children. Relying on data collected last Month, the UN children’s agency, UNICEF, argues these crises negatively impact every...

Loose cannon

14 Dec 2023

In addition to campaigning for re-election Democrat US President Joe Biden is fighting off impeachment efforts by Congressional Republicans who cite his possible implication in the illegal activities of his...

West’s support for Ukraine war is declining

10 Dec 2023

Joe Biden’s Ukraine war has failed to progress as planned. After recapturing the eastern Kharkiv region and its capital city Kherson at the end of last year, Ukrainian forces have...

Michael Jansen

The author, a well-respected observer of Middle East affairs, has three books on the Arab-Israeli conflict.