I loved this reflection on the life + legacy of remarkable "accidental theologist" Lesley Hazleton, who left us (on her own terms) 2 years ago. I am proud to have curated her TED talks and miss her dearly. Thank you, Gayle Karen Young, for this beautiful piece: missgayle.substack.com/p/c868e010-9...

Fantastic @thisamericanlife.org episode on the daily realities of Iranian life (and diversity of opinion) during this horrific war. Thank you for humanizing the Iranian people. This captures well the reality my family has shared with me between blackouts. www.thisamericanlife.org/886/blackout

An artist and TEDFellow I admire, who plays with humor and technology: @gabebc.bsky.social. Interview by an amazing creative agency that makes art to improve the world: creativeplaybook.org/blog/nothing...

I love this photo of astronaut Christina Koch looking back at Earth from Artemis II. She's the first woman to see the full sphere of our beautiful planet. Welcome home to the crew, and thank you for reminding us of all we can discover together.

Trump sending JD to surrender to Iran is sort of a more blatant version of Biden putting Kamala Harris in charge of immigration.

“It is obvious from Israel’s latest round of strikes that Iran’s civilian infrastructure and domestic capabilities are now under attack. From its research and development facilities to universities to pharmaceutical labs. Israel wants a servile Iran.” — @smohyeddin.bsky.social

Another excellent radio/podcast interview about the Iran war. This time with my dear @kaminmohammadi.bsky.social. I endorse everything she says. She's an excellent journalist and nonfiction author who loves Iran and sees it clearly. Highly recommended. kaminm.substack.com/p/my-intervi...

Excellent interview about Iran war--what both sides misunderstand about each other. @alivaez.bsky.social--nuclear expert (with technical chops), head of International Crisis Group's Iran desk, and progressive Iranian-American--on the @ezrakleinbot.bsky.social show. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/14/o...

More wisdom from @nargesbajoghli.bsky.social on why it's so hard to make sense of this latest Iran war: www.instagram.com/p/DV4U0LIiJr...

Favorite read of last week on the Iran war. Author, journalist, and Iran expert, @kaminmohammadi.bsky.social shares her feelings about the conspicuous holes in media reporting on the Israel/US-led Iran war. www.truthdig.com/articles/as-...

Reza Aslan and Hooman Majd beautifully summarize how I feel about this war: www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/o... and lareviewofbooks.org/article/iran... None of us are regime apologists, but we doubt air strikes will bring democracy or diaspora communities should dictate Iran's future

Pedro Sanchez continues his run as the only world leader convincingly acting like he cares to defend a rules based world order

We are all watching/dreading unfolding Iran events. The people are trapped between a horrific regime and a terrible prospect of war. Meanwhile, see this chilling @nytimes.com reporting by @roxanasaberi.bsky.social + colleague on Iran's health providers' experiences: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

As the US intensifies the blockade on Cuba to include food, it is important to understand the link to Gaza. Israel's forced starvation of Gaza served to destroy the norms & laws around collective punishment and normalize the punishment of civilians. The US is now replicating this in Cuba.

US siege on Cuba, a 60 year embargo now blocking food + fuel, a war that has little of world's attention. I'm ashamed of the US (+ very worried what it will do to Iran): www.weareceda.org/en/us-cuba-n... Democracy + human rights were always just a ruse; Marco Rubio has wanted to do this for ages

no foreign foe has ever dreamed of being able to sack and pillaging this country the way Trump admin and its congressional and scotus enablers do every day.

I really feel like: Donald Trump is building a prison camp system on the scale of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao … would be a good and true headline to run every day. Advertisements across media. Speeches on the Senate. Everywhere.

Inspiring short podcast. TEDFellow, global health eye surgeon and kind, evolved human Dr. Andrew Bastawrous talks about his vision (ha!) for outstanding health care at scale. With TED Fellow director Lily James Olds. Slow down and soak it in. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

Afghan women have so many barriers to education (secondary school and beyond currently banned in Afghanistan). This beautiful Go Fund Me helps them to apply to university in the US: www.gofundme.com/f/help-afgha...

This is another effort that has taken a HUGE amount of local activism, led by community folks who care. It CAN be done. Get involved where you live and push back. www.elpasotimes.com/story/news/i...

The importance and difficulty of confirming the Iran death toll: www.aljazeera.com/opinions/202...

Yikes. Our crumbling geopolitical structure…people thought I was overreacting when I became a Trump refugee

Excellent article by @janehu.bsky.social of @slate.com, exploring the tricky terrain of double-blinded, placebo controlled randomized controlled trials of psychedelics. slate.com/technology/2... We in Western medicine undervalue the very real placebo effect (ask me about my NIH-funded RCT of Reiki).

100% this on false choices and imposed binaries benefitting those in power. There is another way for Iran if we are a bit slower and steadier in political and economic pressure. Another must read by SAIS’s @nargesbajoghli.bsky.social www.facebook.com/share/p/1Cp5...

Run to see Jafar Panahi's latest film "It was just an accident" or Simple Accident. Secretly filmed in Iran. Such poignant themes today about the human desire for revenge and reconciliation, the complexity of human emotions, the reverberations of torture/PTSD, and the resilience of ordinary people.

Everything is connected. From Gaza to MPLS. We are in the days of transnational empire--networked, distributed, enabled by big tech/corporations. Trenchant analysis by the ever wonderful Dr. Narges Bajoghli of SAIS: www.facebook.com/share/p/18H4...

Latest numbers out of Iran.

Incredibly powerful, beautiful, and heartbreaking letter from a young man in Iran in the midst of his military service writing about the days following the protests, the "suspended agency" quieter than despair. www.equator.org/articles/teh...

This is too good. Greenlanders talk about Trump deserving the Nobel Peace Prize...with a twist: www.facebook.com/share/p/1DQ5...

Disheartened by in-fighting (not new) in Iranian diaspora. Those on the "right" supporting Reza Pahlavi cyber-bully (+ much worse) those who don't agree with them. I've received online hate + kicked out of a supposedly apolitical med humanitarian group 4 questioning their support of foreign bombing.

The most helpful, concise analysis on the Iran-USA-Israel access and next steps I'm reading lately come from @citrinowicz.bsky.social on Twitter (lamentably). He's an Israeli, a political Iran, peace and security expert, and Atlantic Council Fellow. Balanced views. Follow him: x.com/citrinowicz

Meticulously researched (including by friends of mine), horrific, brutal account by @nytimes.com about what happened in Iran: www.nytimes.com/2026/01/25/w...

This is cold-blooded state murder of an US citizen. Stephen Miller called Alex Pretti a "domestic terrorist" & claimed he was trying to "assassinate" federal officers. A total lie. Only a cretin would hurl this falsehood & stick with it. This a fascistic and reckless disregard of life & the truth.

WOW on Pretti's denial of medical treatment "I informed the ICE agents that I am a physician, and I asked to assess the victim. At first, the ICE agents wouldn't let me through. ... But none of the ICE agents who were near the victim were performing CPR, ... None of the agents were helping him."

"I am a children's entertainer who specializes in face painting," writes a woman now in hiding from the federal government for witnessing a state-sanctioned street execution

BREAKING - Iran update As some Iranians have been able to use messaging apps, confirmed fatalities, arrests, etc have skyrocketed. Currently 22,490 fatalities have been confirmed and are under investigation.

“There is a logic, and this logic has a name. It’s called state terror.” www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/o...

This is such an important point and here in Europe we should be building the skills and connections now to make sure that the truth continues to matter and powerful people can be held to account. The alternative is going down and down the spiral of democratic disenchantment and erosion…

This is brilliant re-framing. The best scientists ask the right question (which is often refocused), they don't necessarily arrive at the right answer. Wonderful perspective published in Genome Biology in 2019 thanks to discovery in Tim Ferriss' 5 bullet Friday link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The US withdrawal from #WHO became official today, leaving the world less prepared for dangerous disease outbreaks. “When that will bite us in the ass, it’s impossible to predict. But there is a 100% certainty that it will bite us in the ass,” one expert told me. www.statnews.com/2026/01/22/u...

This kind of evidence made me run to get my Shingles vax. One down, one to go.

Two weeks without internet in Iran. What we already know is bad enough — just imagine what we’re going to find out in the coming weeks and months. The Islamic Republic is a criminal regime.

I want to know if Trump will sue or if he appreciates the Putin meme

Excellent, must-read piece by Siamak Namazi, a former political prisoner in Iran.

I wish @citrinowicz.bsky.social were actually using Bluesky. He's posting excellent political analysis on Iran on Twitter. eg. x.com/citrinowicz/...; x.com/citrinowicz/...; x.com/citrinowicz/... I much rather engage on this site but alas, most I follow on Iran are not here.

Super proud of fellow Iranian-American immigrant @repyassansari.bsky.social for speaking out about the brutality of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the need for human rights monitoring + international action without calling for bombing. Here's her video from the US Capitol: x.com/RepYassAnsar...

Excellent analysis on the IRGC, myths of a coup, post-Khamenei order and what could happen to the Islamic Republic following these latest fissures by Berlin-based Iran scholar @hamidrezaaz.bsky.social www.irananalytica.org/p/the-myth-o...

soooo good. do yourself a favor and listen. waiting for @thisamericanlife.org to do an episode about what's happening to civil society in Iran today.