IntroductionThe True Origin of the “Fake News” Euphemism“Fake News” and the Russiagate SagaThe Persecution of Julian AssangeThe Mainstream Media’s Habit of Spreading Fake News and the Present Danger of CensorshipWhat You Can Do to Help Combat Fake News Introduction As...
IntroductionHow the Mainstream Media Report the US Shootdown of Flight 655The Facts about the US Shootdown of Flight 655Conclusion Introduction Today marks twenty-nine years since the shootdown by the USS Vincennes of Iran Air flight 655, which killed all of the...
The official website of Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khamenei, khamenei.ir, recently interviewed me to discuss US policy toward Iran, as well as Saudi Arabia and the Qatar crisis. The editors, however, chose to censor a portion of my interview that was...
IntroductionSyriaIranRussiaCubaIsrael & PalestineConclusion Introduction John Kerry earlier this month penned an op-ed for the New York Times touting “America’s leadership” as “essential and effective” thanks largely to the...
A journalist from Iran’s state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) contacted me for a few comments about the Iran nuclear agreement–known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). His first question was whether this was a bad deal for...
[Update, February 20, 2016: After expressing my disappointment and publicly calling them out, the Habilian Association restored the full text of my interview.] I was recently asked to do an interview by Meysam Haddadian for the Habilian Association, but much...
The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) interviewed me this week about the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program, published June 30. If you can read Farsi, click here. Otherwise, here’s an abridged English version. Following are my answers to...
The only relevance of Netanyahu’s speech to the US Congress, and the melodrama surrounding it, is that it illustrates how the framework for debate is limited to the dichotomy of the hard-liners, on the one side, who think that Iran shouldn’t be...
Following Benjamin Netanyahu’s melodramatic speech to the US Congress, the New York Times, in an article about the supposed “Chasm” between the Israeli Prime Minister and President Barack Obama on the issue of Iran, explains that Obama would...
The caption of a Google Earth image accompanying a recent New York Times article by David Sanger and William Broad describes it as: A view of the mountain where Iran built a hidden centrifuge facility called Fordo. The U.S. revealed its existence in 2009....
The New York Times presents readers with criticisms of Israel and the U.S. by Iran’s Supreme Leader as though they were merely “uncompromising” opinions by informing readers at the end of a recent article titled “As Iran Nuclear Talks Resume,...
The U.S. mainstream media has a rather strange understanding of what “diplomacy” in international relations means. Under the headline “Obama Signals a Shift From Military Might to Diplomacy”, Mark Landler in the New York Times offers...
There was a great deal of buzz about the initial agreement between the U.S. and its Western allies and Iran, with the media calling it “historic”, “a breakthrough” and a “game-changer”. The media is also characterizing the Obama...
A Reuters headline reads “Iran says to continue building at Arak nuclear site despite deal”, thus implying that its ongoing construction would be in violation of its recent agreement with the U.S. and its Western allies. The lead paragraph...
There are a couple points worth noting about recent reporting on the recent talks between the U.S. and its Western allies and Iran over its nuclear program. 1) The first is that the media effectively accepts the U.S. government’s framework that Iran’s...
On November 7, Michael R. Gordon reported in the lede of a New York Times article titled “West and Iran Seen as Nearing a Nuclear Deal”: After years of fruitless negotiations, Western and Iranian diplomats are on the verge of an agreement that would...
On the matter of Iran’s talks with the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (the U.S., U.K., Russia, China, and France) plus German (the so-called “P5+1” group), the New York Times reports: Iran has insisted that the West...
Last week, the Associated Press published an interview with Obama. Its headline declared: OBAMA: IRAN ‘YEAR OR MORE’ FROM GETTING BOMB The article opened: President Barack Obama says U.S. intelligence agencies believe Iran is still “a year or...
Vali Nasr, dean of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, argues in a New York Times op-ed titled “America Mustn’t Be Naive About Iran” that, even though “Iran’s economy is indeed in dire straights” due to...
The New York Times reported that: In a hurriedly arranged telephone call, Mr. Obama reached Mr. Rouhani as the Iranian leader was headed to the airport to leave New York after a whirlwind news media and diplomatic blitz. The Washington Post said: Iranian...