Displaying items by tag: Egypt

For two years now I have often been asked why I have not visited Egypt, where I had been forbidden entry for 18 years. Just as often I repeated that on the basis of the information I was able to obtain—confirmed by Swiss and European officials—the Egyptian army remained firmly in control and had never left the political arena. I never shared the widespread “revolutionary” enthusiasm. Nor did I believe that events in Egypt, any more than in Tunisia, were the result of a sudden historical upheaval. The peoples of these two countries suffered from dictatorship, from economic and social crisis ; they rose up in the name of dignity, social justice and freedom. Their awakening, their “intellectual revolution,” and their courage must be saluted. But to accept or justify a simple-minded, linear explanation of the political, geostrategic and economic issues would have been totally unconscionable. Nearly three years ago, in a book and then in a series of articles, I alerted my readers to a body of troubling evidences, and to the underlying geopolitical and economic considerations that were often missing from mainstream political and media analyses, and that insisted on submitting the euphoria that accompanied the “Arab spring” to critical analysis.................Download the full article in pdf attachment (below)

In the name of Allah, the Merciful and the Compassionate!

THE people of Kazakhstan have for ages been part of the Muslim world. Islam came to our land more than 1,000 years ago. The Lord Creator and geography have defined Kazakhstan as a unique place for advancing dialogue between the Islamic and Western civilisations. The beginning of the 21st century’s second decade turns out to be a time of great challenges for the ummah.

The global financial crisis, dependence on food import, youth unemployment and a wide range of other problems have caused unprecedented upheavals in a number of countries in North Africa and the Middle East. The shifts in the political regimes of Tunisia and Egypt. as well as the humanitarian catastrophe faced by Libya have brought about the emergence of hundreds of thousands of refugees. Problems of many Muslim states in terms of sustainable development ........Download the full article in pdf attachment (below)

We might ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush’s compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic.

It’s increasingly clear that the operation was a planned assassination, multiply violating elementary norms of international law. There appears to have been no attempt to apprehend the unarmed victim, as presumably could have been done by 80 commandos facing virtually no opposition—except, they claim, from his wife, who lunged towards them.

 

In societies that profess some respect for law, suspects are apprehended and brought to fair trial. I stress “suspects.” In April 2002, the head of the FBI, Robert Mueller, informed the press that after the most intensive investigation in history, the FBI could say no more than that it “believed” that the plot was hatched in Afghanistan, though implemented in the UAE and Germany.......Download the full article in pdf attachment (below)

The Arab Uprising is no longer what it was.  Its complexion is changing.

One of the outstanding features of the first phase of the Uprising was its peaceful, non-violent character. The ouster of both the Tunisian dictator, Ben Ali, on 25 January 2011 and the Egyptian autocrat, Hosni Mubarak, on 11 February 2011 was largely peaceful. But the protesters in Libya resorted to arms within a day or two of their uprising in Benghazi on 15 February.  It is well known that one of the leading groups in what has evolved into a full-scale rebellion is a well-armed militia, the National Front for the Salvation of Libya (NFSL).......Download the full article in pdf attachment (below)

It is medieval Crusade.  This is how the Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin described the American, British and French military strikes on Libya -made possible due to cruel dictator Gaddafi‘s  scorched earth policy .

On  20 March  2003 Crusaders launched their “Shock and Awe” attack on Iraq which killed around 1.4 million innocent civilians and  virtually turned this once almost developed Muslim country into  a wasteland. Eight years later today,  on 20 March 2011, this very same American, British and French Crusaders attacked Libya, perhaps to commit yet another mass slaughter........Download the full article in pdf attachment (below)

Zahida Kazmi has been hailed as Pakistan's first female taxi driver. She has driven from the crowded markets of Islamabad to the remote tribal country in the north. Here she tells Nosheen Abbas about her two decades in a male-dominated world.

In 1992 at the age of 33, newly widowed Zahida Kazmi decided to take her fate in her own hands and become a taxi driver.

 

Read the full story here ... BBC Online 12 March 2011.

 

Note: women taxi drivers are not uncommon here is Malaysia

LOS ANGELES: Veteran United Sates reporter Helen Thomas lashed out at Israel in an interview published on Friday, standing by fiery comments which forced her to quit as doyenne of the White House press corps last year.

Speaking to Playboy, she denied she was anti-Semitic but railed against Jewish lobbies she said controlled power in America, from the White House and Congress to Hollywood and financial markets.

The combative 90-year-old also reiterated her view that Jews should stay in Europe and the US rather than move to Israel, which she said was stolen from the Palestinians.

“I’m not anti-Jewish; I’m anti-Zionist. I am anti-Israel taking what doesn’t belong to it. If you have a home and you’re kicked out of that home, you don’t come and kick someone else out.”

Thomas was forced to quit last June after saying about Israel: “Tell them to get out of Palestine,” adding: They can go home, Poland, Germany, America and everywhere else.”

Asked about those comments by Playboy, she said: “Well, that immediately evoked the concentration camps. What I meant was they should stay where they are because they’re not being persecuted – not since World War 2.

“If they were, we sure would hear about it. I want people to understand why the Palestinians are upset. They are incarcerated and living in an open prison.”

Thomas also wanted to set the record straight on her departure from the White House, announced as a retirement by Hearst Corp, where she worked as a newspaper columnist after decades at United Press International.

“I’m not retired! I was fired,” she said in the interview which was conducted in Washington where she took Playboy contributing editor David Hochman to her favourite Palestinian restaurant, the magazine said. - AFP

Published in The New Sunday Times - Sunday 20 March 2011.