Syrian TV serials

Syrian TV serials are the phenomenon of this Ramadan season, again.  The popular acclaim is so deserved: Syrians are charming, natural, and very funny on TV unlike, say, Lebanese TV serials that no one watches.  Egyptian TV serials are losing their touch: or they lost it years ago.

The US/Saudi Shi`ite candidate in Lebanon

In the last 2009 Parliamentary election, the US and Saudi Arabia had a brilliant scheme. They threw tons of money to the son of Shi`ite Za`im, Kamil Al-As`ad, whose influence ended by the time the civil war started in Lebanon.  But the US and Saudi Arabia had other plans.  So Ahmad Al-As`ad received millions to beat Hizbullah and Amal in South Lebanon.  If you consult the valuable Lebanese Elections Encyclopedia 2009 by comrade Kamal Fghali you will find that the dude received 1.8% of the Shi`ite vote in South Lebanon.

Israeli solidarity

"Dozens of rabbis, educators, public figures and right-wing activists attended on Wednesday a support rally for Rabbis Dov Lior and Yaakov Yosef, who refused to report for police questioning over their endorsement of the controversial book "Torat Hamelech," which relates a halachic perspective on violence against non-Jews."

History of world GDP

From the Economist.

Zionist war criminals, occupiers, terrorists and...thieves

"Military Police arrested an Israel Defense Forces officer suspected of stealing laptop computers from activists aboard the Gaza-bound aid ship raided by Israeli commandos in May and selling them to other officers.
The officer allegedly sold the computers to a friend, who in turn sold them to friends of his. Three officers who are suspected of having bought the computers have also been detained for questioning."  (thanks Sarah)

On the demise of Arabic

"Just how dire is the crisis facing Arabic? Is it in danger of becoming merely a language of religious ritual, as some have wondered, or are these the laments of language purists who, like Ibn Manzur in the 13th century, are inclined to see the glass as half-empty? Arabic is, after all, the language of 300 million people, a language of literature and culture, politics and scholarship, not to mention religion. How could it possibly be in danger of extinction? " (thanks Elias)

what is few thousands occupation troops here or there?

"The U.S. troop strength in Iraq is 56,000, a senior Obama administration official said on Wednesday evening, correcting his earlier statement the troop level was down to the 50,000 level Washington has targeted for the end of the month."

the wrong religion

"A substantial and growing chunk of the country believes that President Obama, a self-described Christian, is Muslim, while only about a third of Americans are able to correctly identify his religion, according to a survey released Thursday." (thanks Nader)

The most active Lebanese saint: one miracle, after the other

This Lebanese "saint", Sharbil, does not stop from performing miracles.  (thanks Hisham)

Burn, burn, burn for freedom

"In an e-mail newsletter sent out Wednesday, the church announced: "City of Gainesville denies burn permit -- BUT WE WILL STILL BURN KORANS."" (thanks Marc)

Idiot on TV

I am watching an idiot on Egyptian TV channel, Dream, in which he is predicting the demise of Israel in 2022 based on a advanced formulas derived from Quran, he says.  You think that Israel will last that long?

Tolerance of the Catholic Church in the US

"But in July, the church backed away from a plan to sell a vacant convent on Staten Island to a Muslim group that planned to turn it into a mosque. A Catholic parish there had agreed to sell the building, but after strong local protests, the pastor decided to pull out of the deal and the parish board — which includes Archbishop Dolan — agreed."

Isabel Kershner: the emotional propagandist for Israel

"Several were tracked down and killed by Israeli counterterrorist squads abroad."  No, Ms. Kershner.  Israel tracked the wrong people (poets, writers, scholars, and people who had nothing to do with Black September) in response to the Munich attack when the German police went wild.

Sons of Zayid: what can you say about the business partners of Muhammad Dahlan?

"Erik Prince, whose company, Blackwater Worldwide, is for sale and whose former top managers are facing criminal charges, has left the United States and moved to Abu Dhabi, according to court documents."

Look how nice the US is: it invaded Iraq to protect its civilians

"To protect the civilians in a country that is still home to insurgents with Al Qaeda and Iranian-backed militias, the State Department is planning to more than double its private security guards, up to as many as 7,000, according to administration officials who disclosed new details of the plan."

And this guy (a former college professor) is considered an informed American columnistlumnist

"In 1936, when the British administered Palestine, the Peel Commission concluded that there was "an irrepressible conflict" -- a phrase coined by an American historian to describe the U.S. Civil War -- "between two national communities within the narrow bounds of one small country." And: "Neither of the two national ideals permits" a combination "in the service of a single state." The commission recommended "a surgical operation" -- partition. What followed was the Arab Revolt of 1936 to 1939."  Look at this passage by George Will (a PhD in political theory from Princeton).  First the Peel Commission issued its report in 1937, and the Arab Revolt began prior to the report.  This only proves my theory: that in the US, you can say anything about the Middle East provided it is done from a pro-Israeli perspective.  Tell this Likudnik propagandist to get his facts straight at least. (thanks Nabeel)

She could not receive speaking engagements from US colleges

"Eden Abergil, the former Israel Defense Forces soldier who has been criticized for publishing controversial images on Facebook, allegedly wrote on her Facebook page on Thursday that she would "gladly kill Arabs – even slaughter them."" (thanks Olivia)

Cash payments

I can report this to you.  When a new president assumes office in Lebanon, he received a cash payment of $5 million from the King of Saudi Arabia (and another $5 from the UAE ruler).  A new prime minister receives $15million.  When Najib Miqati became prime minister, he told the Saudi King: that he does not need the money but would instead request that the Saudi King receives him once a year when he performs the `Umrah.  The Saudi King agrees.

testing draft blogger

testing.

Dahlan's Islamic Republic in the West Bank

"Police in the northern West Bank governorate of Salfit detained and charged six men on Wednesday for smoking in public during fasting hours of the month of Ramadan."

Educating the public

"Most young Americans entering university this year can't write in cursive, think email is too slow, that Beethoven's a dog and Michelangelo a computer virus, according to an annual list compiled by two academics at a US college."

Defending Palestinian rights

A campaign to defend the permanent and fixed Palestinian rights. (thanks Mirvat)

The dumbest ranking imaginable: Israel cheers

I have made fun of Lebanon for its obsession with silly rankings and dubious honors. This Israeli story is even worse. How dumb can they be?

If he were an Arab leader, it would be a front page story in the US

"Former president Moshe Katsav exploited his lofty position to sexually harass female employees, treating the female workforce as a pool out of which he chose sexual objects, the prosecution in Katsav's sexual harassment and rape trial said in transcripts released on Tuesday." Let me predict this. He won't serve one day in jail. Israeli leaders never spend time in jail, no matter what they do (and I am excluding their crimes against the Palestinian people for which they are never prosecuted of course).

Look how CNN justifies the use of cluster bombs by Israel

"Originally used by the Israeli military to combat Hezbollah forces firing rockets across the border." More than 200 Lebanese have been killed or injured in South Lebanon from those bombs since 2006.

Cyber laws in Jordan

"The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to defending press freedom worldwide, is deeply concerned about a provisional law on cyber crimes that was approved by the cabinet of ministers on August 3. We believe that the law contains several repressive aspects that can be used to harass online media. The law, if you endorse it through a royal decree, would undermine Jordan's image as a free and open society." And is the CPJ that ignorant to regard Jordan as "free and open society"?

Don't you love it when the occupiers think that they have stumbled on a great idea?

"But the phrase "three cups of tea" has entered the American troop lexicon as shorthand for any leisurely, trust-building chat with locals." And you need to notice that the occupiers sit on chairs while the natives sit on the floor. Brilliant ideas those military commanders come up with.

Israeli destruction of villages

"“No state representative is getting involved in the irrational saga rolling over the backs of children and people whose rights have been trampled, people forgotten by the welfare authorities. Despite the demolitions, no representative of the state in charge of citizens’ welfare comes to examine the goings on.” Haia Noah calls the state to order following the destruction of the village of el-Arakeeb."

Language in Lebanon

"In Lebanon, where everyday conversations have long been sprinkled with French and English, many fear the new generation is losing its connection to the country's official language: Arabic. The issue has raised enough concern for some civil groups to take action." This is so overstated. This article and generalizations of this sort apply mostly to upper class Lebanese who get in touch with Western journalists. You think that kids in `Akkar, Ba`albak, and south Lebanon have no connection to Arabic? This is about social class and not about language. (thanks Olivia)

The Zionist war on children

"Palestinian minors suspected of perpetrating even minor crimes against settlers are subject to extreme pressure during detention and interrogation in an effort to extract a confession, the Palestinian branch of Defense for Children International claims. The group, which represents hundreds of minors in Israeli military courts every year, cites as an example the case of two 16-year-olds from Assira al-Qibalya, near Nablus, who were suspected of setting fire to a field near the settlement of Yitzhar. They were each detained for a total of three weeks, including 10 days in a Shin Bet security service facility in Petah Tikva. Six of those 10 days were spent in isolation. In the end, they were released without charge. The fire near Yitzhar started on June 2. At 2 A.M. on June 10, the army raided the boys' homes and arrested them."

Stealing the land, and what is underneath it

"The final report will be submitted on September 5. However, a preliminary report was already issued to Tel Aviv Stock Exchange on the oil reserves on the site. "The amount of oil in place in Rosh Ha'Ayin plot is estimated at 1.525 billion barrels of oil." In previous reports, the quantity was appraised at only a few hundred barrels of oil a day." (thanks Sarah)

Who speaks for the Iraqi public? The US ambassador in Iraq, of course

"“My sense is that there is impatience among the public with their politicians,” saidChristopher R. Hill, the departing United States ambassador to Iraq, who had pushed for the deal before his departure last week."

Qatar and Saudi Arabia want to heart Israel: let Aljazeera report on this

"According to reports in Israel those shareholders are Olayan Group of Saudi Arabia, a manufacturing, services and investment conglomerate, the QIA, and IDB of Israel, a conglomerate controlled by Nochi Dankner, Israel’s most powerful businessman. IDB said that it would be investing $250m in the fund through two subsidiaries, Koor and Clal Insurance, giving it a share of about 25 per cent in the fund. This is the first time it has emerged that Gulf Arab investors have taken positions alongside an Israeli company. A spokesman for the QIA said that he had “no idea” about the fund and referred questions to Credit Suisse." (thanks Sami)

Ilyas Al-Murr

Comrade Khaled writes about the Lebanese Minister of Defense, Iylas Al-Murr, who recently called a fine reporter at Al-Akhbar, Hasan `Ullayq, "Israeli agent number one" simply because he dared to write about his incompetence.

Forgotten issues in Lebanon

Comrade Fawwaz on the forgotten issues in Lebanon. (thanks Sameer)

radical niche

"or radical niche bloggers like Asaad Abu Khalil ("The Angry Arab")"

The Mosque in Ground Zero

The controversy continues. The original idea is lousy: a kitsch of sorts but why should religious kitsch be denied to Muslims when it is a habit among all religious groups in this country. Of course, the debate is more than filled with much more than a tinge of racism and bigotry that you expect when the debate is about Muslims in the US. Support for the Palestinians becomes evidence of terrorist inclinations and sympathy. It is really ironic that when Muslims try to appease the country in which they live in and they try to win popular sympathy they get slapped on the face. This is one example. By the way, according to the four Sunni schools of jurisprudence, mosques should not be constructed adjacent to one another because the idea of the mosque was to congregate as many Muslims as possible, and there are already two mosques only blocks from the site. But the ADL is clear: they dont mind if a mosque is constructed provided it is on the moon.

This is Zionism

"A Palestinian father says Israel has denied him a permit to visit his wife and newborn triplets in a Jerusalem hospital." (thanks Olivia)

Dan Senor: spokesperson for the occupation

""He [Dan Senor] could have told the truth about the horrific security situation in Iraq early on. He once joked off the record to journalists asking about the deteriorating security in Iraq, replying, “Off the record: Paris is burning,’ he told them. ‘On the record: Security and stability are returning to Iraq.’ ”" (thanks redouane)

Comrade Sinan on Darwish

"If the colonization of Palestine entailed the uprooting of its indigenous inhabitants and the erasure of their history and culture, Darwish’s monumental achievement was to preserve and reinscribe Palestine in his poetry and “build a homeland out of words.” A homeland in and of words is not a luxury, but the cultural and political oxygen for millions of refugees who were born in camps in and outside of Palestine and who are denied their right of return, among many other rights." (thanks Sameer)

From Kashmir

A reader in Kashmir informs me that "in the last two months almost 60 people have been killed by Indian security forces -- the age range of the dead: 8 to 25." More details later.

Israeli homophobia is ignored in the US

"Israel Nature and Parks Authority workers refused to let a gay couple with two children enter two sites over the weekend, claiming the family's membership was for straight couples only.

"A couple is a man and a woman, not a man and a man," the cashier at the Banias reserve said, before finally letting them in. At another site a staff member refused to let them in and insisted they buy an additional ticket for one of the adults."

Saudi Arabia and Qatar cozying up to the Zionist usurping entity

"At a time when Israel is not exactly popular around the world, particularly the Arab world, the agreement by two large investment companies from the Gulf states to cooperate with an Israeli group is no trivial matter. It can even be assumed that they will come under fire for it. For the Saudis this is less worrying. There it's a matter of a private body that can always use the Qatar government as a fig leaf for the approval of an investment alongside an Israeli company. The participation of Qatar however has real significance, because that is a matter of a sovereign fund of a very rich and important Arab country. Make no mistake. The investment giants of Qatar and Saudi Arabia don't really need IDB's $250 million to launch the fund. Therefore, their decision to involve an Israeli company can be seen as a kind of economic-diplomatic declaration of their readiness to cooperate with Israel." (thanks Ala`a)

lies and torture and...freedoms

"When the CIA destroyed its cache of 92 videos of two other al-Qaida operatives, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Nashiri, being waterboarded in 2005, officials believed they had wiped away all of the agency's interrogation footage. But in 2007, a staffer discovered a box tucked under a desk in the CIA's Counterterrorism Center and pulled out the Binalshibh tapes. A Justice Department prosecutor who is already investigating whether destroying the Zubaydah and al-Nashiri tapes was illegal is now also probing why the Binalshibh tapes were never disclosed. Twice, the government told a federal judge they did not exist."

another American genius reporting about the Middle East

"Further, it explains why Washington-based friends of the Jewish state predictably (and correctly) helped persuade Congress to suspend military aid to Lebanon—whose national Army, allegedly responsible for the assassination last week of an Israeli colonel, appears to have been penetrated by Hizbullah." Somebody needs to tell this genius that the Shi`ites constitutes the single largest sect within the army so there is no need for penetration. Secondly, you don't need to "penetrate" the Lebanese Army in order to engender hostility to Israel. In fact, the officer in question who gave the orders to shoot at the Israelis is a Sunni officer (I will of course withhold his name).