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12th August 2014
Yemen's rumour mill has gone into overdrive after the reported discovery of a tunnel, some 80-90 metres long, running between what appears to be a large warehouse and the home of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. Supporters of the ex-dictator are claiming this was part of an assassination plot… Read more
11th August 2014
A British-Israeli Watchkeeper drone pictured during flight trials at Parc Aberporth in West Wales. Photograph: Ministry of Defence
In the wake of the Israeli onslaught in Gaza, a dispute has broken out at the top of Britain's coalition government. Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat deputy prime… Read more
9th August 2014
Israel, as you may have noticed, has been having problems with its public relations recently. One of its difficulties is that the sort of propaganda messages that work well within Israel, rallying people to support the war in Gaza, do not resonate much outside Israel and may actually make people… Read more
8th August 2014
The article below is re-posted from the Niqash website
by Mustafa Habib, Baghdad
Just a few days before the deadline for Iraq to form its new government, around 70 civil society activists met in Baghdad. They announced an initiative – the first of its kind – that will oppose the… Read more
7th August 2014
Saudi women assemble light fittings at a factory near Riyadh. Photo: Brian Whitaker
In a new move to increase employment among Saudi women, the kingdom’s labour ministry has announced that businesses will soon be compelled to provide transport for their female workers.
Getting to and from work is… Read more
6th August 2014
It has become fashionable to talk about partitioning Arab states and redrawing boundaries as a solution to sectarian and ethnic conflicts. The satirical website The Onion recently took this to its logical conclusion by jokingly proposing a 317-million-state solution where everyone in the… Read more
5th August 2014
Yesterday Human Rights Watch made several specific allegations of war crimes committed by Israeli troops in Gaza. These included incidents where, according to local residents, Israeli forces had shot fleeing civilians when "no Palestinian fighters were present at the time and no firefights were… Read more
4th August 2014
The power to grant a pardon can be a useful element in any country's legal system. It allows a measure of discretion in cases where the law is believed to have treated someone unfairly.
But debates about the principle stretch back centuries – certainly to the time of Plato – and in 1776 Thomas… Read more
3rd August 2014
Israel now says that Second Lieutenant Hadar Goldin – who it earlier claimed had been "kidnapped" by Hamas – was actually killed while fighting in Gaza.
On Friday morning, the Israeli military announced:
"We are conducting extensive searches in S. Gaza in order to find a missing IDF soldier. We… Read more
2nd August 2014
The "bitter truth", according to a headline in the Daily Mail this week, is that Iraq and Libya "were better off under the tyrants toppled by an arrogant and naive west". In the article below, columnist Stephen Glover asked:
"Where would you prefer to try to live a half-normal life – in Gaddafi’s… 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
