The Reality Behind the Trump Show
Joining Faisal Al Yafai on this episode of The Lede to explore the optics and ideas behind Donald Trump’s presidency are the Financial Times’ Berlin correspondent Laura Pitel, historian Alex Hobson and New Lines’ Politics Editor Danny Postel.
Overcoming the Deep Roots of Byzantine Orientalism
Western writers have hesitated for centuries — over a millennium even — to call Byzantium what it was: the Roman Empire. The historian Anthony Kaldellis has dubbed this tendency “Roman denialism,” an intellectual condition he has mercilessly criticized for years. Now he has brought this battle to a popular audience.
How a Line on a Map Fanned the Flames of a Middle Eastern Conflict
For centuries, Ghajar was a poor, remote village in the Ottoman Empire. But after World War I, French colonial cartographers drew a line on a map that had long-term implications for the villagers. Today, they live in political limbo, their village claimed by Syria and divided between Lebanon and Israel.
Islamism Is Still Thriving in Idlib
As she prepared to return to Idlib province after several years in exile, the author was hopeful that the Islamist rule over her hometown might have been relaxed — but what she found made her question if she would return again.
How De-Banking Became a Conservative Rallying Cry
Without cause or recourse, banks in the U.S. and abroad abruptly close individual, business and nonprofit accounts. To hear conservatives tell it, de-banking is part of a culture war against the right. But the truth is that it threatens Americans across the political spectrum.