a well rounded blog.
by the end of the day, i hope i leave a marc.
Why is the Arab world so easily offended?
by Fouad Ajami
Modernity requires the willingness to be offended. And as anti-American violence across the Middle East and beyond shows, that willingness is something the Arab world, the heartland of Islam, still lacks.
There Be Dragons
by Thomas Friedman
“The Arab/Muslim awakening phase is over. Now we are deep into the counter-revolutionary phase, as the dead hands of the past try to strangle the future. I am ready to consider any ideas of how we in the West can help the forces of democracy and decency win. But, ultimately, this is their fight. They have to own it, and I just hope it doesn’t end — as it often does in the land of dragons — with extremists going all the way and the moderates just going away.”
Egypt Promises to Address Coptic Christians’ Concerns
by David Kirkpatrick
Egyptian officials announced they would investigate disputes over the construction of churches as hundreds gathered in Cairo to mourn the Coptic Christians killed on Sunday.
good. -marc
U.N. rights chief urges 'immediate' international steps to protect Syrians
(CNN) — The top U.N. human rights official deplored the “devastatingly remorseless toll of human lives” in Syria and exhorted the world community on Friday “to take immediate measures” to protect citizens.
Libya Inspires the Arabs
by Marc Lynch
The scenes of the joyous reception for Libyan “Freedom Fighters” entering Tripoli with little resistance yesterday sent an electric shock through the Arab public.
(Source: foreignpolicy.com)
In Libya’s Wake: Pressure Builds on Assad
Was Syrian President Bashar al-Assad one of the millions around the world who watched Libyan revolutionaries triumphantly stream into their capital Tripoli on Sunday night? Did the sudden collapse of most of the Libyan regime’s defenses in and around Tripoli cause Assad to feel a heightened sense of anxiety? It’s impossible to tell but the Twittersphere certainly drew parallels between the two regimes, with many jubilant commentators predicting that the young Syrian president would be the next Arab leader toppled by his people.
(Source: TIME)
Why Turkey Holds the Key to the Regional Power Game on Syria
by Tony Karon
As the Assad regime on Sunday escalated its brutal crackdown by sending gunboats to shell the coastal city of Latakia, yet the rebellion shows no sign of abating despite at least 1,700 deaths so far, Syria’s fate may come to rest less in the hands of its own people, than in the corridors of power in neighboring and more distant capitals.
A Revolutionary Ramadan
by Foreign Policy
A great slideshow summarizing where the uprisings in the Arab world stand today.
Egyptians See Signs of a Reckoning in Mubarak Trial
by Anthony Shadid
MIT KENANA, Egypt — In this town of unfinished brick buildings, along parcels of corn and rice watered by the Nile, the elation, suspicion and introspection of a country played out along one street a day after residents witnessed the unthinkable: former President Hosni Mubarak put on trial.
The New Hama Rules
by Thomas Friedman
What a difference three decades make. In April 1982, I was assigned to be the Beirut correspondent for The Times. Before I arrived, word had filtered back to Lebanon about an uprising in February in the Syrian town of Hama — famed for its water wheels on the Orontes River. Rumor had it that then President Hafez al-Assad had put down a Sunni Muslim rebellion in Hama by shelling the neighborhoods where the revolt was centered, then dynamiting buildings, some with residents still inside, and then steamrolling them flat, like a parking lot. It was hard to believe and even harder to check. No one had cellphones back then, and foreign media were not allowed access. That May I got a visa to Syria, just as Hama had been reopened. It was said that the Syrian regime was “encouraging” Syrians to drive through the town, see the crushed neighborhoods and contemplate the silence. So I just hired a cab in Damascus and went. It was, and remains, one of the most chilling things I’ve ever seen: Whole neighborhoods, the size of four football fields, looked as though a tornado had swept back and forth over them for a week — but this was not the work of Mother Nature.
(Source: The New York Times)
Robert Fisk: The Arab world’s dictators cling on, but for how long?
by Robert Fisk
Ever a weathervane of passing fortunes, Walid Jumblatt has begun to make some very pessimistic comments about Syria. Druze leader, head of the Lebanese Progressive Socialist Party, “warlord”, he it was who suggested that the international UN tribunal into the 2005 assassination of ex-prime minister Rafiq Hariri might be set aside in the interests of “stability before justice”. Howls of rage from Saad Hariri, the ex-premier’s son, currently perambulating around the world to stay out of Lebanon – understandably, because of his own fears of being murdered – while Sister Syria sits silently to the east. Now Jumblatt is saying that some in Syria are impeding reform.
Sure, ‘Gaddafi Must Go’, But What Else Did U.S. Officials Tell the Libyan Leader’s Envoys?
by Tony Karon
Washington insists that the U.S. officials who met with representatives of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in Tunisia last week were not negotiating; they simply went to deliver one message: “Gaddafi must go.” There’s no reason to doubt that this demand was the center-piece of what the Americans told Gaddafi’s emissaries, since Obama Administration concurs with all the NATO powers — and even those skeptical of the Western alliance’s war effort, such as Russia and the African Union — that the key to a political solution to the conflict is for the self-styled “Brother Leader” to relinquish power. But that message has been delivered repeatedly through the metaphorical megaphone of the media throughout the five-month civil war. Presumably the reason it was communicated discreetly by diplomats behind closed doors last weekend is that it was accompanied by some ideas on just how Gaddafi might “go”, and what would follow if he does.
(Source: TIME)
Blunt Anthem Tells Syrian Leader It’s Time to Go
by Anthony Shadid
HAMA, Syria — As anthems go, this one is fittingly blunt. “Come on Bashar, leave,” it declares to President Bashar al-Assad. And in the weeks since it was heard in protests in this city, the song has become a symbol of the power of the protesters’ message, the confusion in their ranks and the violence of the government in stopping their dissent.
Will Egypt’s Military Hijack its Revolution?
by Tony Karon
Turkey, with its pluralistic democracy and booming economy under the stewardship of a moderate Islamist party, is hailed as the model for post-Mubarak Egypt by many leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood. But the latest initiatives by the 25-man military junta that has ruled since February’s ouster of President Hosni Mubarak suggests that the generals are guided by their own Turkish model, of an earlier era — a military autonomous of civilian political control, claiming veto power over the democratic process and intervening at will as self-appointed guardian of secularism and the national interest.
(Source: TIME)
Why the Arab Spring Never Came to the U.A.E.
by Angela Shah
To understand why the Arab Spring has largely passed by the United Arab Emirates, take a moment to listen to Naser Al Hammadi. “What more do we need?” says the 30-year-old electrical engineer. “Here, everything is taken care of. Our education. Our health care. We have free housing.”
NIGHTNIGHT by DEDDY
