Ben Friedman

Is starvation in Gaza really Israel's fault? The facts are clear Rising starvation in Gaza may have a number of factors. But Israel's wartime policies on humanitarian aid are inarguably among them.

For @forward.com, I wrote about how we know that Israel has been withholding food as a military tactic because Israeli officials have said versions of “we are withholding food as a military tactic” for the entirety of the war and pretending otherwise is willful ignorance forward.com/opinion/7586...

This suggests the opportunity for an off-ramp, which may be facilitated by Israel running low on a few key things, and thus willing to quit after they hit a few more militarily useless targets in a bank-shot attempt to destabilizie the Iranian government.

Live Updates: Iran Fires Missiles at U.S. Base in Qatar

Both the US strikes on Iran and their retaliation today seem partly theatrical. The US didn't do the sustained campaign likely in the can to really cripple Iranian nuclear weapons program, and the Iranians shot at well-defended bases with warning.
www.nytimes.com/live/2025/06...

Trump’s Iran Choice: Last-Chance Diplomacy or a Bunker-Busting Bomb

This binary view is wrong. The third choice is to live with Iran as a nascent nuclear weapons state, as we've been doing for a while, or fully nuclear one, and pressure Israel to not destabilize the situation by bombing.
www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/u...

Under no circumstances should we get sucked into Israel's preventive war on Iran, which will likely prove counterproductive. The question is how bad it gets.

US begins evacuating Mideast embassies, army bases as Iran nuclear talks come to a head CENTCOM chief shelves Senate testimony as nonessential embassy staff, troops' dependents depart region; Iranian defense minister threatens to strike US bases amid stalled talks

If Israel bombs Iran in an attempt to kibosh US negotiations and drag us into a war, can we stop underwriting their military? Or at least acknowledge we shouldn't pay them to screw us? www.timesofisrael.com/us-begins-ev...

As Trump Seeks Iran Deal, Israel Again Raises Possible Strikes on Nuclear Sites

Long and short of this is Israel is considering striking Iran in order to screw up US diplomacy and expecting US help if they do. What is stronger than chutzpah? www.nytimes.com/2025/05/28/u...

How U.S. cuts in Somalia could imperil the fight against al-Shabab Somalia’s government has increasingly turned to Turkey to repel al-Shabab, as America’s diminished focus on Africa scrambles global power dynamics.

News article advocating endless US war in Somalia, in part by overstating Al Shabab's threat to the west. www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/0...

Hamas Says Witkoff Personally Promised to Lift Gaza Blockade in Exchange for Edan Alexander The U.S. immediately broke the deal, senior Hamas official Basem Naim tells Drop Site. “They threw it in the trash” and there has been “zero” progress on a Gaza ceasefire.

If Trump indeed agreed to get the last US hostage freed in exchange for getting the blockade of Gaza lifted and then ignored the obligation, it's no favor to the remaining hostages. If the US won't honor its own agreement, who will push Israel to honor theirs? www.dropsitenews.com/p/witkoff-ha...

Trump’s gifted Qatari 747 would be a security problem, officials say The Qatari luxury jet offered to Trump is in San Antonio, Texas, suggesting that improvements to the plane may already be underway. But officials have raised security concerns.

It's very DC to treat this Qatar aircraft gift, which is potential (arguably open) corruption of US foreign policy as primarily a security problem because of bugs and so forth.
www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

Trump administration will accept a luxury jet from Qatar to use as Air Force One Trump is expected to discuss arrangements for the plane during his visit to Qatar this week, one source said.

Is Trump being bribed by Qatar good because it somewhat reduced the odds of a war with Iran? www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcn...

It's confusing, but for the US it's a win if we are quitting a failing little war and letting Israel fight its own battles.

The Houthis are denying the deal and Oman confirming it? But no one is saying they agreed to stop shooting missiles at Israel, just ships (maybe US ships, maybe all ships).

US to stop strikes on Houthis in Yemen | CNN Politics President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that the US would “stop the bombings” against the Iran-backed Houthi rebel group in Yemen, after the Houthis told the US that “they don’t want to fight anym...

Seems like Trump either jumped the gun, prematurely announcing Houthi deal before it was finalized or threw Israel under the bus by making a separate peace with the Houthis just as their fight with the Houthis escalates, or both.
www.cnn.com/2025/05/06/p...

A political prisoner in other words.

YouTube video by Forbes Breaking News BREAKING NEWS: Hegseth Blasts Media Over Signal Story At White House Easter Egg Roll

Some real Kenny Powers energy from Hegseth here.
youtu.be/vf7-d9mIGvA?...

Trump administration weighs drone strikes on Mexican cartels The administration has increased surveillance flights over Mexico as it tries to track the powerful cartels that dominate the fentanyl trade.

Is there anyone in or out of the Trump administration who truly believes that drone strikes on cartels would work to limit fentanyl flows or really in any sense beyond just showing that we remain committed to illegal and unpredictable violence?
www.nbcnews.com/politics/nat...

Make him veto it!

Trying unsuccessfully to open shipping lanes. But yes it's ironic for him to promote free trade.

U.S. Strikes in Yemen Burning Through Munitions With Limited Success In just three weeks, the Pentagon has used $200 million worth of munitions in Operation Rough Rider against the Houthi militia, officials said.

Bear in mind this is not being done to defend core US interests but rather to reduce increased shipping costs, which mostly fall on non-American consumers, and to defend Israel from a failed Houthi effort to coerce it into not starving Gaza. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/04/u...

U.S. Strikes in Yemen Burning Through Munitions With Limited Success In just three weeks, the Pentagon has used $200 million worth of munitions in Operation Rough Rider against the Houthi militia, officials said.

Predictably, Trump's campaign against the Houthis seems to be going as poorly as Biden's, only at greater cost. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/04/u...

Finally, this administration, like Biden's, should have given diplomacy a chance before bombing. The Houthis' demand is that Israel let more aid into Gaza. They stopped attacks during the ceasefire. Both good ideas in their right. Why not push both and see what it happens before bombing?

Second, the war won't work. Airstrikes won't deprive the Houthis of the ability to fire drones and inaccurate ballistic missiles, especially when they're resupplied by Iran. And the violence inflicted on them is more likely to increase their desire to attack shipping than scare them into submission.

For one, the war isn't necessary. Houthis attacks on shipping are disruptive, but shippers have adjusted to going the longer route, they actually make profit as a result, and global supply chains have adjusted. To the extent there are victims of this disruption today, they are mostly European.

The U.S. War Against the Houthis Is the Real ‘Signalgate’ Scandal Lost in the uproar over ‘Signalgate’ is a bigger issue: the Trump administration’s misguided decision to attack the Houthis in the first place.

For @wpr.bsky.social, Rose Kelanic and I argue that the real Signal chat scandal should be the war it discussed. We show why it's unnecessary and bound to fail.
www.worldpoliticsreview.com/houthis-us-t...

Throwing students out of the country for speech is a terrible offense to American values in any circumstance, but what makes this worse is how it's done in abject service of a foreign power where a fascist organization is bragging about how it is manipulating US immigration policy.

We could've tried forcing Israel to let aid into Gaza—the aid cutoff is why the Houthis were resuming attacks, they say—instead of bombing, just to see if that (decent thing we should do anyway) preempted their renewed threat to shipping, rather than trying again to bomb them into submission.

A nation of yapping infosec inspectors who don’t know and don’t care about first-order strategic choices, policies, acts of war

Also the war they are so casually green lighting is stupid. It's not going to work, and it's not remotely necessary.

Also it's a discussion with the seriousness of when to hold a fantasy football draft where the topic is whether to bomb a country, something there is no evident legal basis for in this case. This should be seen as part of Trump lighting the constitution on fire.