AboutArticles by Michael Jansen

Chess genius

20 Apr 2023

Eleven-year-old Syrian chess prodigy Hussein Besou is on the German team competing in the Mitropa tournament currently taking place at the Aurora Hotel on Losinj Island in Croatia. Born in...

Teixeira seems to be inspired by the Ukraine war

16 Apr 2023

Massachusetts Air National guardsman Jack Teixeira who has been accused of revealing US diplomatic and military secrets is no whistleblower. The 21-year-old airman first class is instead a young man...

Serious misconduct

13 Apr 2023

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has been criticised by both Democrats and Republicans for arresting former US President Donald Trump and charging him with 34 felony counts of falsifying his...

China, surprise peacemaker in Saudi-Iran ties

09 Apr 2023

China stepped onto the world stage as a peacemaker with the March 10th agreement between Saudi Arabia and Iran to reopen embassies in each others’ capitals. This was followed by...

Breaking Records

06 Apr 2023

Scotland’s First Minister Humza Yousaf is the third politician of South Asian origin to head a government in the British Isles. The first was Leo Varadkar who served as Irish...

Netanyahu appears to thrive on creating tension

02 Apr 2023

In response to US President Joe Biden’s verbal call not to risk Israel’s democracy by overhauling its Supreme Court, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu rudely tweeted that Israel would take its...

Trump’s troubles

30 Mar 2023

Donald Trump is railing against multiple legal cases threatening to scupper or, at least, complicate his bid for a second term in the White House. During last Saturday’s rally drawing...

This could be Turkey’s most crucial election

26 Mar 2023

Turkey’s presidential and parliamentary election campaign is gaining momentum ahead of the May 14th vote. Trailing in the polls and facing his first electoral defeat in two decades, President Recep...

Serious questions

23 Mar 2023

Since the 2003 disastrous US war on Iraq, anniversaries have prompted commentators to ask, “Where are the architects of the war?” This query is particularly pertinent now because the International...

What did the US gain from the Iraq war?

19 Mar 2023

Today is the 20th anniversary of the deadly and disastrous war US President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld inflicted on Iraq. Victory would...

Michael Jansen

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