Today's Liberal News

A Before-and-After Moment in the Middle East

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Israel’s response to Iran’s attack this past weekend signals an “astonishing win,” my colleague Graeme Wood wrote yesterday. With help from several allies, Israel managed to fend off what could have been a mass-casualty event (though one 7-year-old girl sustained life-threatening injuries).

Why Did U.S. Planes Defend Israel But Not Ukraine?

On April 13, the Islamic Republic of Iran launched missiles and drones at Israel. Also on April 13, as well as on April 12, 14, and 15, the Russian Federation launched missiles and drones at Ukraine—including some designed in Iran.
Few of the weapons launched by Iran hit their mark. Instead, American and European airplanes, alongside Israeli and even Jordanian airplanes, knocked the drones and missiles out of the sky.
By contrast, some of the attacks launched by Russia did destroy their targets.

Is This the End for Bluey?

This article contains spoilers for the Bluey episode “The Sign.”
A few weeks ago, I found myself, fairly late at night, Googling Is Bandit Heeler depressed? This is, I admit, a ridiculous thing to wonder about a cartoon dog, but what can I say? The vibes had just been off for the patriarch of Bluey, Disney+’s wildly popular show about a family of Australian Blue Heelers. In “Stickbird,” something is clearly bothering Bandit, to the point where he’s grouchy and detached on a family vacation.

Trump’s Willing Accomplice

Yesterday, ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos conducted a skillful and revealing interview with New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu. Over nine damning minutes, Sununu illustrated how deep into the Republican Party the rot has gone.
The context for the interview is important. Governor Sununu is hardly a MAGA enthusiast. During the 2024 GOP primary, he supported Nikki Haley, and over the past several years, he’s been a harsh critic of Donald Trump.

Trump in the Dock: First Criminal Trial of a Former U.S. President Begins Today in NYC

Donald Trump is making history today in New York as the first former U.S. president to stand trial for criminal charges. Trump faces 34 criminal charges of falsifying business records as part of a scheme to hide hush money payments he made to adult film actor Stormy Daniels and others, just weeks before winning the 2016 election. He is accused of violating federal campaign finance laws for failing to disclose the payments and instead recording them as a “legal expense.

“A Stalemate and Attritional Grind”: Journalist Luke Mogelson on 2 Years of Russia’s War in Ukraine

We speak with The New Yorker war correspondent Luke Mogelson about the war in Ukraine, where the government has just passed a controversial bill that expands military conscription and cracks down on draft dodgers in an effort to replenish the depleted ranks of the army, more than two years since Russia launched its invasion. Military leaders have warned that Russian forces outnumber Ukrainian troops tenfold in the east.

“Council of War”: Walden Bello on Biden’s Trilateral Summit with Philippines & Japan to Contain China

President Biden hosted Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. at the White House on Thursday, the first meeting of its kind, which comes as the U.S. moves to expand its military presence in the South China Sea to counter China. The Philippines has deepened military ties with both the United States and Japan in recent years as maritime confrontations with China have escalated.

A Test of Strength

Israel stopped an Iranian drone and missile barrage last night, with help from the United States Navy, Britain’s Royal Air Force, and Israel’s Arab allies.
Israel’s Arab allies is a strange phrase to write in the midst of the war in Gaza, but it’s important to understand. The Jordanian air force shot down many of the Iranian drones, Reuters reported—meaning Arabs flew and fought to protect Israel.

Ken Will Never Die

Before Ryan Gosling played Ken in Barbie, he had a varied career. He was the romantic heart of The Notebook, the moody center of Drive, the slapstick king of The Nice Guys. But now it seems like he might always live in the shadow of a tanned, bleach-blond doll whose job is “beach.”
See, for example, Gosling’s Saturday Night Live monologue, in which he proudly announced that he was there to promote his new movie, The Fall Guy, and explained that he and Ken have broken up.

The Coalition of the Malevolent

My wife the photo archivist likes to point out that all stills are a double crop—a crop in time (we do not know what happened before or after) and a crop in place (we do not know what was outside the photographer’s frame). So, too, are pulses of violence, like Iran’s recent salvo of 300 drones, cruise, and ballistic missiles aimed at Israel. To understand what we are observing, we have to push out beyond the frame of what we at first see.

What Will Netanyahu Do Now?

On April 1, Israel killed Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior official of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, by attacking Iran’s consulate in Damascus. Iran spent the next two weeks promising revenge, and the world tried to imagine what form that revenge might take. Missile strikes on the Golan Heights? Bombing an Israeli embassy? (Iran has practice at this one.

Ordinary Iranians Don’t Want a War With Israel

Updated 11:29 a.m., April 14, 2024
The moment we were all afraid of finally arrived yesterday evening. For me, it was announced by a phone call from a terrified teenage cousin in Iran. Had the war started? she asked me through tears.
Iran had fired hundreds of drones and missiles on Israel, hitting much more widely than most of us had anticipated. Only thanks to Israel’s excellent defenses, and the help of its Western and Arab allies, have almost all of these been intercepted.