Mehdi Hasan

My tribute to my dad, who passed away last month in the UK. He was a proud Indian immigrant *and* a proud British citizen. His life story is one long rebuttal to the nativists, bigots and xenophobes.

Bernie Sanders: “To give another 20K bombs to a country which committed genocide in Gaza happens to be among many other things, forget the moral issue, happens to be in violation of American law. You don’t sell arms to countries that violate international law and human rights. Clearly Israel has done that. Why anybody in their right minds would want to continue funding Israel is beyond me”

I was just thinking how objectively evil it is to do a laughing vertical video about a kill list. I think we’ve grown numb to just how depraved and glib the current US-Israeli murder spree is. It’s so naturalized, banal and not really commented on much anymore in US media.

AP: Gov. JB Pritzker criticizes AIPAC after pro-Israel group spent heavily in Illinois primary “It became an organization that was supporting Donald Trump and people who follow Donald Trump,” Pritzker said. “AIPAC really is not an organization that I think today I would want any part of.” apnews.com/article/illino…

Elon Musk is an extremely skilled propagandist.

The repudiation of international law and embrace of Genghis Khan-ism by the countries that were formerly at the forefront of championing the liberal order will inevitably raise questions about the continued survivability of many smaller states who benefited from that system.

Imagine if Obama had done this. Just imagine. GOP and Fox would have melted down. No other story in the news for weeks on end, 24/7.

It’s a cult. An authoritarian cult.

Embarrassing.

📸 EXCLUSIVE 🫓 Mamdani met today with Orthodox bizman Dov Bleich, who showed him a Haggadah dating to the Civil War era in NY ahead of Passover. Bleich said the mayor appeared “visibly moved” by the artifact and reaffirmed commitment to protecting Jewish New Yorkers. More ⬇️

Winners of the Iran War: 1. Eric & Don Jr.'s drone company investments 2. Jared Kushner's plans to reconstruct the Gulf 3. Witkoffs' Middle East real estate deals The corruption here runs deep and goes in a circle. More in my latest newsletter, Follow The Money: bit.ly/FollowTheMoney…

Anas al-Sharif should have been celebrating Eid today. And Hossam Shabat. And Ismail al-Ghoul. And Hind Rajab. And Shaban al-Dalou. And Mariam Abu Dagga. And every beautiful soul in Gaza murdered by Israel. May the next Eid be in a Palestine free from Israeli oppression.

Google “Taba”

23 years ago tonight, in an Oval Office address, George W. Bush announced the start of the Iraq War. 4,492 American service members were killed in the years that followed. 32,292 were wounded. At least 200,000 Iraqi civilians died. The humanitarian impact was immense. America wasted 9 years and 3 trillion dollars on a war that never should have happened—a war predicated on a lie, pushed by warmongering neocon politicians, and paid for by everyday people. Imagine what that $3 trillion could have bought here at home. Imagine the decade we could have spent focusing on America, our people, our place in the world. Imagine the lives our service members, stolen from us, would have lived. But instead, the president took us to war. Yet another costly quagmire in the Middle East. I voted against the Iraq War. I knew the White House would lie to Members of Congress and voters alike to manufacture the pretext for a conflict—and they did. Now, Iran is shaping up to be Iraq 2.0—new lies, new bloodthirsty politicians, still paid for by American families. Yesterday, we learned that Trump wants another $200 billion for his war. That's after Congress already gave the Pentagon more money than it even asked for in the budget. Enough is enough. It is not too late to learn from the past. Stop this madness. Bring our troops home. End this war.

Read here: zeteo.com/p/i-wargamed-i…

“The US and Israel ensured that at the moment of truth, the dominant imperative inside Iran was… simply survival.” Former US official @ilangoldenberg lays out the 5 biggest lessons the Trump administration should have learned before starting a war with Iran.

How did Hezbollah rebuild itself? If Iran has Mosaic doctrine, Hezbollah has “Mughniyeh spirit”, which has envisioned establishing dispersed, semi-autonomous units, which don’t need direct instruction. Fascinating read by @adamchams middleeasteye.net/news/exclusive…

Director Christian Petzold weighs in on the Berlin Film Festival controversy over its handling of the Gaza conflict: "We had many, many people onstage in the time when I was on the jury. We have people in from Gaza, and they were onstage and said they wanted to have a ceasefire. And the Germans had a big problem. [The Germans] are the killers; they made the Holocaust. And now they want to be the good guys. So, therefore, they say that antisemitism is the worst thing in the world. And it is. It’s the worst thing. Terrible. But there is a quotation by [philosopher Theodor] Adorno — he says that a philosemite is an antisemite who’s loving Jews. Now they want to be philosemites." variety.com/2026/film/feat…

Qatar’s nightmare scenario has come about. ‘The risks to the region of a war with Iran were high, a senior diplomat told me. but to Qatar they were “existential”. From my long read during the 12 Day War on Qatar’s place in global politics. theguardian.com/world/2025/jul…

Funny how the Islamic Republic preserved the Shah’s palaces and kept them open to the public—and it’s a US-Israel attack, backed by his son, that’s now damaging them.

More horrific news from the West Bank. The number of casualties from the Iranian missile that struck the town of Bayt Awa yesterday has risen to four. Aseel Masalma, 32, who was six months pregnant, has succumbed to her wounds.