Egypt on The Huffington Post

Egyptian Soccer Fans Riot Against Algeria (PHOTOS)

2009-11-20T11:36:12Z

(AP) CAIRO — Egyptian soccer fans burned Algerian flags and rioted outside the Algerian Embassy in Cairo, smashing cars and shop windows, in an escalating row between the two countries over a bitter World Cup rivalry.

Egyptian fans – and the country's media – have been thrown into a frenzy over reports that Algerians attacked and injured Egyptians after their countries' teams squared off in a World Cup qualifier in the Sudanese capital Khartoum this week. Algeria won the game 1-0, giving them a spot in the 2010 Cup in South Africa.

Egypt Recalls Algerian Ambassador As Soccer Rift Grows

2009-11-19T16:18:21Z

CAIRO — Egypt on Thursday recalled its ambassador to Algeria for consultations as part of a growing diplomatic row caused by a bitter soccer rivalry between the two Arab nations that has sparked violence among fans.

Egyptian fans were attacked after Algeria won a make-or-break World Cup qualifying game Wednesday in the Sudanese capital Khartoum, and offices of Egyptian companies in Algeria were ransacked after a matchup in Cairo over the weekend.

Soccer In Sudan: Guns And Soldiers Required

2009-11-19T10:08:40Z

KHARTOUM, Sudan -- The streets emptied at sunset. Twitchy-faced soldiers hit the pavement, literally thousands of them, wearing all stripes of camouflage, blues, greens, grays and browns. They twirled clubs and AK-47s and plastic pipes and ragged old beating sticks. Their giant trucks with four-foot-high wheels blocked the roads. This did not feel like a major sporting event. It felt more like a presidential coup.

Read more: Sudan, Sudan Soccer, Egypt, Algeria, Soccer, World News

Egypt Vs. Algeria, November 18: Sudan Hosts World Cup Soccer Qualifier

2009-11-18T09:30:47Z

PARIS — The first rock was thrown with such force that it traveled through the bus, smashing windows on its way in and out, Michel Gaillaud, a French doctor, recalls.

Panicked, he and the soccer players he treats dived for cover.

Ancient Mummies Had Heart Disease

2009-11-17T19:03:31Z

ORLANDO, Fla. — You can't blame this one on McDonald's: Researchers have found signs of heart disease in 3,500-year-old mummies.

"We think of it as being caused by modern risk factors," such as fast food, smoking and a lack of exercise, but the findings show that these aren't the only reasons arteries clog, said Dr. Randall Thompson, a cardiologist at the Mid America Heart Institute in Kansas City.

Yvonne R. Davis: The Challenge of Arab Unemployment -- An Issue We Must Not Ignore!

2009-11-16T12:52:19Z

The 10.2% unemployment rate in the U.S. has the citizenry completely disillusioned and vexed with our government. Despite the “Average Joe/Jane” outrage, a slight fall in jobless claims this month, a number of the unemployed live in neighborhoods with foreclosure signs over their heads. They hang on by their fingernails praying for economic relief. Never perhaps returning to the days of “good and plenty,” fear runs rampant with an aging “Super Power” population. According to the U.S. Census by 2030, 1 in 5 Americans will be 65 years and older. Our Nation’s fastest growing population is 85 and above.

As the “Senior Citizen Hegemons” go through its most painful metamorphosis to facilitate in a Google Economy, another part of the world we are appendaged to due to our devoted dependency on its natural resources, foreign debt, Wall Street ownership, wars and terrorism, is facing perhaps its most solemn challenge in its entire existence -- massive unemployment in the Arab World. And while we in America might want to be NIMBYish (Not In My Back Yard) about it, we can’t. There is a link between violence, terrorism and Arab youth many educated not having the ability to have pride and self-esteem because they lack gainful and respectable employment to take care of their families. On the contrary to America's aging population, over 60% of the Arab population is 40 years of age and under; with a mean age of 27 or younger in some countries. Whether we like it or not, the issue of Arab unemployment is on our front step and maybe the very thing that ultimately turns the world upside down economically, socially and politically if we do not begin to face this reality.

Saeed Al Khabaz, a retired Human Resources professional and father of four is a successful business owner and communitarian from the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. Al Khabaz lives in the economic fulcrum of the Kingdom. Beyond the black gold that flows from the oil refineries, the region heavies with industries of steel, glass, construction materials, foodstuffs, aluminum products, pipes, air-conditioners, electrical equipment, carpets, soap, and rubber products. With all of this stuff going on, unemployment in the Eastern Province is climbing and so is the crime. “Right now in Saudi Arabia and throughout the entire Middle East and North Africa region, we are weathering a typhoon of unemployment,” declares Al Khabaz. “With an average jobless rate in some regions of 25%, the huge numbers of unemployment in the Arab world is creating all kinds of social problems, and no community can continue to survive this way.”

Ten years ago, after doing a very successful “turn around” on a medical clinic that was barely treating 40 patients per day, to over 100,000 annually, Al Khabaz made sure all of the employees he hired in his Al Hadi Medical Clinic in Qatif, Saudi Arabia were women under the age of 40. All of the women who work for Al Khabaz never want to leave him; despite receiving bigger opportunities because he believed in them and gave them a chance when no one else would and they succeeded. He meets the needs of a demographic with the greatest hardship. “You are talking about millions of young people who have the energy and they are frustrated and they have to vent their frustration at something,” says Al Khabaz. “I don’t think any community in history has been challenged like this before.” By 2015, the Arab population will be over 435-million. The United Nations and the International Labor Organization predicts by 2020, 100-million will unemployed in the MENA region. “No society can sustain that level of unemployment without exploding,” declares Al Khabaz.

Although reported to having some of the lowest crime rates in the world, in areas where unemployment is high with Arabs living on less than $2 per day in penury, coupled with the growing problem of jobs, there is a direct correlation between economic disadvantage and higher crime rates; especially among youth.The Investigation and Prosecution Commission (IPC) in Saudi Arabia reported a jump in reported crimes in 2009. This dynamic of low crime may change rapidly if solutions are not in place quickly enough to buffer the population explosion and need.

While the problem of unemployment in the Arab world seems insurmountable, there are a number of initiatives being implemented and proffered in the region to begin to put a dent in the problem.

Her Royal Highness Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al-Missned, the consort of the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, is the Educator in Chief in her country chairing the Qatar Foundation for Education. She is the first Royal in the Middle East to create an Education City initiative that brings together world class Universities under one roof to educate students in her country and the region.

Sheikha Mozah founded Silatech (Sila means 'Connection' in Arabic), to meet the urgent need to create jobs with a primary focus in the Arab World where the need is greatest. A social enterprise, her organization creates signature level East-West partnerships with the private sector to provide opportunities for the youth in diverse markets. Silatech works on several levels, policy (government participation), psychological (mindset), programmatic (training) and practical (partnerships for actual jobs). Thus far, Silatech has launched a number of initiatives that include intensive training programs in the areas of media, hospitality and tourism, and leadership for women. Partnerships include: Fortune 500 companies like Cisco and Manpower, senior academic institutions, research centers such as Gallup and sister countries i.e. United Arab Emirates, Syria, and Lebanon for various training, banking and financing initiatives for young entrepreneurs.

After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Ron Bruder wanted to make a huge difference by taking not taking an American isolationist approach to dealing with the tragedy. A powerful man on Wall Street, Bruder left his profession and founded the non-profit Education for Employment Foundation (EFE). EFE’s mission is combat chronic unemployment in the Arab World by providing young men and women professional and technical training. What makes his organization special is that it guarantees jobs for Arabs when they graduate from the program. Bruder believes his organization can contribute a great deal to promote peaceful environments by eliminating the despair, doubt and rage caused by not having a job. “In order to have world peace, the youth must have piece of the global pie,” said Bruder. “The key component of that is an education that enables one to be employable in the country’s labor market. Our mission is to train youth in cutting edge skills that will enable them to immediately enter the labor market.”

Located in Jordan, Gaza/West Bank, Egypt, Morocco and Yemen, the EFE has remarkably changed the lives of several thousand Arab Youths and their families. His latest initiative includes establishing a partnership Prince Sultan University in Riyadh. “We helped launch the "Prince Salman Education for Employment Initiative" and an accelerated a second Bachelor’s of Science nursing program for unemployed young Saudi women in association with Simmons College in Boston, Massachusetts,” announced Bruder. Classes are expected to begin in January 2010.

While Al Khabaz clearly articulates the problem of youth unemployment in the Middle East, he believes Arabs in the region should first seek find their own solutions by forming strategic mentor/protégé partnerships that expands social capital by investing in human capital on a multi-community and multi-country level. He is not for any “token support” that foreign enterprise gives often times in the Middle East. “We want foreign expertise, but it is better when the local people come together,” states Al Khabaz. He strongly believes local level investment must always be the priority. He also feels any plans created must be cohesive and involve the people on the ground at all times. “We have to be self-determined.”

His thoughts are evidenced by establishing the Qatif Youth Achievement Award and launching a virtual world initiative entitled Arab Youth Supercomputer 2010 Project. In its second year, the Qatif Youth Achievement Award annually recognizes seven men and women who have demonstrated skills and talents in a most distinctive way. Judges select winners based upon creativity, leadership, ingenuity, invention and drive. This award encourages small and medium sized enterprises to take serious looks at youths involved in Qatif; hiring them for jobs.

The Arab Youth Supercomputer 2010 Project challenges Arabs 40 and under from all over the MENA region to build a Supercomputer by year end 2010. With nearly 300 members world wide supported by a sister organization of about 500, Al Khabaz is leading a worldwide movement for change for his people. Khabaz has garnered support for this program from business leaders, marketing professionals, academics, IT technology professionals, and security specialists from as far as Europe, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and the United States. Those who support his initiative subscribes to the mission of building Arab economic sustainability -- “so that all that is being done benefits our community.”

Egypt To Apply For First Arabic Domain Name: .MASR

2009-11-15T19:56:56Z

SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt (AP) -- Egypt will apply for the first Internet domain written in Arabic, its information technology minister said Sunday at a conference grouping Yahoo's co-founder and others to discuss boosting online access in emerging nations.

Tarek Kamel said Egypt on Monday would apply for the new domain -- pronounced ".masr" but written in the Arabic alphabet -- making it the first Arab nation to apply for a non-Latin character domain. The effort is part of a broader push to expand both access and content in developing nations, where the Internet remains out of reach for wide swaths of the population.

The registering of the domain "will offer new avenues for innovation, investment and growth, and hence we can truly and gladly say ... the Internet now speaks Arabic," Kamel said at the start of the Internet Governance Forum -- a U.N.-sponsored gathering that drew Net legends like Yahoo Inc.'s Jerry Yang and Tim Berners-Lee, known as one of the Internet's founding fathers.

"It is a great moment for us," Kamel said of the domain name, which translates as ".Egypt" (and looks like this).

The new domains stem from a decision taken at the end of October by the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, a key Internet oversight agency, to develop a "fast-track" mechanism for domain names in languages such as Chinese, Korean, Arabic and others that do not use the Latin alphabet.

The decision marks a key step in the Arab world, where a mixture of censorship, limited content and access have stymied efforts to boost Arabic-language content on the Web.

The dearth of content has opened new market opportunities for Internet companies, with Yahoo, for example, recently acquiring Arab online community Web site Maktoob.com.

Yang said that while there are over 300 million Arabic speakers in the world, less than 1 percent of the content online is in Arabic.

As part of the company's push to boost access in Arabic, Yang said Yahoo would offer its mail and messenger service in Arabic next year. He did not provide an exact date.

Yang said there are approximately 325 million Internet users in emerging markets -- a figure expected to grow 19 percent yearly through 2012. In all, about 75 percent of the world's population is still not online.

The prospective new users in developing nations face a number of challenges, ranging from monetary constraints to restrictions on their liberty -- as evidenced by an announcement in Iranian media Saturday that officials were deploying a special police unit to sweep Web sites for political material and prosecute those deemed to be spreading lies.

The move reflected the influence the Web had in mobilizing Iranians -- and informing the outside world -- during the country's disputed presidential election in June -- a vote that brought tens of thousands of Iranians into the streets in protests of what President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's opponents claimed was massive fraud.

It also underscores the challenges Internet companies face in some countries and in hosting content deemed by some governments as subversive.

Many of the new users from emerging markets "will need Web content, and want more content, in their native language and still others won't just be bound by language and barriers, but have other challenges such as reading, liberty," Yang said.

The challenge "isn't just about getting as many people online as possible, but making sure that once they get online, they have something productive to do, something to gain, something meaningful to experience."

Sultan Sooud Al-Qassemi: Play Fair And Egypt May Yet Be Land Of The Rising Son

2009-11-15T01:44:18Z

To his supporters he is a voice of reform in a stagnant country. To his detractors he represents the ruling elite responsible for the stagnation of the Arab world's most populous nation. However one looks at it, there is no denying that Gamal Mubarak is a powerful force in the National Democratic Party that has been in control in Egypt for three decades.

This was all the more evident in the voices of both support and discontent at the NDP annual congress last month, to the extent that in the run-up to the congress the Egyptian secular opposition launched a new slogan: "Mayihkomsh", which translates into "He's not ruling". Perhaps taking a step back allows us to be able to assess the situation more objectively.

That his father, Hosni Mubarak, is president should not disqualify Gamal Mubarak from contesting a future election for the presidency. After all, even in the world's two biggest democracies that is not unheard of. In India, Jawaharlal Nehru was the country's first prime minister, a position held later by his daughter, Indira Gandhi, and his grandson, Rajiv Gandhi. In the United States, the country's sixth president, John Quincy Adams, was the son of the second president, John Adams. More recently, George W Bush's undisputed second election came only 12 years after his father left office.

In a true democracy there should be nothing stopping Gamal from becoming Egypt's president. He is an American University of Cairo educated technocrat and a former London banker. He has been active in the political sphere in his country since 2002, as head of the NDP's policies secretariat. So there shouldn't be anything to stop him from running - except that there is.

Paradoxically, the policies of the ruling NDP and its leaders are probably the biggest hurdle stopping Mr Mubarak from fairly contesting future elections. If the president and the NDP are confident of Gamal's credentials and success then they should encourage him to run in an open arena.

Creating a free and fair electoral process is not the impossible task that some Arab regimes scaremonger their citizens and the West into believing. In Egypt, for instance, there is a rule that a presidential candidate has to have led a political party for one year. That should be removed, along with the rule that only parties that have existed for five years can contest an election.

The requirement that a presidential candidate obtain the signatures of 250 parliament members should also be scrapped. The disqualification of Ayman Nour, the only candidate to contest an election against a sitting president, must be lifted. And the state-controlled media must cover the campaigns of all candidates fairly. All this should be complemented by sweeping electoral reforms, such as limiting the presidency to two terms and lifting the emergency law, which has been in operation since Anwar Sadat was assassinated in 1981.

To deal with the perceived threat of the Muslim Brotherhood, an electoral law could be introduced to compel parties wishing to offer candidates for election to publish a clear manifesto of their policies on various issues. The Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, like Hamas in Gaza and other extremist Islamist movements, suffers from a lack of vision and has no agenda that states how they wish to govern.

Their positions on women rights, trade ties, the peace treaty with Israel, education and labour rights, among other issues, must be unambiguously stated before they field candidates. It may very well turn out that ordinary Egyptians are not as comfortable with the policies of the Muslim Brotherhood as the latter believes.

Democracy isn't merely about electing a representative. A large component of it is knowing what that representative stands for in detail. This is possibly the most powerful element of the US democratic system. Candidates are grilled for months on end and no issue is too trivial for them to discuss and take a position on. The result is that American voters hold extensive knowledge about whom they are voting for before an election. An independent media largely free of government interference will ensure that this is possible in Egypt.

Ultimately, Egypt should not take the path that Syria took in 2000. Back then the Syrian regime installed the late president Hafez al Assad's son as new life-long leader of the republic. In fact, like Gamal Mubarak, Bashar al Assad is an intelligent and educated man who could have had a serious shot at winning a fair election had the country ever held one. Today, Arabs across the region have passively accepted that presidential inheritance is the unavoidable destiny of other Arab regimes such Yemen, Tunisia and Libya - all of which are so-called republics.

Today, Hosni Mubarak is at a fork in the road. If he takes one path, he could be the man who inherited the presidency, avoided fair elections for decades and (like too many other Arab leaders) was emotionally attached to power until his passing away. If he takes the other, he could be the man who inherited the presidency, avoided fair elections for decades but then decided to introduce sweeping electoral reforms and stepped aside to see democracy in his country flourish in his lifetime.

Who knows, maybe his son Gamal could be fairly elected as the next Egyptian president after all.

*This article first appeared in The National on Sunday 15th November 2009

Algerian Soccer Team Attacked With Bricks In Bloody Cairo Assault (VIDEO)

2009-11-13T10:27:16Z

A bus carrying the Algerian national soccer team was attacked after leaving the airport in Cairo, Goal.com reports. According to the web site, bricks thrown through the bus windows created a bloody scene:

"They struck our bus with large bricks," said a distraught Antar Yahia. "Players have open head wounds with blood. We were lying down in the bus. All the windows were broken. It makes you fear for your life.

An Al Jazeera video (embedded below) reports that the Algerian government claims the team was attacked by youths. Four players are alleged to have been injured in the attack, including one who was hospitalized.

WATCH THE ATTACK:

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Creationism And Intelligent Design Gain Foothold In Turkey

2009-11-07T23:05:39Z

With direct and indirect help from American foes of evolution, similarly-minded Turks have aggressively made the case that Charles Darwin's theory is scientifically wrong and is the underlying source of most of the world's conflicts because it excludes God from human affairs.

Wael Nawara: Opposition Can Seriously Damage your Health

2009-11-07T09:32:15Z

Since I started writing in Facebook a few years ago, quite a
few of the friends I meet or make at Facebook give it straight to me. That I
lose a lot of my credibility by being associated with, in their words,
“controversial political figures from the opposition." To tell you the truth,
when I decided to join the founders of El Ghad Party in 2003, I was faced with the same friendly warnings.
I must say that they were, still are, very well-intentioned, because sometimes
they come from the people closest to me, including my own family. I realize
that the reputation of many opposition leaders is tarnished with scandalous
character assassination campaigns which can magnify the personal flaws of
anyone beyond proportion to discredit him or her and destroy their reputations.
But here comes an ironic paradox. The accusations and dirt digging only manage
to influence the opinions of certain people, mostly the elites, who usually
suffer least from status quo. The average simple men and women who cannot
survive the status quo and actually go to polling stations to vote, either do
not closely follow these dirt campaigns or are miraculously unaffected by them.
The living proof of this is Ayman Nour’s case. For as long as I remember, Ayman
Nour has always had his most candid critics from Cairo’s elites. White-collar
writers, thinkers, business people and professionals.

In 2005, following his arrest on forgery charges, Egyptian
media launched the most ferocious character assassination campaign it had ever
mounted on anyone in Egypt’s history of journalism, on the man who publicly
challenged Mubarak on the seat of the presidency of Egypt. Several newspapers
and talk shows would devote incredibly huge space to throw all kinds of
accusations on Ayman Nour. From casting doubts on the source of his “wealth,”
to claims that his doctorate degree was fake and that even his father was not
his real father! Nevertheless, and despite all sorts of harassment to El Ghad
Party and Ayman Nour’s Presidential campaign in Egypt’s first multi-candidate
presidential elections, Ayman Nour managed to get over 540,000 votes from
Egyptians if you trusted government figures, mostly from simple men and women
who reside in Egypt’s poorest towns and villages from Aswan to Areish.

In all objectivity, like him or not, Ayman Nour stands as
one of the very few home-grown politicians in the last 60 years who addressed
the real issues of Egypt and stood up in the face of tyranny and oppression
paying a heavy toll from his life and freedom. Until El Ghad Party started its
campaign demanding an end to Mubarak’s then 24-year-long reign and gathering
public resistance to the replication of the Syrian example in Egypt in the
person of the President’s son, no one had dared to publicly or privately oppose
the president. Writers would criticize a minister, a governor or even the prime
minister, but Mubarak and his family were off-limits. In the 90's Ayman Nour
himself was a part of the co-opted opposition which exercised self-censorship
in speech and action. It was like a secret "code" where opposition
and independent politicians and writers would observe a system of self-imposed
"red lines". Everyone had their own ceiling. Some writers and
politicians were allowed to challenge or criticize officials at sub-ministerial
levels and very few would be allowed to raise that self-imposed ceiling up to
the Prime Minister - but that was it. Mubarak senior and junior and a few other
"symbols" of the authoritarian regime were totally off-limits. Of
course code-breakers would be subjected to severe punishment as to set an
example and enforce the system. For instance, Abdel Halim Kandeel, former
editor in chief of El Araby Newspaper and later one of the leaders of Kifaya
movement, was kidnapped in 2003, stripped from his clothes and thrown in the
desert in response to a series of daring articles where Mubarak himself was
mentioned.

El Ghad, however, changed broke that "code". In
March 2004, El Ghad drafted a small booklet with a few questions to the
Egyptian people. The booklet was titled “Change Now”. Internal party discussions about the title of
the book took more than 5 hours, since even members of an opposition party at
that time felt that using the word “Change” was an open invitation to
harassment from security apparatus that could end them in jail. In September
2004, El Ghad developed and published a draft of a new constitution for Egypt.
This was simply unprecedented. In
December 2004, a new opposition movement called “Kifaya,” the word literally
means “Enough,” organized the first opposition demonstration of its kind in
decades, with participation from El Ghad leaders and members.

In January 2005, Ayman Nour was stripped off his
parliamentary immunity and arrested on forgery charges. He was released six
weeks later on bail pending trial yet ran as the main opponent to Mubarak in
September 2005 elections in which he came second amidst wide election
irregularities, rigging, fraud and abuse of power favoring the incumbent
president. In 2008, April 6 youth opposition movement was launched mainly by
young members or ex-members of El Ghad Party. Ayman Nour, and El Ghad Party, like
them or not, championed democracy, freedom and change in Egypt in the past 6
years and paid the price while most others took comfort either in the warm arms
of the regime, in silence, in absentia or in salon-style elitist political
activism.

This is why Ayman Nour and over 100 others from El Ghad
Party have been arrested and jailed on and off during the past 4 years. This is
why El Ghad Party was banned by the Parties Committee, headed and controlled by
the ruling party leaders. This is why El Ghad Newspaper, once selling 170,000
copies, the second largest after Al Ahram, was banned in 2007. This is why El Ghad Party headquarters was
torched in 2008 in broad day light as the
police cleared the streets for the attacking thugs while members and leaders of
El Ghad Party gathered inside. The thugs, who are registered felons, were never
arrested or charged although their photos filled were widely published on the
Internet and even in one independent newspaper, El Badeel.

Surely one loses credibility and a lot more when one is
involved with a party that is targeted by a regime which owns and or controls
all media outlets, including independent media, in a country where the regime
even controls permits for foreign media correspondents wishing to operate in
Egypt. But the sad news is, it is not only credibility that one loses. One
loses a lot more when in active opposition. The few hundred activists from El
Ghad, Kifaya, 6 April Movement and other opposition groups, pay heavy
sacrifices and work under severely hostile circumstances in parties or
movements which are plagued by lack of financing, poor organization and
security infiltration in addition other flaws and chaotic conditions. In all
fairness, being in opposition can seriously damage your health.

Hillary Clinton Spotted Reading The Lost Symbol (PHOTO)

2009-11-05T14:54:21Z

On a recent trip to Egypt for talks with the Egyptian President, Foreign Minister, and Intelligence Chief, Hillary Clinton was spotted, as seen on Lauren Rosen's Politico blog, reading Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol on the plane.

Is it scary that she's reading Dan Brown? Should our Secretary of State be reading something more serious? Let us know what you think.

Beyonce Egypt Show Called "Insolent Sex Party" By Islamic Conservatives

2009-11-05T14:47:12Z

CAIRO — As Egypt gears for pop diva Beyonce Knowles' first performance in North Africa, Islamic conservatives are branding her show an "insolent sex party" that threatens the Muslim nation's "social peace and stability."

On giant posters plastered across the Egyptian capital advertising the Friday evening concert, Beyonce sports a revealing, flame-covered outfit and grips a set of motorcycle handlebars extending from her hips – a sharp contrast to Cairo streets, where most women wear the traditional Muslim headscarves.

Hillary Clinton: US Wants Israel To Stop Building West Bank Settlements 'Forever'

2009-11-04T08:15:12Z

CAIRO — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton defended the U.S. stance toward Israeli settlement building to worried Arab allies on Wednesday, saying Washington does not accept the legitimacy of the West Bank enclaves and wants to see their construction halted "forever."

Still, she said an Israeli offer to restrain – but not halt – construction represents "positive movement forward" toward resuming Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.

Amb. Marc Ginsberg: Timidity Vs. Audacity? The Tests Are Yet to Come

2009-11-03T15:46:35Z

A year ago today I was sitting on a cold floor of a dark elementary school at 5am determined to be the first in my precinct to vote for Barack Obama. I could not sleep the night even though as a veteran of other election campaign nights I could feel the anticipated outcome coursing through my veins -- one of those few and far between great election highs. How great it felt -- no artificial stimulation necessary!

The world is a far better place because Obama is president. In most of the world (but in too many vital places not necessarily so where it may matter, such as Russia and Israel) Obama has shepherded a restoration of trust and confidence in the ideals that rekindle America's role as a beacon of hope. The President has positioned himself as a first among equals on the world stage -- and has done so with aplomb, steady bearing and an incredible grasp of national security minutiae. For those who questioned this young president's national security experience he has been consistently sure-footed on the world stage and a credit to his countrymen.

And yes, just ask them. Obama and his talented national security team are globally "engaged." Engaged with Russia, engaged with Europe, engaged with Latin America, engaged with Iran, and today, even engaged in Myanmar. Engagement is great. I am all for it. But "engagement" is a means to an end, and not a national security strategy, but a tactic -- an important one given what was inherited from the un-engaging (please read pejorative into my use of this word) Bush Administration.

But to date, other than the impending monumental Afghan troop decision, there's not many "buck stops here" tests of presidential leadership on which history books are written.

Much of the initial global euphoria has given way to the hard reality of inherited messes, and the Oval Office is becoming a lonely place for our global hero, who confronts life and death choices that will shape his presidency and the nation's future.

Afghanistan is a "buck stops here" decision. So, too, is what to do about Iran's "give and take back" uranium export offer. What will Obama do if the Iranians kick more sand in his face on fulfilling its IAEA obligations? Is conflict avoidable and, if so, at what cost to our security? And what can be done to move the Israeli-Palestinian equation off its dead center? Time's a-wastin' and in a year of best intended efforts we're not much closer to any acceptable Palestinian state goal line. Extremism and terrorism remain ever constant threats to our homeland. And nothing gives me more pause than the future stability of Pakistan. Like the scene out of "Naked Gun", one can't help fearing the world's dictators and terrorists are gathered around some mountain hideaway contriving up a crisis to surely test presidential mettle.

These are the tests that may likely make a 3am wakeup call a certainty in the months ahead.

So far there has been a tendency to vocalize intent and engage in convenient can-kicking, rather than actionable resolve. That's not timidity....that's testing the state of the ship's rudder. Well, I for one am glad that the Nobel Peace Prize will sit on its rightful pedestal in the White House as a tangible reminder of what constitutes unfinished business.

But these are damn difficult problems and they would have been easier to contend with had Bush and Co. not fallen flat on their proverbial derrieres while on the job. And Cheney's neocons have the audacity to accuse Obama of making the country less safe...what temerity!

I know this President is determined to make his mark internationally -- and the canvas is before him. Transforming eloquent word into sustainable deed will be the true test of his audaciousness.

So, one year after the election, what do you think Candidate Obama would think of President Obama? Tweet your response (our Twitter hashtag is #OneYearLater), or post it in the comments section.

CIA Rendition Plane Spotted In Birmingham UK

2009-11-01T20:27:46Z

An American plane named in an inquiry by the European parliament into alleged CIA torture flights landed at Birmingham airport last month and was met by British special forces helicopters.

Ali A. Rizvi: Can Arab/Muslim Countries Criticize Israel Under the UN Anti-Blasphemy Resolution?

2009-10-30T04:05:58Z

The turning point occurred on June 16, 2008 at 4:40 pm, when David Littman took the floor at a UN Human Rights Council meeting to speak on behalf of the Association for World Education (AWE) and the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU).

"Mr. President," he said, "In the context of integrating the human rights of women throughout the United Nations system, we wish to draw attention to four examples of widespread violence against women that we believe merits far greater attention from the Council.

"One, regarding FGM [female genital mutilation], we are making available our detailed written statement -- "

And that's as far as it went before the gavel sounded.

Doru Costea, the president of the UN Human Rights Council, noted a point of order, and gave the floor to Egyptian delegate Amr Roshdy Hassan, who raised an objection over the joint written statement that the AWE and IHEU had circulated.

"The first paragraph, you talk about Egypt and the Sharia law. In the second paragraph you talk about Sudan, Pakistan, and the Sharia law. The third and fourth paragraphs are on the Sharia law... If we have no time to come on something new, then we shouldn't speak."

Pakistani delegate Imran Ahmed Siddiqui was given the floor when Costea asked for other requests on the matter.

"Mr. President, the voices which we hear in this Council and the issues they raise are not unfamiliar. There is an agenda behind it... we have strong objections on any discussion, any direct or indirect discussion, any out of context, selective discussion on the Sharia law in this Council... we would again request you to please use your authority to bar any such discussion again, at the Council."

After some discussion, including protests against the censorship from Slovenia and Canada and a 40 minute break, Doru Costea returned with a ruling allowing Littman to continue, which he did briefly until interrupted again by the Egyptian delegate, who challenged the ruling.

As part of his objection to the continued discussion on human rights abuses like FGM, child marriages, and the stoning of women, Hassan declared: "I couldn't care less if I will win or lose this vote. My point is that Islam will not be crucified in this Council."

Following the meeting, the "Defamation of Religions" resolution was proposed by Pakistan on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), a body made up of 57 Muslim countries. It was passed by the UN Human Rights Council with 23 votes in favor, 11 against, and 13 abstentions. The complete text of the resolution can be read here.

Although it was triggered as an attempt to quell criticism of Islam, Muslims, and Sharia law, the resolution does call for "all possible measures to promote tolerance and respect for all religions and beliefs" -- which unquestionably also includes Judaism.

So, to what extent does this apply to the right of the Arab and Muslim countries in the OIC to criticize the Israeli occupation -- in particular the building and expansion of settlements in the West Bank?

The members of the OIC almost unanimously consider most aspects of the occupation of Palestinian territory a human rights issue, much like female genital mutilation, death by stoning, and child marriages are.

If discussion on Sharia-based abuses against women and children is now off limits at the Human Rights Council, wouldn't the same apply to the Israeli occupation? The right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel is clearly articulated in the Torah, the five books of which are also accepted by Christians as the Old Testament. Take the passages 23:31-2 from Shemot (Exodus):

"And I will set thy border from the Red Sea even unto the sea of the Philistines [Mediterranean], and from the wilderness unto the River; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee. Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods."

Or 1:8 from Devarim (Deuteronomy):

"Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which the LORD swore unto your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them."

Or 15:18-21 from Breishit (Genesis):

In that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying: 'Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates...'"

Additional specific, detailed descriptions of the borders of the Land of Israel are given in passages such as 34:1-15 from Bamidbar (Numbers).

These passages are among many in the Jewish scripture that form the foundation for everything from Zionism to current Israeli policy, just as the Quran and Sunnah (Muhammad's tradition or hadith) form the foundation for Pakistan's Constitution. It is in accordance with them that Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman has called for the expulsion of Arabs from Israel, and that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party's charter states the following about the building of settlements and expansion:

"The Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria [ie West Bank], and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and constitutes an important asset in the defense of the vital interests of the State of Israel. The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities and will prevent their uprooting."

As the debate to make the anti-defamation legislation a legally binding treaty gets underway this week, how do the Arab/Muslim countries of the Organization of the Islamic Conference plan to continue their criticism of the Israeli occupation and settlement expansion without, in a way, violating their own proposed resolution?

Are they open to the likelihood that their proposed assault on the freedom of speech of others also potentially curtails their own? Does victimhood take on a new definition when applied to the child brides of Saudi Arabia or the allegedly adulterous women stoned to death in Somalia compared to the victims of the bombings in Gaza last year?

Finally, is criticism of Quranic passages and Sunnah equivalent to criticism of passages in the Torah in the eyes of the UN Human Rights Council? Both books are believed to be the word of God by their adherents, and both prescribe capital punishment for blasphemy by stoning (Vayikra/Leviticus, 24:16) or beheading (Quran, 8:12 and several hadith). Who decides where to draw the line?

The sadly elusive take-home message from all of this was perhaps best articulated by Canada's representative to the Council, who said: "It is individuals who have rights, not religions."

Amen.

Betwa Sharma: No Toilets or Air For "Forgotten Prisoners"

2009-10-29T17:45:38Z

Prison conditions worldwide are worse than the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture could have imagined. So he said, while presenting his latest findings from detention centers in different regions. Jails without air, toilets and food are not rare.

The UN produces a steady stream of reports every year that are judiciously discussed and web-linked. Occasionally, some of these studies before being archived, invite a raised eyebrow.

In Equatorial Guinea, Rapporteur Manfred Nowak reveals that the government does not provide food and water to the prisoners who must wait for their families to bring water in plastic bottles and food in plastic bags.

Since there are no toilets, prisoners use the same bottles to urinate and the plastic bags to defecate. In most police stations, including the police headquarters in the capital Malabo, tons of filled and stinking plastic bottles and bags had been thrown through the bars to the corridors and open yards.

The government of Equatorial Guinea has rejected the report. “So many countries are not living up to their obligations to respect the basic dignity of human beings in detention,” says Nowak.

In prisons little bit outside of Montevideo in Uruguay, detainees used the water in the toilets for drinking. The sewage system does not work so inmates use plastic bags for defecation, which they later throw outside.

In Uruguay, hundreds of convicts and pretrial detainees spend years in tiny metal boxes called “las latas” (tin cans) under conditions described by the Rapporteur as “inhuman.”

During the summer, heat in these metal boxes reaches 60° C and the lack of ventilation means that detainees had to sit in shifts in front of tiny openings to breathe. They also had to cut themselves in order to get medical assistance.

In Nigeria, a small hole in the corner of the cell served as a toilet for 100 detainees whose cell had a makeshift roof making the temperature and humidity unbearable.

In many cases, prisoners have to wait for hours before a guard lets them out to use a toilet, and most detainees are watched by others as they use a hole in the corner of an overcrowded cell.

The Uruguayan leadership gave orders to close down that particular prison three days after Nowak’s visit in March. In Nigeria, the government decided to release 20,000 prisoners since their pre trial detention lasted longer than their maximum term. Many people above the age of 60 have already been released.

Worse than the beatings and torture to extract confessions.... is living in prisons where the government does not provide food or health services. Instead, it the responsibility of individual families to organize meals and toilet articles.

“If you’re a foreigner or you don’t have a family....you might starve or you may try to get food from other detainees in exchange for slavery like services, sexual services and other services….”says Nowak. “The poor are at the bottom of the prison hierarchy.”

The study declares the “re-education through labour” programme in the infamous Chinese Falun Gong camps equivalent to brainwashing. Then, in Togo, three detainees with serious mental disabilities were simply left unattended in a dark cell.

It is a conservative estimate that one million children are behind bars. Under international law, children can be jailed only under exceptional circumstances for a short period of time.

The report finds that children as young as eight or nine are packed away for minor crimes, end up for prolonged periods in pre-trial detention, and are treated much worse than the grown-ups. “Children more often than adults are subject to beatings and institutionalized corporal punishment......sexual violence,” says Nowak.

This is the Rapporteur’s fifth report since 2004, and now the UN agent is pushing for an international convention that will protect the rights of detainees as a vulnerable group. “Most people have no idea how life behind bars looks in reality,” he says.

In many instances, the UN’s requests to come and inspect the prisons have been denied for several years. “Unfortunately in the Arab world on the one hand torture is wildly practiced and secondly most countries did not request favorably to my request,” he says.

Countries suspected of human rights violations, Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Syria have not responded to requests.

In Jordan, Nowak found that while there was no systematic torture, practices like beating on the soles and then walking on salt were carried out in a prison in Amman. The notorious Al-Jafr prison, located in the desert 350 km south of Amman in Jordan, was closed after the Special Rapporteur visited.

The UN estimates that the 10 million persons deprived of liberty worldwide are living in unacceptable conditions. The Rapporteur stresses that abuses also occur in industrialized nations particularly with aliens awaiting deportation or minors who have broken immigration laws.

Several countries have avoided a check-up including Afghanistan, India, Iran, Israel, Russia and United States. Cuba has invited Nowak for a visit in 2010.

Leon T. Hadar: The Shape of Things to Come: War before Peace in the Mideast

2009-10-28T12:19:56Z

Not unlike the local weatherman who was being accused by Larry David in an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" of falsely forecasting rain in order to clear the golf course, political analysts and financial experts have been faulted for allegedly elevating wishful thinking or biased opinion to the status of reliable forecasts in an effort to promote specific personal or institutional agendas; the Republican strategist forecasting his party's election victory is hoping to influence the outcome of the vote or the investment analyst hyping a favorite company to raise the value of its stock.

So for the record: my predictions about what's going to happen in the Middle East don't reflect any personal interest or political agenda. In fact, as someone who has been committed to bringing an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to reaching peace in the Middle East, the notion that all these wonderful things are not going to happen anytime soon runs contrary to my own wishful thinking.

But as someone who has been a proud member of the Reality-Based Community I need to maintain a certain consistency when it comes to the Middle East. During the debate over the Iraq War, I challenged the notion advanced by neoconservative ideologues that Iraq could be transformed into a liberal democracy as a first step towards remaking the Middle East, and predicted that the Freedom Agenda would produce a big mess in the region. So as President Barack Obama is creating new expectations about his plans to re-energize the peace process and help resolve the clash between Jews and Arabs in the Promised Land, I wish I had faith in his ability to deliver it. But as a hard-core Realpolitik type I need to face reality and to conclude that Obama's peace-processing has reached a dead-end, and that the next round of diplomacy in the Middle East diplomacy would come only after the next round of war in the region.

Indeed, the two most dramatic and serious efforts to make peace between Arabs and Israelis had transpired only after devastating military confrontations demonstrated that the costs of maintaining the diplomatic status-quo were not sustainable. Hence, while American diplomacy helped advance the Egyptian-Israeli peace process, beginning with the disengagement agreement of 1974 and 1975 and culminating in the Camp David Accord of 1978, it was the 1973 Middle East War that opened this road to peace. And it was the First Palestinian Intifadah or uprising (1987-93) that led directly to the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

In the aftermath of the electoral victory of Obama, I had experienced an acute case of foreign policy schizophrenia. The Realpolitik side of my persona remained skeptical about the new president's ability to revive the dormant Israeli-Palestinian peace process. I recalled that in 2000, when Washington had embarked on its last Mideast peace processing, the United States was at the apex of international power in a unipolar world, and the Israelis and the Palestinians were led by strong and more moderate leaderships than today. But even at that time, the Clinton Administration could not significantly advance Israeli-Palestinian. Hence, there was little reason to expect that Obama, leading an overstretched military and an economy in recession, would become an effective peacemaker in 2009.

But applying Samuel Johnson's maxim about a second marriage, that it was "the triumph of hope over experience," hope seemed to prevail in my thinking. It was possible that using use his charismatic and cosmopolitan persona, including his quasi-Muslim roots, Obama would succeed in re-energizing U.S. diplomatic influence in the Middle East and be in position to bring about Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation.

Ten months into the new administration it seems that notwithstanding his commitment to resolving the conflict, Obama is finding it close to impossible to move toward an agreement at a time of weak political leadership on both sides and when there is no sign of the narrowing of the gap between the two national communities over the core existential issues that have separated them, such as the fate of Jerusalem and of the "right of return" of the 1947 Palestinian refugees. In reality, the Obama Administration has failed to produce the first scene in the movie in which the Israelis were supposed to end the buildup of new Jewish settlements and the Saudis were expected to respond with "gestures" to the Israelis.

I'm familiar with the counter-arguments. Obama needs to stand-up to the nationalist Israeli government and its supporters in Washington. But let's face it. That's not going to happen any time soon as Obama continues to confront major domestic (health care; unemployment) and foreign (Afghanistan; Iraq) challenges and is not ready to start a costly battle on a new political front even if the guys in J Street are going to fight on his side.

So we are back in square one -- the status-quo -- where the road to Jerusalem seems to be blocked. But we've been there before. In the aftermath of the Israeli victory in the 1967 Middle East War, Israelis governments were operating under the assumption that, "It's better to have war with us having Sinai than peace without Sinai," as Israel's legendary military figure Moshe Dayan put it. By launching the 1973 War, the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat challenged the status-quo and helped transform Israeli strategic calculations. The Palestinian uprising had also shaken-up the status-quo and demonstrated to the Israelis that the long-term occupation of the Palestinian territories ceased to be a realistic proposition.

Hence, expect the current status-quo in the Middle East to be disturbed -- sooner rather than later. Another Palestinian uprising, a new Israeli-Hizbollah war, a confrontation between Israel and Iran -- or a combination of all the above -- would then create the conditions for the next round of Middle East diplomacy. I do hope that Obama will prove me wrong. But I'm afraid that once again, experience is going to triumph over hope.

Naos Shrine Returned By Metropolitan Museum Of Art To Egypt

2009-10-27T15:20:40Z

CAIRO — New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art will return to Egypt a fragment of an ancient pharoanic shrine it purchased from a collector, Egypt's antiquities department said Monday.

The Supreme Council of Antiquities said that a piece of a red granite shrine, known as a "naos," was purchased from an antiquities collector in New York last October so that it could be returned.

Lisa Haisha: Life Lessons From The City of The Dead

2009-10-20T22:03:28Z

Stretching for miles along the base of the hillsides just beyond the city of Cairo is a group of ancient cemeteries that occupies approximately 15,000 acres, spreading in all directions. What is most remarkable about the site is that it is home to half a million homeless people who live next to the tombstones and call the mausoleums home, sweet home.

A Necropolis Metropolis

I visited the site with two friends. One, whose name is Mahmood, is an archeologist and a tour guide in the cemetery, which is called the City of the Dead.

It really is a city, complete with honking buses spewing black clouds of diesel pollution, music playing in the streets, a weekend flea market, and the occasional food kiosk or video rental shop.

Some City of the Dead residents work menial jobs by commuting into downtown Cairo. Many have stay-at-home businesses such as tea stands, furniture making or carpentry shops, and car repair businesses that are set up right there in the cemetery. Vendors even come into the graveyard slum from neighborhoods of Cairo that are beyond the cemetery, so that they can hawk cheap wares to residents and visitors.

I watched tourists barter for found objects sold as antiques or for miscellaneous trinkets and souvenirs. I caught the odor wafting through the dusty streets from a nearby animal market where I was told that it was possible to buy birds and fish to take home as pets.

Domestic pets are one thing. But I had to ask Mahmood how City of the Dead residents felt about having tombstones in their homes. He said that they view the dead beneath the tombstones as guardians and protectors.

"The dead were here first," he said. "So people believe that these mausoleums they currently occupy are really the homes of the dead and that they -- the living -- are merely temporary residents and fortunate caretakers."

Feeling at Home with Tombstones

"Mama's in the factory, she ain't got no shoes. Daddy's in the alley,
he's looking for food. I'm in the kitchen with the tombstone blues." - Bob Dylan

I observed how a mausoleum might be converted into a studio apartment. Stone markers identifying the remains of the dead might work really well as bookshelves or kitchen counters. With a little imagination and ingenuity a family could transform a macabre setting into a proud home.

One family welcomed me into their home, inviting me to sit on a torn and ragged mat on the dirt floor. Ants were crawling all over the place as my hostess, Nadia, prepared tea. She lived there with her husband Said, their son Abdul, and their son-in-law Kanal.

Their tiny, cramped two-room dwelling had three beds, and outside they kept a goat and several rabbits. Said -- who was seventy-five years old -- told me that the mausoleum we were sitting in was the only home he had ever known. He had lived there his whole lifetime, and it was once the home of his parents who are now deceased. I didn't ask where they were buried, but I imagined that they were not far from where we sat and sipped our tea.

A Paradise Too Beautiful to Imagine

"We connect to everybody here," he said, and I knew that he referred to
not just the living and breathing but also to the dearly departed.

"If you could have just one wish come true, what would it be?" I asked one elderly City of the Dead resident. His eyes sparkled with desire and he gave me an answer that I would not have guessed in a million years, judging from his needy surroundings.

"I would like to visit Mecca."

When I asked him what the afterlife held for him, he said "Paradise is too beautiful for us to imagine."

I wondered whether he would rather live in modern times, or back in the glorious time of the Egyptian Pharaohs. "Now," he said, matter-of-factly.

"We love Cairo," he said, sitting in his graveyard home, "because we connect to everybody here. If we lived in a nicer place with more luxuries, we would have to give up the love of the people here." The secret to life, he told me, is to "take care of your health and be honest with people and make heart connections."

A Vision of Grandeur by 2050

In the summer of 2009 I read an announcement in the news.
The Cairo government plans to transform the City of the Dead
into a gorgeous and rather upscale public park.

As Mahmood had explained to me, the government has largely ignored the City of the Dead community. But in recent years was forced to add some semblance of an infrastructure in order to support the hundreds of thousands of people who live there in what the government perceives as squalor.

I saw signs of upgrades when I walked through the expansive slum. There were a few public water taps and pay phones, and I was told there is at least one tiny post office to serve the city. But sewage lines are rare and many residents use crude latrines. City transport buses come and go on the main arteries that traverse the cemetery, and some of the busier streets have even been paved and have police patrols to try to make them safer.

But the city planners have a grand vision for the City of the Dead. Graves will be moved to new cemeteries, they say, that the city proposes to create just outside of Cairo. Officials have announced that the change will add "17,000 acres of graveyard capacity."

The people living in the City of the Dead, the government promises, will be moved into new public housing projects. The Ministry of Housing touts the plan - which is scheduled for completion in 2050 - by saying that it will revitalize Cairo, a city that was once called "Paris on the Nile".

I'm skeptical of such government intervention. But I try to remain hopeful, remembering Mahmood who said that when we think negative thoughts "death knocks on the door" -- serving its eviction notice.

Germany's Nefertiti Statue Must Be Returned, Demands Egypt

2009-10-19T08:44:14Z

BERLIN Culture lovers, visitors and the city authorities of Berlin were reveling in the reopening Friday of the Neues Museum in the heart of the German capital by Chancellor Angela Merkel, the culmination of decades of efforts to renovate a special site destroyed during World War II.

Hamas Rejects Egyptian Plan To Reconcile With Fatah

2009-10-15T08:39:09Z

DAMASCUS, Syria — Syrian-based leaders of the Islamic militant Hamas said Thursday the group will not sign an Egyptian-mediated proposal to reconcile with rival Fatah unless it is amended to say Palestinians have the right to keep fighting Israel.

The joint statement by Hamas and seven other radical, Damascus-based Palestinian factions came in response to a pressing deadline by Egypt to respond to their proposal within days.

Egypt's Christians Tattoo Children As Mark Of Pride And Protection

2009-10-14T12:56:47Z

An Irishman, who asked to go only by Allen, arrived in Cairo four years ago to visit family here. He brought his tattoo equipment for fun but quickly found that there was a thirst among certain Egyptians to indulge in the art form that had been so absent from their culture.

Fatah Agrees To Egyptian Deal With Hamas

2009-10-13T09:39:39Z

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Fatah has agreed to an Egyptian proposal for the two main Palestinian factions to separately sign a long-delayed unity deal by October 15, a senior party official said on Tuesday.