Matt Duss
@mattduss
EVP at @CIPolicy. Co-host of @UnDiplomaticPod. Former foreign policy advisor for @SenSanders. Nyack boy.
Americans need an alternative to the choice between “America first” unilateralism or “America is back” nostalgia. New piece from @NancyGEO and me in @ForeignAffairs foreignaffairs.com/united-states/…
The mass starvation & killing of Palestinians in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli gov’t is a chillul hashem, a desecration of God. Jewish leaders who criticized Zohran Mamdani for three words he doesn’t use should raise their voices loudly here as well.forward.com/opinion/757549…
A powerful, sobering look at the forces that have pulled multiracial voters away from the Democratic Party. The most important, by far, has been the party’s failure to address the economic vulnerabilities of these voters. nytimes.com/interactive/20… via @NYTOpinion
As a longtime humanitarian who has battled famines and hunger crises, I fear that starvation in Gaza has now passed the tipping point and we are going to see mass-scale starvation mortality. A thread on famine momentum, famine response, and what it means for Gaza today.
Doctors and health officials report wave of hunger deaths in Gaza on.ft.com/46iUoK6
The forced famine of more than 2 million people in Gaza, including one in five children, is the direct result of Israel withholding food aid. The US government must pressure Israel to immediately let in more aid and stop shooting people trying to feed their families before…
Doctors Without Borders, Save the Children and Oxfam International were among the 115 international aid groups that signed a statement describing food shortages in Gaza as "mass starvation," as the "Israeli government’s siege starves the people of Gaza." abcnews.link/IjBCpVy
Feed the Children of Gaza, no child should be starving.
This is comedy
Remarkable moment between Trump and Powell.
🎧 Listen: @mattduss joins @NegarMortazavi on the @IranPodcast to discuss Trump’s Middle East policy, the path ahead for U.S.-Iran diplomacy, and more. open.spotify.com/show/4zlwE2FMy…
“The U.S. could quickly make a difference if it chose to,” @mattduss told @politico. But as global pressure mounts over Gaza’s civilian deaths and church strike, the U.S. continues to withhold meaningful action. politico.com/newsletters/na…
It is true that Hamas can get aid into Gaza by agreeing to a ceasefire. Which is exactly what Hamas did in January, an agreement Netanyahu violated, and since then has been trying to force Hamas into a different agreement, which he will later violate. The US can end this farce.
The US can stop this at any time.
As the Epstein crisis unfolded — Speaker Johnson, Scalise, leaders + Rules Committee rebels huddled for an emergency meeting in Emmer’s office They quickly chose to surrender full control of the House floor - rather than take another Epstein vote politi.co/46rFEsy
🤜 Brad Lander, NYC comptroller and a Mamdani ally, responds: “Josh Shapiro won’t help keep Jews safe in NYC or Pennsylvania by feeding Trump’s narrative about our Democratic nominee for mayor.”
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro on Mamdani: "He left open far too much space for extremists to either use his words or for him to not condemn the words of extremists that said some blatantly antisemitic things." jewishinsider.com/2025/07/josh-s…
Media companies making promises about their future news reporting in order to gain better regulatory treatment from the federal government, very bad situation.
The future owners of Paramount are promising to hire a CBS ombudsman and pledging not to implement any DEI policies. FCC chair Brendan Carr did not respond to my text about whether he is closer to approving the merger now. Here's my recap from @TheLeadCNN
The brazenness of Trump's scam rationale for threatening Obama is the whole point of it. He's asserting the power to jail foes based on pretexts that are *unabashedly* manufactured for that very purpose. On the pod Ryan Enos is good on what this means: newrepublic.com/article/198250…
The US can stop this at any time.
After 4 months of a near-total Israeli siege, Gaza’s hospitals now have wards for the malnourished children whose tiny bodies are just the width of their bones. Aid groups had warned of this for more than a year. Now a worst case scenario is upon us. washingtonpost.com/world/2025/07/…
Hard to imagine anyone who has less credibility here than a guy who has staked his professional reputation on arguing that everything Israel is doing in Gaza is perfectly legal and acceptable.

The experience with Iran and Russia makes it abundantly clear: while oil sanctions are good for restructuring oil flows around geopolitical relationships, they fall short on changing state behavior. Lessons for US policy on decoupling from China. My latest for @ForeignPolicy
Heartbroken by the news. I was blessed to be able to cover War Pigs and get your recognition. Ozzy Forever 🤘🏿
I joined @Morning_Joe to discuss Trump's failure to end wars and avoid new ones — the standard he set for himself in his inaugural address.
Unilateral sanctions kill civilians, as once again demonstrated in a peer-reviewed study. They're not just morally wrong, they also drive migration, damage economic interests, and hurt the US standing in the world. It's past time for us to rethink our sanctions-first approach.
NEW: @ceprdc’s @TheLancet study finds unilateral sanctions kill about 564K people annually - that rivals the death toll from armed conflicts. Sanctions are as deadly as war itself. bit.ly/Sanctions_Study