Phil Free

The war on Iran is already upending the Middle East. Look to the Gulf states to see how | Nesrine Malik Countries such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE are finding their carefully projected image of stability has been blown away, says Guardian columnist Nesrine Malik

“Always there lurks the assumption that although the western consumer belongs to a numerical minority, he is entitled either to own or to expend the majority of the world’s resources. Why? Because he, unlike the Oriental, is a true human being.” - Edward Said
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Trump Just Pardoned Ticketmaster When No One Was Looking The Trump DOJ settled with Ticketmaster, while state enforcers said they'll continue. The judge is mad, the parties showed "absolute disrespect for the court, for the jury, for this entire process."

Trump Just Pardoned Ticketmaster When No One Was Looking
open.substack.com/pub/mattstol...

EXCLUSIVE: I’m the Palestinian Who Has Been in ICE Detention for Almost a Year Don't forget us on International Women's Day, writes Leqaa Kordia.

I’m the Palestinian Who Has Been in ICE Detention for Almost a Year
open.substack.com/pub/zeteo/p/...

New Israeli poll shows young Jewish voters most right-wing, fanatically religious, and pro-genocide in Israeli history A poll conducted by Israel’s Channel 12 found that half a million new young Jewish Israeli voters are the most right-wing and religiously fanatic in Israel’s history. They’re voting in the upcoming Kn...

New Israeli poll shows young Jewish voters most right-wing, fanatically religious, & pro-genocide in Israeli history
mondoweiss.net/2026/02/new-...

Prediction Markets May Have Inadvertently Outed Themselves as Casinos - The American Prospect By intervening in individual bets, companies like Kalshi and Polymarket are not acting as neutral market makers, as they have claimed in litigation.

Prediction Markets May Have Inadvertently Outed Themselves as Casinos
prospect.org/2026/02/26/p...

The Looming Chaos of Tariff Refunds - The American Prospect Companies, consumers, and hedge funds all want a piece of the revenue from the tariffs the Supreme Court invalidated. That will create unnecessary economic damage.

The Looming Chaos of Tariff Refunds
prospect.org/2026/02/24/l...

Trump says US Navy sank Iran's warship off the coast of Sri Lanka because "it's more fun" to sink ships than capture them.

Whitening American History - The American Prospect Trump’s efforts to remove Blacks from America’s story have been countered by scholars, activists, judges—and history itself.

Whitening American History
prospect.org/2026/02/23/w...

First AIPAC, Now AI PACs - The American Prospect AI and crypto PACs are spending millions in Chicago-area midterm races.

First AIPAC, Now AI PACs
prospect.org/2026/02/20/a...

America’s Holy War in Iran For roughly half a century, a certain strain of American evangelical theology has taught millions of believers to read conflicts like Trump’s war with Iran not simply as geopolitics in action but as p...

“But when American commanders are reportedly invoking Armageddon in military briefings, & US Senators attend ‘End of Days’ sermons, it becomes harder to claim that prophecy is influencing only one side in the conflict.”

America’s Holy War in Iran
jacobin.com/2026/03/evan...

PFAS: The Devil’s Piss | Climate & Capitalism Part Two of a series on the poisons that capitalism spreads worldwide examines deadly ‘forever chemicals’…

PFAS: The Devil’s Piss
climateandcapitalism.com/2025/12/05/p...

Living in a Mineral World One of the main driving forces of 2020s geopolitics is the neo-colonial scramble to access so-called critical minerals used in the AI industry. How on earth did this dystopian nightmare come to pass?

Living in a Mineral World
tribunemag.co.uk/2026/02/livi...

Socialism, Communism, Degrowth: A Comparison | DEGROWTHIFY #9 This is a tough one.

Socialism, Communism, #Degrowth
open.substack.com/pub/vladbune...

Jeffrey Epstein Recruited NSA Codebreakers for Genome “Manhattan Project” The financier pursued cryptographers to “hack” the genetic code, and develop “new signals intelligence” to understand inter-cellular communication.

Jeffrey Epstein Recruited NSA Codebreakers for Genome “Manhattan Project”
open.substack.com/pub/dropsite...

This Land Is Not Your Land The long thread of white grievance.

“His job is to add a sprinkle of academic justification to the administration’s instinctive policies of retribution, & sell them both up & down the social hierarchy.”

This Land Is Not Your Land
open.substack.com/pub/howthing...

REDD myth no. 5: “Carbon offsets reduce emissions” The reality is that to achieve real emissions reductions, carbon offsetting has to end.

“& here’s the reality: Carbon credits allow companies to claim to be reducing their emissions while continuing to pollute. The reductions are on paper, while the emissions go into the atmosphere.”

“Carbon offsets reduce emissions” - @reddmonitor.bsky.social
open.substack.com/pub/reddmoni...

World roundup: March 7-8 2026 Stories from Iran, Nepal, Ethiopia, and elsewhere

“The Israeli military has now killed at least 394 people, including 83 children in Lebanon since Monday, according to the Lebanese Public Health Ministry. Its attacks have displaced some 517,000 people.”

World roundup: March 7-8 2026
open.substack.com/pub/fx/p/wor...

My book on the history of British South Asian political activism is out this September!

Available to pre-order now from all good bookshops and online.

If GDP is a broken measure, why do politicians still worship it? GDP dominates political debate, but it tells us almost nothing about real prosperity, well-being, or care. Created as a technical statistic of massive use in wartime, GDP was never meant to measure su...

If GDP is a broken measure, why do politicians still worship it?
www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/02...

Epic Fury • EQUATOR The adoration of force has become the West’s ruling passion

“The wielder of force experiences their power as the natural order of things, & cannot imagine that it could be otherwise, or that the people their force is directed against—women, immigrants, Muslims, progressives & liberals—are human beings at all.”
www.equator.org/articles/epi...

The Dirty Industrial Deal FAQs Part IV: Hydrogen & Carbon Capture | Corporate Europe Observatory The Clean Industrial Deal is the EU Commission’s flagship policy – but despite the name, it’s definitely not clean. This series will guide you through the basics with our answers to some frequently as...

The Dirty Industrial Deal: Hydrogen & Carbon Capture #CCS
corporateeurope.org/en/2025/11/d...

Epstein and the end of alloparental civilization Why is pedophilia so common among the rich and powerful?

Epstein & the end of alloparental civilization
open.substack.com/pub/carlbeij...

The theft at the heart of Israel's booming wine industry After seizing Palestinian land, settlers are replanting it with vineyards — then exporting their wine as ‘Made in Israel’ to obscure its origins.

“‘They kept threatening us, every night, every day, every hour’, said 76 year old Issa Abu Al-Qbash… a month after he was expelled from his home…

‘They hit me—5 of them—with M16s, right between the eyes, & told me: You will die if you don’t leave. You have 5 days’.”
www.972mag.com/israel-wine-...

The impossible task of representing Palestinian detainees With Israel running its prisons as 'torture facilities,' lawyers point to the absence of state and judicial oversight allowing them to operate with impunity.

“I had a client in a wheelchair, which was confiscated at the start of the war. He spent nearly a year & a half in prison without it, until he managed to reach a lawyer.”

The impossible task representing Palestinian detainees
www.972mag.com/israeli-pris...

GOP House Nominee Has Bragged About His Copy of Mein Kampf—and More Meet Brandon Hererra, Republicans’ new nominee for Congress.

GOP House Nominee Has Bragged About His Copy of Mein Kampf—& More
newrepublic.com/post/207484/...

Judges Have One Defense Against Trump They (Mostly) Haven’t Used Yet Judicial contempt is a tool few jurists have reached for to curb the administration’s misrule—and for good reason. But that may be about to change.

Judges Have One Defense Against Trump They (Mostly) Haven’t Used Yet
newrepublic.com/article/2067...

Red States’ Fascist Campaign Against Colleges and Professors Trump and his hench people get all the attention, but red-state governors and legislators are waging a largely under-the-radar war on liberal education.

Red States’ Fascist Campaign Against Colleges & Professors
newrepublic.com/article/2068...

We Can’t Address Affordability Without Tackling Corporate Power Concentrated economic influence is making us increasingly powerless—and angry.

We Can’t Address Affordability Without Tackling Corporate Power
newrepublic.com/article/2064...

What the Foodies Get Wrong About Food Reform Telling people to eat more home-cooked meals and start gardening isn’t a realistic prescription for widespread change.

What the Foodies Get Wrong About Food Reform
newrepublic.com/article/2067...

Tareq Baconi’s Search for Liberation “Fire in Every Direction” recounts the uneasy coming of age of a queer scholar in the Palestinian diaspora.

“The feeling of not belonging that came to permeate my days. The conviction that one must remain hidden to live. Masked, covered. The inner bifurcation, the double consciousness. The exile of the authentic self.”

Tareq Baconi’s Search for Liberation
newrepublic.com/article/2058...