Blog archive all
27th January 2017
In an apparent policy shift, Britain's foreign secretary has suggested that Bashar al-Assad could be allowed to contest a future presidential election in Syria.
Since the start of the conflict in 2011, Britain has insisted that there can be no sustainable peace while Assad remains in power, though… Read more
25th January 2017
Mona" src="/sites/default/files/tahrir-2011.jpg" style="border-style:solid; border-width:1px; height:456px; width:500px" />
On the sixth anniversary of the Egyptian uprising that ousted President Mubarak, Wael Eskandar asks: "Was it worth it?"
Six years have passed since that… Read more
25th January 2017
A guest post by Omar Mashjari
The countries making up the Arabian Peninsula are no strangers to British influence, none are more impacted by this influence today than Yemen. Unlike the dominant Gulf States which were never formally colonialised by Britain, Yemen’s second city,… Read more
22nd January 2017
Numerous social media accounts associated with Voiceless Victims, a mysterious and possibly sinister "human rights" organisation, have been deleted over the last couple of weeks.
Voiceless Victims had approached Amnesty International and other established organisations with a view to cooperating in… Read more
20th January 2017
The volunteer militias formed to fight the Islamic State group are now policing Baghdad’s neighbourhoods. But as they do, they compete with the real police, ignore the real laws and often act more like a mafia.
By Mustafa Habib in Baghdad (reposted from niqash.org)
In Baghdad,… Read more
18th January 2017
Yesterday I received a disturbing message from a young man in Yemen who fears for his life – not because of the tragic war there but because of something that he wrote.
Twenty-year-old Mohammed Atboush (seen in the video above) is a medical student in Aden and the son of a judge. He also takes an… Read more
17th January 2017
One much-repeated argument in favour of Brexit is that it will "liberate" Britain from the "burden" of complying with EU regulations. For several weeks now, the British government has been trumpeting the prospect of compensating for lost trade with Europe by boosting trade with the Gulf… Read more
13th January 2017
The border between Iraq and Syria is 600 km long – and porous. As ISIS is gradually driven back in Iraq, this raises the question of how to prevent militants from returning via Syria. Securing the border is no simple matter and, as Mustafa Habib explains in the article below, it's an area… Read more
11th January 2017
The story of Voiceless Victims, the fake human rights organisation that sought to "cooperate" with campaigns supporting migrant workers in Qatar, has taken a puzzling turn.
A newly-created Twitter account using the Voiceless Victims logo has begun tweeting about rape and sexual assaults in the… Read more
10th January 2017
On a recent trip to Beirut I came across a stack of magazines that – judging by their cover photos – looked suspiciously like Arabic porn. Unambiguously titled "al-Jins" (Arabic for "sex") they were displayed on a newspaper stall in Hamra Street, for sale secondhand.
Their less-than-pristine… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
