January 2011

Could Egypt follow Tunisia?

by Paul Woodward 01.19.2011

Investors are often among the most sober of political analysts — after all, their single interest is in finding the safest and most profitable places to put their money and right now, Egypt does not look like such a location. Reuters reports, “Cairo’s stock index tumbled to an 11-week low on Wednesday on fears of [...]

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The promise of a progressive popular revolution

by News Sources 01.19.2011

Issandr El Amrani writes: The elation felt across the Arab world over the Tunisian uprising is deep and palpable. It is not simply that, like most people, Arabs are pleased to see a long-repressed people finally have a shot at gaining their freedom. It is also that many recognise themselves in the Tunisian people and [...]

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Tunisian dissident blogger takes job as minister

by News Sources 01.19.2011

The Guardian reports: Only last week, the dissident blogger Slim Amamou was handcuffed to a chair in the notorious interrogation rooms of Tunisia’s interior ministry being psychologically tormented by the dictator’s henchmen and led to believe that the screams he could hear from neighbouring rooms was his family members being tortured. It’s a sign of [...]

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Turkey’s rise points to the post-American Middle East

by News Sources 01.19.2011

In the New York Times, Anthony Shadid writes: In a series of stalemates — from the Arab-Israeli conflict to Lebanon — Turkey has proved the most dynamic, projecting an increasingly assertive and independent foreign policy in an Arab world bereft of any country that matches its stature. Its success is a subtle critique of America’s [...]

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Why America is like imperial Spain

by News Sources 01.19.2011

Michael Vlahos writes: The Spain of Quixote was in 1568 a world empire — and the king’s holdings covered the globe. Its fleets and armies seemed to be everywhere. So, too, is the United States today. With 700 overseas bases, its military personnel are equally omnipresent. Spanish world authority in the 16th century and that [...]

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» Nitin Sawhney – The Preacher

by Attention to the Unseen 01.19.2011

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Worse than Bush

by Paul Woodward 01.18.2011

While George W Bush was president it was possible to sustain what turned out to be a naive hope: that much of the harm he had done could be undone once he was out of office and the neoconservatives had been dislodged from power. But the harm personified by Bush and Cheney is now being [...]

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Tom Engelhardt: alien visitations

by TomDispatch 01.18.2011

In the crosshairs — Tucson-Kabul By Tom Engelhardt “Slowly a humped shape rose out of the pit, and the ghost of a beam of light seemed to flicker out from it. Forthwith flashes of actual flame, a bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of men. It was as if [...]

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The brutal truth about Tunisia

by News Sources 01.18.2011

Robert Fisk writes: The job of the Arab potentates will be what it has always been – to “manage” their people, to control them, to keep the lid on, to love the West and to hate Iran. Indeed, what was Hillary Clinton doing last week as Tunisia burned? She was telling the corrupted princes of [...]

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Change without change in Tunisia’s “unity” government

by Paul Woodward 01.18.2011

Before it was even clear it was a revolution, the Tunisian uprising had been dubbed the Jasmine Revolution — as though revolutionary change was about to sweep the Arab world as rapidly as color revolutions transformed former Soviet states. That might still happen, but the name most fitting for what has happened in Tunisia is [...]

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Stuxnet attack on Bushehr: Russia warns of ‘Iranian Chernobyl’

by Paul Woodward 01.18.2011

Following Saturday’s New York Times report that the Stuxnet malware targeting Iran’s nuclear program was a joint US-Israeli operation, the Daily Telegraph reports that Russian nuclear scientists are concerned that the Bushehr nuclear plant could suffer catastrophic damage. Fuel rods were inserted in the new reactor at the end of November and the plant is [...]

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Stephan Salisbury: the right wing of killing

by TomDispatch 01.18.2011

Reprinted with permission of TomDispatch.com I couldn’t imagine a more appropriate piece for Martin Luther King Day. Sadly, what more is there to say? Tom Engelhardt Extremist killing is as American as apple pie Murders grow on the far right four decades after Martin Luther King By Stephan Salisbury The landscape of America is littered [...]

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In the Middle East, no one thinks Obama is serious about democracy

by Paul Woodward 01.17.2011

In Washington, when a cabinet level official is facing calls for his resignation, he is likely to take cover behind that regal phrase, “I serve at the president’s pleasure.” Most of the Arab world’s autocratic leaders could use the same expression since most would find their positions untenable without American support. Last Wednesday, when Hillary [...]

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What was Israel’s connection to the AQ Khan nuclear network?

by Paul Woodward 01.16.2011

The New York Times reports that the Stuxnet worm which was designed to attack Iran’s nuclear enrichment program was a joint US-Israeli operation. One of the crucial elements in developing the plan was being able to test the malware’s ability to disable P-1 centrifuges — the type that Iran employs in cascades of thousands of [...]

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Obama’s telling misalignment

by Paul Woodward 01.16.2011

“When we align our values with our actions, great things can happen,” says Bemporad Baranowski Marketing Group (BBMG), a New York-based branding agency dedicated to nonprofits and socially responsible businesses. President Obama shares the same philosophy. Addressing the memorial service in Tucson this week, Obama said: We recognize our own mortality, and we are reminded [...]

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Who grows thorns will reap wounds

by News Sources 01.15.2011

Peter Beaumont writes: One of Tunisia’s most famous poets, Abou al-Kacem Echebbi, whose face adorns the 30-dinar note, is best known in the wider Arab world for several verses that warn tyrants they will face bloody insurrection. “Who grows thorns will reap wounds,” Echebbi wrote – a line that the country’s dictatorial president, Zine al-Abidine [...]

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Will Tunisia be a turning point for Arab democracy?

by News Sources 01.15.2011

Michael Hanna writes: For observers throughout the Arab world, the significance of the Tunisian uprising is near-impossible to understate. During this era of retrenchment by aging descendants of revolutionary regimes, the prospect of democratic change had long-ago vanished as a believable possibility. The closest point of reference to the civil unrest in Tunisia is the [...]

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State Department clueless on Tunisia

by Paul Woodward 01.15.2011

The mystique of American power is sustained in no small measure by the ability of US government officials to convey the impression that they understand global affairs. In the last 48 hours the State Department has clearly shifted into overdrive in an effort to portray the US as being fully engaged with and attuned to [...]

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Tunisia’s overthrown president flees to the ‘refuge of dictators’: Saudi Arabia

by News Sources 01.15.2011

Egypt’s Al Ahram reports: The Arab Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) on Saturday condemned Saudi Arabia’s decision to grantasylum to Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia’s overthrown president, in a statement entitled “Tunisia’s deposed dictator receives hospitality from Saudi Arabia’s dictator”. The announcement said that Ben Ali should be tried in front of a [...]

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Will the Tunisian revolution lead to democracy?

by News Sources 01.14.2011

Professor Emma Murphy writes: Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali came to power in 1987 through a constitutional coup and he appears to have been removed from power through a constitutional coup. The key here on both occasions was not the constitution but the army. In 1987 the army moved to secure stability as an increasingly senile [...]

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The first Middle Eastern revolution since 1979

by News Sources 01.14.2011

Juan Cole writes: Tunisian President Zine al-Abidin Bin Ali has fled the country before the advancing crowds pouring in to the capital’s center. A French eye-witness said of the masses thronging Bourguiba Avenue that “it was black with people.” The Speaker of Parliament is caretaker leader of the country. The dramatic events in Tunisia yesterday [...]

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Tunisia sends a message to the Arab world

by News Sources 01.14.2011

The BBC reports: A state of emergency has been declared in Tunisia amid protests over corruption, unemployment and inflation. The decree bans more than three people from gathering together in the open, and imposes a night-time curfew. Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali has dismissed his government and dissolved parliament, and called new elections within [...]

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After the collapse of the Lebanese government — what next?

by News Sources 01.14.2011

Lebanon’s government collapsed on Wednesday while Prime Minister Saad Hariri was in Washington. It wasn’t until today that he returned to Beirut. Robert Fisk writes: There are many who believe that Lebanon will now descend into a civil war, similar to the fratricidal conflict which it endured from 1976 to 1980. I doubt it. A [...]

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