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Ali Gharib, New York-based journalist on U.S. foreign policy and LobeLog writer, discusses the FBI raids on antiwar activists’ homes, how Israel put Iran in “Axis of Evil” after 9/11, the Global War on Terror’s conflation of national resistance groups (and any enemy of Israel) with international terrorist groups like al-Qaeda, neoconservative warmongers re-using the Iraq War playbook to gin up support for an attack on Iran, the tangled neocon web of familial relationships and the new cottage industry of neophyte Koran “scholars” quoting passages out of context to portray Islam as a religion bent on world domination.

MP3 here. (46:57)

Ali Gharib is a New York-based journalist on U.S. foreign policy with a focus on the Middle East and Central Asia. His work has appeared at Inter Press Service, where he was the Deputy Washington Bureau Chief; the Buffalo Beast; Huffington Post; Mondoweiss; Right Web; and Alternet. He holds a Master’s degree in Philosophy and Public Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science. A proud Iranian-American and fluent Farsi speaker, Ali was born in California and raised in D.C.