Inside Stories

Sarah Abed is an independent journalist and political commentator.  She covers a broad range of issues relating to the Syrian war, Kurdish issues in Iraq and Syria, as well as U.S policy in the Middle East.  The following is an account of Sarah’s conversations with Aramean Christians living under Kurdish rule in occupied northern Syria, as well as her personal take on the issues surrounding those conversations.  MintPress News could not independently verify the information given by Sarah’s sources.  

On December 4, 2001, less than three months after 9/11, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13224, which designated Holy Land Foundation (HLF) as a terrorist organization. On February 27, 2002, the Wall Street Journal quoted Bush as having said:

In the first part of this MPN exclusive, we speak to Ka Oris of the New People’s Army and Professors William I. Robinson and Roland Simbulan about the new U.S. intervention in Asia, which raises the Philippines to the same level as Syria and Iraq for the Pentagon’s war plans.
In the second part, we will look at the 1999-2015 counterinsurgency initiative “Plan Colombia” as a template for Operation Pacific Eagle, as well as the use of the operation to continue the encirclement of China by U.S. bases.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump won over many American voters by his promise to put “America First.” Though this catchphrase was thought – at the time — to imply a populist message of putting the American people first, Trump has largely failed to deliver on his promises to roll back the corporate welfare state and instead invest in everyday Americans — as evidenced by his tax reform bill, the only legislative “victory” of his young presidency.

DAMASCUS, SYRIA (Analysis) — The war in Syria has been relatively absent from media coverage in recent weeks following the declared victory of Syrian, Russian and Iranian militaries in their battle against the U.S.- backed rebels and terror groups, including ISIS and al-Qaeda.

MALMSTROM AFB, MONTANA — An Air Force Sergeant is under investigation for twice posting racist messages to the Facebook group of the Los Angeles chapter of Black Lives Matter (BLM). It’s the second time in less than a week that a Sergeant in the U.S. Air Force has come under fire for making derogatory remarks about African-Americans on social media.

ATHENS, GREECE (Analysis) – Hundreds of thousands of Greeks took to the streets of Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-largest city, on Sunday, January 21, in a mass rally opposing a compromise on the part of the Greek government regarding the Macedonia name dispute with Greece’s northern neighbor, temporarily recognized by the United Nations as the “Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” (FYROM).

NEW YORK — “It’s Not a Roar,” read the first-edition headline for the New York Times business article published January 27, “but the Global Economy is Finally Making Noise.”
A death rattle, perhaps?
Try as they may, the mainstream media simply cannot prepare for public viewing the gaping wound to the head that murdered the U.S. economy. Never mind the Dow, the Fed Funds rate, or Apple’s latest earnings report, the cause of death is really quite simple: work is underpaid.

JERUSALEM, PALESTINE — When you encounter face to face the systems of oppression as they are imposed by Israel on Palestinians, the shock leaves you searching for words. The dirt roads, dusty in summer and muddy in winter; the cold iron gates; the cement blocks; the metal revolving doors that start and stop abruptly, even violently and as you try to pass through; and the darkened windows from which orders are barked at people.

NEW YORK – A couple of weeks ago ProPublica noted that 2017’s murder rate in New York City was down to 291, the lowest since the 1950s. That number is noteworthy in and of itself, but also because of the context in which it occurred: the number of “stops” and “frisks” employed by the NYPD. About 10,000 people were stopped and frisked — checked for weapons, illegal substances, or outstanding warrants – on the streets of New York in 2017.