The technical details of the history of chemical weapons stays largely unnoticed by the general public. Anniversaries such as the 100th anniversary of the first chemical attack on a battlefield, or the 25th anniversary of the first use of nerve agents in a terrorist attack pass completely unremarked.  Few readers, if any, know those two incidents. And no, theyaaa

We should not be so surprised that Israel and the UAE have now concluded a peace agreement, which will be signed amid much fanfare in Washington. For over a decade now, Israel and several of the Gulf monarchies have been moving closer together, a shared animus towards Iran being the most obvious driver pushing the UAE, Bahrain and, albeit more slowly, Saudi Arabia to align their regional security interests ever more closely with those of Israel.

George Floyd’s killing and the protests that followed it are being described as the latest episode in a centuries-old history of racial conflict. Both anti-racists and white supremacists, for very different reasons, concur in this vision of a race war where blacks and whites are the rival protagonists. True as this account may be whenaaa

In the neoliberal 1990s Hollywood became the model for elite American universities. Celebrity academics, paid much more than their colleagues in secretive deals, were part of a financing formula that included large capital projects like recreational facilities, satellite campuses and terms abroad.

In recent weeks, UK citizens have been regularly assured that government policy related to the Covid-19 pandemic is ‘guided by the science’. Given that many of the policies rolled out relate to ‘social distancing’, it is striking that one type of science—‘social science’—has remained largely absent from the airwaves.

In the middle of August 1918, the H.M.S. Mantua was only two days into its familiar route from the Royal Navy Base in Devonport, England, to Sierra Leone when influenza broke out on board. By the time the vessel arrived in Freetown on August 15th, more than 200 of its crew were sick.

Pandemic, it seems, is not a word to be used lightly.

For several weeks now, the novel coronavirus outbreak that began in Wuhan in December has been spreading steadily from person-to-person and from country to country.

Bob Marley may have died in 1981, but decades later he is one of the world’s most revered icons. February 6th marked what would have been his 75th birthday, and his music and image are now far more widespread than during his life.