Now the Wikileaks sh*t is really hitting the fan
The US government is stepping up security in Afghanistan to stop smuggling, after WikiLeaks cables embarrassingly showed that millions of dollars were leaving the country by nefarious means. According...
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Egyptian Muslims protect Copts at church
After the recent murderous attacks in Egypt on the Coptic Christian minority, thousands of Egyptian Muslims, outraged by these attacks (which many believe are due to foreign terrorists), have banded...
View ArticleIsrael, negotiations and the benefits of secrecy
Al Jazeera in conjunction with Wikileaks, has revealed some of the secret offers being made in recent rounds of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. While there is a lot of interesting material in there,...
View ArticleEgyptian protests gather pace
A few weeks ago, Egypt was seen as an unlikely successor to the unrest in Tunisia. Despite its unemployment and corruption, Egypt was reckoned to have a better security service and a better ability to...
View ArticleMore evidence Israel was never really interested in the peace roadmap
Interesting piece in Foreign Policy magazine: For the last eight years the roadmap has been the mother’s milk of U.S. efforts to resolve the conflict. It was at the heart of Barack Obama’s Cairo...
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Now Christians protect Muslims in Egypt
After the uplifting scenes in Egypt during Coptic Christmas, when Muslims formed human shields to protect their Christian brethren at mass after terror attacks on Copts, Christians have returned the...
View ArticleThe rise of ‘new pan-Arabism’ and a rejection of Sharia
I think this article at al-Jazeera captures some pretty big issues in three paragraphs The Egyptian revolution, itself influenced by the Tunisian uprising, has resurrected a new sense of pan-Arabism...
View ArticleWhich will go next: Bahrain or Libya?
It’s all kicking off in ABhrain and Libya, and to a lesser extent Iran. The New York Times reports: Protests convulsed half a dozen countries across the Middle East on Wednesday, with tens of thousands...
View ArticleThe War on Terror gravy train
The New York Times yesterday published this incredible article: A onetime biomedical technician with a penchant for gambling, Mr. Montgomery is at the center of a tale that features terrorism scares,...
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More Middle East demonstrations in favour of religious freedom
After this, and this, now Tunisia is seeing protests in favour of religious harmony between Christians, Jews and Muslims: As many as 15,000 of the demonstrators on Saturday were protesting against...
View ArticleGreater international pressure on Libya
There has been some welcome developments in the last few days, with Libya increasingly isolated on the international stage: The UN’s top human rights official has called on the world to back the...
View ArticleHamas and the Muslim Brotherhood go in different directions
This is very encouraging: A group of roughly 2000 young members of the Muslim Brotherhood say they are planning to stage a “revolt” against the group’s authoritative Guidance Bureau and Shura Council...
View ArticleThe chances of anyone invading Libya: virtually nil
US warships are moving towards the region and the UK government is stepping up the rhetoric. But the chances of invasion? Virtually nil. I’m not even sure why people are getting worked up about it....
View ArticleUN no-fly zone finally agreed
It is good they were finally able to get round to it: UK forces are preparing to help enforce a no-fly zone over Libya after the UN backed “all necessary measures”, short of an invasion, to protect...
View ArticleMiddle East’s only democracy continues to oppose more democracy
Hey look, Israel is still rooting for Middle Eastern dictators: As popular unrest threatens to topple another Arab neighbor, Israel finds itself again quietly rooting for the survival of an autocratic...
View ArticleMore massacres in Syria
As protests in Syria continue, the Syrian state is reacting in its usual bloodthirsty way by killing scores more people: Dozens of people have been shot dead by Syrian security forces, activists claim,...
View ArticleDamning: how BBC coverage is biased against Palestinians
Former BBC journalist Tim Llewellyn has a damning article in the Guardian today, exposing the BBC’s failings when reporting on Israel / Palestine. He says: There is no attempt to properly convey cause...
View ArticleCampaigning against societal norms and customs
Nesrine Malik has a good piece on the Women2Drive campaign in Saudi Arabia and the difficulties faced by campaigners who are protesting against customs rather than just laws: Manal al-Sharif, the woman...
View ArticleBahraini medical staff put on trial for treating wounded
Robert Fisk reports from Bahrain, where 48 surgeons, doctors, paramedics and nurses were put on trial for allegedly attempting to overthrow the monarchy. Their crime was to have treated anti-government...
View ArticleNo freedom of speech for Palestinians
Sorry, was someone from the Libdems claiming that their coalition government cherished freedom of speech? Bollocks. The home secretary, Theresa May, has ordered “a full investigation” after a leading...
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