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Shir Hever discusses investigative work by the Israeli/Palestinian magazine +972, which exposed the use of AI targeting to justify the Israeli bombing of apartment buildings and hospitals.

In honor of Martin Luther King Day, we republish his speech, Why I am Opposed to the War in Vietnam. King’s speech broadened the scope of the Civil Rights Movement to include economic and global justice, linking the fight against racism to opposition to war and militarism. King criticized the U.S. government for prioritizing military spending over addressing domestic poverty and inequality. He famously argued, “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”

Francis Boyle is an international lawyer and Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois College of Law. On behalf of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Boyle successfully initiated proceedings in 1993 against the former Yugoslavia at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for its violations of the 1948 Genocide Convention. Boyle discusses South Africa's recent request for an interim measure from the ICJ to halt Israel's alleged violations under the 1948 Genocide Convention. He explains the merits of the case, the likelihood of the ICJ ruling in favor of South Africa, and the legal implications for both Israel and the United States.

Dr. Ardi Imseis is an Assistant Professor of International Law at Queen’s University, as well as a legal practitioner, having spent 12 years working for the United Nations in the occupied Palestinian territories. Imseis argues that the UN has not been the standard-bearer of the international rule of law but, since 1947, has enforced “rule by law” in the way it has created and then “abused and selectively applied” international law with regards to the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination. He discusses UN General Assembly Resolution 77/247, which calls on the ICJ to issue an advisory opinion on the legal status of Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories.

Patrick Bond, political economist, Professor of Sociology at the University of Johannesburg, and Director of the Centre for Social Change, expands on the first Global Stocktake produced at COP28. He criticizes the document's weak language of "transitioning away" from fossil fuels, which he says is a distraction from the need to phase out fossil fuels outright. Sanctions such as the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) to prevent carbon leakage were removed from the GST in the name of promoting global trade, another aspect Bond problematizes. He also addresses the BRICS+ divided approach toward Israel's bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Israeli Member of Knesset Dr. Ofer Cassif is a member of the Hadash Party, which supports Jewish-Arab cooperation and workers' rights. MK Cassif highlights how the occupation generates class inequalities and a regime of elite oppressors vs. the oppressed, which is not exclusively based along ethnic or religious lines. He outlines Prime Minister Netanyahu's disregard for the well-being of both Israelis and Palestinians, as well as a history of propping up Hamas.

Bruce Robertson, independent energy analyst, exposes the hypocrisies and lobbying taking place at COP28 and how talk of investing in a green transition is belied by increasing fossil fuel subsidies worldwide. He explains how the industry employs terms such as net zero and carbon capture and storage (CCS) to appease social opinion and pretend that emissions are being cut, while CCS technology has largely been a failure. Lastly, he tears into deceptive emissions accounting frameworks, which purport to reduce domestic emissions by exporting gas to other countries but, in fact, contribute to higher emissions globally.

Dr. Shana Marshall is the Associate Director of the Institute for Middle East Studies at George Washington University in D.C. She highlights a crucial element of financing the military and defense technology sector by venture capitalist and private equity firms with dubious financial and political interests. She explains how the business models of these firms shape the sort of weaponry produced in the U.S., such as an increase in drones and AI-powered systems and the "attritable" form of warfare that is waged as a result. Furthermore, she argues that U.S. policy in the Middle East and American support for authoritarian regimes has had dire consequences for the people in the region.

Author of the book "On Corruption in America: And What is at Stake" and former NPR correspondent Sarah Chayes discusses embedded corruption networks in Afghanistan, particularly under U.S. and allied occupation, and other countries plagued by endemic corruption. She argues that the very institutions— primarily Western— seeking to tackle corruption in these countries end up propping up corrupt financial and military institutions by supporting networks of elite capital interests and a conglomeration of private contractors.

Argentina elected Javier Milei, a right-wing libertarian populist, as its president on November 19th. Milei won because he represented a clear alternative to Argentina's untenable economic crisis, says political scientist Atilio Borón. While he will no doubt inflict more pain on Argentina, his ability to privatize everything, though, is not assured because he lacks a majority in Argentina's legislature.