The U.S. designation of the Ansarallah movement (Houthis) as a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist” organization last week is unlikely to stop Houthi attacks on commercial shipping through the Red Sea.
The Houthis’ leaders are defying U.S.-led retaliatory attacks and the terrorism designation, insisting their attacks will only cease when the Israel-Hamas war ends.
Iran has called US air strikes on Iraq and Syria a “strategic mistake” after 85 targets were hit across the region on Friday.
The US launched retaliatory strikes in response to last week’s drone attack on a US military base that killed three American soldiers.
In a recent long opinion article for the New York Times, pundit Thomas Friedman announces “a titanic geopolitical struggle between two opposing networks of nations and nonstate actors over whose values and interests will dominate our post-Cold War world.” (NY Times, January 26, 2024, p. A26). This perception is not silly. The essentially unipolar hegemony enjoyed by the United States since the end of the Cold War is surely under fire, and new constellations of power and influence are forming. But Friedman’s description of the emerging conflict is a sophomoric mashup of historical theory and primitive moralism. It is as if he were a sportscaster announcing a fight between villainous and heroic contestants.
struck more than 50 Hezbollah targets in Syria since the Gaza war began, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) disclosed on February 3. In a televised briefing, IDF chief spokesperson Adm. Daniel Hagari showed a map of Syria including the coordinates of Israeli military strikes on “Hezbollah infrastructure.” Adm. Hagari added, “We are continuing to take action. Everywhere Hezbollah is present, we shall be. We will take action everywhere required in the Middle East.”
Key Takeaways:
Northern Gaza Strip: Palestinian fighters claimed clashes with Israeli forces. Hamas and other Palestinian fighters have contested Israeli raids in certain areas of the northern Gaza Strip throughout January 2024.
Central Gaza Strip: Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s militant wing targeted an Israeli supply line with mortars and rockets.
Southern Gaza Strip: The Israel Defense Forces 98th Division destroyed weapons warehouses and clashed with Palestinian fighters in western Khan Younis. Several Palestinian militias, including Hamas, continued to execute a deliberate defense against the Israeli ground operations in Khan Younis, particularly west and south of the city.
For those who remember their high school textbooks, the issue of America’s imperial history is very clear cut. American imperialism, the textbooks told us, was that fairly brief period in American history that lasted from 1898 to 1945. This was the period during which the United States acquired a number of overseas territories, including the Philippines and Puerto Rico, among others. The era of imperialism, we are told, ended in 1945 when the Philippines was finally granted full independence from Washington. Even more dubious—the textbook writers tell us—is the idea that the US is or has been a colonial empire. After all, American citizens did not set up any colonies in the Philippines or in Puerto Rico in the way that British migrants populated Virginia or New England.
The Indian Navy led by the INS Visakhapatnam was among the first rescue team to respond to the stricken Marlin Luanda after it was hit by a missile fired by the Houthis. It was reportedly on fire for a lengthy amount of time, by some accounts over six hours, before the blaze was extinguished by the Indian Navy.
Three U.S. soldiers were killed and dozens wounded in a drone strike by a pro-Iranian militia on a U.S. outpost in northeast Jordan overnight, President Biden said in a statement on Sunday.
Why it matters: This is the most serious attack on U.S. forces in the Middle East since Hamas launched its Oct. 7 attack and it is the first such attack in Jordan.
What is Arab?
Understanding Arab culture and the values based on it are the crucial points for the proper understanding of the modern region of MENA (composed of the Middle East and North Africa) and its fundamental features. Nevertheless, it must be noticed that all people in the region of MENA are not Arabs like Turks, Jews, some North African tribes, or Iranians. The Arab League (or the League of Arab States) is composed of 22 Arab countries. Even though Arab states are, in fact, from a very cultural viewpoint considered to be Middle Eastern (in a broader sense), not all of them belong to the Middle East (in a narrow sense), and not all Middle Eastern or MENA countries are Arab.
US Central Command claimed Sunday that three US soldiers were killed and 25 injured in a drone strike against a US base in Jordan near the Syrian border. US officials told the New York Times that the strike hit a barracks housing troops at a US base known as Tower 22.