In Translation: Belal Fadl on Egypt becoming "A Nation of Snitches" Belal Fadl, an Egyptian screenwriter and columnist who has continued to speak his mind on the brutality and hypocrisy of the country's military regime, has published a five-part series with the news site Mada Masr on the history of domestic espionage in Egypt. Our good friends at the professional translation service Industry Arabic have translated the final installment in the series; the earlier ones are available in Arabic on the Mada site.
Egypt: The Nation of Snitches Makes a Comeback. Is Sisi Fulfilling Nasser’s Dream of Turning All Citizens into Informers? When a ruler depends solely on the power of oppression and completely impedes rational thinking, he no longer concerns himself with ensuring that there is an informant for every citizen. Rather, he seeks to drive each and every citizen to become an informant of his or her own volition. In the four previous parts of this article, we surveyed the documents of the vanguard organization presented by Dr. It’s Time to Bring Imperialism Back to the Middle East. Though imperialism is now held in disrepute, empire has been the default means of governance for most of recorded history, and the collapse of empires has always been messy business, whether in China and India from antiquity through the early 20th century or in Europe following World War I.
The meltdown we see in the Arab world today, with chaos in parts of North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Levant, is really about the final end of imperialism. The Islamic State’s capture of Palmyra, an ancient caravan city and one of the most visually stunning archaeological sites in the Near East, only punctuates this point. Palmyra represents how the region historically has been determined by trade routes rather than fixed borders. Its seizure by the barbarians only manifests how the world is returning to that fluid reality. It is actually three imperial systems whose collapse we are now witnessing in the Middle East.
The second group of Middle Eastern states is even more unstable. Persian Empire, anyone? "Iran is piling one brick on the other," warns one pundit with solemnity. "Today's Iranians, with their Persian heritage, are on the march as surely as were the armies of Xerxes 2,500 years ago. " Usually such right-wing wizardry is the premise upon which is launched the criticism of US President Barack Obama's evident determination to pursue a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear issue. "Desperate for a legacy," this particular warmonger surmises, "our president obsesses about a deal [no matter how wretched] on Iran's nuclear programme, while ignoring Iran's aggression across the Middle East". If the domain of such nonsense about the rising "Persian Empire" - a blatant act of fear mongering to call for yet another disastrous war in the region to facilitate the further Israeli theft of Palestine - were limited to these neocon artists, there would be very little to be said.
Fanciful ghostbusting But did he - really? Reviving the Persian Empire? Iran has not become a Persian empire. “We should recognize that there are other imperialisms”: A Marxist dissident explains what the left gets wrong about Russia. Russia today is not as depicted on Russia Today, the English-language news network established by the Russian government in 2005 that paints a capitalist state led by a right-wing nationalist in pseudo-left colors: the anti-America, almost, where the poor are always fed – not just shot dead by racist police – and foreign policy is motivated not by cynical self-interest, but a dogged, one might even say principled determination to stand athwart U.S. imperialism and yell “stop!”
The critiques the network airs of poverty in the United States and Washington’s bloody wars abroad are an amusing, completely fair rejoinder to the State Department’s habit of pointing out the human rights hypocrisy of everyone else, but the implication that things are any better in Moscow is no less amusing to leftists in Russia who are aware an Occupy Red Square, like Occupy Wall Street, would be crushed with all the skull-cracking efficiency a state can muster. Other stories recommended for you Yes, of course. Why the details of the Iran deal don’t matter. Negotiating with Iran over its nuclear program has become something of a national pastime and a cottage industry in U.S. foreign policy circles. Since that fateful day in 2002 when it was revealed that Iran was secretly pursuing an enrichment program, we have all learned more than most of us would have cared to about advanced centrifuges, uranium enrichment, and pathways to nuclear weapons.
And so naturally, with the semi-culmination of the negotiations last week, we are all picking over the minutiae, while declaring gravely that “the devil is in the details.” But while we have learned much in the last 13 years about nuclear weapons development, we have forgotten one essential fact—the details really don’t matter. In the first instance, they don’t matter because it is not the content of the deal that will ultimately stop the Iranian nuclear program. Of course, both sides will fasten onto the details of the deal to try to convince the broader public to take their point of view.
Rewarding repression: Proposals to aid the Eritrean government | martinplaut. Hastily drawn up and poorly considered plans by several governments appear about to provide succour and support to one of Africa’s most notorious regimes. The process is led by the European Union, which is planning to provide a substantial bilateral aid package worth € 312 million to Eritrea. This is almost a three-fold increase from 2009, and comes despite scathing assessments of the human rights of Eritrea by bodies including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. A group of international scholars, who have worked on the Horn of Africa for many years, has united with Eritrean activists and former Eritrean diplomats to denounce the proposal.
The plans are driven by a desire to cut the number of Eritrean refugees flowing out of the country and seeking asylum in Europe and beyond. These proposals will not halt this exodus. Nor will it do anything to prevent hundreds of Eritreans dying while crossing the Sahara and the Mediterranean. The appeal calls on the all government’s to: Dr. Russia fails in bid to stop UN staff benefits for all gay couples. Fathom – Making Sense of the Israeli Elections. On 20 March 2015, three days after the Israeli election, former Deputy Speaker of the Knesset Naomi Chazan made sense of the election results at a Fathom Forum in London. These were heavily contested elections – they were unquestionably the most contested elections since 1999 – and the results show that. During the course of the election there was a lot of acrimony – very, very heated – there was a tremendous amount of engagement of civil society, which is not something we have seen in the past.
To the wire, it was clear that we were talking about some form of a toss-up. I will contend that the polls weren’t wrong (in broad strokes). The result of the Israeli election is a split in Israeli society and Israeli politics, just as anticipated. In terms of the ‘blocs’ – right, centre and left – the numbers are almost precisely as predicted. Much of Israeli politics is about numbers and I want to do the calculations. So, the Left went up while the Right and the ultra-Orthodox contracted. Zu spät, zu zaghaft, zu unambitioniert | IP - Die Zeitschrift. Wenn Berlin mehr Verantwortung will, muss es mehr in Prävention investieren 01.01.2015 | von Omid Nouripour Kategorie: Sicherheitspolitik, Bundeswehr, Auslandseinsätze, Deutschland Will deutsche Außenpolitik einen relevanten Beitrag zu gerechter Entwicklung und zur Beilegung internationaler Konflikte leisten, muss sie ehrgeiziger und frühzeitig genug agieren.
Das sieht man vor allem bei der Krisenprävention sowie der Afrika-Politik. Wichtig ist dabei auch eine verbesserte Koordinierung der beteiligten Bundesministerien. Deutsche Außenpolitik muss Friedenspolitik sein. Dabei muss ... login Dieser Artikel ist nicht frei zugänglich.Um den vollständigen Artikel zu lesen, können Sie sich als Abonnent/Mitglied einloggen. Noch nicht registriert? Sie können auch die Ausgabe als Printversion erwerben. zur Heftbestellung. Ukraine-Sammler: Mehr als 6.000 Tote in nicht mal einem Jahr. Putin, Fascist-Supporting Neoliberal Faux-"Anti-Imperialist" (10 February 2015) A strange authoritarian segment of the Western “left” has consistently propped up Vladimir Putin as a symbol of anti-imperialism, anti-fascism, anti-neoliberalism, and even anti-capitalism. This is odd, considering Putin is an ardent proponent of neoliberal policies, engages with imperialist or imperialist-backed powers when it suits his interests, and even flirts with fascism.
Fascism The absence of powerful genuine leftist anti-imperialist countries, outside of Latin America, has led Western “leftists” to defend regimes that are essentially quasi-fascist, if not entirely fascist—those of Putin, Assad (fascists worldwide support Assad, and neo-Nazis have been alongside his forces in Syria), Qaddafi, Saddam Hussein (Michel Aflaq and Zaki al-Arsuzi, the architects of Ba’athism—the Arab nationalist ideology by which Hussein and Assad abided—were explicitly influenced by fascism and Nazism), and others. A Russia/EU flag at a PEGIDA march in Dresden in January 2015. Boko Haram, and Massacres Ruled by Whim. Photo MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — They came in the dead of night, their faces covered, riding on motorcycles and in pickup trucks, shouting “Allahu akbar” and firing their weapons. “They started with the shootings; then came the beheadings,” said Hussaini M. Bukar, 25, who fled after Boko Haram fighters stormed his town in northern Nigeria.
“They said, ‘Where are the unbelievers among you?’ ” Women and girls were systematically imprisoned in houses, held until Boko Haram extracted the ones it had chosen for “marriage” or other purposes. “They were parking” — imprisoning — “young girls and small, small children, parking them in the big houses,” said Bawa Safiya Umar, 45, whose 17-year-old son was killed when her town fell under Boko Haram’s control. Refugees flocking into this besieged provincial capital describe a grim world of punishment, abduction and death under Boko Haram in the Islamist quasi state it has imposed in parts of northern . Continue reading the main story OPEN Graphic. Ursachen für den Terror in Frankreich: Von Antisemitismus und Banlieues. Stand: 20.01.2015 12:47 Uhr Nach den Anschlägen diskutiert Frankreich weiter über die Ursachen des Terrors.
Warum haben sich junge Franzosen so radikalisiert? Experten sehen ideologische und soziale Gründe - und empfehlen eine Doppelstrategie gegen den Terror. Von Patrick Gensing, tagesschau.de Warum erschießen junge Menschen Journalisten oder Menschen in einem jüdischen Supermarkt? Ähnlich argumentiert die französische Autorin Cécile Wajsbrot: Wichtiger als die Entfremdung zwischen den Ethnien und Religionen scheine ihr die soziale Spaltung der Gesellschaft zu sein.
Ist die Mehrheitsgesellschaft also schuld? Die Frustration über die eigene Situation sei der Nährboden, so Loch. Lehrer und Seelsorger überfordert Auch Ahmed Coulibaly, einer der drei Mörder von Paris, habe sich erst in einem französischen Gefängnis radikalisiert, betont Journalist Musharbash. Auch die Schulen seien mit neuen Problemen konfrontiert, sagt die Journalistin Beate Klarsfeld. "Juden sehr niedergeschlagen" Around the Halls: What is ISIS' Strategy? Charles Lister, Visiting Fellow, Brookings Doha Center, Foreign Policy Program: Through 2014 (and particularly post-June), ISIS has more or less abided by a step-by-step approach of encouraging its enemies (local, regional and international) to take steps down a long slippery slope—whereby ISIS’ own apparent unpredictable advances have induced a short-termist reactiveness amongst its opponents, which it has been keen to present as a process towards adopting unplanned escalation and the risky investment of existentially valuable resources.
In this regard, the beheading of hostages was at least in part intended to exploit what ISIS perceives as a particular reluctance within U.S. and EU circles to become embroiled in another conflict in the Middle East, but the inevitability of some extent of action when its citizens are killed in such circumstances abroad. Taken in isolation, ISIS has at least partially succeeded here. The Roots of the Islamic State's Appeal. France's False Choice. The impressive and inspiring show of solidarity at France’s unity march on January 11—which brought together millions of people and more than 40 world leaders—was not necessarily a sign of good things to come.
“We are all one” was indeed a powerful message, but what did it really mean, underneath the noble sentiment and the liberal faith that all people are essentially good and want the same things, regardless of religion or culture? Even if the scope is limited to Western liberals, the aftermath of the assaults in Paris on Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket has revealed a striking lack of consensus on a whole host of issues, including the limits of free speech, the treatment of religions versus racial groups, and the centrality of secularism to the liberal idea.
Turns out, we are not all one. French schoolteachers were reportedly dumbfounded that (some) Muslim students refused to stand up for a moment of silence after the attacks. But this is where confusion seeps into the debate. How Islamist rebels engineered Israel’s oil grab in Syria. A US oil company is preparing to drill for oil in the Golan Heights. Granted the license in February 2013 by Israel, Afek Oil and Gas is a subsidiary of Genie Energy Ltd., whose equity-holding board members include former US Vice President Dick Cheney, controversial media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and financier Lord Jacob Rothschild. Also on the board is Brigadier General Effie Eitam, a former Israeli minister for infrastructure who currently resides in the Golan Heights himself. Afek, which has exclusive rights to a 153 square mile radius in the south of the Golan Heights, started “dirt works” in December 2014, to prepare the first site for drilling.
Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Six-Day War, annexing and occupying the territory in 1981 in violation of international law. Accordingly, Israel has considered unilaterally creating a new buffer zone that would extend up to 10 miles inside Syrian territory, on the pretext of securing the border from Islamist fighters. Land for war. How Come India Isn’t Speaking Out Against the Islamic State? When President Barack Obama visited New Delhi this week as a guest of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, mentions of the global fight against the Islamic State were notably absent.
The only hat tip to cooperation is buried deep into a U.S. -India joint statement released on Sunday, where the two leaders “reaffirmed their deep concern over the continued threat posed by transnational terrorism,” including groups such as al Qaeda and the Islamic State. The White House says India could play a role battling the Islamic State, according to a Reuters report. And yet at least publicly, top Indian leaders have said almost nothing about fighting the rampant terrorist group in Syria and Iraq. So why has India been so quiet?
For one, India has huge stakes in the Middle East — but in very different ways from the United States. An estimated seven million Indians reside in the Middle East, overwhelmingly concentrated in the Gulf, where they tend to be guest workers. Beth A. Simmons for Democracy Journal: What’s Right with Human Rights. Hilfe, die Russen kommen | Lower Class Magazine. Frederic Wehrey and Wolfram Lacher | Libya's Legitimacy Crisis | Foreign Affairs. Sklaven und Sklaverei: Leibeigene in Thailand schuften auf Schiffen. The case against human rights | Eric Posner | News. Nicholas Sambanis and Jonah Schulhofer-Wohl | The Case Against Dividing Iraq.