Israel’s tortured choice on Russia

To a devoted Zionist, Israel’s response to Russia’s slaughter in Ukraine is an agonizing sight. That’s because the siege of Ukraine presents a particularly challenging clash between Israel’s strategic and moral interests. On the one hand, Israel is heavily dependent on Russia as it confronts the radical regime in Iran and its terrorist proxies in …

How To Make Russia Pay Over Ukraine: Deploy Every Financial Weapon Possible

How to Make Russia Pay – When asked, after his speech on Thursday, why the United States and its allies weren’t then kicking Russia completely out of SWIFT, the global banking communications system, over its invasion of Ukraine, President Biden said, “[It] is always an option. But right now, that’s not the position that the …

Cuba Protests Could Presage Brighter Regional Future

As video of protests in Havana circulates on social media, many are wondering about Cuba’s future. Why now? What’s changed for everyday Cubans? And, most importantly, what do the protests mean for the island nation’s communist government and its grip on power? “The basic economic situation is what’s pushing people to go out and raise …

Help Wanted: America Must Resume Its Postwar Role of Promoting Freedom

“We’re at an inflection point,” President Joe Biden told the Munich Security Conference the other day, “between those who argue that . . . autocracy is the best way forward” and “those who understand that democracy is essential” to meeting the world’s economic, health, and other challenges. A month into his presidency, Biden seems deeply …

West should echo Prague’s Nemtsov remembrance

This week, the city of Prague will commemorate the fifth anniversary of the slaying of Russia’s freedom-promoting opposition leader, Boris Nemtsov, by renaming for him the square where Russia’s embassy is located. It’s a timely gesture, for it comes as freedom and democracy continue their global decline of recent years, as China and Russia promote …

Trump must hang tough on North Korea

With Pyongyang demanding that Washington reverse its policy toward North Korea before any resumption of nuclear talks, President Donald Trump needs to maintain a hardline U.S. posture toward the North’s growing nuclear weapons program and resist temptations to offer more unilateral concessions. Kim Jong Un’s disparaging response of recent days to Trump’s call for a …