Daniel Burston: What is Anti-Semitism?
Anti-Semitism is an old and remarkably persistent form of ethnic and religious prejudice. Scholars have found strong evidence of anti-Semitic attitudes in Hellenistic and Roman authors up to three centuries … Continue reading
Sam Hamill: Who Will Stand With The Innocents?
Fifty years ago, I found myself in the war-ravaged former nation of Okinawa, where some of the fiercest battles of the Pacific War had taken place, and where I began … Continue reading
Sandy Tolan: The Flute at the Checkpoint
The Everyday Politics of Confinement in Palestine The SUV slows as it approaches a military kiosk at a break in a dull gray wall. Inside, Ramzi Aburedwan, a Palestinian musician, … Continue reading
Doug Anderson: Surrender, Panic, and Control
When I was living in Texas in the 70s, I read a book on lucid dreaming that offered a technology of participating in my dreams. I had always been a … Continue reading
Leonard Gontarek: Night
1 Let the man write about Philadelphia. He has a little cynicism in him. Cynicism is nothing. It’s black coffee with sugar. Let him write about the sirens floating around … Continue reading
Eduardo Galeano: The Right to Bravery
. In 1816 the government in Buenos Aires bestowed the rank of lieutenant colonel on Juana Azurduy “in virtue of her manly efforts.” She led the guerrillas who took Cerro … Continue reading
W. J. Astore: A Nixon Quote Explains the Root of So Many U.S. Foreign Policy Blunders
On 30 April 1970, 45 years ago this month, President Richard M. Nixon ordered an invasion into Cambodia. Explaining his reasoning for widening the war in Southeast Asia, Nixon declared: … Continue reading
Video: A Virtual Tour through Ancient Rome in 320 C.E.
In this virtual tour, we discover ancient Rome, guided by renowned “virtual archaeologist” and overseer of the Rome Reborn project Dr. Bernard Frischer, professor emeritus at the University of Virginia. … Continue reading
Naomi Shihab Nye: Different Ways to Pray
There was the method of kneeling, a fine method, if you lived in a country where stones were smooth. The women dreamed wistfully of bleached courtyards, hidden corners where knee … Continue reading
Paul Christensen: Disunited States
The recent invitation John Boehner extended to Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress was an unprecedented sign of disharmony between Republicans and Democrats. Usually, heads of state … Continue reading
Doug Anderson: The Torturers
Took their break after they finally broke a man and made him lie, implicate his friends and cause their deaths. They washed off the blood, sat smoking in the shade. … Continue reading
James Keye: Wake up to your Myths, America!
. I created this list of “American Myths” 25 years ago thinking that some significant part of the people would begin to understand them over time. What seems to be … Continue reading
Leonard Gontarek: Coffee
1 For the young women going door to door, black dresses, fishnet stockings, asking if we’ve thought about death on this beautiful fall Saturday. For the light that has made … Continue reading
Marc Jampole: Drones dehumanize the enemy and make it easier to go to war
It’s so easy to kill an animated figure on a screen in a video game. And then another, and then another, each of them so realistic in their detail that … Continue reading →