Syria's war destroyed more than cities. With groundwater down 65m, 30% of woodland lost, and 72% of tensions linked to water access, the environmental crisis now threatens peace.
Read the full analysis from Peter Schwartzstein on #NSB:
www.newsecuritybeat.org/2026/02/syri...
Quite a difficult (though not entirely unexpected) conclusion to a long negotiation.
Following 10 days of negotiations, #INC5 talks to develop a global #PlasticsTreaty adjourned on 15 August in Geneva without consensus on a text of the instrument.
Negotiations will resume at a future date to be announced: www.unep.org/news-and-sto...
US under Trump is not content with hampering international action on climate change. It’s also lobbying other countries to oppose an ambitious plastic pollution treaty
www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
The worst drought in 60 years may push Syria into a serious crisis, warns the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. Some 16.3m people risk food insecurity in 2025. As with oil, Syria relies on wheat imports from Russia—a first shipment arrived in April.
@afp.com: www.france24.com/en/live-news...
The impact of water shortages from #climatechange are going to be brutal this summer. In Lake Dukan in northern #Iraq, the water levels have dropped nearly 60% in 6 years time impacting farmers and households depending on it www.scmp.com/news/world/m...
Thinking about Max Weber’s claim that modern states hold a “monopoly on the use of force.” Increasingly, in an era of mass media and lawfare, it is a “monopoly on defining violence.” Legitimate / illegitimate. Peaceful / violent. Terror / collateral. Protest / insurrection. Order / resistance.
"The trends are clear: By 2050, every single country in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) will live under extremely high water stress," warns @mideast.csis.org expert @natashahall.bsky.social
Learn more:
Striking stat from @kellycnbc.bsky.social on this:
The rise in treasury yields since Trump’s tariffs were announced leads to an increase in US debt interest payments that is larger than all the DOGE savings.
Update! The senate at Indiana U-Bloomington has passed an identical resolution to the Rutgers Senate's calling for a Big Ten defense compact!!
And the Rutgers Senate is meeting tomorrow in a special emergency session to plan next steps. Read their open letter to President Jonathan Holloway below.
Just two weeks ago UNICEF warned “More than 500,000 [Syrian] children under five are suffering life-threatening malnutrition, while 2 million more on the verge of becoming malnourished.”
Haley Britzky @halbritz AFRICOM commander Gen. Langley tells senators that China is "trying to replicate" USAID programs in Africa as the US scales back USAID. "They're trying to use that as an extension of the Belt and Road Initiative to gain favor by the African countries," Langley said.
Wow who could’ve guessed that this would happen
It’s almost as if USAID was a pillar of American soft power and influence in the world
It’s almost as if it was entirely predictable that America’s adversaries would work to fill the void left by USAID’s destruction
This is cool. The Guardian recreated a searchable climate future risk tool (wildfire, extreme heat, drought, hurricane, and coastal flood) for the US that was developed by FEMA but deleted by the Trump administration’s ‘climate’ purge.
“Now their universities are on notice that the government is looking for a settlement that includes abridging the autonomy of centers and departments devoted to the study of the Middle East,” Professor Bali said…. “I’ve never seen anything comparable to this. This is totally unprecedented.”
Rep. Raskin sets the record straight: In America, Congress makes the laws. The President’s job is to take care that the laws are faithfully executed—not thwarted, frustrated and trashed.
