AboutArticles by Michael Jansen

Mistrust, frustration keep Lebanon on the boil

20 Oct 2019

Tens of thousands of Lebanese have taken to the streets across Lebanon to vent their anger against the country’s economic and political crisis. They have adopted the slogan of...

Trump’s decisions are changing the political landscape

18 Oct 2019

Donald Trump’s presidency has been disastrous for this region. He has taken three ignorant, snap decisions which have had terrible short-term consequences and are in the process of changing...

When Trump capitulated to Turkish pressure

13 Oct 2019

Both the current occupant of the White House, Donald Trump, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are courting their electoral “bases” by taking ruinous decisions on north-eastern Syria. Trump...

Pelosi is risking the loss of both presidential and legislative elections next fall

11 Oct 2019

During his fight to remain in the White House, it is just and fitting that Donald Trump, a political neophyte, should battle Nancy Pelosi, a woman long-versed in the...

Iraq’s broken state a legacy of George Bush

06 Oct 2019

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi is honest enough to state the obvious. In response to mass protests in Baghdad and the south, he said there is “no magic...

Heart of a lion

04 Oct 2019

The names of Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame have returned to the headlines again. Wilson has been remembered in laudatory obituaries after his death this week at the age of...

Ukraine affair could see the end of Donald Trump

29 Sep 2019

The launch by US Democrats of a long-overdue impeachment investigation into the current occupant of the White House has also resulted in a scandal which could force their leading...

Shamsie paying the price for backing Palestinians

26 Sep 2019

Anglo-Pakistani author Kamila Shamsie staunchly supports the “Boycott, Divest and Sanction” (BDS) movement designed to put pressure on Israel over its brutal treatment of the Palestinians, although her stand...

Netanyahu on shaky ground in bid for second term

22 Sep 2019

Israel’s second parliamentary election this year has taken the country back to square one: to political deadlock between sitting Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and challenger Benny Gantz. Netanyahu, who...

The spy who tried to stop a war

19 Sep 2019

In early 2003, Katherine Gun, an unknown Mandarin Chinese translator with British intelligence, tried to foil the US-UK conspiracy to wage their disastrous war on Iraq. Last week, a film, entitled...

Michael Jansen

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