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Mideastdilemma.com was established in 2004 as a channel for an alternate view to what is happening in the Middle East and the World. Also, the site is home to the most extensive archive for the work of the Slovenian philosopher and critical theorist, Slavoj Zizek (http://mideastdilemma.com/zizek). "“violence may destroy one or more bad rulers, but . . . others will pop up in their places.” Mahatma Gandhi
Mission: A community committed to propagating the truth.
Bomb that killed 40 children in Yemen was supplied by US
The bomb used in a devastating attack on a school bus in Yemen was sold as part of a US State Department-sanctioned arms deal with Saudi Arabia, munitions experts told CNN.
Sacks of Mail Reach the West Bank, 8 Years Late
Ten tons of letters and packages, which Israel had prevented from entering the Palestinian territory of the West Bank, have finally been released.
Saudi Arabia picks a pointless fight with Canada
The kingdom is harming its own citizens to send a warning to other allies
Slavoj Žižek: Saudi-Canada spat reveals the real new world order
For years, experts believed liberal democracy would gradually spread around the world but the system has eaten itself and the result is a new global populism.
Saudi king tells U.S. that peace plan must include East Jerusalem as Palestinian capital
***
Israel Has No Right of Self-Defense Against Gaza
Israel has no legal right to use any kind of force in Gaza — under any circumstances.
U.N. Palestinian Agency Will Trim 267 Jobs, Citing U.S. Funding Cut
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees is also curtailing mental health services and mobile health clinics.
Natalie Portman Backs Out of Israeli Award Ceremony
Representatives cited her distress over “recent events” in Israel, without elaborating. Many took it to mean the deadly protests in Gaza.
So we should not interpret or judge singular acts together, we should excise them from their historical texture: the present actions of the Israeli Defence Forces on the West Bank should not be judged against the background of the holocaust. The fact that many Arabs celebrate Hitler or that synagogues are desecrated in France and elsewhere in Europe should not be judged as an inappropriate, but understandable, reaction to what Israelis are doing in the West Bank.
When any public protest against the Israel Defence Forces activities in the West Bank is flatly denounced as an expression of antisemitism, and – implicitly, at least – put in the same line with the defenders of the Holocaust, that is to say, when the shadow of the Holocaust is permanently evoked in order to neutralise any criticism of Israeli military and political operations, it is not enough to insist on the difference between antisemitism and the critique of particular measures of the State of Israel – one should go a step further and claim that it is the state of Israel which, in this case, is desecrating the memory of the Holocaust victims, ruthlessly manipulating them, instrumentalising them into a means to legitimise present political measures.
The ongoing attacks on the Labour Party for the alleged antisemitism of some of its prominent members is not only extremely biased and in the long term, it also obfuscates the true danger of antisemitism today.
Why has Erdogan released the genealogy of thousands of Turks?
Only in Turkey is the identity of a citizen a matter of national security. That’s why the population registry in Ankara was until now a closed book, its details a state secret. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s definition of “Turkishness” was “anyone who is attached to the Turkish state as a citizen...
When Jokes Become a Crime: Free Speech Under Fire in Lebanon
A surge of legal cases against entertainers, journalists and activists has raised concerns about one of the Arab world’s freest environments.
She Accused a Moroccan Pop Star of Rape. Online, She Was Vilified.
A young Frenchwoman has made an internet plea to clear her name and counter threats, opening a debate about sexual assault in the Arab world.
"Put bluntly, he [Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman] is clawing down all his rivals and – so the Lebanese fear – trying to destroy the government in Beirut, force the Shia Hezbollah out of the cabinet and restart a civil war in Lebanon. It won’t work, for the Lebanese – while not as rich – are a lot smarter than the Saudis. Every political group in the country, including Hezbollah, are demanding one thing only: Hariri must come back. As for Saudi Arabia, those who said that the Arab revolution will one day reach Riyadh – not with a minority Shia rising, but with a war inside the Sunni Wahhabi royal family – are watching the events of the past week with both shock and awe."
When Saad Hariri’s jet touched down at Riyadh on the evening of 3 November, the first thing he saw was a group of Saudi policemen surrounding the plane. When they came aboard, they confiscated his mobile phone and those of his bodyguards. Thus was Lebanon’s prime minister silenced.
NYU faculty ends ties with UAE over sectarianism claims
Professors Arang Keshavarzian and Mohamad Bazzi believe they were denied security clearance because of their Shia roots.
Iraq may be coming to the end of 40 years of war
There is a growing mood of self-confidence in Baghdad which I have not seen here since I first visited Iraq in 1977. The country seemed then to be heading for a peaceful and prosperous future thanks to rising oil revenues. It only became clear several years later that Saddam Hussein was a monster of...
Mosul
Follow four young Iraqi soldiers tasked with leading the fight against ISIS in Mosul.
The century of revolution
Open access // by Serge Halimi (Le Monde diplomatique - English edition, October 2017)
Opinion | Roger Waters: Congress Shouldn’t Silence Human Rights Advocates
Lawmakers from both parties want to criminalize boycotting Israel. That’s un-American.
"A nationwide poll of Iraqis carried out by the Almustakilla for Research group in April 2017 found that for the first time since our surveys began in 2003, Sunni Arab public opinion in Iraq is very positive about the political situation in the country, while the Shiite Arab view of politics has grown more negative."
Members of the sect are impressed by the defeat of the Islamic State.
U.S. Muslims Concerned About Their Place in Society, but Continue to Believe in the American Dream
Despite the concerns and perceived challenges they face, 89% of Muslims say they are both proud to be American and proud to be Muslim.
"Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the widow who defied Myanmar’s dictators, endured a total of 15 years of house arrest and led a campaign for democracy, was a hero of modern times. Yet today Daw Suu, as the effective leader of Myanmar, is chief apologist for this ethnic cleansing, as the country oppresses the darker-skinned Rohingya [a Muslim Minority] and denounces them as terrorists and illegal immigrants.
"And “ethnic cleansing” may be an understatement. Even before the latest wave of terror, a Yale study had suggested that the brutality toward the Rohingya might qualify as genocide. The U.S. Holocaust Museum has also warned that a genocide against the Rohingya may be looming.
"For shame, Daw Suu. We honored you and fought for your freedom — and now you use that freedom to condone the butchery of your own people?"
Aung San Suu Kyi, a beloved Nobel Peace Prize winner, is presiding over an ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.
Yale study accuses Myanmar of genocide against Muslim minority
Little more than a week before national elections in Myanmar, a new report documents what it says was the country’s military-controlled government’s collaboration to exterminate the country’s Rohingya, a minority Muslim group that has been persecuted for decades.
'Manmade catastrophe': Yemen conflict has killed 1,100 children, says UN
The UN human rights office urges international investigation as new figures reveal an escalation in hostilities, with children as young as 10 recruited to fight
The Photos the U.S. and Saudi Arabia Don’t Want You to See
We’re complicit in the war crimes committed in Yemen by the Saudi-led military coalition.
London Police Reopen Investigation Into 1987 Killing of Palestinian Cartoonist
Naji al-Ali, the creator of the character Handala, a refugee child who became a symbol of the Palestinian cause, was gunned down outside a newspaper office.
"The Saudi-led coalition waging a bombing campaign in Yemen has once again been named in a United Nations draft report as the major culprit in the deaths and injuries of children in that war-ravaged Arab state. The Saudis are already said to be privately campaigning to change the report and keep its coalition off the list of armies that kill and maim children. Last year they succeeded. That should not be allowed to happen again."
If the Saudis don’t want to be on the blacklist of forces that harm children, they should seek an end to the destruction in Yemen.
Pope says migrants' rights should override national security concerns
Pope Francis urged political leaders on Monday to defend migrants, saying their safety should take precedence over national security concerns and that they should not be subjected to collective deportations.
Yemen Records 500,000 Cholera Cases, Nearly 2,000 Deaths: WHO
Each day there are more than 5,000 new cases of the waterborne disease.
The world’s most atheistic places, mapped
China is the world's least religious country - but what other nations have large atheist populations?
Fourteen men at imminent risk of beheading as Saudi Arabia continues bloody execution spree
The Saudi Arabian Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the death sentences of 14 men after a grossly unfair mass trial is a worrying reminder of the country’s lethal crackdown on dissent, said Amnesty International today. The men who were found guilty of protest-related crimes now face imminent execut...
Opinion | Dunkirk, the War and the Amnesia of the Empire
Two and a half million Indians fought alongside the British in World War II but are left out of accounts like Christopher Nolan’s film “Dunkirk.”
In Mosul, Revealing the Last ISIS Stronghold
A photojournalist for The New York Times documented the devastating toll within the Islamic State’s last holdout area in Mosul’s Old City.
Freed From ISIS, Yazidi Women Return in ‘Severe Shock’
In tents in northern Iraq, a grim scene of barely conscious women and girls hints at the cost of three years of sexual enslavement.
If you're reading Rumi, do yourself, Rumi, and Islam a big favor and steer clear of any translations by Coleman Barks. Apparently, Barks doesn't even know any Persian and never studied Islamic literature. His so called translations are interpretations of other translators' works, minus Rumi's Islamic references. This also goes for books on Rumi by Deepak Chopra and Daniel Ladinsky.
Rumi is often called a mystic, a saint, an enlightened man. He is less frequently described as a Muslim.
"This April a number of Republican congressmen set up an Israel Victory Caucus in Washington (1). Its co-chair Bill Johnson said: ‘We believe Israel has been victorious in the war and that this reality must be recognised for any peace to be achieved between Israel and its neighbours.’ Historian Daniel Pipes added that ‘victory means imposing your will on your enemy.’ As if in response, hundreds of Palestinian political prisoners acted on a call from their best-known member, Marwan Barghouti, to go on hunger strike, their way of saying loud and clear that the Palestinians’ resistance continues and all ideas of their destruction are illusions."
by Alain Gresh (Le Monde diplomatique - English edition, June 2017) // Fifty years after the June 1967 war, the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands continues. Whatever new plan is devised will concern the entire (...)
"Everyone, sober or drunk, is seeking a beloved,
everywhere, mosque or synagogue, is the house of love." (Hafiz)
In the field of religious studies, the word "religion" is commonly understood to designate a worldview along with the various cultural phenomena that emb...
"The world’s eight richest billionaires control the same wealth between them as the poorest half of the globe’s population, according to a charity warning of an ever-increasing and dangerous concentration of wealth.
"In a report published to coincide with the start of the week-long World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Oxfam said it was “beyond grotesque” that a handful of rich men headed by the Microsoft founder Bill Gates are worth $426bn (£350bn), equivalent to the wealth of 3.6 billion people."
A new report by Oxfam warns of the growing and dangerous concentration of wealth
Maryam Mirzakhani, Only Woman to Win Math Equivalent of Nobel Prize, Dies
Ms. Mirzakhani, a Stanford University professor who was the first and only woman to win the prestigious Fields Medal in mathematics, was 40.
Mosul families complain overuse of airstrikes killed thousands as they count their dead in wake of
"No one can see where this will end, with the parties only further entrenching their positions and the world responding with apathy. The lack of electricity results in a lack of clean water and flooding of untreated sewage. Gaza is accustomed to all of that, but even the fantastic and unparalleled resilience of Gaza’s residents has its limits.
"Israel bears primary responsibility for this situation, due to the siege it imposes, but Israel is certainly not the only culprit.
"The PA and Egypt are full partners in this crime. Yes, crime. This is 2017 and preventing millions of human beings from receiving electricity means depriving them of oxygen and water. Israel’s responsibility cries out to the heavens because Gaza is still under partial Israeli occupation."
One of the biggest experiments involving human subjects ever conducted anywhere is taking place right before our eyes, and the world is silent.
"N.C.: I don’t think things are quite that bleak. Take the success of the Bernie Sanders campaign, the most remarkable feature of the 2016 election. It is, after all, not all that surprising that a billionaire showman with extensive media backing (including the liberal media, entranced by his antics and the advertising revenue it afforded) should win the nomination of the ultra-reactionary Republican Party.
"The Sanders campaign, however, broke dramatically with over a century of U.S. political history. Extensive political science research, notably the work of Thomas Ferguson, has shown convincingly that elections are pretty much bought. For example, campaign spending alone is a remarkably good predictor of electoral success, and support of corporate power and private wealth is a virtual prerequisite even for participation in the political arena.
"The Sanders campaign showed that a candidate with mildly progressive (basically New Deal) programs could win the nomination, maybe the election, even without the backing of the major funders or any media support. There’s good reason to suppose that Sanders would have won the nomination had it not been for shenanigans of the Obama-Clinton party managers. He is now the most popular political figure in the country by a large margin."
The Republicans appear driven to destroy our chances for decent survival, but there are ways to counter their malign project.
Netherlands outraged after Israel seizes Dutch-funded solar panels in West Bank
The only two countries with an increase in favorability under Trump are Russia and Israel.
President Trump and many of his key policies are broadly unpopular around the globe, and ratings for the U.S. have declined steeply in many nations.
"Mr. Trump has given the military “total authorization” to decide how, and how much, force will be used, authority that was more closely held by the Obama White House. But Secretary of Defense James Mattis insisted on May 28 that the rules of engagement have not changed. 'There is no relaxation of our intention to protect the innocent,' he said."
Since Trump took office, the number of civilian casualties in the war against the Islamic State has jumped. We need oversight now.
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