Archive for March 4, 2007
First, it royally annoys me when an Israeli takes up the case of an Arab victim of oppression. You can do better if you worry about Arab victims of Israeli oppression–if you really care that is, and we both know that you don’t. Secondly, Saadawi already published her autobiography–my students are reading it for this [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
“They came with dreams of working on a movie set, or at the very least of earning some respectable cash as a walk-on extra, encouraged by a mysterious advertisement printed recently in a Berlin tabloid. But the reality was different for dozens of Arab-speaking applicants at a supposed casting session, only to be told they [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
“A draft report prepared by the Bush administration admits that emissions of greenhouse gases by the United States will rise by 2020 to 20% above 2000 levels, flying in the face of warnings from scientists that drastic action to cut emissions is needed if environmental catastrophe is to be averted.”
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
A tribute to Joseph Samahah: the new issue of Al-Akhbar.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
You watch the Syrian singer Asalah–you watch her talk or sing–and then you compare her to Lebanese singers, and realize: claims of Lebanese superiority are immediately discredited. You can say that about Syrian TV serials compared to Lebanese TV serials.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
I decided to post this picture (From left to right, Michelle Obama, then Illinois state senator Barack Obama, Columbia University Professor Edward Said and Mariam Said at a May 1998 Arab community event in Chicago at which Edward Said gave the keynote speech. (Image from archives of Ali Abunimah). I am certain of this: if [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
They will rescue Islam from…Muslims. (thanks Amer)
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
You will not read this in the US press, so I should tell you. There were demonstrations by students yesterday in Sulaymaniyyah. They were protesting the corruption in government offices in the Kurdish province.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
Fu’ad Sanyurah, on whether he is an official US puppet:“Does U.S. support help you, or make you look like an American puppet? I’m a pragmatic man.” (According to the transcript, he pronounced man in a British accent, as “maaaaaaaannnnnnnne”.) (I was amused when I read Sanyurah say this: ” We worked all together to fight [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
“May You Be Blessed, O Wise Man of the Ummah” (From an open letter by Hariri Sunni Mufti of Mount Lebanon to Saudi King). Cedar Revolution Marches on.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
Pretty Good. Salim Huss responds to Faris Khashshan (only in Lebanon would somebody like Faris Khashshan be considered a journalist. What an insult to the profession).
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
Hariri rag and Lebanese newspapers are proud that the Arab League has selected a Lebanese diplomat to head the Arab League office in…Baghdad. Do you think that the family of the poor guy is also proud?
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
After more than 35 years, the Arab foreign ministers (in their official statement in Cairo) remembered that Iran occupies three islands that belong to UAE. How convenient.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
On Joseph Samhah’s tomb they engarved (by Ibn Al`Arabi): ((كلّ٠شَوق٠يَسْكن٠باللقَاء٠لا ÙŠÙعوًّل عليهْ))
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
I wish I am making this story up, but I am not. Sources close to Jordan’s king told Al-Hayat’s correspondent in New York–who will not rest until she finds and punishes the killers of Rafiq Hariri–that they “stressed…that the `Abdullah II comes to the US not to “represent Jordan only” but “for the first time [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
“Sultan’s detractors include not only Muslims but members of the Jewish community as well. In an op-ed piece published in the Los Angeles Times (June 25, 2006) and titled “Islam’s Ann Coulter,” Rabbi Stephen Julius Stein at Wilshire Boulevard Temple, who attended a fundraiser for a local Jewish organization where Sultan was a speaker, wrote, [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
All US newspapers today are carrying a version of this: “China will boost military spending by 17.8 percent this year.” I don’t understand the hue and cry. Compare that to US military budget. In fact, the Chinese military budget is around 4 times only of the Israeli military budget.
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
As much as I like technology and advances in technology, I am not keen on voice recognition technology. This technology is not intended for people like me who speak English with a heavy foreign accent. Even when I deal with simple automated questions on the phone (as in “yes or no”?), my answers are never [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
I am not exaggerating when I say that I know of no books on Islam or the Middle East that has been more reviewed in US press than Hirsi Ali’s book. In fact, it has been reviewed more than once in several newspapers. Here, it says: “Hirsi Ali was called “filthy prostitute†by her own [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad
“A three-year investigation into the activities of one of the Middle East’s largest and most influential banks is producing extensive evidence of how tens of millions of dollars have flowed from wealthy Saudi Arabians to Palestinian groups that allegedly used some of the money to pay off suicide bombers and their survivors. The information being [...]
Posted on March 4, 2007 by As'ad