Max Rodenbeck

Saving Gaza from Starvation | International Crisis Group Israel’s plan to conquer Gaza and impose a new aid scheme threatens to prolong the war and weaponise the starving population’s most vital needs. Gulf Arab states have a chance to press the U.S. to put...

www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-...

Is the Gaza War Approaching Its Endgame? | Crisis Group The renewed Israeli military campaign in Gaza, together with politicians’ statements, give insights into Israel’s intentions for the strip. In this Q&A, Crisis Group experts explain why these plans, i...

www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-...

White House threatens to VETO the new Grassley/Cantwell bill to require Congress’s approval to impose tariffs. This affirms that it will effectively require two-thirds of the House and Senate to limit (or undo) President Trump’s moves on tariffs.

BREAKING - U.S. team in quake zone told they are fired, per source.

The 3-person disaster assessment team sent to Myanmar for the U.S. received termination notices while staying/sleeping outside — US AID workers were told on an all hands call today, per a source familiar.

Trump's April 2 tariff spree could cripple developing economies President Donald Trump presented his new tariffs on April 2 as a pragmatic, "reciprocal" trade policy intended to balance trade between the US and its trading partners. But the tariffs on imports from...

The new tariffs do not mirror tariffs developing countries impose on the US, nor account for different economic conditions & fiscal realities shaping tariff regimes in poorer countries—& ignore basic realities of institutional capacity, resource endowment, & geography. By @cullenhendrix.bsky.social:

Shameful.

Harvard Suspends Research Partnership With Birzeit University in the West Bank

www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...

Adam Shatz | Submission There’s nothing surprising about Trump’s attack on the universities, or on the liberal law firms that he also...

"There’s nothing surprising about Trump’s attack on the universities, or on liberal law firms... What is shocking is the ease with which his attack has so far succeeded... This is a tale not so much of capitulation to an authoritarian leader as of collusion with him." www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2025/ma...

Breaking the Silence on X: "Friday morning, a mob of settlers descends on the small village of Jinba in Masafer Yatta, injuring 5 Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy and a 64-year-old man. The IDF quickly responded - arresting over 20 Palestinians. From there, it got worse 🧵 https://t.co/rrHUa8WKgk" / X Friday morning, a mob of settlers descends on the small village of Jinba in Masafer Yatta, injuring 5 Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy and a 64-year-old man. The IDF quickly responded - arresting over 20 Palestinians. From there, it got worse 🧵 https://t.co/rrHUa8WKgk

This film has not won an Oscar x.com/BtSIsrael/st...

Excellent point. Damn.

The ‘America First’ Masquerade Though packaged as a kind of foreign policy realism, the doctrine guiding the Trump administration is riddled with contradictions

There's a tendency to conflate the "America First" and realist foreign policy outlooks, which are distinct — actually incompatible in key ways. This has led to a lot of confusion about what Trump and Vance are up to.

Here's my attempt to pierce the ideological fog.

newlinesmag.com/argument/the...

I received a heartbreaking email today: A paper in a special issue I’m editing is being retracted because one of its authors is afraid of losing their job and their legal status in the U.S. if they publish a scientific study on evolution. Yes, on evolution, nature's engine of diversity.

Our latest work on Gaza was produced in collaboration with multiple organisations, including ARIJ, Forbidden Stories, ZDF, and Zeit. Here's a thread of their articles based on the investigation.

Shot From Above: The Dangerous Work of Drone Journalists in Gaza - bellingcat Examining the high price those documenting devastation in Gaza pay.

Together with our publishing partners, Bellingcat continues the work of drone journalists who had been killed while documenting the war in Gaza, visualising the unprecedented scale of destruction through detailed 3D aerial maps. www.bellingcat.com/news/2025/03...

Pete Hegseth, Mike Waltz, Tulsi Gabbard: Private Data and Passwords of Senior U.S. Security Officials Found Online Donald Trump's most important security advisers used Signal to discuss an imminent military strike. Now, reporting by DER SPIEGEL has found that the contact data of some of those officials, including ...

www.spiegel.de/internationa...

Gaza’s stolen childhood: The thousands of children Israel killed A child is killed in Gaza every 45 minutes. That is an average of 30 children killed every day over the past 535 days.

www.aljazeera.com/news/longfor...

Firma la petición STOP KILLING JOURNALISTS IN GAZA. Manifesto for the Right to Report

chng.it/Qskmjmgvsf

YouTube video by Bellingcat Shot From Above- The Dangerous Work of Drone Journalists in Gaza

Watch our 24-minute documentary on the investigation here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLbv...

And lets not forget that shifty foreigners with funny accents are shifty. But mostly its a recent product of algorithm-generated echo chambers. Europe is "dying", "a disaster", "pathetic" etc.

Its partly a feel-good American trope that dates back decades, even centuries: "Poor, failing Europe, always getting bogged down in wars, and then flooding us with grubby refugees". And it is part of misty MAGA nostalgia for an age when everyone wanted blue jeans, rock n roll and burgers.

For the first time in history we can no longer trust our eyes. Our eyes! Imagine the conspiracy theories you can now 'back up' with images. It is becoming increasingly hard to see how democracy and the Rechtsstaat can survive this, in the long term.

One family. One attack. 132 names. A Gaza investigation. More than 50,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's war with Hamas, Gaza health officials say. We reconstructed what happened in one of the deadliest Israeli strikes of the war.

Very powerful report: apps.npr.org/gaza-buildin...

Note to Correspondents: on Gaza | United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs - Occupied Palestinian Territory Stéphane Dujarric, Spokesman for the Secretary-General Note to Correspondents: on Gaza In the past week, Israel carried out devastating strikes on Gaza, claiming the lives of hundreds of civilians, in...

www.ochaopt.org/content/note...

The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat about upcoming military strikes in Yemen. I didn’t think it could be real. Then the bombs started falling.

www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

Law in Mahmoud Khalil’s Case Was Once Struck Down — by Trump’s Sister Judge Maryanne Trump Barry ruled that the law invoked against Mr. Khalil violated the Constitution by giving unfettered discretion to the secretary of state.

The 1952 law under which the Trump administration seeks to deport Mahmoud Khalil, a lawful permanent resident who helped organize protests at Columbia University, was ruled unconstitutional in 1996 — by Judge Maryanne Trump Barry, President Trump’s sister.

Stopping Israel’s War in Gaza | Crisis Group On 18 March, Israel resumed bombing Gaza, upending a two-month ceasefire. Returning to war promises little but more death and destruction. The U.S. should insist on restoring the truce and endorse the...

www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-...

Ten to one that the reason Bhutan is on the list is because he wants a Trump property there and the current tourism laws wouldn't allow his type of exploitation.

The Real Threat to American Soft Power Moral authority matters more than foreign aid.

My latest, in which I argue that foreign aid is overvalued as an instrument of soft power… how the Trump administration treats Americans will do more to undermine U.S. influence in the world than the gutting of USAID.

www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

G-7 Nixes ‘Two-State Solution’ to Push Through Communique Group of Seven foreign ministers have reached consensus on a joint statement calling for more sanctions on Russia if it doesn’t agree to a ceasefire. But the breakthrough was possible only after allie...

Trump admin breaks longstanding Western consensus on Middle East www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

This thing will fail Trump will not restore the "strong gods" of community, family, and faith.

Some interesting Big Thoughts on the Trumpolution: www.noahpinion.blog/p/this-thing...