Archive for December 22, 2007
Lebanese are obsessed with rankings: “At the bottom of the table come Addis Ababa and Beirut.” (thanks Jennifer)
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Bilal Al-Hasan offers a polite (he has to–writing in Prince Salman’s mouthpiece after all) but sound critique of the last speech by Abu Mazen (seen above).
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Al-Arabiya TV has been touting a “study” published in a British Tabloid that “proves” that men are funnier than women. Notice that among the colonized, any opinion from the White Man, including from quacks, is considered authoritative. For a sample of funny men, look at those hilarious bunch above.
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Conspiracy? What conspiracy? You have to look at the picture from Iraq on the front page of Hariri rag, Al-Mustaqbal.
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“At lunch, when I asked him who influences his thinking on foreign affairs, he mentioned Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, and Frank Gaffney, a neoconservative and the founder of a research group called the Center for Security Policy.”
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
`Abdul-`Aziz Al-Hakim, the leader of the Badr Shi`ite sectarian militia (which manages to receive the support of US and Iran simultaneously–because it believes in the Wilayat Al-Faqih (the faqih is both, Khamenei and Bush together), expressed reservations about the Al-Anbar tribal council. He said that only sectarian Shi`ite gangs should be allowed to roam the [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Whenever Al-Arabiya TV invites one of those tribal “sawha” council dudes–and they invite them quite regularly–you are struck that they all, I mean ALL, look and sound like thugs and criminals. But then again: it could be a coincidence. And those same people were allies of Zarqawi before they switched after reading John Locke.
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Is it not indubitable that between the Taliban regime, the pro-US Karzai regime, and the pro-Soviet communist regime in Afghanistan the latter was by far the best (or least worst)–and the most favorable to women’s rights?
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
This Palestinian girl is selling sesame to help support her family while doing her homework. (thanks Yun)
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“And what about that scene where Charlie takes a sexy Texas belly dancer to Cairo and she does a sultry dance for the Egyptian defense minister while Charlie and an Israeli arms dealer try to convince the Egyptian to sell them weapons for the Afghan rebels — that’s gotta be a Hollywood fabrication, right? Wrong.”
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“President Shimon Peres apologized Friday for the 1956 massacre in Kafr Qasem, in which Border Police officers killed 47 residents of the Israeli Arab village.” Apologize? Apologize? And how do you decide which Zionist massacre warrants an apology, and which does not? It is not an apology that the Palestinians are after. Of that I [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
For those who are outside of the US, and who may not know the real New York Times. The New York Times yesterday put the story of the pregnancy of Jamie Lynn Spears on its front page. But then again: what do you expect from a newspaper that has Thomas Friedman as its in-house foreign [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
To deal with domestic violence, Ayatullah Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah, rules that women can learn boxing and bear arms to deal with men.
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
Zionism is also scroogism. “Israeli guards beat five demonstrators, including one dressed as Father Christmas, during a protest on Friday against Israel’s separation barrier in the West Bank, organisers said.” (thanks Badis)
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“Professor Joel Beinin, who teaches at both the American University of Cairo and Stanford University, specializes in the history of labor movements. He says most people, when measuring whether Egypt is democratizing or not, are looking at the wrong things. “There is nothing whatsoever in the formal political arena, or even in the arena of [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
““There was a shocking silence of the Jewish community on the issue of torture, and there is still a lacuna on this vital issue, to my eye,†said Felice Gaer, director of the AJCommittee’s Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights. “All Americans, Jewish and non-Jewish, need to be more vocal on this [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“In September 2006, British novelist Martin Amis told the Times of London: “There’s a definite urge–don’t you have it?–to say, ‘the Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order.’ What sort of suffering? Not letting them travel. Deportation–further down the road. Curtailing of freedoms. Strip-searching people who look like they’re [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
The dean of former Arab leftists, Hazim Saghiyyah, has a new idea. He says that anybody who opposes imperialism or Hamid Karzai is basically supporting the Taliban. I kid you not. He actually said that.
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
“A lesbian high school student says she was asked by a teacher to cover up a lesbian-themed T-shirt or face suspension, and now a civil liberties group has taken up her cause.” (thanks John)
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad
I saw Ghassan bin Jiddu on New TV with Ghadah `Id. He is able to say “the martyr prime minister Rafiq Hariri” 20 times per minute, when asked any question about Hariri. At one point, he was explaining why people in the opposition should understand (the fananticism?) of the Hariri camp. The courageous `Id (the [...]
Posted on December 22, 2007 by As'ad