Juan Cole: Israel Returns to Deliberately Starving Palestinian Civilians in Gaza, Planning for Further Total War

By Juan Cole / Informed Comment Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Ashraf al-Hur reports at al-Quds al-`Arabi [Arab Jerusalem] that the extremist government in Israel has escalated its military attacks on the Gaza Strip in the past few days. The moves come after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to start the second phase of the ceasefire… Read More Juan Cole: Israel Returns to Deliberately Starving Palestinian Civilians in Gaza, Planning for Further Total War

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Neighbourhood Lost: The End is Nigh for South Asian University

Sasanka Perera On February 26, 2025, Yashada Sawant, an Indian student from the South Asian University (SAU) was publicly assaulted by Ratan Singh and a gang of goons with clear affiliations to the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP). The attackers’ grouse was that fish was being served on Maha Shivaratri and Sawant’s ‘crime’, as the university’s mess secretary,… Read More Neighbourhood Lost: The End is Nigh for South Asian University

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Camouflaging Crimes

Every so often at The Caravan, we come across crimes and violations committed by men and women in uniform. In February this year, we reported on the Delhi police’s illegal detention and harassment of students who had been protesting at the Jamia Millia Islamia university. The protest was in response to the university’s attempts to… Read More Camouflaging Crimes

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The Price of Monotheism

Nothing has so radically transformed the world as the distinction between true and false religion NB: This is one of the most thought-provoking studies in the history and philosophy of religion that – in my limited reading – I have come across. The author Jan Assman (1938-2024) was a German Egyptologist, cultural historian, and religion… Read More The Price of Monotheism

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Juan Cole: Cyberpunk Nation

The opening weeks of the second Trump administration have produced daily headlines that read — no, this is not hyperbole! — like science fiction. The spectacle of a South African tech billionaire and his cronies staging a twenty-first-century cybercoup with the acquiescence of an aging lunatic of a president beggars belief. Elon Musk has given… Read More Juan Cole: Cyberpunk Nation

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There are 1,000 grotesque memes of J. D. Vance: they’re all more likable than the real thing

Angry, rude and addicted to web troll-ery, the vice-president has the Make America Awful Again portfolio. Seems a perfect fit Marina Hyde You may well be aware that Backpfeifengesicht is the German word for a face that is worthy of being slapped. Even so, how has this not been internationalised? Or at the very least Americanised, where… Read More There are 1,000 grotesque memes of J. D. Vance: they’re all more likable than the real thing

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It’s the age of regret: gen Z grew up glued to their screens, and missed the joy of being human

A generation who came of age online now feel deprived of real connections. The upside is they are doing something about it Gaby Hinsliff It’s the love-hate relationship that defined a generation. We think we know all about teenagers and the phones to which they’re so umbilically tied: sleeping with them under the pillow, panicking… Read More It’s the age of regret: gen Z grew up glued to their screens, and missed the joy of being human

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The Mask is Off. After Ukraine, imperialism is now the norm

NB: Whereas I agree with Professor Mehta’s arguments about the sinister significance of Trump’s treatment of President Zelenskyy; the following is where I disagree. He says the Russian invasion of Ukraine was only the second time since World War II that one country had claimed an entire other country… It was a war to erase… Read More The Mask is Off. After Ukraine, imperialism is now the norm

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