The Campus Soapbox

By Tim Holmes — May 26, 2006

By Tim Holmes, Student Action for Palestine

It is a fairly basic moral principle that we are primarily responsible for actions we commit ourselves – or help others commit – and not for those committed by others. It follows that, as citizens in a democratic country, who exercise some degree of control over our government, we share some degree of moral responsibility for its actions. And the crimes Britain has assisted Israel in committing against the Palestinians are grave indeed.

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Shia and Sunni Muslims scholars condemn sectrarian attacks as civil war threatens Iraq

By Tim Holmes — March 14, 2006

Tim Holmes examines the Iraqi insurgency and discovers it is not driven by foreign fighters but by ordinary Iraqis who oppose the occuptation

With the bombing of the al-Askari “golden” mosque in Samarra on the 22nd of February, Iraq seemed to have taken a step closer to civil war. Over the following week, according to Baghdad’s main morgue, the ensuing sectarian violence claimed 1,300 lives – making it “the deadliest of the war outside of major U.S. offensives”, The Washington Post reported, most of the killing coming “at the hands of self-styled executioners”.

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Parties and media turn blind eye to real issues

By Tim Holmes — May 9, 2005

For any interested observer, the election season is always a particularly stark illustration of how British political culture works. All the normal mechanisms for the filtering and framing of issues are suddenly intensified – the “major” issues are presented in stark relief, and everything else is pushed to the margins.

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Chavez concerned over US hostility

By Tim Holmes — March 7, 2005

From its involvement in the removal of the Allende government of Chile in 1973 and the installation of the more “congenial” General Pinochet to the defeat of the Nicaraguan Sandinistas through the of funding insurgents and later direct bombing attacks, to the more recent intervention, in February 2004…

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Gonzales new US attorney general

By Tim Holmes — February 12, 2005

George Bush’s nomination of Alberto Gonzales as the new attorney general, a former White House legal counsel, has proved to be yet another controversial decision by the US President.

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