@heissenstat
Laurentian Associate Professor of History, St. Lawrence University. Non-resident scholar, Stockholm University, Institute for Turkish Studies (SUITS) Focused on Turkey and the Middle East. Unlikely to argue on-line. Blocks dumb, annoying, or noisy.
To some degree the administration is now along for the ride in this war it started on Iran.
Israel seems to have a clearer desired end state—Iranian state collapse—than the US.
The question is when POTUS has had enough and decides he wants off the ride.
www.axios.com/2026/03/10/i...
Iranian judiciary claims to be working to identify Iranians in the diaspora collaborating or sympathizing with the U.S. and Israel’s war on the country, after earlier pledging to seize their assets.
The dystopia is here, it's just unevenly distributed
The fact that Trump is right now bombing Iran with no end in sight shows the cynics often get what they are after.
NBC News poll Voters hold negative views of Al. In fact, the only topics less popular in the survey were the Democratic Party and Iran.
Truly a perfect news alert
I posted about the vagaries of international law and war crimes before.
This discussion is helpful for us laypeople in understanding the distinctions.
The TL:DR: these questions can be complex, but "Trump and Hegseth don’t care about these rules"
I posted about the vagaries of international law and war crimes before.
This discussion is helpful for us laypeople in understanding the distinctions.
The TL:DR: these questions can be complex, but "Trump and Hegseth don’t care about these rules"
I sometimes worry that too many people think being a good critic means being a self-righteous dick about every little thing and I think far too many miss the point that you can't critique anything if you don't know how to love something.
A new Yale HRL report on Sudan "provides compelling evidence relevant to multiple RSF starvation crimes in the vicinity of El-Fasher, including war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide."
New from me and @tomdannenbaum.bsky.social:
www.justsecurity.org/131508/repor...
In general, aside from the obvious attacks on civilian sites and basic infrastructure, I have been struck by how little we know about the specifics of the war generally. Maybe I'm just not following the right accounts or news services, I really haven't seen anything that would help me assess
Here is a useful discussion of the legal debates, written before we knew for certain that it was a U.S. attack.
in my layman's reading, a lot depends on the question of "recklessness"
www.hrw.org/news/2026/03...
Was the Minab school attack a war crime? Unclear — it depends on what US officials knew, what they intended, and the quality and care of their targeting decisions.
Debating whether it was a US strike at all is a distraction from the question that matters.
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/08/w...
"Of the 102 antisemitism complaints sent to the Department of Education analyzed in the report, all but one focused on speech critical of Israel."
www.chronicle.com/article/how-...
Well worth reading: on Turkey's response to the war on Iran.
3h que Farnaz a les yeux rivés sur le tableau d’affichage des arrivées à l’aéroport d’Istanbul. De nationalité iranienne, venue spécialement de Londres, l’étudiante a suivi avec angoisse la répression meurtrière du régime.... Reportage à İstanbul via @lemonde.fr - www.lemonde.fr/internationa...
#CoulissesDuJournalisme : Aux premières heures de l'offensive israélo-étatsunienne sur l'Iran, notre premier réflexe a été de se poster à Van, près de la frontière avec l'Iran, dans l'attente de personnes qui viendraient se "réfugier" en Turquie...
www.lalibre.be/internationa...
BLUESKY PREACHES MEDIA LITERACY BUT EMBRACES ANON ACCOUNTS THAT DO NOT LINK TO SOURCES - REUTERS
👇🎯
www.wsj.com/world/middle...
At this point (caveats of things always subject to shift), what would u do if you were the Iranian government? Would you take a face saving and kinda favorable deal now or would you push it harder, cause as much pain as you think you can, to try to tell the world: do not do this again
Well worth reading: on Turkey's response to the war on Iran.
"Of the 102 antisemitism complaints sent to the Department of Education analyzed in the report, all but one focused on speech critical of Israel."
www.chronicle.com/article/how-...
A drawing of an old Congressman in a wheelchair with oxygen Holden Bloodfeast (R) Iowa -118 years old -Please god just let us nuke Iran, nothing else matters. I'll do anything please I just want to see burning flesh one last time before I die -Respectable bipartisan
A tired-looking, warmongering Lindsay Graham really channeling Holden Bloodfeast these days
💯
My latest piece on Turkey and the Iran war:
1️⃣ NATO intercepted a second Iranian missile that entered Turkish airspace. Ankara warned Tehran, while Iranian officials denied responsibility and said they respect Turkish sovereignty. But Iran’s so-called “mosaic defense” strategy, 1/4
Electing this guy twice is really bad. But the real reason the US cannot be trusted is that it has been unable to impeach him.
I can't compete with this.
I know everything is sh.t right now but at least we have books! Here’s one that I had the opportunity to blurb, and it’s genuinely a great addition to the literature on propaganda, diplomacy and Cold War cultural politics. @julideetem.bsky.social
One imperial war at a time, please
The era of the axis of resistance is coming to an end. Syrian President:
"We stand alongside the Lebanese President in disarming Hezbollah."
