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Two attempted coups in Morocco during the 1970s (which came close to succeeding) continue to cast a long shadow over relations between the king and his military, according to a Wikileaks document.
The document – a memo from the US embassy in Rabat dated August 2008 – says Mohammed VI has… Read more
In Tunisia, 30-year-old Mohamed Sakhr El-Matri is increasingly viewed as a possible successor to his dictatorial father-in-law, President Ben Ali. The American ambassador in Tunis met him last year and wrote a report marked "secret" which has now been published by Wikileaks:
El-Matri… Read more
Following FIFA's rejection of England to host the 2018 World Cup, there has been an extraordinary outpouring of hostility in the UK directed against Qatar, which was chosen to host the 2022 World Cup. I tried to set the record straight in an article for Comment Is Free, though clearly many… Read more
A batch of US embassy cables relating to Yemen emerged yesterday, courtesy of Wikileaks. I have linked them below, in chronological order. The New York Times has a commentary on them here, as does the Guardian (here and here).
The content isn't earth-shattering but it does provide… Read more
Writing for the Jadaliyya blog, Lara Deeb offers some interesting thoughts on mut'a marriage among the Shia community in Lebanon.
In Muslim societies there's a general principle that sexual relations should take place within some kind of legal framework that legitimises them. But conventional… Read more
With attention in Egypt focused mainly on the rigged election, the jailing of a 30-year-old man for posting "defence secrets" on Facebook has passed without much notice.
Ahmed Hassan Bassyouni, whose case I highlighted here last week, was sentenced to six months' imprisonment… Read more
The owners of Saudi Arabia's only cinema, which opened in Dammam last month, appear to be getting a bit nervous about the publicity surrounding it.
In a move worthy of the surrealist painter, René Magritte, and despite appearances to the contrary (see picture above), they are… Read more
Yesterday I received a second email from MEMRI asking for money – just a week after the first one. OK, so they've gone into the red to the tune of $1.2 million over the last couple of years but that's not my problem. The answer is no.
As I said before, I haven't a clue why they think I might… Read more
What to say about the fraudulent Egyptian elections? When I wrote about the rigging process last Sunday and said "There are indications this time that the government may have been too restrictive for its own good" in its efforts to suppress the opposition, I didn't expect it to be quite… Read more
Amid all the excitement about the king of Saudi Arabia urging the Americans to bomb Iran, the Wikileaks documents show Sultan Qaboos of Oman taking a much cooler view.
In a two-hour meeting with Admiral William Fallon of Centcom last February, the Sultan remarked that the Iranians are "not fools,"… 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
