Human rights defender Kouhyar Goudarzi says the fact that Iran stopped backing Hamas during nuclear talks should be reason enough for Israelis to support nuclear deal.

Let’s move away from these products and focus on how soft power actually incorporates ethical standards of behavior and important societal norms that resonate with others in the world. These fundamental norms should not surprise us: liberal ideas of individualism, economic incentives, democracy and human rights. Implementing these liberal values over many decades has led the U.S. to our dominant global economic and political position.

Dozens of high-profile Iranians, many of whom have been jailed in Iran for their political views, launched a video campaign calling on the American people to lobby Congress not to jeopardize the landmark nuclear agreement. 

But the new relationship will give American diplomats greater leeway to reach out to dissidents. Instead of asking permission to travel around the island, diplomats simply have to notify the government of their travel plans. Not ideal, but then Cuba is not a free country. That’s the whole point of the new policy, to achieve by engagement — soft power, if you will — what hard power could not achieve during the Cold War and beyond.

Oftentimes, when words fail, art has the ability to express our deepest pain and unrelenting hope. Visions from the Inside is a project enlisting 15 artists from across the country to create a piece of art based off letters from women in detention. The initiative, a collaboration between CultureStrike, Mariposas Sin Fronteras and End Family Detention, illuminates the horrific realities of life inside some for-profit detention facilities in the U.S., as well as the resilient spirit that keeps the inmates going.  

Amnesty International’s recent publication of a draft policy recommending the decriminalization of sex work has been received positively by sex workers, advocates, researchers and many feminists, academics, medical experts and human rights groups. [...] Anti-trafficking organisations have been successful in garnering celebrity endorsement, with sometimes disastrous consequences for rational debate.

At Amnesty International's 32nd International Council Meeting which takes place in Dublin from 7-11 August, members will consider a resolution calling for an explicit organizational commitment to respect, protect and fulfill the human rights of sex workers.