Clifford D. May

How Biden’s failed clean energy revolution weakened America’s national security

"A clean energy revolution is helping to save this planet." Thus spoke President Obama in 2015. Published September 2, 2025

The long U.N. war against Israel

As a foreign correspondent roving around Africa years ago, I often met United Nations personnel. Published August 26, 2025

Alaska summit revealed Putin’s neo-Soviet goals

Friday's summit meeting in Alaska was short on substance but long on symbolism. Published August 19, 2025

European leaders siding with Hamas make Gaza ceasefire harder for Trump

At a United Nations Security Council meeting on Sunday, U.S. Amb. Dorothy Shea offered an observation about the Gaza conflict: "This war could end today if Hamas would let the hostages go." Published August 12, 2025

Vladimir the Terrible: Trump must make Putin recalculate the costs, benefits of war

President Trump now sees Vladimir Putin through clearer eyes. I suspect first lady Melania Trump deserves much of the credit. Published August 5, 2025

Syria’s endangered minorities deserve protection

The Arab Spring was the media's name for a wave of protests -- some peaceful, some violent -- against various Middle Eastern dictatorships from 2010 to 2012. Published July 29, 2025

History shows tyrants in Iran, Russia and China only respond to decisive force, not empty talks

"You don't make peace with friends. You make it with very unsavory enemies." That aphorism, attributed to former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, has always struck me as more hopeful than convincing. Published July 15, 2025

Law and disorder: Interpol does the bidding of bad guys

Interpol is such a cool idea: Cosmopolitan cops chasing criminals around the world. The reality, I'm sorry to tell you, is rather different. Published July 8, 2025

America wins, media spins: Why liberal news outlets hate Trump’s success against Iran

President Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth were hopping mad last week over attempts to minimize what they had achieved against the nuclear weapons facilities in Iran Published July 1, 2025

No more appeasement: Trump took out Iran’s nuclear crown jewel while others only talked

The uranium enrichment plant at Fordow was known as the jewel in the crown of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader. Published June 24, 2025

Roots of the Middle East conflict trace back centuries

In 1979, I spent several months in Iran covering what was then called the Iranian Revolution. Published June 17, 2025

What a Stalin statue in a subway station should tell Trump about Putin

A statue of Josef Stalin was recently unveiled in Moscow's Taganskaya subway station. Published June 10, 2025

A secular jihadi brings the intifada to Washington

Not so long ago, homicidal antisemitism in America was widely regarded as peculiar to neo-Nazis, White supremacists and other far-right extremists. Published May 27, 2025

What Qatar wants, Qatar gets

Lots of people have been duped by the Qataris. I was one of them. Published May 20, 2025

Trump halts the Indo-Pakistani conflict

President Trump has long been eager to stop armed conflicts. He succeeded last week, but with two asterisks. Published May 13, 2025

The Iran nuclear deal Trump wants

A fourth round of talks between Tehran's envoys and Steve Witkoff, President Trump's lead negotiator, did not occur in Rome over the weekend as expected. Published May 6, 2025

Putin only understands strength: Time for Trump to show it

A year ago, amid indications that Iran's rulers were preparing to launch a direct attack on Israel, President Biden publicly warned them: "Don't!" Published April 29, 2025

Truth matters: Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks now documented for history

The atrocities committed by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, were recorded by the terrorists themselves on their hip GoPro cameras, their mobile phones and even the phones of their victims. Published April 22, 2025

A ‘Reverse Kissinger’ would be a fool’s errand for Trump

You probably know what a reverse mortgage is because you've seen Tom Selleck selling them on television commercials, and you may recall what a reverse half-nelson is from high school gym class. Published April 15, 2025

Israel’s second War of Independence

It has been 18 months since Hamas' invasion of Israel and the barbaric pogrom that followed. Hamas is still holding and torturing hostages. Published April 8, 2025