Image via X By Vijay Prashad Iran is in turmoil. Across the country, there have been protests of different magnitudes, with violence on the increase with both protesters and police finding themselves in the morgue. What began as work stoppages and inflation protests drew together a range of discontent, with women and young people frustrated with a system unable to secure their livelihood. Iran has been under prolonged economic siege and has been attacked directly by Israel an

The relationship between Cuba and Venezuela transcends traditional diplomacy; it is a phenomenon of direct confrontation against imperialism and a model of cooperation between peoples that has transformed the geopolitics of the Caribbean and South America. This alliance is not a recent or improvised development; it has deep roots, and its destruction has become a primary strategic objective for the United States. Chavez and Castro meet, December 1994 By Carmen Navas Reyes Bac

Delcy Rodriquez sworn in as acting Venezuelan president with Maduro's son as part of the ceremony -- image via video screenshot on X By Vijay Prashad and Carlos Ron On the early morning of January 3, the United States government launched a massive attack on Caracas, Venezuela, and three of the country’s states. Roughly 150 aircraft swarmed the skies, bombing with exceptional ferocity. Amongst these aircraft were EA-18 Growlers equipped with the most advanced electronic warfar

Nicolas Maduro at a rally at the end of December -- image via his Facebook page By Taroa Zúñiga Silva and Vijay Prashad A little after 2am, Venezuela time, on 3 January 2026, in violation of Article 2 of the United Nations Charter, the United States began an attack on several sites in the country, including Caracas, the capital. Residents awoke to loud noises and flashes, as well as large helicopters in the sky. Videos began to appear on social media, but without much context

Gaza, December 2025 -- image via the UNRWA on X By Vijay Prashad On 19 January 2025, a ceasefire took effect to halt the Israeli bombing of Palestinians in Gaza. This ceasefire emerged from a mediation process by Egypt, Qatar, and the United States, which had been sealed in June 2024 with United Nations Security Council Resolution 2735 . However, the Israelis rejected the agreement and waited until Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election to proceed so that Trump coul

Far right Chilean President Elect Kast in October -- Equipo Kast, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Taroa Zúñiga Silva and José Roberto Duque The disappointment felt by many left-wing supporters in Latin America has been renewed with the recent democratic victory of the far right in Chile. This sentiment is particularly poignant as it reflects the struggles of those who identify politically with progressive ideals. Much of this disappointment stems from a simplistic and lin

Obama, Clinton and Biden, along with members of the national security team at the Situation Room of the White House during the operation to kill Bin Laden -- Pete Souza, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Raïs Neza Boneza If everything you thought you knew about the War on Terror were nothing more than a mirage—an extravagant shadow-play staged by geopolitical puppeteers—would you really be surprised? After all, the last two decades have taught us two things: nothing se

Ursula von der Leyen, Volodymyr Zelensky, Mark Rutte & António Costa, December 8, 2025 -- © European Union, 2025, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Vijay Prashad Sitting in a lively room in the University of Amsterdam, I ask a question about the respect accorded by students to their former Prime Minister and now head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), Mark Rutte. The room is animated and funny. No-one seems to accord Rutte with the respect that he might deser

Trump on December 13 -- public domain image By Tings Chak On 10 December 2025, U.S. forces seized the oil tanker Skipper off the coast of Venezuela, carrying over a million barrels of crude. “Well, we keep [the oil],” President Trump told reporters. Venezuela’s foreign ministry called it “blatant theft and an act of international piracy,” adding: “The true reasons for the prolonged aggression against Venezuela have finally been revealed. It has always been about our natural

Kast and Argentinian president Milei on December 16 -- Argentina.gob.ar , CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Vijay Prashad On 14 December, the predictable happened: José Antonio Kast, the candidate of the far-right Republican Party, prevailed over Jeannette Jara of the Communist Party of Chile by 58.16 percent to 41.84 percent. Kast ran as the candidate of the Cambio por Chile (Change for Chile) platform and was backed by all the parties of the traditional right and the cent

Kast campaigning in October, 2025 -- Equipo Kast, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Atilio A. Borón José A. Kast’s resounding victory in the runoff election is bound to have a profound influence on Chile. A solid, neo-fascist, extreme right-wing force consolidated as a result of the convergence of two radical variants of Pinochetism —one led by Kast and the other, even more extreme, by Johannes Kaiser— to which rushed to join the standard-bearer of a political fiction calle

Simón Bolívar International Airport By Ricardo Vaz Multiple international airlines have suspended flights to and from Caracas amidst a heightened US military presence in the Caribbean, after the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issuance of a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) Friday. Iberia (Spain), TAP (Portugal), LATAM (Chile), Avianca (Colombia) and Turkish Airlines (Turkey) were among the companies to cancel upcoming flights connecting the Venezuelan capital to internation

Kamla Persad-Bissessar with Marco Rubio, September 30, 2025 -- public domain image By Vijay Prashad US President Donald Trump has authorised the USS Gerald R. Ford to enter the Caribbean. It now floats north of Puerto Rico, joining the USS Iwo Jima and other US navy assets to threaten Venezuela with an attack. Tensions are high in the Caribbean, with various theories floating about regarding the possibility of what seems to be an inevitable assault by the US and regarding

People march in Belem, Brazil on November 15 as part of the popular protests outside of COP30 -- news screenshot via X By Cade Dunbar On Friday, 17 October 2025, the UN Development Programme released the 2025 edition of its Multidimensional Poverty Index Report . For the first time, the report directly evaluates their multidimensional poverty data against climate hazards, exposing the extent to which the world’s poor are threatened by the environmental crisis. According to th

The Trump administration continues to escalate its threats of war against Venezuela, as millions in the US are set to lose essential benefits US Marines engaged in an amphibious training exercise, October 18, 2025 -- image via Secretary of the Navy John C. Phelan on X By Manolo De Los Santos The United States government is in the grips of one of its longest-running funding gaps in history. The ongoing government shutdown has already stretched beyond 30 days and now, the food

Trump’s ICE forces are facing militant and organized opposition everywhere they turn. Screenshot via X By Sonali Kolhatkar A New York City woman wearing a navy blue polka-dot dress has gone viral for her defiant resistance to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents during a raid in lower Manhattan on October 21, 2025. Appearing as though she was on her way from work—the woman wore a navy blue blazer and brown shoes and carried a large handbag—the “polka-dot dress wo

Trump and Netanyahu with a number of US officials at the White House, September 29, 2025 -- public domain image By Vijay Prashad On 26 October, Caroline Willemen of Médecins Sans Frontières stated that Israel continues to use the need for humanitarian aid in Gaza as “means of pressure”. “The humanitarian situation in Gaza has not improved significantly”, she told the press, “as water and shelter shortages persist and hundreds of thousands of people continue to live in tents

Washington’s unease is rising as Brazil’s Pix bypasses U.S.-dominated payment networks. The country’s digital payment revolution may soon be impossible to contain as other countries adapt their own models. By John P. Ruehl The Trump administration’s July 2025 decision to have the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) investigate Brazil’s “ attacks on American social media companies as well as other unfair trading practices ,” followed by the launch of 50 percent tari

Image via X By Biljana Vankovska The flood of angry—and justified— reactions to this year’s Nobel Peace Prize laureate, María Corina Machado, reveals less about the committee’s decision than about the public’s sense of shock. How can anyone still be astonished when a figure who embodies everything but peace receives this award? History shows that the Nobel Peace Prize has often gone to war criminals, opportunists, and politically “convenient” figures—honored not for moral

By Vijay Prashad Slowly, a full picture of the devastation of Gaza by Israel is becoming clear. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) released a report around the time of the ceasefire that began to lay out the numbers: Israel’s bombardment of Gaza resulted in the total destruction of 190,115 buildings and the almost total destruction of another 330,500 housing units. The constant artillery and aerial fire over the 734 days of the genocide resulted in the wrec