The United States is mobilizing for a new war on Iran — repositioning military forces, floating assassination threats, and insisting on negotiations at the same time.

As this military buildup intensifies, Western media is reviving a familiar propaganda narrative: that Iran is collapsing, its government has lost control, and foreign intervention might actually help.

To cut through the noise, Rania Khalek is joined by Navid Zarrinnal, an Iranian-American academic and host of The Colony Archive, speaking from inside Tehran. Navid breaks down what’s actually happening on the ground — from internal debates over negotiations, to Iran’s potential military retaliation, to why the myth of Iran’s imminent collapse keeps getting recycled.

They also discuss the end of Iran’s so-called “strategic patience,” the reality of U.S. hybrid warfare, the role of foreign intervention in recent protests, and the dangerous push to fracture Iran along ethnic and sectarian lines — a policy openly floated by Western elites.

Finally, Navid explains why the nuclear deal failed, why sanctions and regime-change politics won’t bring justice, and what the Western Left should actually be focusing on.

Read Navid’s Breakthrough News article here; https://breakthroughnews.org/irans-protests-explained-a-diary-from-tehran/ 

Join Rania Khalek and Zoe Alexandra for a special live show as Minneapolis erupts after Border Patrol agents killed nurse and legal observer Alex Pretti, just hours after a historic general strike shook the state. Zoe will report from Minneapolis as protests surge nationwide and fury at ICE and federal occupation explodes. With special guests, Rania and Zoe will discuss the Democrats’ weak response, the connections between imperial violence from Gaza to Minnesota, and the rising calls to defund ICE and a national general strike against ICE terror. 

Special Guests:
-Craig Mokhiber, Human Rights Lawyer 
-Meghdad Bose, Independent journalist and professor of journalism at the University of Memphis
-Simon Elliott, Community Activist in Minnesota 

Rania Khalek is joined by former UN human rights official Craig Mokhiber, whose recent Mondoweiss article, "Ushering in the age of impunity: Venezuela, Palestine, and the end of international law," unpacks how recent U.S. aggression from Venezuela to Gaza signals a dangerous unraveling of the post-World War II legal order. 

We’ll discuss:

• What the U.S. attack on Venezuela reveals about the limits of global legal restraints. 

• How the violence in Palestine fits into a broader pattern of unchecked power. 

• The crisis facing international law and global institutions like the UN, ICC, and ICJ. 

• What meaningful resistance and accountability might look like.

The U.S. military raid on Venezuela on January 3 shocked the world. On Dispatches, Rania Khalek is joined by Jorge Arreaza, Venezuela’s former foreign minister, to explain what actually happened and to respond directly to U.S. media narratives about “betrayal,” regime change, and control.

Rania Khalek is joined by journalist and political economist Ben Norton, editor of the Geopolitical Economy Report, to break down why the Trump administration attacked Venezuela—and what comes next. 

Norton explains how Trump’s bombing of Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro are not isolated acts, but part of a broader U.S. imperial offensive in Latin America. The goal: control strategic resources like oil, gas, rare earths, and critical minerals, reassert U.S. dominance in the region, and build a supply chain that cuts out China.

Rania Khalek is joined by Zoe Alexandra of People’s Dispatch and special guests for a live episode of Dispatches examining the Trump administration’s unprecedented attack on Venezuela. The US has invaded and bombed Venezuela, kidnapped President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, and is openly threatening to expand its campaign against Venezuela’s neighbors and allies. We break down the lies used to justify this aggression — and what comes next.

A DSA member just won one of the most significant left-wing electoral victories in recent memory with Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York — despite red-baiting, anti-Palestinian smears, and a full-on campaign to demonize socialism.

But that victory has raised big questions: Why keep Jessica Tisch as NYPD commissioner? Why discourage a primary against Hakeem Jeffries — and then endorse him for Speaker? What does accountability look like when socialists actually win power?

To unpack all this, Rania Khalek is joined by the national co-chairs of the Democratic Socialists of America, Megan Romer and Ashik Siddique, to talk about Zohran’s win, DSA’s national strategy, Venezuela, Cuba, Palestine and how they plan to hold their elected members accountable. 

👉 Hear the full member-only episode at: https://www.patreon.com/BreakthroughNews 

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As the world slides deeper into imperial rot — from Trump’s transformation of the U.S. into a Department of War state, to Europe’s political collapse, to global leaders shamelessly bowing to Washington — a socialist shockwave has erupted in New York City: Zohran Mamdani has just won the mayoral race while proudly defending Palestine.

What does this contradiction reveal about the global moment we’re living in?

Yanis Varoufakis — economist, political leader, former Greek finance minister, and author of “Technofeudalism” — joins Rania Khalek to unpack the rise of fascistic politics, the failures of global capitalism, the myth of Western “democracy,” and the lessons of Zohran’s victory.

Watch the full member-only episode at: https://www.patreon.com/BreakthroughNews

As Israel continues its relentless assault on Gaza, killing and starving hundreds of thousands of Palestinians with Western backing, even during so-called ceasefires, one thing has become clear: this isn’t just about Palestine. It’s about Western supremacy, empire, and the racism that underpins them both.

To discuss this, Rania Khalek is joined by Dr. Ghada Karmi — academic, physician, and Nakba survivor — who has written powerfully about how Western imperialism, Arab complicity, and Zionism’s own contradictions have led us here. Dr. Karmi is a former research fellow at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter and author of many books including “One State: The Only Democratic Future for Palestine-Israel.”

She has spent her life exposing the deeper roots of this catastrophe: the colonial mindset that made Palestine disposable, the Western guilt that turned Jewish suffering into Palestinian punishment, and the moral rot that allows genocide to be broadcast live without consequence.

Dozens have been killed in U.S. airstrikes on boats off the Venezuelan and Colombian coasts.

The Trump administration claims it’s targeting drug traffickers — but there’s no evidence. And now they’re threatening airstrikes inside Venezuela.

U.S. warships now encircle Venezuela, joined by 10,000 troops and the Navy’s largest aircraft carrier.

This is a war in slow motion, justified by recycled lies, CIA covert ops, and billionaire-backed propaganda.

Rania Khalek speaks with Zoe Alexandra, managing editor of Peoples Dispatch and co-author of “Why Venezuela? How the US tries to undermine democracy and sovereignty in Latin America,” to unpack the truth behind Washington’s latest regime-change operation and what it means for Latin America and the Global South.

👉 Watch the full episode: Patreon.com/BreakthroughNews

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