Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at Background Briefing.org.

I'm Ian Masters, and today we'll look into a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with the head of an international humanitarian effort

underway to alleviate the suffering of the Cuban people whose country is falling apart all around them

as they run out of food, water, gas and electricity while garbage piles up and cars and motorcycles are abandoned on the side of the roads.

Joining us from Mexico City is David Adler, General Coordinator of the Progressive International,

who previously served as a foreign policy advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders in his campaign for

U.S. President, policy director of the Democracy and Europe Movement 2025, and the co-founder

of the Green New Deal for Europe campaign. He recently helped organize the global summit

flotilla to Gaza, leading to his arrest and detention in a prison camp in the Nakhab Desert

by Israel. He is now organizing the New Wester America convoy to Cuba,

an international coalition delivering humanitarian aid by air, land and sea to Havana, Cuba on this

coming Saturday, March the 21st. Then we'll explore possible scenarios to end the U.S. Israeli war on Iran, as well as the

likelihood the war will escalate after Israeli strikes on a major Iranian gas field that could

lead to reciprocal attacks against vulnerable Saudi, Qatari and other Gulf oil and gas terminals

and storage facilities, resulting in windfalls for the remaining oil producers, the US and Russia, and energy crises for China, Japan, South Korea and Europe, along with everyone else.

Joining us is Stephen Simon, who served on the National Security Council staff as Senior Director

for Middle Eastern and North African Affairs and also worked on the NSC staff on counterterrorism

and Middle East security policy.

Currently a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and a distinguished fellow at the

Davidson Institute for Global Security and Professor of Political Science at Dartmouth College.

He is the co-author among other books of The Age of Sacred Terror, and his latest book is

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