By Garsha Vazirian

Trump’s gilded cage and the sycophancy doctrine

A global playbook of flattery fraying statecraft’s spine with spectacles and shadows

TEHRAN – The spectacle has become the point. Fighter jets escort Air Force One. Prime ministers arrive with golf relics and gold-leaf baubles. Foreign leaders orchestrate airport pageants and shield Donald Trump from protesters — not to salute partnership but to flatter a temperament that prizes adulation above counsel.

By Shahrokh Saei 

Mamdani’s win lays bare failure of U.S. capitalism

TEHRAN – Just a year ago, Zohran Mamdani was little known outside Queens, the New York City borough he represents. Now, at just 34 years old, he has made history as the new Mayor of New York City — the largest and most influential city in the United States.

By Wesam Bahrani 

U.S. pressures Iraq ahead of elections

TEHRAN – U.S. pressure to disarm Iraq’s resistance factions is intended to influence elections and thereby undermine the country’s sovereignty and popular security forces.

By Sondoss Al Asaad

Washington’s truce mechanism aimed to turn Lebanon into next Syria

BEIRUT — Political and military developments in Lebanon are accelerating amid increasing U.S.-Israeli pressure and attempts to redraw the rules of engagement in South Lebanon through the five-member committee tasked with monitoring the implementation of the ceasefire between Lebanon and the Zionist entity.

By Sondoss Al Asaad 

Washington’s pressure and Lebanon’s slide toward forced normalization

BEIRUT — The recent talk of a “negotiation option” announced by President Joseph Aoun has reignited one of Lebanon’s most dangerous debates, that of normalization disguised as pragmatism. 

By Shahrokh Saei

Imported victory: Milei’s win and the price Argentina paid

TEHRAN – Argentina’s October midterm elections handed President Javier Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party a sweeping victory. But this was not a triumph of domestic approval — it was a triumph of foreign leverage. 

By Wesam Bahrani 

Gazans still face death, misery and starvation 

Only about 24% of humanitarian aid agreed under the truce has been allowed into Gaza

TEHRAN – Developments in Gaza show that the occupying Israeli regime continues its attacks across the besieged Gaza enclave, despite a fragile truce agreement. The al-Ahli Hospital reported that a Palestinian was killed by the Israeli fire in the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza. 

By Shahrokh Saei 

From Gaza to Darfur: Mossad’s strategic footprint in Sudan’s genocide

TEHRAN – As the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) consolidate control over western Sudan with the fall of el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, questions are growing about the involvement of foreign actors—particularly Israel and the United States—in shaping the trajectory of the country’s civil war.

Batool Subeiti

Legitimacy from the people: The will that defines victory

LONDON - Despite the destruction that war leaves behind, true victory belongs to those with unyielding willpower.

By Sondoss Al Asaad 

Electoral crisis and shadow of Geagea’s presidential ambition

A dispute over expatriate voting exposes Lebanon’s entrenched political maneuvering and paralysis

BEIRUT — Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam’s cabinet has postponed a decision on proposed electoral amendments until Thursday, awaiting the report of a ministerial committee tasked with reviewing the changes. 

By Wesam Bahrani 

Israel, U.S. fabricating a plot to justify attack on Iraq

TEHRAN – The American and Israeli regimes fabricate an Iraqi threat to justify aggression and destabilize regional stability.

By Shahrokh Saei

Holy hostility: How Trump weaponizes religion to threaten Nigeria

TEHRAN – U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent threat to launch military strikes against Nigeria under the banner of protecting Christians is not a sudden outburst — it is part of a long-standing pattern. 

By Sondoss Al Asaad

Thomas Barrack’s ‘failed state’ narrative masks Washington’s missteps

BEIRUT— U.S. foreign policy, long celebrated by Washington as a beacon of democracy and human rights, is in reality a carefully engineered system of global corruption and control. 

By Wesam Bahrani

Gaza reels under renewed bombings

TEHRAN – The Israeli regime escalates Gaza strikes as blockade tightens, aid restricted, and casualties rise.

‘Power play on Venezuela’s coast is about hegemony, not drugs:’ Analyst

Venezuelan analyst Diego Sequera told Iran’s Mehr News Agency that Washington’s latest maneuvers in and around Venezuela are not truly about the drug trade.

By Garsha Vazirian

Can Iraq navigate November’s vote without succumbing to Washington’s coercion?

TEHRAN – Iraq’s November 11 parliamentary election will be judged less by campaign rhetoric than by the mechanics of participation and the geopolitics that frame them.