Thursday, March 10, 2011
James Carroll: Where Did All the Fatwas Go?
[Note to TomDispatch Readers: I have a special offer to make today. Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World, a new book by Boston Globe columnist and bestselling author of Constantine’s Sword James Carroll, will officially be published tomorrow. Let me extend the TomDispatch guarantee: it’s remarkable and, this early in 2011, already my frontrunner for year’s best book. For a $100 donation, which will give TomDispatch a real boost of support, you can get a personalized, signed copy of Carroll’s book. He will be in New York City to sign books on the 21st of this month, after which this offer expires. (All contributions to TomDispatch.com are tax-deductible to the extent provided by law.) For more information, or simply to make your donation and get your copy, click here.]
A week or so ago, a friend of mine noticed a poster taped to a wall inside the rotunda of the Wisconsin State Capitol building, where American demonstrators were camped out. It showed a lone demonstrator walking toward a line of helmeted Egyptian police, holding high a protest sign. Under the photo, a caption said simply: “Walk like an Egyptian.”
If you want to know something new about our American world, just think about that. No further explanation was needed. Across this country Americans undoubtedly understood just what that meant and what it represented: an unbelievably brave explosion of desire for freedom in the Arab world. If that caption had said, “Walk like a Tunisian (or Bahraini, Algerian, Iranian, Iraqi, Omani, Libyan, etc.),” few would have found that strange either. It’s already as normal here as mom and apple pie. And yet, had you predicted that this was coming as 2010 ended, you would have been laughed out of the American living room by experts, among others, who assured you that Arabs were incapable of such acts, that their religion prevented it, and that “walk like an Egyptian” was nothing more than a 1986 hit by the Bangles about the bizarre way Egyptians of old moved.
Sometimes the tectonic plates of our cultural world shift radically and we hardly know it’s happened. This seems to be such a moment and today one of my favorite columnists, James Carroll of the Boston Globe, considers just that shift. In the disastrous early years of the George W. Bush era, Carroll put the rest of the mainstream media and the punditocracy to shame. As a weekly columnist, he was perhaps the first media figure to notice -- and warn against -- a presidential "slip of the tongue" just after the assaults of 9/11, when President Bush referred to his new Global War on Terror as a "crusade." He was possibly the first mainstream columnist to warn against the consequences of launching a war on Afghanistan in response to those attacks. In September 2003, he was possibly the first to pronounce the Iraq War "lost" in print.
He’s still ahead of the game. As he so strikingly summed up events in the Middle East in his column last week, “The revolutions in the Arab streets, whatever their individual outcomes, have already overturned the dominant assumption of global geopolitics -- that hundreds of millions of impoverished people will uncomplainingly accept their assignment to the antechamber of hell.” Tomorrow, his newest book, Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World, is officially published. It is a stunning reconsideration of much of Western (even American) as well as Middle Eastern history. It offers a new way of looking at the origins and development of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, of the Christopher Columbus story, of the history of printing, and of so much else, including the moment in 1973 when the Middle East nearly went nuclear. There is no way to sum it up, except to indicate that the bestselling author of Constantine’s Sword has done it again. Here’s my advice: buy this book. It will change the way you see our world. (To catch Timothy MacBain’s latest TomCast audio interview in which Carroll discusses just how the Arab revolutions, the last acts of the post-colonial drama, punctured American myths, click here, or download it to your iPod here.) Tom
A week or so ago, a friend of mine noticed a poster taped to a wall inside the rotunda of the Wisconsin State Capitol building, where American demonstrators were camped out. It showed a lone demonstrator walking toward a line of helmeted Egyptian police, holding high a protest sign. Under the photo, a caption said simply: “Walk like an Egyptian.”
If you want to know something new about our American world, just think about that. No further explanation was needed. Across this country Americans undoubtedly understood just what that meant and what it represented: an unbelievably brave explosion of desire for freedom in the Arab world. If that caption had said, “Walk like a Tunisian (or Bahraini, Algerian, Iranian, Iraqi, Omani, Libyan, etc.),” few would have found that strange either. It’s already as normal here as mom and apple pie. And yet, had you predicted that this was coming as 2010 ended, you would have been laughed out of the American living room by experts, among others, who assured you that Arabs were incapable of such acts, that their religion prevented it, and that “walk like an Egyptian” was nothing more than a 1986 hit by the Bangles about the bizarre way Egyptians of old moved.
Sometimes the tectonic plates of our cultural world shift radically and we hardly know it’s happened. This seems to be such a moment and today one of my favorite columnists, James Carroll of the Boston Globe, considers just that shift. In the disastrous early years of the George W. Bush era, Carroll put the rest of the mainstream media and the punditocracy to shame. As a weekly columnist, he was perhaps the first media figure to notice -- and warn against -- a presidential "slip of the tongue" just after the assaults of 9/11, when President Bush referred to his new Global War on Terror as a "crusade." He was possibly the first mainstream columnist to warn against the consequences of launching a war on Afghanistan in response to those attacks. In September 2003, he was possibly the first to pronounce the Iraq War "lost" in print.
He’s still ahead of the game. As he so strikingly summed up events in the Middle East in his column last week, “The revolutions in the Arab streets, whatever their individual outcomes, have already overturned the dominant assumption of global geopolitics -- that hundreds of millions of impoverished people will uncomplainingly accept their assignment to the antechamber of hell.” Tomorrow, his newest book, Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World, is officially published. It is a stunning reconsideration of much of Western (even American) as well as Middle Eastern history. It offers a new way of looking at the origins and development of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, of the Christopher Columbus story, of the history of printing, and of so much else, including the moment in 1973 when the Middle East nearly went nuclear. There is no way to sum it up, except to indicate that the bestselling author of Constantine’s Sword has done it again. Here’s my advice: buy this book. It will change the way you see our world. (To catch Timothy MacBain’s latest TomCast audio interview in which Carroll discusses just how the Arab revolutions, the last acts of the post-colonial drama, punctured American myths, click here, or download it to your iPod here.) Tom
Saudi Arabia : we want change and we want it now: Ahmad Al Omran
We are sick and tired of the status quo; we want change and we want it now. The demands are clear and simple: a constitutional monarchy, the rule of law, justice, equality, freedom, elections, and respect of basic human rights. Is this too much to ask in this age and time?
I have become very pessimistic about the prospects of reform for my country. The huge age gap between the young population and the ruling elite makes it nearly impossible for the ruled and the rulers to communicate and understand each other. We practically speak two different languages, and I don't see how the government can keep up with our aspirations.
We are sick and tired of the status quo; we want change and we want it now. The demands are clear and simple: a constitutional monarchy, the rule of law, justice, equality, freedom, elections, and respect of basic human rights. Is this too much to ask in this age and time?
Everyone now is waiting to see what is going to happen on Friday. In the past few weeks, two Facebook groups have called for protests around the kingdom on 11 March. The two groups have more than 17,000 members, but it is almost impossible to predict how many of these will take to the street. While I think we might see some protests in the Eastern Province, and smaller ones in Riyadh and Jeddah, I remain very sceptical that we will see large-scale street action.
However, the situation will be really interesting to watch and to see how the government reacts. It seems to me that the government is in a lose-lose situation. If they do not stop people from protesting, the people will feel empowered to repeat it and continue protesting, defying the government's ban in a way that makes it difficult for authorities to restore it again. But if the government uses violence to crack down on protesters, this will fuel their anger and push them to protest even more and in larger numbers in the future.
Let us wait and see.
I have become very pessimistic about the prospects of reform for my country. The huge age gap between the young population and the ruling elite makes it nearly impossible for the ruled and the rulers to communicate and understand each other. We practically speak two different languages, and I don't see how the government can keep up with our aspirations.
We are sick and tired of the status quo; we want change and we want it now. The demands are clear and simple: a constitutional monarchy, the rule of law, justice, equality, freedom, elections, and respect of basic human rights. Is this too much to ask in this age and time?
Everyone now is waiting to see what is going to happen on Friday. In the past few weeks, two Facebook groups have called for protests around the kingdom on 11 March. The two groups have more than 17,000 members, but it is almost impossible to predict how many of these will take to the street. While I think we might see some protests in the Eastern Province, and smaller ones in Riyadh and Jeddah, I remain very sceptical that we will see large-scale street action.
However, the situation will be really interesting to watch and to see how the government reacts. It seems to me that the government is in a lose-lose situation. If they do not stop people from protesting, the people will feel empowered to repeat it and continue protesting, defying the government's ban in a way that makes it difficult for authorities to restore it again. But if the government uses violence to crack down on protesters, this will fuel their anger and push them to protest even more and in larger numbers in the future.
Let us wait and see.
Saud al-Faisal, the veteran foreign minister, weighed in: "Reform does not come via protests
Saud al-Faisal, the veteran foreign minister, weighed in: "Reform does not come via protests and [the clerics] have forbidden protests since they violate the Qur'an and the way of the prophet."
Shia minority have defied ban on demonstrations for two days and are optimistic that change can be effected
Ian Black, Middle East editor
Al-Qatif in Saudi Arabia's eastern province has a harsh climate: summer temperatures often reach the mid-40s, though the winter is pleasantly mild. But it is not the weather that is exercising locals and the government in these days of political turbulence across the Middle East.
Residents say all seems calm, and see no sign that security has been reinforced. But there is a mood of expectation about Friday's Saudi "day of rage" and whether the "Arab spring" will spread to the conservative kingdom.
The city lies in the heartland of the country's oil-producing area, home to a restive Shia minority that has long complained of poverty and discrimination.
Tensions mounted last month when the neighbouring island state of Bahrain saw an unprecedented uprising that left seven dead and set nerves jangling in a region already deeply unsettled by the turmoil in Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen.
Demonstrations are rare in Saudi Arabia – a country with no legal political parties or mass movements – and even committed reformists admit they are anxious about taking to the streets. "There is no history of public protests, even in support of the government," said Jaafar al-Shayeb, a city councillor and businessman in al-Qatif. The Facebook organisers of Friday's event are breaking new ground. "No one knows who is behind the protests," said Waleed Abu al-Khair, a human rights activist in Jeddah. Some fear a ploy by the secret police to entrap protesters.
Last week the security forces came out to forestall trouble after Friday prayers. A young Sunni teacher named Muhammad al-Wad'ani, arrested in Riyadh after a video of him calling for change was posted on YouTube, remains in detention.
"Every citizen should co-operate with the authorities to maintain security and stability throughout the kingdom," warned the appointed shura council chairman, Abdullah Al-Asheikh.
Saud al-Faisal, the veteran foreign minister, weighed in: "Reform does not come via protests and [the clerics] have forbidden protests since they violate the Qur'an and the way of the prophet."
Saudi Arabia shares many problems common to the Arab world – a youth "bulge," lack of opportunities for graduates, precious few political freedoms, plus an absence of transparency and accountability by an absolute monarchy that includes 8,000 princes. Restrictions on women – who are not allowed to drive and cannot travel abroad without the permission of a male relative – are another big negative. The notorious religious police are another. Torture is frequently used on detainees. Unemployment between the ages of 14 and 24 is 40% – in a country where almost 70% of the population is under 20.
Demands for change are relatively modest. Of three reform petitions circulating on the internet, one has gathered signatures from 1,500 prominent liberal and Islamist Saudis calling for a constitutional monarchy, an elected parliament and an accountable executive. Entitled Towards a Country with Rights and Institutions, it is couched in polite and formal language and starts by wishing the king good health. It is a far cry from the slogans heard in Tunis, Cairo and Tripoli. But online access was still quickly blocked.
A "youth petition" signed by 60 journalists and cyber-activists calls for political liberalisation and lowering the average age of ministers to 40 and of shura council members to 45. "There is a new generation of people who are more liberal," says a senior Saudi journalist, "but they still respect the old red lines."
Many Saudi liberals insist the king is a well-intentioned reformist, if one limited by his age and experience. Khaled al-Maeena, editor of the Jeddah-based Arab News, is one of them. "People are adamant that the day of rage will not be about throwing stones and shouting slogans, so there shouldn't be an over-reaction."
With national income three times the level of Egypt's and control of 20% of the world's oil reserves, the government's instinct is to throw money at problems. Last month the king returned from a long convalescence in the US and Morocco and announced a $37bn package to boost salaries, tackle unemployment and provide affordable housing. Abdullah's generosity was hailed in the media but a princess who castigated people for their ingratitude at royal largesse angered many.
"The king has given a financial answer," said Abu Khair, "but not a political one. People need more than money."
the shura council. But will such measures be enough to satisfy the critics?
"There is anger everywhere," said al-Maeena. "We have had years of lethargy and inaction. We need to change the mindset. The king is loved. His personality is something people look up to and the House of Saud is a pillar of this kingdom. But they have to realise that times have changed and people have changed."
Shia minority have defied ban on demonstrations for two days and are optimistic that change can be effected
Ian Black, Middle East editor
Al-Qatif in Saudi Arabia's eastern province has a harsh climate: summer temperatures often reach the mid-40s, though the winter is pleasantly mild. But it is not the weather that is exercising locals and the government in these days of political turbulence across the Middle East.
Residents say all seems calm, and see no sign that security has been reinforced. But there is a mood of expectation about Friday's Saudi "day of rage" and whether the "Arab spring" will spread to the conservative kingdom.
The city lies in the heartland of the country's oil-producing area, home to a restive Shia minority that has long complained of poverty and discrimination.
Tensions mounted last month when the neighbouring island state of Bahrain saw an unprecedented uprising that left seven dead and set nerves jangling in a region already deeply unsettled by the turmoil in Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen.
Demonstrations are rare in Saudi Arabia – a country with no legal political parties or mass movements – and even committed reformists admit they are anxious about taking to the streets. "There is no history of public protests, even in support of the government," said Jaafar al-Shayeb, a city councillor and businessman in al-Qatif. The Facebook organisers of Friday's event are breaking new ground. "No one knows who is behind the protests," said Waleed Abu al-Khair, a human rights activist in Jeddah. Some fear a ploy by the secret police to entrap protesters.
Last week the security forces came out to forestall trouble after Friday prayers. A young Sunni teacher named Muhammad al-Wad'ani, arrested in Riyadh after a video of him calling for change was posted on YouTube, remains in detention.
"Every citizen should co-operate with the authorities to maintain security and stability throughout the kingdom," warned the appointed shura council chairman, Abdullah Al-Asheikh.
Saud al-Faisal, the veteran foreign minister, weighed in: "Reform does not come via protests and [the clerics] have forbidden protests since they violate the Qur'an and the way of the prophet."
Saudi Arabia shares many problems common to the Arab world – a youth "bulge," lack of opportunities for graduates, precious few political freedoms, plus an absence of transparency and accountability by an absolute monarchy that includes 8,000 princes. Restrictions on women – who are not allowed to drive and cannot travel abroad without the permission of a male relative – are another big negative. The notorious religious police are another. Torture is frequently used on detainees. Unemployment between the ages of 14 and 24 is 40% – in a country where almost 70% of the population is under 20.
Demands for change are relatively modest. Of three reform petitions circulating on the internet, one has gathered signatures from 1,500 prominent liberal and Islamist Saudis calling for a constitutional monarchy, an elected parliament and an accountable executive. Entitled Towards a Country with Rights and Institutions, it is couched in polite and formal language and starts by wishing the king good health. It is a far cry from the slogans heard in Tunis, Cairo and Tripoli. But online access was still quickly blocked.
A "youth petition" signed by 60 journalists and cyber-activists calls for political liberalisation and lowering the average age of ministers to 40 and of shura council members to 45. "There is a new generation of people who are more liberal," says a senior Saudi journalist, "but they still respect the old red lines."
Many Saudi liberals insist the king is a well-intentioned reformist, if one limited by his age and experience. Khaled al-Maeena, editor of the Jeddah-based Arab News, is one of them. "People are adamant that the day of rage will not be about throwing stones and shouting slogans, so there shouldn't be an over-reaction."
With national income three times the level of Egypt's and control of 20% of the world's oil reserves, the government's instinct is to throw money at problems. Last month the king returned from a long convalescence in the US and Morocco and announced a $37bn package to boost salaries, tackle unemployment and provide affordable housing. Abdullah's generosity was hailed in the media but a princess who castigated people for their ingratitude at royal largesse angered many.
"The king has given a financial answer," said Abu Khair, "but not a political one. People need more than money."
the shura council. But will such measures be enough to satisfy the critics?
"There is anger everywhere," said al-Maeena. "We have had years of lethargy and inaction. We need to change the mindset. The king is loved. His personality is something people look up to and the House of Saud is a pillar of this kingdom. But they have to realise that times have changed and people have changed."
Mark Steel: I know, let's sell weapons to a lunatic
The people who defend the befriending of Gaddafi, such as Douglas Alexander, the shadow foreign secretary, insist he promised he wouldn't use weapons such as tear gas "against his own people", which seems a liberal attitude towards someone you've derided as a madman for 30 years. Presumably Blair said to him: "Now I'm trusting you here, so if you DO open fire on thousands of protesters demanding a minimum wage, you'll not just be letting me down, you'll be letting yourself down."
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/mark-steel/mark-steel-i-know-lets-sell-weapons-to-a-lunatic-2236066.html
The Western leaders now condemning Colonel Gaddafi as a madman must be perplexed as to what's gone wrong with him, because up until a month ago they obviously thought he was perfectly sane and well-balanced – otherwise they wouldn't have sold him all those tanks. They must wonder if the stress of being a dictator has got to him, and if he'd had a fortnight off and started yoga all this trouble could have been avoided.
So maybe the best way to intervene is to send him a good shrink. Then they could make a report for the UN that went: "His desire to refer to his fellow Libyans as 'Cockroaches' who must be killed suggests the patient is experiencing the trauma of feeling he's a woman trapped in a Colonel's body. And the need to make speeches while under an umbrella is a classic symptom of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, so maybe we shouldn't send him any tanks for at least three weeks, until he's better."
They should have been prepared for this, because they all said he was mad for 30 years, then suddenly decided he was rational about 10 years ago, by coincidence around the time he announced he'd back the West in the war on terror. To be fair, some of those who embraced him at this time are impressively unrepentant. For example, Peter Mandelson insists when Gaddafi renounced his desire for weapons of mass destruction we had to "bring him into the fold" with deals for oil and arms.
Because when a dictator tells you he no longer wants destructive weapons, what else can you do but welcome his change of heart, by selling him a desertful of destructive weapons? It's like wandering up to someone at Alcoholics Anonymous and saying: "Congratulations on finally renouncing drink. Now to celebrate let's go and get pissed."
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/mark-steel/mark-steel-i-know-lets-sell-weapons-to-a-lunatic-2236066.html
The Western leaders now condemning Colonel Gaddafi as a madman must be perplexed as to what's gone wrong with him, because up until a month ago they obviously thought he was perfectly sane and well-balanced – otherwise they wouldn't have sold him all those tanks. They must wonder if the stress of being a dictator has got to him, and if he'd had a fortnight off and started yoga all this trouble could have been avoided.
So maybe the best way to intervene is to send him a good shrink. Then they could make a report for the UN that went: "His desire to refer to his fellow Libyans as 'Cockroaches' who must be killed suggests the patient is experiencing the trauma of feeling he's a woman trapped in a Colonel's body. And the need to make speeches while under an umbrella is a classic symptom of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, so maybe we shouldn't send him any tanks for at least three weeks, until he's better."
They should have been prepared for this, because they all said he was mad for 30 years, then suddenly decided he was rational about 10 years ago, by coincidence around the time he announced he'd back the West in the war on terror. To be fair, some of those who embraced him at this time are impressively unrepentant. For example, Peter Mandelson insists when Gaddafi renounced his desire for weapons of mass destruction we had to "bring him into the fold" with deals for oil and arms.
Because when a dictator tells you he no longer wants destructive weapons, what else can you do but welcome his change of heart, by selling him a desertful of destructive weapons? It's like wandering up to someone at Alcoholics Anonymous and saying: "Congratulations on finally renouncing drink. Now to celebrate let's go and get pissed."
اختطاف حركة شباب 14 فبراير من قبل الاحتلال الخليفي: حركة الاحرار البحرينية
أنتم صانعو المجد، الزاحفون نحو النصر، الهاتفون بالحرية
قضايا عديدة تجددت في الاسبوعين الماضيين، بعد المجزرة الخليفية التي حصدت ارواح ثلة طاهرة من ا بناء البحرين، وجرحت اكثر من 500 منهم. وهي جديرة بالاهتمام لمنع تشوش الاذهان &# 1608;اختلاط الاوراق وتداخل الاولويات. وفي ما يلي عدد من النقاط الجديرة بالاهتمام من اجل ترشيد الثورة ومنع تمييعها:
اولا: ان الثورة عمل جماهيري يهدف لاسقاط النظام من اساسه بعد ان فشل في نيل ثقة الجماهير، سواء عبر دستور يقره الشعب ام من خلال المزاج العام الذي ساد البلاد خصوصا في السنوا&# 1578; العشر الاخيرة، اي منذ الغاء الدستور الشرعي. ولكي تتواصل جذوة الثورة يجدر بشباب 14 فبراير الذين اشعلوا فتيلها بدمائهم (شهداء ومصابين)، مطلوب منهم المراقبة المستمرة لمس& #1610;رتها، وذلك يقتضي تصعيد فعالياتها وتطويرها واستهداف اسس النظام من جهة، ومنع تحولها الى حالة احتجاج عامة من جهة اخرى. فهي ليست حركة احتجاجية او محصورة بمطلب اصلاح النظ&# 1575;م كما كان الامر عليه قبل 14 فبراير، بل اصبح شعارها المركزي" الشعب يريد اسقاط النظام". وهذا الاسقاط يتطلب استمرار الثورة وروحها ووهجها وعدم السماح بتحويلها الى مظاهر اح 578;جاجية ضد بعض السياسات لكي لا تنحرف البوصلة.
ثانيا: ان الثورة عمل لا يخضع للمنطق العادي عند البشر، بل هو انفجار سياسي ونفسي وعاطفي يحرك القوى الكامنة في المجتمع باتجاهات غير متوقعة وغير معتادة لدى النشطاء والساس ;ة الذين اعتادوا على معارضة الانظمة وفق وتيرة "معتدلة" و "ضمن الاطار العام" وفق مقولات "الشرعية" و "الحفاظ على هيبة الدولة". كما انه يقلب المفاهيم والثوابت، ويوقظ القل&# 1608;ب النائمة، ويزيل عنها ادران الاستكانة والخنوع، ويستبدل اليأس بالأمل، ويحول المستضعف الى عملاق يخشاه الطغاة، وتضع القوى الكبرى له الف حساب. الثورة لا يقوم بها الا ال 84;ين طهرت نفوسهم من حب المناصب وعمقوا ارتباطهم بالله سبحانه، وتوثق ايمانهم بان الله هو المقتدر الجبار، وليس الحاكم الطاغية. هؤلاء يخرجون بصدور عارية لمواجهة الدبابات والمسلحين ونفس كل منهم تناطح السحاب شموخا، وتنافس الجبال رسوخا. اما السياسيون الذين اصبحت المعارضة مهنة لهم، فلديهم اعتباراتهم الخاصة التي تدفعهم للسعي لـ "عقلنة" ا ;لثورة ومطالبها، وتكرار الكلام الذي طالما تردد ان الاوضاع المحلية والاقليمية غير مؤاتية، وان امريكا لا تسمح بالتغيير، وان السعودية مستعدة للتدخل لحماية النظام الق 5;ئم. اما شباب 14 فبراير فمرجعيتهم دائما الآية القرآنية: "الذين قال لهم الناس ان الناس قد جمعوا لكم فاخشوهم، فزادهم ايمان وقالوا حسبنا الله ونعم الوكيل، فانقلبوا بنعمة من 575;لله وفضل لم يمسسهم سوء، واتبعوا رضوان الله، والله ذو الفضل العظيم، انما ذلكم الشيطان يخوف أولياءه، فلا تخافوهم، وخافون ان كنتم مؤمنين".
ثالثا: من الخطأ الكبير ان يسعى اي من القوى السياسية للهيمنة او السيطرة او اختطاف حركة شباب 14 فبراير، لانها تعبر عن وجدان الشعب، وقد تصدرها شباب لا يخشون العدو، ويستسخفو&# 1606; كبرياءه وقضه وقضيضه، وعدده وعدته. بامكان هؤلاء تحقيق النصر المرتجى من قبل هذه الامة منذ عقود. ومن يريد ان يتحاور مع العدو الخليفي لا يستطيع احد ان يمنعه، ولكنه لن يستطي ;ع ان يلزم الثوار بما يتوصل اليه مع العدو الذي سفك دماء شبابنا بدون رحمة. لقد انتهى العهد الخليفي اخلاقيا وسياسيا، وان اي حوار معه سوف يطيل عمره، كما ان استبدال رئيس الو 86;راء، مهندس الحقبة السوداء، بخليفي آخر، أيا كان، لا يمكن اعتباره اصلاحا لدى العقلاء. فالقضية ليست مع الاشخاص بل مع الاحتلال الخليفي البغيض، والنظام التوارثي الاستب&# 1583;ادي الذي لا ينسجم مع روح العصر والاصلاح والتطور. ونهيب بكافة القوى السياسية والشعبية تحاشي اضعاف دور شباب 14 فبراير الذين صنعوا المجد والنصر، لان ذلك ليس من مصلحة احد.
رابعا: نظرا لطبيعة عمل شباب الدوار الثوري، فقد رفعوا شعار "اسقاط النظام" والتزموا به وسوف يصرون عليه، ولن تستطيع قوة في الارض ان تثنيهم عن موقفهم. فقد اصبح هذا من ثوابت ; ثورة 14 فبراير، وتعاهد الشباب على تحقيقه، واعربوا عن استعدادهم للتضحية على طريق ذلك. يحدوهم في هذا الهدف تجربتهم الطويلة مع العدو الخليفي الذي ما فتيء، حتى هذه اللحظةš 8; يتآمر ضد البحرين واهلها، سواء بنهب اراضيها ام بتمزيق صفها الوطني بترويج الطرح الطائفي المقيت الذي يرفضه الشيعة والسنة معا. هذا العدو يسعى لتجنيد البلطجية لدعم احتل& #1575;له والمساس بوحدة الشعب، في مقابل اصرار الاحرار والشرفاء من كافة الطائفتين على رفض هذا النظام واستبداله بنظام وطني يختاره اهل البحرين على قدم المساواة وفق مبدا "لكل ; مواطن صوت". آل خليفة فشلوا حتى هذه اللحظة في تقديم اية خطوة تثبت جدوى الحوار معهم او الاعتراف بوجودهم. شباب الدوار لم ينتظروا هذه المبادرات نظرا لبصيرتهم الثاقبة ومبد ئيتهم في صياغة مطلب عصري يؤكد تحضرهم وثقتهم بالنفس وقدرتهم على تجاوز المعوقات سواء المتمثل بالارهاب السلطوي ام الإرجاف الذي يمارسه البعض الذي لم يستوعب بعد قدرة الث 608;ار على تحقيق ما عجز عنه بأساليبه المتداعية.
خامسا: ان أمل المؤمنين بالله كبير بدون حدود، خصوصا بعد ان فقد العدو الخليفي ليس شرعية وجوده كنظام فحسب، بل قدرته على استعادة السيطرة على الموقف السياسي والاخلاقي في إ 9;ر عدوانه الغاشم على اهل البحرين النائمين في الدوار. هذا الامل يحدوهم للاستمرار في ثورتهم حتى يتحقق النصر المؤزر للشعب، وترتفع رايات النصر خفاقة في سماء أوال، ويتحقق ل ;لمظلومين، خصوصا ضحايا القتل والتعذيب والاصابة والحرمان، محاكمة جلاديهم الذين ارتكبوا جرائم حرب واخرى ضد الانسانية. نهيب باخوتنا الذين صنعوا المعجزات بثورتهم الثب ;ات على خط المواجهة مع العدو، فما عليهم الا ان يتشبثوا بمواقعهم ويرفعوا اصواتهم وسوف يمدهم الله سبحانه بالعون الذي يمحق العدو الى الابد: "بلى ان تصبروا وتتقوا ويأتوك 605; من فورهم هذا، يمددكم ربكم بخمسة آلاف من الملائكة مسومين". وكما حقق المصريون والتونسيون انتصارات متواصلة نتيجة ثباتهم، سوف يحقق الثوار في دوار اللؤلؤة انتصارا غير مس ;بوق بعون الله تعالى. سيمضي هؤلاء صامدين، تحميهم الملائكة، ويدعو لهم المؤمنون وتخفق لهم قلوب الامهات الثاكلات، وتصفق لهم شعوب العالم، ويتضامن معه الاحرار في كل مكان
Maroc: le rendez-vous des manifestants prévu le 20 mars : FR
Quelques centaines de manifestants, des jeunes en majorité, ont participé, hier, à un rassemblement devant le Parlement marocain à Rabat pour réclamer «un Etat de droit» et des réformes politiques et sociales «radicales» dans le pays. Les manifestants répondaient à un appel lancé via Facebook, soutenu par des militants de défense des droits de l’homme.
Ils se sont rassemblés dans le centre de la capitale marocaine avant de se diriger vers le Parlement où ils se sont figés pendant quelques minutes, faisant le V de la victoire. A Casablanca, plusieurs centaines de personnes, se sont réunies sans incident sur la place Mohammed-V, dans le centre-ville, portant des pancartes avec les mots «dignité», «justice sociale», «non au cumul du pouvoir et de la fortune». Dans la foule se trouvaient de nombreux membres de l’important mouvement islamiste Justice et Bienfaisance, une organisation non reconnue mais tolérée, qui a récemment appelé à un «changement démocratique urgent» au Maroc.
Un autre rassemblement d’une centaine de manifestants a eu lieu à Tanger (nord). Les forces de l’ordre sont intervenues pour disperser un groupe de jeunes venus perturber la manifestation, selon les autorités locales. A Taounate (nord), un rassemblement organisé par la coordination locale de soutien au mouvement Jeunes du 20 Février a été empêché par la police. Les participants entendaient réaffirmer leur pleine adhésion aux revendications exprimées par les jeunes qui exigent des réformes constitutionnelles de fond, notamment l’adoption d’une nouvelle Constitution, la dissolution du Parlement et la démission du gouvernement.
Les promesses du roi n’ont pas calmé la rue
Les manifestants exprimaient également des revendications à caractère socioéconomique, une justice indépendante, la fin de la corruption, du travail pour les Marocains et l’augmentation du salaire minimum garanti. Des jeunes femmes ont également pris part à ces manifestations, dénonçant notamment le mariage des mineures, la polygamie et la ségrégation en matière de salaires.
Le mouvement du 20 Février a appelé à une nouvelle journée nationale de manifestations le 20 mars pour réclamer «plus de démocratie» et un changement de Constitution qui limite les pouvoirs du roi. Le message vise en premier lieu le Makhzen, le puissant appareil d’Etat, et réclame une limitation des pouvoirs très étendus du roi, mais sans remettre en cause la légitimité de la monarchie qui reste très populaire au Maroc. Les revendications multiformes font écho aux inégalités toujours profondes au Maroc, en dépit des réformes promises par le roi Mohammed VI, après son accession au trône en 1999.
Des hommes d’affaires, pour certains proches de la monarchie, des intellectuels et des défenseurs des droits de l’homme soutiennent le mouvement, de même qu’un important parti de la coalition gouvernementale, l’Union socialiste des forces populaires.
Ils se sont rassemblés dans le centre de la capitale marocaine avant de se diriger vers le Parlement où ils se sont figés pendant quelques minutes, faisant le V de la victoire. A Casablanca, plusieurs centaines de personnes, se sont réunies sans incident sur la place Mohammed-V, dans le centre-ville, portant des pancartes avec les mots «dignité», «justice sociale», «non au cumul du pouvoir et de la fortune». Dans la foule se trouvaient de nombreux membres de l’important mouvement islamiste Justice et Bienfaisance, une organisation non reconnue mais tolérée, qui a récemment appelé à un «changement démocratique urgent» au Maroc.
Un autre rassemblement d’une centaine de manifestants a eu lieu à Tanger (nord). Les forces de l’ordre sont intervenues pour disperser un groupe de jeunes venus perturber la manifestation, selon les autorités locales. A Taounate (nord), un rassemblement organisé par la coordination locale de soutien au mouvement Jeunes du 20 Février a été empêché par la police. Les participants entendaient réaffirmer leur pleine adhésion aux revendications exprimées par les jeunes qui exigent des réformes constitutionnelles de fond, notamment l’adoption d’une nouvelle Constitution, la dissolution du Parlement et la démission du gouvernement.
Les promesses du roi n’ont pas calmé la rue
Les manifestants exprimaient également des revendications à caractère socioéconomique, une justice indépendante, la fin de la corruption, du travail pour les Marocains et l’augmentation du salaire minimum garanti. Des jeunes femmes ont également pris part à ces manifestations, dénonçant notamment le mariage des mineures, la polygamie et la ségrégation en matière de salaires.
Le mouvement du 20 Février a appelé à une nouvelle journée nationale de manifestations le 20 mars pour réclamer «plus de démocratie» et un changement de Constitution qui limite les pouvoirs du roi. Le message vise en premier lieu le Makhzen, le puissant appareil d’Etat, et réclame une limitation des pouvoirs très étendus du roi, mais sans remettre en cause la légitimité de la monarchie qui reste très populaire au Maroc. Les revendications multiformes font écho aux inégalités toujours profondes au Maroc, en dépit des réformes promises par le roi Mohammed VI, après son accession au trône en 1999.
Des hommes d’affaires, pour certains proches de la monarchie, des intellectuels et des défenseurs des droits de l’homme soutiennent le mouvement, de même qu’un important parti de la coalition gouvernementale, l’Union socialiste des forces populaires.
Lebanon: Reveal Fate of Disappeared Syrians, Lebanon doing Syria's dirty job
Military Intelligence agents detained at least six Syrians, all members of the Jasem family, on February 23 and 24, 2011, after they distributed flyers calling for protests demanding democratic changes in Syria. One of them, Jasem Mer`i Jasem, disappeared in the early hours of February 25 with two of his brothers who had gone to pick him up from a police station in Ba`abda, a suburb east of Beirut. Their family is concerned that the three might have been forcibly transferred to Syria. The Internal Security Forces told journalists that it had opened an investigation, but to date officials have made no information public nor communicated any information to the men's family.
"We fear that Lebanon may be back to doing Syria's dirty job of shutting up its critics," said Nadim Houry, Beirut office director at Human Rights Watch. "Lebanon's judiciary should open an independent inquiry into why the Syrian men were detained in the first place and the murky events surrounding the disappearance of Jasem Mer`i Jasem and his two brothers."
At around 2 a.m. Thakila Jasem received a call from her husband's number. When she answered an unidentified man told her that "they were taking Jasem to Syria" and threatened her with reprisal if she publicly spoke about the case. She said she was unable to tell whether the man had a Lebanese or Syrian accent. When she tried to call the brothers' cell phones, another man answered, saying they had "willingly" gone with Jasem to Syria.
Jasem's family has not received any information about him or his two brothers since the early morning hours of February 25. The gray Toyota has not been found, and Military Intelligence has not returned Jasem's computer to his family.
"Given Lebanon's painful history of people being detained and illegally transferred to Syria, the disappearance of the three Jasem brothers should concern the highest levels of the Lebanese state," Houry said. "Only a credible and transparent investigation will put to rest fears that Lebanon's security services may have acted outside the law."
On March 4 and March 6, newspaper articles reported that Syrian opposition sources had accused Salah al-Hajj, a Lebanese security official tasked with protecting the Syrian embassy, of "kidnapping" Jasem and his two brothers. A March 6 article in al-Hayat, the pan-Arab daily published in London , cited an unnamed Lebanese security source as saying that a policeman from the Ba`abda police station - where Jasem was held on the evening of February 24 - saw three cars driving around the station the night of Jasem's disappearance and identified one of the passengers as al-Hajj. The Syrian embassy issued a statement on March 6 denying any role in the disappearance of Jasem. Human Rights Watch has been unable to verify these allegations.
"Lebanon Military Intelligence needs to explain why it has detained these Syrian nationals," said Houry. "If it is simply for distributing pamphlets calling for a peaceful demonstration, authorities should immediately release them and discipline the officials who ordered their arrest."
"We fear that Lebanon may be back to doing Syria's dirty job of shutting up its critics," said Nadim Houry, Beirut office director at Human Rights Watch. "Lebanon's judiciary should open an independent inquiry into why the Syrian men were detained in the first place and the murky events surrounding the disappearance of Jasem Mer`i Jasem and his two brothers."
At around 2 a.m. Thakila Jasem received a call from her husband's number. When she answered an unidentified man told her that "they were taking Jasem to Syria" and threatened her with reprisal if she publicly spoke about the case. She said she was unable to tell whether the man had a Lebanese or Syrian accent. When she tried to call the brothers' cell phones, another man answered, saying they had "willingly" gone with Jasem to Syria.
Jasem's family has not received any information about him or his two brothers since the early morning hours of February 25. The gray Toyota has not been found, and Military Intelligence has not returned Jasem's computer to his family.
"Given Lebanon's painful history of people being detained and illegally transferred to Syria, the disappearance of the three Jasem brothers should concern the highest levels of the Lebanese state," Houry said. "Only a credible and transparent investigation will put to rest fears that Lebanon's security services may have acted outside the law."
On March 4 and March 6, newspaper articles reported that Syrian opposition sources had accused Salah al-Hajj, a Lebanese security official tasked with protecting the Syrian embassy, of "kidnapping" Jasem and his two brothers. A March 6 article in al-Hayat, the pan-Arab daily published in London , cited an unnamed Lebanese security source as saying that a policeman from the Ba`abda police station - where Jasem was held on the evening of February 24 - saw three cars driving around the station the night of Jasem's disappearance and identified one of the passengers as al-Hajj. The Syrian embassy issued a statement on March 6 denying any role in the disappearance of Jasem. Human Rights Watch has been unable to verify these allegations.
"Lebanon Military Intelligence needs to explain why it has detained these Syrian nationals," said Houry. "If it is simply for distributing pamphlets calling for a peaceful demonstration, authorities should immediately release them and discipline the officials who ordered their arrest."
De l’Irak à l’Arabie saoudite : Alain Gresh
En Irak même, « libéré » il y a huit ans par les troupes américaines, le gouvernement de M. Nouri Al-Maliki est contesté et ne trouve à répondre, « démocratiquement » évidemment, que par la répression et en faisant envahir les sièges de deux partis d’opposition, dont le Parti communiste, par sa police. Le chroniqueur Robert Dreyfuss a pu écrire dans The Nation un article où il dressait un parallèle entre Maliki et Moubarak « Iraq’s Revolt : Is Maliki Mubarak ? » (7 mars). « Durant deux semaines, Maliki a déchaîné la force totale de ses milices privées contre les manifestants, tuant des dizaines de personnes, bloquant les rues avec des barricades pour empêcher les rassemblements pacifiques, etc. »
Au Kurdistan, « libéré », lui, depuis 1991, se confirme l’arbitraire du pouvoir des deux partis qui se le partagent et dont la presse occidentale ne se lasse pas de chanter les louanges depuis vingt ans. Bernard Kouchner inventa même pour eux le droit d’ingérence humanitaire. Mais il semble que les Kurdes eux-mêmes se lassent de ces partis rongés par le népotisme, l’autoritarisme, la corruption. Pour répondre aux manifestations, le Parti démocratique du Kurdistan et l’Union patriotique kurde n’hésitent pas à utiliser les mêmes méthodes que les dictatures, faisant attaquer les manifestants par des gangs armés (« Iraqi Kurdistan : Prevent Attacks on Protesters, Human Rights Watach, 7 mars) ou fermant des stations de radio indépendantes (« CPJ condemns attack on radio station in Iraqi Kurdistan », 8 mars). On trouvera ici images et textes sur ces événements.
La monarchie saoudienne semble aussi nerveuse en cette veille de vendredi 11 mars, alors que des appels à manifester ont circulé sur le Net. Ce jour sera le neuvième anniversaire d’un événement qui a marqué le pays, l’incendie d’une école de filles à La Mecque.
« Tôt dans la matinée du 11 mars (2001), un incendie éclate dans l’école de filles n° 31, à La Mecque. Une quinzaine d’adolescentes, entre 12 et 17 ans, trouvent la mort dans cette tragédie. La direction de l’enseignement des filles publie dans l’après-midi un communiqué, aussitôt relayé par la télévision officielle, faisant assumer aux victimes leur destin : “Les blessées et les morts ont été provoquées par la bousculade des étudiantes et non par le feu.” »
« L’essayiste Raid Qutsi les éclaire dans une tribune intitulée “La tragédie de l’école doit sonner l’alarme”. Huit cents élèves fréquentaient le collège, dont les capacités avaient été prévues pour 250 ; le bâtiment était loué depuis treize ans, alors que légalement cette location ne peut excéder dix ans. D’autre part, l’édifice était vétuste, ne disposait ni de sorties de secours ni d’alarme incendie. Dans les jours suivants, la presse fut submergée de reportages sur l’état de délabrement des bâtiments scolaires, sur l’incompétence de la direction de l’enseignement des filles, sur les programmes inadaptés au monde moderne, sur une pédagogie fondée sur l’apprentissage par cœur. »
Les manifestations dans le monde arabe et, surtout, le lâchage du président Moubarak par les Etats-Unis ont suscité une forte inquiétude à Riyad (lire « Ce que change le réveil arabe », Le Monde diplomatique, en kiosques).
C’est dans ce cadre que se sont multipliés les appels au roi, dont trois ont eu un certain écho. Le premier s’intitule « Demands of Saudi Youth for the Future of the Nation » (5 mars). Il demande la libération de tous les prisonniers de conscience, l’instauration d’une monarchie constitutionnelle, la lutte contre la corruption, la création d’emplois, l’association des jeunes aux institutions, l’ouverture de cinémas et de théâtres, etc.
Une seconde pétition s’intitule « Vers un Etat de droit et d’institutions ». Elle demande des élections parlementaires, une séparation des fonctions du roi et du premier ministre et la libération de tous les prisonniers politiques. Plus de 1 500 personnes l’ont signée, dont certains islamistes qui s’étaient opposés à la promotion des femmes par le roi Abdallah (lire « Saudi Arabia : Free Cleric Who Backs Change », Human Rights Watch, 28 février).
Quant à la troisième pétition, publiée le 26 février sous le titre Déclaration nationale pour la réforme, elle a été signée par 330 personnes incluant de nombreux réformistes libéraux.
On a même vu un prince, le millionnaire Walid Bin Talal, un neveu du roi et l’un des hommes les plus riches du monde, plaider pour la réforme et soutenir son père Talal, le frère d’Abdallah, un des apôtres les plus persistants de la réforme (« A Saudi Prince’s Plea for Reform », par Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, The New York Times, 24 février).
Face à cette montée des mécontentements, le roi a d’abord répondu par un plan social de plusieurs dizaines de milliards de dollars, et l’augmentation du salaire des fonctionnaires de 15%. Le gouvernement a aussi annoncé sa volonté de faire passer le nombre de Saoudiens travaillant de 3,9 millions à 5,04 en deux ans et à augmenter le nombre de fonctionnaires de 75 000.
Toutes ces déclarations décourageront-elles les protestataires ? Le remaniement ministériel que l’on annonce manifestera-t-il une volonté d’ouverture ? Quoi qu’il en soit, la vague qui submerge actuellement le monde arabe ne s’arrêtera pas aux portes de la monarchie saoudienne.
Au Kurdistan, « libéré », lui, depuis 1991, se confirme l’arbitraire du pouvoir des deux partis qui se le partagent et dont la presse occidentale ne se lasse pas de chanter les louanges depuis vingt ans. Bernard Kouchner inventa même pour eux le droit d’ingérence humanitaire. Mais il semble que les Kurdes eux-mêmes se lassent de ces partis rongés par le népotisme, l’autoritarisme, la corruption. Pour répondre aux manifestations, le Parti démocratique du Kurdistan et l’Union patriotique kurde n’hésitent pas à utiliser les mêmes méthodes que les dictatures, faisant attaquer les manifestants par des gangs armés (« Iraqi Kurdistan : Prevent Attacks on Protesters, Human Rights Watach, 7 mars) ou fermant des stations de radio indépendantes (« CPJ condemns attack on radio station in Iraqi Kurdistan », 8 mars). On trouvera ici images et textes sur ces événements.
La monarchie saoudienne semble aussi nerveuse en cette veille de vendredi 11 mars, alors que des appels à manifester ont circulé sur le Net. Ce jour sera le neuvième anniversaire d’un événement qui a marqué le pays, l’incendie d’une école de filles à La Mecque.
« Tôt dans la matinée du 11 mars (2001), un incendie éclate dans l’école de filles n° 31, à La Mecque. Une quinzaine d’adolescentes, entre 12 et 17 ans, trouvent la mort dans cette tragédie. La direction de l’enseignement des filles publie dans l’après-midi un communiqué, aussitôt relayé par la télévision officielle, faisant assumer aux victimes leur destin : “Les blessées et les morts ont été provoquées par la bousculade des étudiantes et non par le feu.” »
« L’essayiste Raid Qutsi les éclaire dans une tribune intitulée “La tragédie de l’école doit sonner l’alarme”. Huit cents élèves fréquentaient le collège, dont les capacités avaient été prévues pour 250 ; le bâtiment était loué depuis treize ans, alors que légalement cette location ne peut excéder dix ans. D’autre part, l’édifice était vétuste, ne disposait ni de sorties de secours ni d’alarme incendie. Dans les jours suivants, la presse fut submergée de reportages sur l’état de délabrement des bâtiments scolaires, sur l’incompétence de la direction de l’enseignement des filles, sur les programmes inadaptés au monde moderne, sur une pédagogie fondée sur l’apprentissage par cœur. »
Les manifestations dans le monde arabe et, surtout, le lâchage du président Moubarak par les Etats-Unis ont suscité une forte inquiétude à Riyad (lire « Ce que change le réveil arabe », Le Monde diplomatique, en kiosques).
C’est dans ce cadre que se sont multipliés les appels au roi, dont trois ont eu un certain écho. Le premier s’intitule « Demands of Saudi Youth for the Future of the Nation » (5 mars). Il demande la libération de tous les prisonniers de conscience, l’instauration d’une monarchie constitutionnelle, la lutte contre la corruption, la création d’emplois, l’association des jeunes aux institutions, l’ouverture de cinémas et de théâtres, etc.
Une seconde pétition s’intitule « Vers un Etat de droit et d’institutions ». Elle demande des élections parlementaires, une séparation des fonctions du roi et du premier ministre et la libération de tous les prisonniers politiques. Plus de 1 500 personnes l’ont signée, dont certains islamistes qui s’étaient opposés à la promotion des femmes par le roi Abdallah (lire « Saudi Arabia : Free Cleric Who Backs Change », Human Rights Watch, 28 février).
Quant à la troisième pétition, publiée le 26 février sous le titre Déclaration nationale pour la réforme, elle a été signée par 330 personnes incluant de nombreux réformistes libéraux.
On a même vu un prince, le millionnaire Walid Bin Talal, un neveu du roi et l’un des hommes les plus riches du monde, plaider pour la réforme et soutenir son père Talal, le frère d’Abdallah, un des apôtres les plus persistants de la réforme (« A Saudi Prince’s Plea for Reform », par Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, The New York Times, 24 février).
Face à cette montée des mécontentements, le roi a d’abord répondu par un plan social de plusieurs dizaines de milliards de dollars, et l’augmentation du salaire des fonctionnaires de 15%. Le gouvernement a aussi annoncé sa volonté de faire passer le nombre de Saoudiens travaillant de 3,9 millions à 5,04 en deux ans et à augmenter le nombre de fonctionnaires de 75 000.
Toutes ces déclarations décourageront-elles les protestataires ? Le remaniement ministériel que l’on annonce manifestera-t-il une volonté d’ouverture ? Quoi qu’il en soit, la vague qui submerge actuellement le monde arabe ne s’arrêtera pas aux portes de la monarchie saoudienne.
Algérie: Bouteflika ne partira pas avant 2014 : l’agence financière américaine
Algérie: Bouteflika ne partira pas avant 2014
Dans un entretien accordé hier, lundi, à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones, le ministre des Affaires étrangères a estimé que parler d’un départ anticipé du président de la République relevait de «la spéculation». Il a réaffirmé que le chef de l’Etat n’a pas l’intention de partir avant 2014, date de la fin de son troisième mandat, tout en soulignant que la question d’une présidence à vie «n’est pas soulevée». M. Medelci a également précisé que la santé du chef de l’Etat est «excellente».
C’est ce qu’a déclaré hier, lundi, le chef de la diplomatie algérienne, Mourad Medelci, dans un entretien accordé à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones. Ainsi, M. Medelci explique que le chef de l’Etat, au pouvoir depuis 1999, n’a pas l’intention de partir avant 2014, date de la fin de son troisième mandat.
A travers cet entretien, le ministre des Affaires étrangères a voulu mettre fin aux spéculations sur une éventuelle démission du chef de l’Etat pour des raisons de santé ou à cause de pressions politiques. Pour M. Medelci, parler d’un départ anticipé du président Bouteflika relevait de la « spéculation ». Dans cet entretien, le chef de la diplomatie algérienne a également tenu à démentir toutes les informations concernant l’état de santé du président de la République. «Permettez-moi de vous rassurer, sa santé est excellente », a précisé Mourad Medelci, à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones.
Si le président de la République ne compte pas quitter le pouvoir avant la fin de son mandat, il n’a nullement l’intention de briguer une présidence à vie, selon le ministre des Affaires étrangères. « Je n’ai pas perçu … dans l’esprit du président de la République qu’il avait envisagé une présidence à vie. Cette question n’est pas soulevée», a-t-il souligné. C’est ce qu’avait affirmé également Mourad Medelci, le 27 février dernier, sur la chaîne française Public Sénat. D’ailleurs, le ministre des Affaires étrangères n’avait pas hésité à qualifier ce scénario de «blague».
A la question du journaliste Jean-Pierre El Kabach, M. Medelci a répondu : «ça, c’est plutôt une blague pour moi en tant qu’Algérien.» Le ministre a rappelé que M. Bouteflika avait deux objectifs à son arrivée au pouvoir en 1999 à savoir, ramener la paix et la réconciliation nationale et remettre l’Algérie sur le chemin de la croissance.
«Ces objectifs sont atteints et le président, quelle que soit la date à laquelle sera terminé son mandat aura fait son parcours. Il nous appartient maintenant d’aller vers la relève, tous les uns et les autres», avait-il dit.
Dans un entretien accordé hier, lundi, à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones, le ministre des Affaires étrangères a estimé que parler d’un départ anticipé du président de la République relevait de «la spéculation». Il a réaffirmé que le chef de l’Etat n’a pas l’intention de partir avant 2014, date de la fin de son troisième mandat, tout en soulignant que la question d’une présidence à vie «n’est pas soulevée». M. Medelci a également précisé que la santé du chef de l’Etat est «excellente».
C’est ce qu’a déclaré hier, lundi, le chef de la diplomatie algérienne, Mourad Medelci, dans un entretien accordé à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones. Ainsi, M. Medelci explique que le chef de l’Etat, au pouvoir depuis 1999, n’a pas l’intention de partir avant 2014, date de la fin de son troisième mandat.
A travers cet entretien, le ministre des Affaires étrangères a voulu mettre fin aux spéculations sur une éventuelle démission du chef de l’Etat pour des raisons de santé ou à cause de pressions politiques. Pour M. Medelci, parler d’un départ anticipé du président Bouteflika relevait de la « spéculation ». Dans cet entretien, le chef de la diplomatie algérienne a également tenu à démentir toutes les informations concernant l’état de santé du président de la République. «Permettez-moi de vous rassurer, sa santé est excellente », a précisé Mourad Medelci, à l’agence financière américaine Dow Jones.
Si le président de la République ne compte pas quitter le pouvoir avant la fin de son mandat, il n’a nullement l’intention de briguer une présidence à vie, selon le ministre des Affaires étrangères. « Je n’ai pas perçu … dans l’esprit du président de la République qu’il avait envisagé une présidence à vie. Cette question n’est pas soulevée», a-t-il souligné. C’est ce qu’avait affirmé également Mourad Medelci, le 27 février dernier, sur la chaîne française Public Sénat. D’ailleurs, le ministre des Affaires étrangères n’avait pas hésité à qualifier ce scénario de «blague».
A la question du journaliste Jean-Pierre El Kabach, M. Medelci a répondu : «ça, c’est plutôt une blague pour moi en tant qu’Algérien.» Le ministre a rappelé que M. Bouteflika avait deux objectifs à son arrivée au pouvoir en 1999 à savoir, ramener la paix et la réconciliation nationale et remettre l’Algérie sur le chemin de la croissance.
«Ces objectifs sont atteints et le président, quelle que soit la date à laquelle sera terminé son mandat aura fait son parcours. Il nous appartient maintenant d’aller vers la relève, tous les uns et les autres», avait-il dit.
Syrie : obsèques discrètes du pilote abattu en Libye : MediArabe
Selon le site de l’opposition syrienne « Free-syria.com », le colonel de l’armée de l’air Ahmed Gharib a été inhumé hier, le 7 mars, dans son village d’Al-Salamiyah (à lest de Hama). Officiellement, Gharib a perdu la vie dans le crash de son avion, sans autres précisions. Le commandant de l’armée de l’air syrienne, le général Issam Hallak, a présenté ses condoléances à la famille du pilote. Mais, sans doute pour éviter d’être pris à partie, il s’est rendu dans la localité en hélicoptère.
Des témoins locaux affirment que le cadavre du pilote était défiguré, ce qui semble confirmer la thèse démentie par Damas selon laquelle Gharib est mort dans un avion abattu en Libye par les révolutionnaires
Des témoins locaux affirment que le cadavre du pilote était défiguré, ce qui semble confirmer la thèse démentie par Damas selon laquelle Gharib est mort dans un avion abattu en Libye par les révolutionnaires
الخلاص السورية تدعو الجيش أن يستعيد دوره وثقة الشعب
جاء في البيان الذي صدر بمناسبة ذكرى عيد الجيش السوري الذي يصادف الأول من آب/أغسطس " في مثل هذا اليوم منذ ثلاثة وستين عاما احتفل السوريون بتأسيس جيشهم الوطني رمزاً للاستقلال وحاميا للوطن واحتضن السوريون جيشهم الوطني بقلوبهم" وأضاف "في تلك المرحلة لم يكن الانتساب للجيش بحثاً عن الوظيفة أو مصدراً للرزق وإنما شعورا من شباب ذلك الجيل أن الجيش الوطني هو المؤسسة الأهم في الدفاع عن الوطن" إذ "لم تكن مهمة الجيش حماية السلطة الحاكمة وأفرادها وإنما كانت عينه دائما باتجاه حماية الوطن " وفق البيان
وقالت جبهة الخلاص التي يعد من أبرز مؤسسيها النائب السابق للرئيس السوري عبد الحليم خدام في بيانها " أيها العسكريون ضباطا وصف ضباط وجنود هل سألتم أنفسكم في هذه الذكرى المجيدة لماذا هذه الهوة العميقة بين الشعب وبين القوات المسلحة ؟وهل سألتم أنفسكم عن سوء أوضاع القوات المسلحة ومعاناة أفرادها؟هل سألتم أنفسكم لماذا تتحكم فئة صغيرة من الأقرباء والمقربين في الجيش وتطلق يدها في ممارسة الفساد وزرع الشكوك بين العسكريين ليصبح الجيش الذي تستخدمه الأسرة الحاكمة لتخويف الشعب وإرهابه أكثر خوفا ؟هل سألتم أنفسكم أيها الأخوة العسكريون عن خوف الشعب المزروع بسياسة القمع والتي يستخدمها النظام باسمكم ومن خلال بعض مؤسساتكم ؟" حسب تعبيرها
وحثت الجبهة العسكريين السوريين ان يتحملوا مسؤولياتهم "في أن تعيدوا للجيش ثقة الشعب به فعندما يفقد الجيش ثقة الشعب يفقد هويته الوطنية ودوره الوطني" وفق البيان
نص البيان
رسالة من جبهة الخلاص الوطني الى القوات المسلحة بمناسبة عيد الجيش
في مثل هذا اليوم منذ ثلاثة وستين عاما احتفل السوريون بتأسيس جيشهم الوطني رمزاً للاستقلال وحاميا للوطن واحتضن السوريون جيشهم الوطني بقلوبهم ,
في تلك المرحلة لم يكن الانتساب للجيش بحثاً عن الوظيفة أو مصدراً للرزق وإنما شعورا من شباب ذلك الجيل أن الجيش الوطني هو المؤسسة الأهم في الدفاع عن الوطن.
لم تكن مهمة الجيش حماية السلطة الحاكمة وأفرادها وإنما كانت عينه دائما باتجاه حماية الوطن .
أيها العسكريون ضباطا وصف ضباط وجنود هل سألتم أنفسكم في هذه الذكرى المجيدة لماذا هذه الهوة العميقة بين الشعب وبين القوات المسلحة ؟
وهل سألتم أنفسكم عن سوء أوضاع القوات المسلحة ومعاناة أفرادها؟
هل سألتم أنفسكم لماذا تتحكم فئة صغيرة من الأقرباء والمقربين في الجيش وتطلق يدها في ممارسة الفساد وزرع الشكوك بين العسكريين ليصبح الجيش الذي تستخدمه الأسرة الحاكمة لتخويف الشعب وإرهابه أكثر خوفا ؟
هل سألتم أنفسكم أيها الأخوة العسكريون عن خوف الشعب المزروع بسياسة القمع والتي يستخدمها النظام باسمكم ومن خلال بعض مؤسساتكم ؟
أيها الأخوة العسكريون في ذكرى تأسيس الجيش الوطني مسؤوليتكم كبيرة في أن تعيدوا للجيش ثقة الشعب به وعندما يفقد الجيش ثقة الشعب يفقد هويته الوطنية ودوره الوطني.
كلكم تعرفون سوء الأوضاع في البلاد ومعاناة الشعب وحالة الفقر والضعف التي أصابت الجيش وأفراده كما أصابت الشعب كله.
إن جبهة الخلاص الوطني في سوريا وفي هذه المناسبة المجيدة تدعوكم الى الاصطفاف مع الشعب من أجل أن تستعيد سوريا حريتها ويستعيد الشعب السوري دوره ومكانته ويعود للجيش دوره الوطني .
جبهة الخلاص الوطني في سوريا
السفن السورية التي نقلت المواطنين السوريين من ليبيا كانت تحمل اسلحة وذخائر لمعمر القذافي : مصدر سوري من داخل الداخل
تورط القيادة السورية في التآمر مع القذافي ضد الثوار الليبين
سفينة "الأسد" وصلت شواطئ طرابلس مزودة بالسلاح والذخائر لدعم قوات القذافي
وردت للحركة السورية القومية الاجتماعية من مصادر خاصة جداً سوف يتم الكشف عن تفاصيلها لاحقاً ان الباخرة التي اتجهت من سوريا الى ليبيا كانت محملة باسلحة وذخائر وقوات خاصة بناء على طلب القذافي من النظام السوري.
وتفيد المصادر ان الباخرة السورية نقلت صورايخ واجهزة ليلية ومعدات حديثة وعدد من القوات الخاصة التابعة لماهر الاسد وهي قوات مختصة بالمداهمة.
ويؤكد المصدر ان التاخر الذي حصل بنقل المواطنين السوريين من ليبيا الى سوريا كان سببه طلب القذافي بامداده بالسلاح والعتاد الامر الذي اخر تحرك السفينة لحين تجهيزها لنقل ما طلبه القذافي..
يذكر ان الثوار المقاتلين في ليبيا قد اعلنوا عن اسقاط طائرة يقودها طيار سوري وهناك العديد من قوات الحرس الخاص في العاصمة الليبية واللذين يلعبون دور اساسي في حمايه خاصة لمعمر القذافي.
وسوف تقوم الحركة السورية القومية الاجتماعية بنشر المصدر في الوقت المناسب.
موقع الحركة السورية القومية الاجتماعية
Uri Avnery : Israel on the wrong side of history
”...the Arab awakening will, in the medium and long term, change the Israeli-Arab balance of power – psychologically, politically, economically, and in the end also militarily. At the same time, the world balance of power is also changing. New powers are rising, old powers are gradually losing their clout. This will not be a one-time, dramatic occurrence, but a slow and steady process.
“That is how history is moving. Anyone who places himself on the wrong side of it will pay the price.” (Uri Avnery)
Of all the memorable phrases uttered by Barack Obama in the last two years, the one that stuck in my mind more than any other appeared in his historic speech in Cairo in the early days of his term. He warned the nations not to place themselves “on the wrong side of history”.
It seems that the Arab nations took heed of this advice more than he might have anticipated. In the last few weeks they jumped from the wrong to the right side of history. And what a jump it was!
Our government, however, is moving in the opposite direction. It is determined, so it seems, to get as far away from the right side as possible.
Cul-de-sac
We are in a cul-de-sac. And it lies in the nature of culs-de-sac that the deeper in you get, the further you have to go back when the time comes.
This week, a fascinating telephone conversation took place. On the one end was Binyamin Netanyahu, on the other the German chancellor, Angela Merkel.
In time gone by, the world’s leaders did not generally talk to each other directly. Bismarck did not pick up the phone to talk with Napoleon III. He sent seasoned diplomats, who knew how to smooth the edges and deliver an ultimatum in a soft voice.
Netanyahu called to rebuke Angela Merkel for Germany’s vote in favour of the Security Council resolution condemning the settlements – the resolution blocked by the scandalous US veto. I don’t know if our prime minister mentioned the Holocaust, but he certainly expressed his annoyance about Germany daring to vote against the “Jewish state”.
He was shocked by the answer. Instead of a contrite Frau Merkel apologizing abjectly, his ear was filled by a schoolmistress scolding him in no uncertain terms. She told him that he had broken all his promises, that no one of the world’s leaders believes a single word of his any more. She demanded that he make peace with the Palestinians.
If a person like Netanyahu could be rendered “speechless”, it would have happened at that moment. Fortunately for Netanyahu, it just cannot happen to him.
Growing international isolation
“Yes, Israel’s standing in the world is indeed sinking continuously, but not because of a world-wide plot uniting ‘anti-Semites’ and ‘self-hating Jews’. We are sinking, because we are on the wrong side of history.”
This conversation is a symptom of an ongoing process – the slow but steady deterioration in Israel’s international standing.
In Israel, this is called “delegitimatsia”. It is conceived as a sinister world-wide conspiracy, rather on the lines of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Clearly, it has no connection with anything we do – since all our deeds are pure as gold. The obvious conclusion: the enemies of Israel all over the world – including their fifth column in Israel itself – are plotting the destruction of Israel by all kinds of boycotts.
Our leaders know how to obstruct this plot – by enacting laws. Anyone who supplies the enemies of Israel with lists of enterprises located in the settlements will be punished. Anyone who calls for a boycott of Israel or of the settlements – in the eyes of the lawmakers, they are one and the same – will have to pay astronomical fines and indemnities, millions of dollars. And if all this doesn’t help, the enemies of the regime will be sent to prison, as has happened already to the serial peace demonstrator Jonathan Pollak.
But it appears that our leaders do not rely on these measures alone. Therefore, our deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon (remember? The genius who sought to humiliate the Turkish ambassador by sitting him on a low stool?) decided to reach for even more radical remedies: all Israeli ambassadors will now be sent to the Machpela Cave in Hebron for a historic meeting with our forefather Abraham, who, according to Jewish belief, is buried there (archeologists think that it is a Muslim sheikh who lies there in troubled rest).
Seriously, our leaders now look like the boy in the legend who thrust his finger in the dyke to stop the water, though in our case the whole of the dyke is crumbling.
Yes, Israel’s standing in the world is indeed sinking continuously, but not because of a world-wide plot uniting “anti-Semites” and “self-hating Jews”.
We are sinking, because we are on the wrong side of history.
Stuck in the past
Israel has maintained for decades a regime of occupation. It continues to control and humiliate another people. Ideologically and practically, it lives in the mental world of the 19th century, while the rest of the world is starting to live in the 21st. Israeli policy is simply anachronistic.
The 21st century will see the sight of nations coming together. It will see the beginning of a world order, and I have no doubt that this idea will be realized.
This is not a vision of starry-eyed idealists. It is an essential necessity for the human race and all its peoples and nations. The world is faced with problems that no single state or group of states can solve by itself. Global warming, which is threatening the very existence of the human species, is by its very nature a world problem. The recent economic crisis has shown that the collapse of one country’s economy can spread like wildfire to the entire world. The internet has established a world-wide community, in which ideas spread easily from country to country, as we can see now in the Arab world.
Concepts like democracy, liberty, justice and human rights are not only moral values – in today’s world they have become essential needs, a basis for a new world order.
All these processes are advancing at a maddeningly slow, almost geological pace. But the direction is unmistakable and cannot be reversed. Whatever Barack Obama’s deeds – or lack of them – his intuition about the direction can be trusted.
The Arab nations have suddenly awoken from a centuries-long slumber, and are now fighting to catch up with the other nations. The anachronistic tyrannies that kept them down, wasted their capabilities and imposed on them patterns of bygone ages, are no more.
It is difficult to know where these uprisings, which are engulfing the region from Morocco to Oman and from Syria to Yemen, will go. It is hard to prophesy, especially the future.
The year 2011 may be for the Arab world what 1848 was for Europe. Then, when the French people stood up, the waves of revolution spread over much of the face of the continent. It seems that I am not the only one who is now reminded of this example. Much can be learned from it, and not all of it positive. In France, the uprising swept away a corrupt regime, but paved the way for the rise of Napoleon III, the first of Europe’s modern dictators. In Germany, then fragmented into dozens of kingdoms and principalities, the rulers were frightened and so promised democratic reforms. But while the debates of the lawyers and politicians in Frankfurt about the future constitution went on and on, the kings gathered their armies, crushed the democrats and started another era of oppression. (The failure of the Frankfurt assembly found its expression in the immortal German verse: “Dreimal hundert Professoren / Vaterland, du bist verloren!” – Three times a hundred professors / Motherland you are lost.)
The revolutions of 1848 left behind a legacy of disappointment and despair. But they were not in vain. The noble ideas born in those heady months did not die, future generations strove to realize them in all the countries of the continent. The current flag of Germany was born in those days.
The Arab revolutions, too, may end in failure and disappointment. They may give birth to new dictatorships. Here and there anachronistic religious regimes may spring up. Each Arab country is different from the others, and in each the developments will be subject to local conditions. But what happened yesterday in Tunisia and Egypt, what is happening today in Libya and Yemen, what happens tomorrow in Saudi Arabia and Syria will shape the face of the Arab nations for a long time to come. They will play an entirely new role on the world stage.
Netanyahu’s bogus “peace plan”
“If the Palestinians accept such a plan, they need (in the words of the US secretary of defense in another context) “to have their heads examined’.”
There he will unfold his “peace plan”, whose details have also been leaked. A wonderful plan, with only one minor defect: it has nothing to do with peace.
It proposes setting up a Palestinian state with “provisional borders”. (With us, nothing is more permanent than the “provisional”). It will consist of about half the West Bank. (The other half, including East Jerusalem, will presumably be covered with settlements.) There will be a timetable for the discussion of the core issues – borders, Jerusalem, refugees, etc. (In Oslo, a timetable of five years was fixed. It expired in 1999, by which time negotiation had not even started.) Negotiations will not start at all until the Palestinians recognize Israel as the “state of the Jewish people” and accept its “security requirements”. (Meaning: never.)
If the Palestinians accept such a plan, they need (in the words of the US secretary of defense in another context) “to have their heads examined”. But of course Netanyahu is not addressing the Palestinians at all. His plan is a primitive attempt at marketing. (After all, in the past he was a marketing agent for furniture). The aim is to stop the international campaign of “delegitimatsia”.
Ehud Barak, too, had something to say this week. In a long TV interview, almost entirely consisting of political gibberish, he made one important remark: the Arab uprisings provide Israel with new opportunities. What opportunities? You guessed it: to get increased quantities of American arms. Arms and America über alles.
That is how history is moving. Anyone who places himself on the wrong side of it will pay the price.
“That is how history is moving. Anyone who places himself on the wrong side of it will pay the price.” (Uri Avnery)
Of all the memorable phrases uttered by Barack Obama in the last two years, the one that stuck in my mind more than any other appeared in his historic speech in Cairo in the early days of his term. He warned the nations not to place themselves “on the wrong side of history”.
It seems that the Arab nations took heed of this advice more than he might have anticipated. In the last few weeks they jumped from the wrong to the right side of history. And what a jump it was!
Our government, however, is moving in the opposite direction. It is determined, so it seems, to get as far away from the right side as possible.
Cul-de-sac
We are in a cul-de-sac. And it lies in the nature of culs-de-sac that the deeper in you get, the further you have to go back when the time comes.
This week, a fascinating telephone conversation took place. On the one end was Binyamin Netanyahu, on the other the German chancellor, Angela Merkel.
In time gone by, the world’s leaders did not generally talk to each other directly. Bismarck did not pick up the phone to talk with Napoleon III. He sent seasoned diplomats, who knew how to smooth the edges and deliver an ultimatum in a soft voice.
Netanyahu called to rebuke Angela Merkel for Germany’s vote in favour of the Security Council resolution condemning the settlements – the resolution blocked by the scandalous US veto. I don’t know if our prime minister mentioned the Holocaust, but he certainly expressed his annoyance about Germany daring to vote against the “Jewish state”.
He was shocked by the answer. Instead of a contrite Frau Merkel apologizing abjectly, his ear was filled by a schoolmistress scolding him in no uncertain terms. She told him that he had broken all his promises, that no one of the world’s leaders believes a single word of his any more. She demanded that he make peace with the Palestinians.
If a person like Netanyahu could be rendered “speechless”, it would have happened at that moment. Fortunately for Netanyahu, it just cannot happen to him.
Growing international isolation
“Yes, Israel’s standing in the world is indeed sinking continuously, but not because of a world-wide plot uniting ‘anti-Semites’ and ‘self-hating Jews’. We are sinking, because we are on the wrong side of history.”
This conversation is a symptom of an ongoing process – the slow but steady deterioration in Israel’s international standing.
In Israel, this is called “delegitimatsia”. It is conceived as a sinister world-wide conspiracy, rather on the lines of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Clearly, it has no connection with anything we do – since all our deeds are pure as gold. The obvious conclusion: the enemies of Israel all over the world – including their fifth column in Israel itself – are plotting the destruction of Israel by all kinds of boycotts.
Our leaders know how to obstruct this plot – by enacting laws. Anyone who supplies the enemies of Israel with lists of enterprises located in the settlements will be punished. Anyone who calls for a boycott of Israel or of the settlements – in the eyes of the lawmakers, they are one and the same – will have to pay astronomical fines and indemnities, millions of dollars. And if all this doesn’t help, the enemies of the regime will be sent to prison, as has happened already to the serial peace demonstrator Jonathan Pollak.
But it appears that our leaders do not rely on these measures alone. Therefore, our deputy foreign minister, Danny Ayalon (remember? The genius who sought to humiliate the Turkish ambassador by sitting him on a low stool?) decided to reach for even more radical remedies: all Israeli ambassadors will now be sent to the Machpela Cave in Hebron for a historic meeting with our forefather Abraham, who, according to Jewish belief, is buried there (archeologists think that it is a Muslim sheikh who lies there in troubled rest).
Seriously, our leaders now look like the boy in the legend who thrust his finger in the dyke to stop the water, though in our case the whole of the dyke is crumbling.
Yes, Israel’s standing in the world is indeed sinking continuously, but not because of a world-wide plot uniting “anti-Semites” and “self-hating Jews”.
We are sinking, because we are on the wrong side of history.
Stuck in the past
Israel has maintained for decades a regime of occupation. It continues to control and humiliate another people. Ideologically and practically, it lives in the mental world of the 19th century, while the rest of the world is starting to live in the 21st. Israeli policy is simply anachronistic.
The 21st century will see the sight of nations coming together. It will see the beginning of a world order, and I have no doubt that this idea will be realized.
This is not a vision of starry-eyed idealists. It is an essential necessity for the human race and all its peoples and nations. The world is faced with problems that no single state or group of states can solve by itself. Global warming, which is threatening the very existence of the human species, is by its very nature a world problem. The recent economic crisis has shown that the collapse of one country’s economy can spread like wildfire to the entire world. The internet has established a world-wide community, in which ideas spread easily from country to country, as we can see now in the Arab world.
Concepts like democracy, liberty, justice and human rights are not only moral values – in today’s world they have become essential needs, a basis for a new world order.
All these processes are advancing at a maddeningly slow, almost geological pace. But the direction is unmistakable and cannot be reversed. Whatever Barack Obama’s deeds – or lack of them – his intuition about the direction can be trusted.
The Arab nations have suddenly awoken from a centuries-long slumber, and are now fighting to catch up with the other nations. The anachronistic tyrannies that kept them down, wasted their capabilities and imposed on them patterns of bygone ages, are no more.
It is difficult to know where these uprisings, which are engulfing the region from Morocco to Oman and from Syria to Yemen, will go. It is hard to prophesy, especially the future.
The year 2011 may be for the Arab world what 1848 was for Europe. Then, when the French people stood up, the waves of revolution spread over much of the face of the continent. It seems that I am not the only one who is now reminded of this example. Much can be learned from it, and not all of it positive. In France, the uprising swept away a corrupt regime, but paved the way for the rise of Napoleon III, the first of Europe’s modern dictators. In Germany, then fragmented into dozens of kingdoms and principalities, the rulers were frightened and so promised democratic reforms. But while the debates of the lawyers and politicians in Frankfurt about the future constitution went on and on, the kings gathered their armies, crushed the democrats and started another era of oppression. (The failure of the Frankfurt assembly found its expression in the immortal German verse: “Dreimal hundert Professoren / Vaterland, du bist verloren!” – Three times a hundred professors / Motherland you are lost.)
The revolutions of 1848 left behind a legacy of disappointment and despair. But they were not in vain. The noble ideas born in those heady months did not die, future generations strove to realize them in all the countries of the continent. The current flag of Germany was born in those days.
The Arab revolutions, too, may end in failure and disappointment. They may give birth to new dictatorships. Here and there anachronistic religious regimes may spring up. Each Arab country is different from the others, and in each the developments will be subject to local conditions. But what happened yesterday in Tunisia and Egypt, what is happening today in Libya and Yemen, what happens tomorrow in Saudi Arabia and Syria will shape the face of the Arab nations for a long time to come. They will play an entirely new role on the world stage.
Netanyahu’s bogus “peace plan”
“If the Palestinians accept such a plan, they need (in the words of the US secretary of defense in another context) “to have their heads examined’.”
There he will unfold his “peace plan”, whose details have also been leaked. A wonderful plan, with only one minor defect: it has nothing to do with peace.
It proposes setting up a Palestinian state with “provisional borders”. (With us, nothing is more permanent than the “provisional”). It will consist of about half the West Bank. (The other half, including East Jerusalem, will presumably be covered with settlements.) There will be a timetable for the discussion of the core issues – borders, Jerusalem, refugees, etc. (In Oslo, a timetable of five years was fixed. It expired in 1999, by which time negotiation had not even started.) Negotiations will not start at all until the Palestinians recognize Israel as the “state of the Jewish people” and accept its “security requirements”. (Meaning: never.)
If the Palestinians accept such a plan, they need (in the words of the US secretary of defense in another context) “to have their heads examined”. But of course Netanyahu is not addressing the Palestinians at all. His plan is a primitive attempt at marketing. (After all, in the past he was a marketing agent for furniture). The aim is to stop the international campaign of “delegitimatsia”.
Ehud Barak, too, had something to say this week. In a long TV interview, almost entirely consisting of political gibberish, he made one important remark: the Arab uprisings provide Israel with new opportunities. What opportunities? You guessed it: to get increased quantities of American arms. Arms and America über alles.
That is how history is moving. Anyone who places himself on the wrong side of it will pay the price.
الخرافات الخمس حول الإخوان المسلمين : محمد الراشد
المقال الذي كتبه الباحث لورينزو فيدينو في صحيفة الـ«واشنطن بوست» تحت عنوان «الخرافات الخمس حول الإخوان المسلمين» أثار جدلا في أكثر الأوقات تميزا بالتغيرات السياسية في العالم العربي التي قد تكون إيجابية أو سلبية، ومن المبكر أن نحكم عليها هذه اللحظة.
بالنسبة لي أرى من حق الإخوان المسلمين الوصول إلى الحكم، حتى في دولة محورية مثل مصر، ما دام ذلك في إطار قانوني يعطيهم الفرصة مثل القوى السياسية الأخرى. وهذا ما سعى الكاتب فيدينو إلى قوله أيضا، إلا أن الاختلاف معه هو في توصيف الحركة الإخوانية وتقديمها للمجتمع الغربي على أنها ضحية أسطورة تحاول عبر سرد سلسلة من الخرافات تخويف الغرب من الإخوان ومحاصرتهم سياسيا.
وقد يكون صحيحا أن الأنظمة السياسية سعت لتخويف العالم من الإخوان في فترة الاضطراب السياسي وزمن الإرهاب المنسوب ظلما إلى كل الإسلاميين في العقد الماضي، لكن أيضا الحقيقة أن ليس كل ما قيل في حق الإخوان خرافات.
والإخوان هم الذين سعوا إلى تجميل صورتهم كجماعة تؤمن بالحقوق والحريات، بعد أن رفعت الولايات المتحدة شعار دعم الديمقراطيات في منطقة الشرق الأوسط ووجدوا في ذلك نافذة للوصول إلى الحكم بطريقة ديمقراطية. والحكم طبعا حق لهم مثل غيرهم، خاصة في بلد كان يدعي أن تداول السلطة حق للجميع وفق نظام ديمقراطي إبان حكم مبارك.
الإخوان المسلمون في مصر، وشقيقاتها في الدول العربية الأخرى، حركة سياسية تملك هدفا صريحا وواضحا هو الوصول إلى الحكم، وهذا حقها الشرعي كما أسلفت، إلا أن برنامجها السياسي يهدف إلى التمسك بالحكم وليس الوصول إليه فقط؛ باختراع أدوات إضافية مثل المرجعية الدينية للدولة، وفرض كبار علماء الدين على السلطة التشريعية، وبهاتين الصفتين صار النظام السياسي الموعود يطابق النموذج الإيراني. ديمقراطية مرهونة بقوانين دينية وبرلمان مرجعيته الأخيرة رجال دين. هذه ليست خرافة بل هي نصوص صريحة في برنامج الإخوان المسلمين في مصر.
طبعا عند قراءة برنامج الحزب ستجد فيه العبارات التجميلية مثل الانتخاب الحر، وتداول السلطة، لكن التجربة الإسلامية الإيرانية فيها انتخابات وتداول سلطة محصورة في إطار فريق صغير يحتكر الحكم لنفسه من رجال الدين وأتباعهم.
لقد قبل العالم، والغرب أيضا، الحركة الدينية الإيرانية عندما وصلت إلى سدة الحكم في إيران على اعتبار أن أي حزب ديني بالنسبة للغرب كان أفضل من أي فريق شيوعي أو يساري آنذاك. وها نحن منذ عام 79 والعالم في فوضى من جراء استيلاء الخميني ورفاقه على حكم دولة مهمة مثل إيران. ولا أستبعد أبدا أن الإخوان، مثل الحركة الإسلامية الإيرانية، تؤمن بنفس القيم القائمة على فرض الدين على المجتمع والسياسة، وتعتبر الديمقراطية مطية للوصول إلى الحكم والبقاء فيه بشكل أبدي.
وقد يستنكر أحد لماذا أنا ضد مثل هذه الجماعة الإسلامية، والحقيقة أنني لست ضد وصولها للحكم بل هو حقها، وحضورها ضرورة، لا منة لأحد فيه إن وجد نظام يسمح للجميع بالانتخاب. مشكلتي معها في فكرها الفاشي الذي يقصي الآخرين، وحكم الجميع باستخدام الدين، أي إن الدين هو الوسيلة للوصول إلى السلطة والاستمرار فيها. وبدون ضمانات حقيقية دستورية، وحارس يسهر عليه، مثل الجيش، لن يأمن الإنسان على نفسه من حزب سيتحول إلى مثل إيران؛ بضعة أشخاص يتحكمون بقسوة في حياة الملايين، ويدمرون مقدرات بلدهم تحت شعارات وحروب لأهداف إقامة الخلافة وغيرها. في هذا العصر لم يعد مقبولا لأي تنظيم فاشي سواء كان شعاره قوميا أو دينيا أن يؤتمن على الحكم، ولن يكون خطره داخل حدود بلده بل سيتجاوزه إلى العالم.
alrashed@asharqalawsat.com
Save and send us the most significant newspapers published during the events of the last weeks in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya
"The Arab people has courageously risen to fight against injustice and oppression. Let's preserve these precious events into history for future generations through the front pages of the newspapers that reported about them. Save and send us the most significant newspapers published during the events of the last weeks in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and throughout all the Middle East. We'll keep the front pages for exhibition and we'll post them in this blog for everybody to revisited the events that made history".
الى قرائنا الاعزاء في كل مكان في العالم العربي
الرجاء ارسال الصحف التي اعلنت الثورة العربية، والاعداد التي اعلنت تنحي الدكتاتورات، وذلك في تونس ، مصر، البحرين اليمن، ليبيا،
والاستعداد ايضا لتجميع الصحف التي ستعلن الثورات القادمة ، في السعودية في سوريا
وذلك بهدف عرضها في معرض متنقل في العالم، بداية في قصر الامم المتحدة في جنيف
والف شكر للجميع
في شيراز الإيرانية يتصدون لحملات القمع رغم تعرضهم للضرب : الشامي
مظاهرات وتحركات احتجاجية في إيران مستمرة
• تصدي المواطنين لهجوم القوات القمعية للنظام في يوم المرأة العالمي في طهران ومدن إيرانية أخرى
• اطلاق الغاز المسيل للدموع في شارع جمال زاده بطهران
• أهالي مدينة شيراز الإيرانية يتصدون لحملات القمع رغم تعرضهم للضرب والشتائم
بالرغم من الاجراءات القمعية التي يتخذها النظام الإيراني ضد المتظاهرين في إيران إلا أن التحركات الاحتجاجية تجتاح مختلف المدن الإيرانية.
وتفيد التقارير الواردة انه دخل اضراب 1400 عامل من العمال المتعاقدين للبتروكيماويات في مدينة تبريز (شمال غربي إيران) والذي بدأ يوم السبت الماضي يومه العاشر. العمال وخلال هذه المدة وبفعل مقاومتهم المثابرة أجبروا إدارة ومسؤولي الشركة على التفاوض مع ممثلي العمال ثلاث مرات.
كما وفي يوم الثلاثاء 8 آذار وحوالي الساعة الرابعة والنصف عصراً كان عدد من مناصري أمهات الشهداء والسجناء السياسيين في طهران يتقربون من تقاطع امير آباد (وسط العاصمة طهران) ولكنهم تعرضوا لاقتحام من قبل ميليشيات الباسيج القمعية بالهراوات. وهددت القوات القمعية أحد المناصرين للامهات الثكالى بالضرب والشتائم والاساءة بهم.
ولمناسبة عيد المرأة العالمي (8 آذار) احتشد عدد كبير من المواطنين في شارع آزادي بمدينة كرمنشاه (غربي إيران)، والاجواء مزدحمة وملتهبة في المدينة. القوات الأمنية والمتنكرون بالزي المدني منتشرون بكثافة في الموقع.
إلى ذلك استخدمت القوات القمعية الغاز المسيل للدموع في شارع جمال زاده (وسط العاصمة طهران) لتفريق المواطنين. واعتقلت القوات القمعية عدداً من المواطنين.
هذا وبدأ اضراب في سوق الصاغة في مدينة تبريز (مركز محافظة أذربيجان الشرٍٍقية – شمال غربي إيران) منذ يوم الثلاثاء. فهاجم رجال القمع المحلات وأخذوا معهم سجلات وممتلكات أصحاب المحلات معهم مما أثار غضب أصحاب المحلات.
وتفيد التقارير الواردة ان جمع كبير من المواطنين احتشدوا في شارع ملاصدرا بمدينة شيراز (جنوبي إيران) وهم يرفعون شعار «الموت للدكتاتور» و«مبارك، بن علي، جاء دورك سيد علي». فيما تقمع قوى الأمن بشدة المتظاهرين حيث تعرضوا للضرب والجرح إلا أنهم مازالوا يتصدون لحملات القمع ويزداد عددهم.
زهقتونا ايران...ثورة البحرين لاعلاقة بها بالزعفران او بالجيلو كباب : رسالة من لميس ضيف
كمواطنة بحرينية - أباً عن سالف جد- أقصى علاقتي بإيران أني أحب " الجيلو كباب" سيما بالزعفران؛ عانيت من " نشيده" التبعية لإيران وسأمت منها وضجّتُ بسماع أسم إيران أيضاً !!
المفارقة أن إيران لا تشغلنا ولا تعنينا كما تشغل الكتاب والمحللين المهووسين بها وبكل شاردة وواردة تتعلق بها.. فكل أزمة داخلية سببها إيران، وكل مطالبةً أو امتعاض ورائه إيران، وكل معارض ممول من إيران، وكل ويلات البلاد تحركها إيران، وحتى تكاثر الغربان في البحرين وموت البلابل سببه إيران على الأرجحً !!
إيران.. إيران.. إيران.. ألم تملوا إلقاء كل شيء على شماعة إيران !!
شيعة البحرين عرب أقحاح وكتب التاريخ المتناثرة حول العالم توثق جذورهم وتاريخهم الممتد.. أما البحرينيون من أصول فارسية " سنة أو شيعة" فالبحرين كانت بالنسبة لهم خيار كامل وتام وإلا لما تناسلوا واستقروا فيها وعمروها.. كفاكم تجنياً وتحريفاً للوقائع : ما يحدث في البحرين شأن داخلي وتفجر الاحتقان وليد إحباط وقهر متراكم لاح له أمل الإنعتاق بعد ثورتي تونس ومصر..وإيران ذاتها تشهد تحركات مماثلة نأمل لها النصر، فنحن مع كل ثائر في سبيل حقه في كل بقاع العالم.. وكم من الساذج أن يفكر أحدهم بأننا نقبل بحكمً إيراني قمعي أو نريد حكماً إسلامياً أصلاً.. نحن نطالب بدولة عصرية مدنية، للمواطن فيها حقوق كاملة بغض النظر عن أي اعتبارات أخرى..
كفاكم ترويجاً لأوهام لا يصدقها في العالم غيركم.. كفاكم هوساً بإيران ولا داعي لمعاقبة شيعة البحرين، والتشكيك فيهم وفي كل خطواتهم وهمزاتهم، لمجرد أنهم يشتركون في ذات المذهب مع إيران ولأن بعض علمائهم منهم.. فلا أحد يتهم السنة حول العالم بالعمالة بمصر أو التحرك بإملاءات سعودية لمجرد أن علماءهم من هناك أليس كذلك !!
أما إن كانت الضجة متعلقةٌ بحرص القنوات الإيرانية واللبنانية على تغطية الأحداث في البحرين فماذا عن السي إن إن والبي بي سي والقناة الفرنسية أيضاً ، أهم شركاء في المشروع الإيراني أيضاً !!
كفاكم.. حقاً كفاكم..أن الله لا يحب الظالمين فلا تظلموا الناس في وطنيتهم.. وإن كان الأمر متعلقاً "بالجيلو كباب" فسأقاطعه من اليوم.. فقط أرحمونا ولا تسمعونا كلمة إيران مجدداً يحفظكم الله..!!
Demands of Saudi Youth For the Future of the Nation : Jadaliyya Reports
The Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice’ will be on its toes Friday:
11- We demand an end to the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice’s religious guardianship over society and replacing it with academic programs that breed principles of humanness through schools and universities. This will develop a sense of responsibility and self-censorship among citizens, which the Committee has failed to do for decades and on the contrary, has created an atmosphere of violence, anger, fear, doubting society’s morality, religion, and credibility in dealing with oneself and with others.
[This letter was issued by a number of young Saudi men and women on Saturday night March 5th, 2011. Translation provided by Khuloud.
Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz,
Our precious country is experiencing a relative openness in different fields, and we can feel the tireless efforts of reform in religious, social, and economic areas and organizations, all of which seek to meet the demands of the people. However, we find that the reforms are still far from achieving what we hope for, and what this diverse nation- especially young people- needs and aspires to.
We therefore announce our following demands:
1- We demand an immediate end to the problem of unemployment by providing well-paid job opportunities to young men and women in all specializations. Jobs must also provide health insurance and housing to all citizens, giving them a dignified life in which their basic needs are met, which opens the door to competition, development, and growth.
2- We demand an end to the pervasive problem of poverty which wide sectors of society are suffering from, in our nation that is considered one of the richest oil-exporting countries in the world. Poverty has affected people’s education, health, and quality of life, which in turn disqualify them from good and rewarding employment opportunities.
3- We demand that the government take all necessary financial measures to subsidize and lower the prices of basic necessities, construction materials, rent, and land prices for all citizens. The government must strive to support citizens by providing gas, water, and electricity, and lowering the price of communication and transportation.
4- We demand that the government fight all forms of financial and administrative corruption, and prosecute all those involved in corruption cases, the theft of public money, human rights violations, or abuse of power. We also demand the implementation of the principles of monitoring, transparency, and accountability in dealing with public money, and of fair distribution of wealth among all citizens. We want a monitoring body that oversees and enforces strict rules on the activities of economic and investments organizations so the rights of citizens are guaranteed and protected.
5- We demand the criminalization of all forms of nepotism, bias and regional, tribal, and sectarian discrimination against citizens in the distribution of wealth. Here we demand that regional princes stop all their profit-motivated businesses and their competing with locals for land and wealt. This applies to those in ministerial positions and the managers of government institutions directly responsible for citizens’ daily activities.
6- We demand an end to all forms of discrimination against women and giving women all their political, economic, social, and cultural rights. These include their right to represent themselves without their guardian; choose their educational specialization; work in all administrative, health, educational, and commercial institutions, whether public or private; and partake in public life without any restrictions.
7- We demand the application of the notion of citizenship by putting an end to all forms of racial and sectarian discrimination in the Kingdom; not treating those who belong to the latter categories as second class citizens; providing them with equal employment opportunities; and allowing them to practice their religious rituals.
8- We demand a restructuring of the educational development plan for all grades, in form and content, by improving educational facilities such as transportation, schools, teaching tools; training teachers and preparing them for teaching and educating in all its proper understandings and methodologies; formulating modern educational curricula in all fields of knowledge in a way that prepares students for the labor market; formulating theoretical approaches in a way that affirms values of tolerance and brotherhood; recognizing the right to diversity within society; and dealing with “the other” in an open, discursive and civilized manner.
9- We demand the improvement of the quality of education in all the Kingdom’s universities; Opening more free public universities; increasing the student quota whereby each student can receive a university education without discrimination; ending arbitrary acceptance requirements and ensuring they correspond to requirements of the labor market; implementing principles of academic freedom and impunity when conducting research; allowing the freedom of academic critique that is not censored; and establishing the role of universities in social and volunteer work.
10- We demand the criminalization of all forms of domestic, social, religious, and sectarian violence, and instead, allowing for an atmosphere of tolerance and fighting intellectual stagnancy, and encouraging ijtihad, since Islamic Shari’a is broad enough to deal with the reality in ways that accomplish its noble goals.
11- We demand an end to the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice’s religious guardianship over society and replacing it with academic programs that breed principles of humanness through schools and universities. This will develop a sense of responsibility and self-censorship among citizens, which the Committee has failed to do for decades and on the contrary, has created an atmosphere of violence, anger, fear, doubting society’s morality, religion, and credibility in dealing with oneself and with others.
12- We demand the inclusion of cultural activities in citizens’ lives, which requires an atmosphere of freedom and democracy in running public libraries, literary and sports clubs, and cultural and art societies; and eliminating all restrictions on these societies and relying on their role in reviving Saudi society.
13- We demand activating the role of the arts in developing cultural life for society (acting, directing, music, cinema, etc…) by allowing the establishment of institutes that teach these majors and opening up cinemas and theaters that the public can access freely.
14- We demand the inclusion of young men and women in all institutions involved in economic and cultural development, for purposes of dialogue, the exchange of ideas and planning for the future, so that their voices and aspirations may be heard and incorporated.
We believe that our demands can only be achieved in a democratic atmosphere that informs and organizes the work of the state apparatus and its ministries and institutions, which allows for competition and enables people to be critical and to freely and publicly choose whoever achieves their interests. We believe that this will only be achieved by an immediate implementation of the following procedures:
a) Developing the “system of governance” into a constitutional monarchy that strengthens the rule of law and institutions and guarantees: the separation of the legislative, executive, and judiciary powers; the freedom of opinion and expression; the right to protest and demonstrate; the freedom to form civil society institutions, which includes the freedom to form parties and societies; the right of the people to partake in political decision-making through electing their own male and female representatives in the Shura Council; and commitment to the enforcement of all international human rights covenants and agreements.
b) Releasing all prisoners of conscience, and lifting all travel restrictions on them as well as providing them with moral and financial support, regardless of whether in their peaceful expressions they had represented themselves, a religious sect, or a social or intellectual segment of society.
We are inclined to declare this statement because of our sense of responsibility to our nation and our feeling of national belonging and due to our concerns for the future of the coming generations, and the current widespread problems we are experiencing in light of the failure of government institutions and ministries to adapt to the changes in Saudi society and its needs and aspirations. We assure you that we are ready for reform and equipped for democracy.
[This letter was issued by a number of young Saudi men and women on Saturday night March 5th, 2011. Translation provided by Khuloud. For the original Arabic statement, see here.]
11- We demand an end to the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice’s religious guardianship over society and replacing it with academic programs that breed principles of humanness through schools and universities. This will develop a sense of responsibility and self-censorship among citizens, which the Committee has failed to do for decades and on the contrary, has created an atmosphere of violence, anger, fear, doubting society’s morality, religion, and credibility in dealing with oneself and with others.
[This letter was issued by a number of young Saudi men and women on Saturday night March 5th, 2011. Translation provided by Khuloud.
Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz,
Our precious country is experiencing a relative openness in different fields, and we can feel the tireless efforts of reform in religious, social, and economic areas and organizations, all of which seek to meet the demands of the people. However, we find that the reforms are still far from achieving what we hope for, and what this diverse nation- especially young people- needs and aspires to.
We therefore announce our following demands:
1- We demand an immediate end to the problem of unemployment by providing well-paid job opportunities to young men and women in all specializations. Jobs must also provide health insurance and housing to all citizens, giving them a dignified life in which their basic needs are met, which opens the door to competition, development, and growth.
2- We demand an end to the pervasive problem of poverty which wide sectors of society are suffering from, in our nation that is considered one of the richest oil-exporting countries in the world. Poverty has affected people’s education, health, and quality of life, which in turn disqualify them from good and rewarding employment opportunities.
3- We demand that the government take all necessary financial measures to subsidize and lower the prices of basic necessities, construction materials, rent, and land prices for all citizens. The government must strive to support citizens by providing gas, water, and electricity, and lowering the price of communication and transportation.
4- We demand that the government fight all forms of financial and administrative corruption, and prosecute all those involved in corruption cases, the theft of public money, human rights violations, or abuse of power. We also demand the implementation of the principles of monitoring, transparency, and accountability in dealing with public money, and of fair distribution of wealth among all citizens. We want a monitoring body that oversees and enforces strict rules on the activities of economic and investments organizations so the rights of citizens are guaranteed and protected.
5- We demand the criminalization of all forms of nepotism, bias and regional, tribal, and sectarian discrimination against citizens in the distribution of wealth. Here we demand that regional princes stop all their profit-motivated businesses and their competing with locals for land and wealt. This applies to those in ministerial positions and the managers of government institutions directly responsible for citizens’ daily activities.
6- We demand an end to all forms of discrimination against women and giving women all their political, economic, social, and cultural rights. These include their right to represent themselves without their guardian; choose their educational specialization; work in all administrative, health, educational, and commercial institutions, whether public or private; and partake in public life without any restrictions.
7- We demand the application of the notion of citizenship by putting an end to all forms of racial and sectarian discrimination in the Kingdom; not treating those who belong to the latter categories as second class citizens; providing them with equal employment opportunities; and allowing them to practice their religious rituals.
8- We demand a restructuring of the educational development plan for all grades, in form and content, by improving educational facilities such as transportation, schools, teaching tools; training teachers and preparing them for teaching and educating in all its proper understandings and methodologies; formulating modern educational curricula in all fields of knowledge in a way that prepares students for the labor market; formulating theoretical approaches in a way that affirms values of tolerance and brotherhood; recognizing the right to diversity within society; and dealing with “the other” in an open, discursive and civilized manner.
9- We demand the improvement of the quality of education in all the Kingdom’s universities; Opening more free public universities; increasing the student quota whereby each student can receive a university education without discrimination; ending arbitrary acceptance requirements and ensuring they correspond to requirements of the labor market; implementing principles of academic freedom and impunity when conducting research; allowing the freedom of academic critique that is not censored; and establishing the role of universities in social and volunteer work.
10- We demand the criminalization of all forms of domestic, social, religious, and sectarian violence, and instead, allowing for an atmosphere of tolerance and fighting intellectual stagnancy, and encouraging ijtihad, since Islamic Shari’a is broad enough to deal with the reality in ways that accomplish its noble goals.
11- We demand an end to the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice’s religious guardianship over society and replacing it with academic programs that breed principles of humanness through schools and universities. This will develop a sense of responsibility and self-censorship among citizens, which the Committee has failed to do for decades and on the contrary, has created an atmosphere of violence, anger, fear, doubting society’s morality, religion, and credibility in dealing with oneself and with others.
12- We demand the inclusion of cultural activities in citizens’ lives, which requires an atmosphere of freedom and democracy in running public libraries, literary and sports clubs, and cultural and art societies; and eliminating all restrictions on these societies and relying on their role in reviving Saudi society.
13- We demand activating the role of the arts in developing cultural life for society (acting, directing, music, cinema, etc…) by allowing the establishment of institutes that teach these majors and opening up cinemas and theaters that the public can access freely.
14- We demand the inclusion of young men and women in all institutions involved in economic and cultural development, for purposes of dialogue, the exchange of ideas and planning for the future, so that their voices and aspirations may be heard and incorporated.
We believe that our demands can only be achieved in a democratic atmosphere that informs and organizes the work of the state apparatus and its ministries and institutions, which allows for competition and enables people to be critical and to freely and publicly choose whoever achieves their interests. We believe that this will only be achieved by an immediate implementation of the following procedures:
a) Developing the “system of governance” into a constitutional monarchy that strengthens the rule of law and institutions and guarantees: the separation of the legislative, executive, and judiciary powers; the freedom of opinion and expression; the right to protest and demonstrate; the freedom to form civil society institutions, which includes the freedom to form parties and societies; the right of the people to partake in political decision-making through electing their own male and female representatives in the Shura Council; and commitment to the enforcement of all international human rights covenants and agreements.
b) Releasing all prisoners of conscience, and lifting all travel restrictions on them as well as providing them with moral and financial support, regardless of whether in their peaceful expressions they had represented themselves, a religious sect, or a social or intellectual segment of society.
We are inclined to declare this statement because of our sense of responsibility to our nation and our feeling of national belonging and due to our concerns for the future of the coming generations, and the current widespread problems we are experiencing in light of the failure of government institutions and ministries to adapt to the changes in Saudi society and its needs and aspirations. We assure you that we are ready for reform and equipped for democracy.
[This letter was issued by a number of young Saudi men and women on Saturday night March 5th, 2011. Translation provided by Khuloud. For the original Arabic statement, see here.]
Pepe Escobar : Rage against the House of Saud
So forget about "democracy" or "human rights". Enter the brand new Barack Obama administration "regime alteration" doctrine, where popular aspirations in the Gulf - from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain and Oman - are ditched to the benefit of the "stability" afforded by "key allies", swing producers House of Saud and hosts of the 5th Fleet the al-Khalifa dynasty in Bahrain. Moreover, the House of Saud has told the al-Khalifa that if they do not crush their own Shi'ite-majority revolt, Saudi forces will. And Washington won't bat an eyelid. As it won't bat an eyelid if this Day of Rage turns into a bloodbath.
The key slogan in Tahrir Square in Egypt was "the people want the downfall of the regime". When it comes to Saudi Arabia, it's more like "the House of Saud wants the downfall of its people".
Which brings us to the US$36 billion question; can an ailing monarch (Saudi King Abdullah) bribe his subjects with oil money (including a last-minute, Hosni Mubarak-style 15% pay rise to public servants) and thus escape the furious freedom winds of the great 2011 Arab revolt? The world will be able to watch a preview this Friday, as a Facebook-organized "Day of Rage" hits the globe's largest gas station.
Yet don't expect to see much on al-Jazeera - because the coverage won't be anything like Egypt and Libya; it has already been pre-empted by a princely visit to the emir of Qatar; al-Jazeera is based in Qatar, while the al-Arabyya news channel is a mouthpiece of the House of Saud. Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates all belong to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Obviously none of these GCC kings and emirs want to be swept away by democracy; revolution is only for "others", like Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.
Rage is here to stay
It's official; for the House of Saud, everyone opposing them is an Osama bin Laden, as a hack working for Saudi Prince Salman and his son, who's the editor of the Ash-Sharq al-Awsat paper, made sure this week (in doubt, he also added Iran). The juicy part is that the House of Saud itself gave birth to the original bin Laden - no to mention 15 of the 19 jihadis on 9/11.
This branding of all Saudi opposition as al-Qaeda (Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, Mubarak, Muammar Gaddafi, they all did it) followed the Saudi shura (council) praising a ruling by Medieval Wahhabi clerics in favor of banning any demonstrations - on religious grounds (even though a lot of Saudis on Facebook stressed the country is a signatory to an international treaty recognizing the right of people to demonstrate).
Whatever Wahhabis rule, the House of Saud won't get rid of the underlying rage permeating a mass of unemployed youth wired to the world by Facebook and Twitter (almost half of the total population is under 18). They won't get rid of a demographic boom (from the current 19 million to 30 million in a decade); an overall unemployment rate of 20% compared to 9 million employed foreigners; a monoculture dependent on oil; a paltry education system that can't train people for useful work; and the fact that Saudis are hip to neighborly Bahrain on fire, yearning for democracy.
King Abdullah seems to be certain his billions in handouts will do the trick. He's certainly not listening to Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bin Abdulaziz al-Saud - arguably the West's favorite Arab investor, who told the New York Times, "Arab governments can no longer afford to take their populations for granted, or to assume that they will remain static and subdued". He forgot to add that the House of Saud is absolutely blind to politics - and does not understand the meaning of dignity or democracy.
The demands carried by the Day of Rage are straightforward; a constitutional monarchy; end to corruption; the right to elect at least some of their rulers; freedom for women; and the release of thousands of political prisoners. But like in Bahrain, the demands could easily escalate to "Bring down the House of Saud".
Echoes by Facebook and Twitter from the streets of Riyadh, as well as comments in Saudi newspapers, are uplifting. Apparently Saudis of all ages and professions are following the great 2011 Arab revolt to the minute, wondering if the same could happen "here" - and blaming the House of Saud for unemployment and corruption - in public places; this in a country where any public gathering is strictly forbidden, and punishable by lashings and jail (from several months to two years).
Saudi media have reported on two people who have burned themselves in protest. A nasty crackdown last week in the city of Qatif - including attacks on Shi'ite women - related to a protest for the release of political prisoners, turned even more people against the monarchy. Last week after Friday prayers in Riyadh, protesters gathered in front of al-Rajhi mosque and chanted anti-government and anti-corruption slogans.
Meet the Hunayn revolution
The fact that this is being branded the Hunayn revolution makes the House of Saud freak out even more. Hunayn is a valley near Mecca where Prophet Mohammed battled a confederation of Bedouins in the year 630. The Prophet's forces won. A reference in the Koran, 9: 25-26, reads like a direct message to the House of Saud: "God gave you victory on many battlefields. Recall the day of Hunayn when you fancied your great numbers. So the earth, with all its wide expanse, narrowed before you and you turned tail and fled. Then God made his serenity to descend upon his Messenger and the believers, and sent down troops you did not see - and punished the unbelievers."
It doesn't take a PhD in Koranic studies to see "the unbelievers", in this Hunayn revolution remix - as King Abdullah and his court.
For the Day of Rage, at least 10,000 security goons have been deployed to the key northeastern Shi'ite-majority provinces - where the oil is, and which congregate around 10% of the kingdom's population. There's a risk of serious confrontations. In this case, according to the organizers, women should march as human shields in front of the protesters; this may not work, as it did not dissuade the goons in Qatif.
Moreover, this is a society where for many "reform" is a sin, and with the rulers handing out education to fanatic clerics, constructive criticism and intellectual debate are also widely considered sins.
People for instance still vehemently defend the medieval Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice as essential for good governance. The Saudi Minister of Religion is always a member of the al-Sheikh family (descendants of Ibn Abdul Wahab). Wahhabism is rigid as a rock, allows no interpretation, no "idolatry", veneration of statues, or even works of art. Not to mention no smoking, no shaving of beards, and very few rights for women. And if you don't follow it, even if you're a Muslim, you're the enemy. No wonder this society produced al-Qaeda and jihadis - and no science or ideas.
Make no mistake; for all their glitzy skylines and investor-friendly self-image, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council countries are all ruled by secrecy and fear. No political parties, no trade unions, no defense of workers safety, no defense of immigrant rights, no women's groups, and very few legal organizations to ensure a fair and independent judicial process. If you're branded as an "al-Qaeda" opposition (or an Iranian agent) you can be detained indefinitely without trial - Guantanamo-style. Or you disappear in jail after a grotesque trial. Torture is of course endemic. And foreign workers - especially non-Muslims - live in perpetual fear.
Washington and European capitals are shaken to the core with the prospect of those northern African winds producing a freedom storm in Saudiland - and the Persian Gulf.
So forget about "democracy" or "human rights". Enter the brand new Barack Obama administration "regime alteration" doctrine, where popular aspirations in the Gulf - from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain and Oman - are ditched to the benefit of the "stability" afforded by "key allies", swing producers House of Saud and hosts of the 5th Fleet the al-Khalifa dynasty in Bahrain. Moreover, the House of Saud has told the al-Khalifa that if they do not crush their own Shi'ite-majority revolt, Saudi forces will. And Washington won't bat an eyelid. As it won't bat an eyelid if this Day of Rage turns into a bloodbath.
The key slogan in Tahrir Square in Egypt was "the people want the downfall of the regime". When it comes to Saudi Arabia, it's more like "the House of Saud wants the downfall of its people".
Which brings us to the US$36 billion question; can an ailing monarch (Saudi King Abdullah) bribe his subjects with oil money (including a last-minute, Hosni Mubarak-style 15% pay rise to public servants) and thus escape the furious freedom winds of the great 2011 Arab revolt? The world will be able to watch a preview this Friday, as a Facebook-organized "Day of Rage" hits the globe's largest gas station.
Yet don't expect to see much on al-Jazeera - because the coverage won't be anything like Egypt and Libya; it has already been pre-empted by a princely visit to the emir of Qatar; al-Jazeera is based in Qatar, while the al-Arabyya news channel is a mouthpiece of the House of Saud. Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates all belong to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Obviously none of these GCC kings and emirs want to be swept away by democracy; revolution is only for "others", like Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.
Rage is here to stay
It's official; for the House of Saud, everyone opposing them is an Osama bin Laden, as a hack working for Saudi Prince Salman and his son, who's the editor of the Ash-Sharq al-Awsat paper, made sure this week (in doubt, he also added Iran). The juicy part is that the House of Saud itself gave birth to the original bin Laden - no to mention 15 of the 19 jihadis on 9/11.
This branding of all Saudi opposition as al-Qaeda (Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, Mubarak, Muammar Gaddafi, they all did it) followed the Saudi shura (council) praising a ruling by Medieval Wahhabi clerics in favor of banning any demonstrations - on religious grounds (even though a lot of Saudis on Facebook stressed the country is a signatory to an international treaty recognizing the right of people to demonstrate).
Whatever Wahhabis rule, the House of Saud won't get rid of the underlying rage permeating a mass of unemployed youth wired to the world by Facebook and Twitter (almost half of the total population is under 18). They won't get rid of a demographic boom (from the current 19 million to 30 million in a decade); an overall unemployment rate of 20% compared to 9 million employed foreigners; a monoculture dependent on oil; a paltry education system that can't train people for useful work; and the fact that Saudis are hip to neighborly Bahrain on fire, yearning for democracy.
King Abdullah seems to be certain his billions in handouts will do the trick. He's certainly not listening to Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bin Abdulaziz al-Saud - arguably the West's favorite Arab investor, who told the New York Times, "Arab governments can no longer afford to take their populations for granted, or to assume that they will remain static and subdued". He forgot to add that the House of Saud is absolutely blind to politics - and does not understand the meaning of dignity or democracy.
The demands carried by the Day of Rage are straightforward; a constitutional monarchy; end to corruption; the right to elect at least some of their rulers; freedom for women; and the release of thousands of political prisoners. But like in Bahrain, the demands could easily escalate to "Bring down the House of Saud".
Echoes by Facebook and Twitter from the streets of Riyadh, as well as comments in Saudi newspapers, are uplifting. Apparently Saudis of all ages and professions are following the great 2011 Arab revolt to the minute, wondering if the same could happen "here" - and blaming the House of Saud for unemployment and corruption - in public places; this in a country where any public gathering is strictly forbidden, and punishable by lashings and jail (from several months to two years).
Saudi media have reported on two people who have burned themselves in protest. A nasty crackdown last week in the city of Qatif - including attacks on Shi'ite women - related to a protest for the release of political prisoners, turned even more people against the monarchy. Last week after Friday prayers in Riyadh, protesters gathered in front of al-Rajhi mosque and chanted anti-government and anti-corruption slogans.
Meet the Hunayn revolution
The fact that this is being branded the Hunayn revolution makes the House of Saud freak out even more. Hunayn is a valley near Mecca where Prophet Mohammed battled a confederation of Bedouins in the year 630. The Prophet's forces won. A reference in the Koran, 9: 25-26, reads like a direct message to the House of Saud: "God gave you victory on many battlefields. Recall the day of Hunayn when you fancied your great numbers. So the earth, with all its wide expanse, narrowed before you and you turned tail and fled. Then God made his serenity to descend upon his Messenger and the believers, and sent down troops you did not see - and punished the unbelievers."
It doesn't take a PhD in Koranic studies to see "the unbelievers", in this Hunayn revolution remix - as King Abdullah and his court.
For the Day of Rage, at least 10,000 security goons have been deployed to the key northeastern Shi'ite-majority provinces - where the oil is, and which congregate around 10% of the kingdom's population. There's a risk of serious confrontations. In this case, according to the organizers, women should march as human shields in front of the protesters; this may not work, as it did not dissuade the goons in Qatif.
Moreover, this is a society where for many "reform" is a sin, and with the rulers handing out education to fanatic clerics, constructive criticism and intellectual debate are also widely considered sins.
People for instance still vehemently defend the medieval Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice as essential for good governance. The Saudi Minister of Religion is always a member of the al-Sheikh family (descendants of Ibn Abdul Wahab). Wahhabism is rigid as a rock, allows no interpretation, no "idolatry", veneration of statues, or even works of art. Not to mention no smoking, no shaving of beards, and very few rights for women. And if you don't follow it, even if you're a Muslim, you're the enemy. No wonder this society produced al-Qaeda and jihadis - and no science or ideas.
Make no mistake; for all their glitzy skylines and investor-friendly self-image, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council countries are all ruled by secrecy and fear. No political parties, no trade unions, no defense of workers safety, no defense of immigrant rights, no women's groups, and very few legal organizations to ensure a fair and independent judicial process. If you're branded as an "al-Qaeda" opposition (or an Iranian agent) you can be detained indefinitely without trial - Guantanamo-style. Or you disappear in jail after a grotesque trial. Torture is of course endemic. And foreign workers - especially non-Muslims - live in perpetual fear.
Washington and European capitals are shaken to the core with the prospect of those northern African winds producing a freedom storm in Saudiland - and the Persian Gulf.
So forget about "democracy" or "human rights". Enter the brand new Barack Obama administration "regime alteration" doctrine, where popular aspirations in the Gulf - from Saudi Arabia to Bahrain and Oman - are ditched to the benefit of the "stability" afforded by "key allies", swing producers House of Saud and hosts of the 5th Fleet the al-Khalifa dynasty in Bahrain. Moreover, the House of Saud has told the al-Khalifa that if they do not crush their own Shi'ite-majority revolt, Saudi forces will. And Washington won't bat an eyelid. As it won't bat an eyelid if this Day of Rage turns into a bloodbath.
(CNN) -- سوريا: عفو استثنائي عن هيثم المالح "شيخ الحقوقيين
سوريا أفرجت عن شيخ الحقوقيين في سوريا.. هيثم المالحدمشق، سوريا أفرجت السلطات السورية الثلاثاء عن الناشط هيثم المالح، الملقب بـ"شيخ الحقوقيين" في سوريا، وفقاً لما أكده مصدر سوري مسؤول، ونجل الناشط الحقوقي، الذي كشف أن والده في طريقه إلى المنزل.
فقد أكد مصدر سوري مسؤول في اتصال هاتفي أجرته معه CNN بالعربية نبأ إطلاق سراح المالح.
وأشار المصدر إلى أن هذا الأمر يأتي استكمالاً للعفو الرئاسي الذي كان الرئيس السوري بشار الأسد قد أصدره الاثنين،والذي قرر فيه منح عفو عام عن الجرائم المرتكبة قبل السابع من مارس/آذار عام 2011.
من ناحيته، قال إياس المالح، نجل هيثم، لـCNN بالعربية، إن والده حصل على استثناء بالعفو عنه، ضمن المرسوم الذي قرر فيه الرئيس السوري بشار الأسد، منح عفو عام عن الجرائم المرتكبة قبل السابع من مارس/ آذار 2011.
وكان المالح قد اعتقل يوم الرابع عشر من أكتوبر/تشرين الأول من العام 2009، على خلفية عدد من اللقاءات الإعلامية ومجموعة من المقالات التي كتبها، بحسب ما أشار موقع "سوريون دوت نت."
وسبق أن سجن المالح في الفترة بين عامي 1980 و1986 مع عدد كبير من النقابيين والناشطين والمعارضين السياسيين بعدما طالبوا بإصلاحات دستورية في البلاد.
وقال إياس لـCNN "لقد أجريت اتصالاً هاتفياً بوالدي عبر الهاتف الجوال، وهو في طريقه عائداً من السجن إلى المنزل."
وكان الرئيس السوري، بشار الأسد، قد أصدر المرسوم الاثنين، وجرى تحديد إطار لذلك في الجنح والمخالفات فقط، مع الإشارة إلى مجموعة واسعة من الاستثناءات التي ستمنع المسجونين أو المطلوبين بجرائم "سياسية" أو متعلقة بأمن الدولة من الاستفادة منه.
ووفقاً لمراقبين، فإن مرسوم العفو الرئاسي استثنى المعتقلين السياسيين في البلاد من العفو، دون المالح، وذلك على خلفية ما سمي بالحراك الذي يشهده الشارع السوري.
وبحسب القرار، فإنه يصار إلى الإعفاء عن كامل العقوبة في الجنح والمخالفات، وكذلك عن تدابير الإصلاح والرعاية للأحداث في الجنح، ولا يستفيد الفارون من العفو إلا إذا سلموا أنفسهم خلال 60 يوما من تاريخ القرار صدور هذا المرسوم التشريعي.
ويشمل القرار أيضاً الإعفاء من العقوبة للمحكومين الذين أتموا السبعين من العمر، أو الذين يعانون أمراضا غير قابلة للشفاء.
ويستثنى المرسوم التشريعي الجنح المنصوص عليها في قانون مكافحة الدعارة، والإضرار بالمال العام وتبديده، وجنح مخالفات البناء.
والأهم أن القرار يستثني مجموعة واسعة من الجنح التي عادة ما تستخدم في القضايا السياسية، ومن بينها "الجرائم التي تنال من الوحدة الوطنية أو تعكر الصفاء بين عناصر الأمة" وهي تهمة كثيراً ما تستخدم ضد معارضين يقومون بنشر آراء مخالفة للنظام.
ونقلت وكالة الأنباء السورية عن وزير العدل، أحمد حمود يونس، أن القرار "يأتي في إطار السياسة الاجتماعية الرامية إلى إعادة تأهيل وإصلاح من دفعته الظروف إلى الوقوع في خطأ يقع في دائرة المسؤولية الجزائية بهدف دفعه إلى جادة الصواب."
وأوضح وزير العدل أن القرار "يتميز بشموله عدداً كبيراً من الجرائم وبمختلف أنواعها مع الأخذ بعين الاعتبار الحالات الإنسانية."
وكانت السلطات السورية قد قامت خلال الأسابيع الماضية بمجموعة من الخطوات التي رأى البعض أنها استباقية، وتهدف إلى الحد من أي خلافات داخلية في ظل الأوضاع السائدة في المنطقة، بعد أحداث مصر وتونس وليبيا.
ومن تلك الخطوات توزيع مساعدات وزيادة الدعم لبعض السلع، وتوسيع قاعدة المستفيدين من الضمان الاجتماعي، علماً أن الدعوات السابقة لتنفيذ تجمعات داعية للإصلاح في سوريا باءت بالفشل، وخرج في الأيام المحددة لها مظاهرات داعمة للنظام.
الافق : جمعية مساواة / وردة بطرس للعمل النسائي
الى نساء لبنان الى العاملة والفلاّحة،
الى الطالبة والمعلمة،
الى المبدعة في كل مجالات الحياة،
نحن، اليوم، على موعد مع فجر عربي وفجر لبناني جديد. أطلقته الإنتفاضات الشعبية من تونس الى مصر، فوصلت رياحُهُ الى وطننا الذي انطلقت منه صرخةٌ هادرة : " الشعب يريد إسقاط النظام الطائفي !".
لقد عانينا، نحن النساء بالتحديد، الكثير من هذا النظام الذي حوّلنا الى مهمّشات خارج صورة الوطن، بينما نحن صانعات الحياة وأساس وجود الأوطان واستمراريتها. فبقي الدستور، بفعل ذلك، حبراً على ورق وانتقلت سلطة الفصل في مجال الأحوال الشخصية الى زعماء الطوائف ومديري أعمالها، الذين أمعنوا في تقسيمنا وشرذمتنا الى مجموعات بعدد القوانين الطائفية المطبقة في مجال الأحوال الشخصية... وهي قوانين يزداد عددُها عاماً بعد عام.
لقد علمتنا الشهيدة وردة بطرس، رمز جمعيتنا، أن قوّتنا تنبع من وحدتنا ومن معرفتنا كيف نحدد هدفنا وكيف نسعى الى تحقيقه مهما كثرت الصعاب. وهدفنا اليوم هو اسقاط النظام الطائفي ومعه كل القوانين الني أنتجها في مجال الأحوال الشخصية واستبدالها بقانون مدني موحّد يحوّل اللبنانيين الى مواطنين ومواطنات متساوين، كما نصت على ذلك مقدمة الدستور ومادته السابعة.
لنتحد مع أولادنا وإخوتنا الذين تلاقوا بالأمس وانطلقوا في مسيرة تحدي الذات من أجل مصلحة الوطن العليا.
لنترك بيوتنا ولننزل بكثافة الى الشارع، صارخات بأعلى صوتنا : المرأة اللبنانية تريد إسقاط النظام الطائفي ! وسيسقط !
اعتقال فريق بي بي سي في ليبيا :من الوكالات
قوات أمن موالية للعقيد الليبي معمر القذافي اعتقلت الاثنين فريقا صحفيا تابعا لها 21 ساعة، وضربت أفراده ومنعتهم من الوصول إلى مدينة الزاوية المحاصرة غرب العاصمة طرابلس.
وأضافت الهيئة أن السلطات في طرابلس اتهمت فريقها الصحفي بالتجسس وعرضت للخطر حياة أفراده الثلاثة، وهم البريطاني كريس كوب سميث، والمصور التركي جوكتاي كورالتان، والمراسل الفلسطيني فراس كيلاني.
وأكدت أن جنودا وأفراد شرطة سرية تابعين للقذافي ضربوا الصحفيين الثلاثة بالأيدي والعصي وأعقاب البنادق، وكبلوا أيديهم وغطوا وجوههم.
إعدام وهمي
وقال كيلاني في بيان نشرته بي بي سي إنه أثناء الاعتقال رأى معتقلين ليبيين من مدينة الزاوية تعرضوا بدورهم للضرب والتعذيب، في حين أكد كوب سميث أن الجنود الليبيين أرغموه وزملاءه على الوقوف أمام أحد الجدران.
وأضاف أن الجنود وضعوا البنادق على رقبته ورقاب زملائه وسحبوا الزناد وأطلقوا الرصاص، في محاولة إعدام وهمية.
وقد غادر أفراد فريق بي بي سي ليبيا جوا عقب إطلاق سراحهم، في حين قيدت السلطات الليبية تحركات الصحفيين الأجانب المتمركزين في طرابلس، وأمرتهم ألا يتحركوا إلا مع حراسات رسمية.
وأدانت السلطات البريطانية هذا "التعامل البغيض" مع الفريق الصحفي، واعتبرته "دليلا إضافيا على الجرائم الفظيعة التي ترتكب في ليبيا".
وبدورها أدانت بي بي سي هذا الاعتقال وهذه المعاملة لأفراد فريقها، ودعت السلطات الليبية إلى أن تضمن للصحفيين العمل بحرية واستقلالية.
Mohammed Al-Maskati: Bahraini authorities exploited the bad financial situation of foreigners
After the Ministry of Interior announced about 20,000 new jobs in Police.
Eyewitness told BYSHR: A number of foreign (Asian) is now seeking employment in the Ministry of Interior.
Bahraini authorities exploited the bad financial situation of foreigners (especially Asians).
They used them badly in the suppression of demonstrations.
They are appointed in riot police.
Possible to follow the news on:
Twitter: https: / / twitter.com / byshr
Facebook: https: / / www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=19803144680&ref=ts
E-mail: info@byshr.org, eu-office@byshr.org
Or contact (for media and breaking news), Mr. Mohammed Al-Maskati, head of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights
Mobile phone: 0097336437088
Eyewitness told BYSHR: A number of foreign (Asian) is now seeking employment in the Ministry of Interior.
Bahraini authorities exploited the bad financial situation of foreigners (especially Asians).
They used them badly in the suppression of demonstrations.
They are appointed in riot police.
Possible to follow the news on:
Twitter: https: / / twitter.com / byshr
Facebook: https: / / www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=19803144680&ref=ts
E-mail: info@byshr.org, eu-office@byshr.org
Or contact (for media and breaking news), Mr. Mohammed Al-Maskati, head of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights
Mobile phone: 0097336437088
Jumanah Younis : Egypt's revolution means nothing if its women are not free
A demonstration commemorating International Women's Day was attacked on Tuesday afternoon in Cairo's Tahrir Square. More than 200 men charged on the women – forcing some to the ground, dragging others out of the crowd, groping and sexually harassing them as police and military figures stood by and failed to act.
It was a shocking wake-up call. Even in Tahrir Square, the symbol of Egypt's newfound freedom, it seems that it's going to take much more than a revolution to overhaul the deep-seated misogyny that some Egyptian men so freely and openly impose on the country's female population.
The female demonstrators – myself among them – had been protesting against Egypt's chronic sexual harassment problem, against the many barriers women face in public life, and against the pervasive conservatism that curtails the freedom of women in society at large. The women chanted slogans that had been used in the revolution itself, calling for freedom, justice and equality. But their demonstration quickly attracted a counter-protest.
The women's chants calling for an "Egypt for all Egyptians" were drowned out by retaliations such as "No to freedom!" shouted by the opposing group. The men charged at the female protesters, who had been standing on a raised platform in the middle of Tahrir Square, and shouted: "Get out of here."
Many women were dragged away individually by small groups of men who attacked them. I remained on the platform with five other women. A small circle of sympathetic men held hands around us to protect us from the crowd, which swelled on all sides.
Against the charge of the counter-demonstrators, the circle quickly caved. Several women fell to the ground and a number of attempts were made by the attacking group to steal belongings.
As I struggled to stay upright, a hand grabbed my behind and others pulled at my clothes. When, a few minutes later, I found the other women I was with, one told me that a man had put his hand down her top, while another woman had been pushed to the ground and held down by a man on top of her. The police continued to direct traffic around the square as the incident was taking place.
Such outrageous displays of contempt for women cannot be allowed to persist in the new Egypt. Time and time again so-called "women's issues" have been relegated to the bottom of the agenda: we must end corruption first, we must have political freedom first, etc, etc. On Tuesday, Egyptian women said: "Now is the time." There is no freedom for men without freedom and equality for women.
This is not a free society if a woman cannot walk down the street without fear of being harassed, attacked, or even molested. Women have a right to participate in Egyptian society as equals – and this revolution will have achieved nothing if it does not recognise the basic right of the Egyptian women to exist, to demonstrate, to work, to live and walk the streets with dignity.
It was a shocking wake-up call. Even in Tahrir Square, the symbol of Egypt's newfound freedom, it seems that it's going to take much more than a revolution to overhaul the deep-seated misogyny that some Egyptian men so freely and openly impose on the country's female population.
The female demonstrators – myself among them – had been protesting against Egypt's chronic sexual harassment problem, against the many barriers women face in public life, and against the pervasive conservatism that curtails the freedom of women in society at large. The women chanted slogans that had been used in the revolution itself, calling for freedom, justice and equality. But their demonstration quickly attracted a counter-protest.
The women's chants calling for an "Egypt for all Egyptians" were drowned out by retaliations such as "No to freedom!" shouted by the opposing group. The men charged at the female protesters, who had been standing on a raised platform in the middle of Tahrir Square, and shouted: "Get out of here."
Many women were dragged away individually by small groups of men who attacked them. I remained on the platform with five other women. A small circle of sympathetic men held hands around us to protect us from the crowd, which swelled on all sides.
Against the charge of the counter-demonstrators, the circle quickly caved. Several women fell to the ground and a number of attempts were made by the attacking group to steal belongings.
As I struggled to stay upright, a hand grabbed my behind and others pulled at my clothes. When, a few minutes later, I found the other women I was with, one told me that a man had put his hand down her top, while another woman had been pushed to the ground and held down by a man on top of her. The police continued to direct traffic around the square as the incident was taking place.
Such outrageous displays of contempt for women cannot be allowed to persist in the new Egypt. Time and time again so-called "women's issues" have been relegated to the bottom of the agenda: we must end corruption first, we must have political freedom first, etc, etc. On Tuesday, Egyptian women said: "Now is the time." There is no freedom for men without freedom and equality for women.
This is not a free society if a woman cannot walk down the street without fear of being harassed, attacked, or even molested. Women have a right to participate in Egyptian society as equals – and this revolution will have achieved nothing if it does not recognise the basic right of the Egyptian women to exist, to demonstrate, to work, to live and walk the streets with dignity.
Naomi Wolf : The Middle East’s Feminist Revolution
In both countries, women protesters were nothing like the Western stereotype: they were front and center, in news clips and on Facebook forums, and even in the leadership. In Egypt’s Tahrir Square, women volunteers, some accompanied by children, worked steadily to support the protests – helping with security, communications, and shelter. Many commentators credited the great numbers of women and children with the remarkable overall peacefulness of the protesters in the face of grave provocations.
Other citizen reporters in Tahrir Square – and virtually anyone with a cell phone could become one – noted that the masses of women involved in the protests were demographically inclusive. Many wore headscarves and other signs of religious conservatism, while others reveled in the freedom to kiss a friend or smoke a cigarette in public.
But women were not serving only as support workers, the habitual role to which they are relegated in protest movements, from those of the 1960’s to the recent student riots in the United Kingdom. Egyptian women also organized, strategized, and reported the events. Bloggers such as Leil Zahra Mortada took grave risks to keep the world informed daily of the scene in Tahrir Square and elsewhere.
The role of women in the great upheaval in the Middle East has been woefully under-analyzed. Women in Egypt did not just “join” the protests – they were a leading force behind the cultural evolution that made the protests inevitable. And what is true for Egypt is true, to a greater and lesser extent, throughout the Arab world. When women change, everything changes, and women in the Muslim world are changing radically.
The greatest shift is educational. Two generations ago, only a small minority of the daughters of the elite received a university education. Today, women account for more than half of the students at Egyptian universities. They are being trained to use power in ways that their grandmothers could scarcely have imagined: publishing newspapers (as Sanaa el Seif did, in defiance of a government order to cease operating); campaigning for student leadership posts; fundraising for student organizations; and running meetings.
Indeed, a substantial minority of young women in Egypt and other Arab countries have now spent their formative years thinking critically in mixed-gender environments, and even publicly challenging male professors in the classroom. It is far easier to tyrannize a population when half are poorly educated and trained to be submissive. But, as Westerners should know from their own historical experience, once you educate women, democratic agitation is likely to accompany the massive cultural shift that follows.
The nature of social media, too, has helped turn women into protest leaders. Having taught leadership skills to women for more than a decade, I know how difficult it is to get them to stand up and speak out in a hierarchical organizational structure. Likewise, women tend to avoid the figurehead status that traditional protest has in the past imposed on certain activists – almost invariably a hotheaded young man with a megaphone.
In such contexts – with a stage, a spotlight, and a spokesperson – women often shy away from leadership roles. But social media, through the very nature of the technology, have changed what leadership looks and feels like today. Facebook mimics the way many women choose to experience social reality, with connections between people just as important as individual dominance or control, if not more so.
You can be a powerful leader on Facebook just by creating a really big “us.” Or you can stay the same size, conceptually, as everyone else on your page – you don’t have to assert your dominance or authority. The structure of Facebook’s interface creates what brick-and-mortar institutions, despite 30 years of feminist pressure, have failed to provide: a context in which women’s ability to forge a powerful “us” and engage in a leadership of service can advance the cause of freedom and justice worldwide.
Of course, Facebook cannot reduce the risks of protest. But, however violent the immediate future in the Middle East may be, the historical record of what happens when educated women participate in freedom movements suggests that those in the region who would like to maintain iron-fisted rule are finished.
Just when France began its rebellion in 1789, Mary Wollstonecraft, who had been caught up in witnessing it, wrote her manifesto for women’s liberation. After educated women in America helped fight for the abolition of slavery, they put female suffrage on the agenda. After they were told in the 1960’s that “the position of women in the movement is prone,” they generated “second wave” feminism – a movement born of women’s new skills and old frustrations.
Time and again, once women have fought the other battles for freedom of their day, they have moved on to advocate for their own rights. And, since feminism is simply a logical extension of democracy, the Middle East’s despots are facing a situation in which it will be almost impossible to force these awakened women to stop their fight for freedom – their own and that of their communities.
Naomi Wolf is a political activist and social critic whose most recent book is Give Me Liberty: A Handbook for American Revolutionaries.
Other citizen reporters in Tahrir Square – and virtually anyone with a cell phone could become one – noted that the masses of women involved in the protests were demographically inclusive. Many wore headscarves and other signs of religious conservatism, while others reveled in the freedom to kiss a friend or smoke a cigarette in public.
But women were not serving only as support workers, the habitual role to which they are relegated in protest movements, from those of the 1960’s to the recent student riots in the United Kingdom. Egyptian women also organized, strategized, and reported the events. Bloggers such as Leil Zahra Mortada took grave risks to keep the world informed daily of the scene in Tahrir Square and elsewhere.
The role of women in the great upheaval in the Middle East has been woefully under-analyzed. Women in Egypt did not just “join” the protests – they were a leading force behind the cultural evolution that made the protests inevitable. And what is true for Egypt is true, to a greater and lesser extent, throughout the Arab world. When women change, everything changes, and women in the Muslim world are changing radically.
The greatest shift is educational. Two generations ago, only a small minority of the daughters of the elite received a university education. Today, women account for more than half of the students at Egyptian universities. They are being trained to use power in ways that their grandmothers could scarcely have imagined: publishing newspapers (as Sanaa el Seif did, in defiance of a government order to cease operating); campaigning for student leadership posts; fundraising for student organizations; and running meetings.
Indeed, a substantial minority of young women in Egypt and other Arab countries have now spent their formative years thinking critically in mixed-gender environments, and even publicly challenging male professors in the classroom. It is far easier to tyrannize a population when half are poorly educated and trained to be submissive. But, as Westerners should know from their own historical experience, once you educate women, democratic agitation is likely to accompany the massive cultural shift that follows.
The nature of social media, too, has helped turn women into protest leaders. Having taught leadership skills to women for more than a decade, I know how difficult it is to get them to stand up and speak out in a hierarchical organizational structure. Likewise, women tend to avoid the figurehead status that traditional protest has in the past imposed on certain activists – almost invariably a hotheaded young man with a megaphone.
In such contexts – with a stage, a spotlight, and a spokesperson – women often shy away from leadership roles. But social media, through the very nature of the technology, have changed what leadership looks and feels like today. Facebook mimics the way many women choose to experience social reality, with connections between people just as important as individual dominance or control, if not more so.
You can be a powerful leader on Facebook just by creating a really big “us.” Or you can stay the same size, conceptually, as everyone else on your page – you don’t have to assert your dominance or authority. The structure of Facebook’s interface creates what brick-and-mortar institutions, despite 30 years of feminist pressure, have failed to provide: a context in which women’s ability to forge a powerful “us” and engage in a leadership of service can advance the cause of freedom and justice worldwide.
Of course, Facebook cannot reduce the risks of protest. But, however violent the immediate future in the Middle East may be, the historical record of what happens when educated women participate in freedom movements suggests that those in the region who would like to maintain iron-fisted rule are finished.
Just when France began its rebellion in 1789, Mary Wollstonecraft, who had been caught up in witnessing it, wrote her manifesto for women’s liberation. After educated women in America helped fight for the abolition of slavery, they put female suffrage on the agenda. After they were told in the 1960’s that “the position of women in the movement is prone,” they generated “second wave” feminism – a movement born of women’s new skills and old frustrations.
Time and again, once women have fought the other battles for freedom of their day, they have moved on to advocate for their own rights. And, since feminism is simply a logical extension of democracy, the Middle East’s despots are facing a situation in which it will be almost impossible to force these awakened women to stop their fight for freedom – their own and that of their communities.
Naomi Wolf is a political activist and social critic whose most recent book is Give Me Liberty: A Handbook for American Revolutionaries.
خلص جلبي: القذافي شخصية تستحق المقارنة مع عدد من الطاغية في التاريخ، كاليجولا، نيرون،
إن مذابح التوتسي والهوتو كلفت في أسبوعين مليونا من المقرودين التعساء المذبوحين بالسلاسل والسواطير والهراوات وكان يمكن إيقاف المذبحة بخمسة آلاف جندي من قوات الأمم المتحدة كما اعترفت بذلك أولبرخت وكان كلينتون في الرئاسة تلك الأيام.
ويمكن لسيناريو من هذا النوع أن يحدث في ليبيا فهذا ممكن لأن الطاغية هنا مريض نفسيا على نحو خطير يذكر بهتلر ونيرون وبول بوت وستالين وصدام وحافظ الأسد فكلا منهم كان سفاحا من حجم مخيف..
يذكر شبير وزير الإسكان والبناء في الرايخ الثالث أن هتلر أمره في حال موت الفوهرر أن يحرق كل ألمانيا ويمحو الشعب الألماني لأنه مع موت الزعيم فلا قيمة للشعب الألماني؟ وهو ما فعله وزير الدعاية جوبلز بتسميم بناته الستة ثم انتحاره المزدوج مع زوجته فراو جوبلز؟
إن نفسية مثل القذافي يجب أن تدرس من أجل الاستفادة منها للتغيير في أماكن أخرى من غابة العروبة فلا نعلم أنواع الضواري التي سنواجه في هذه السفاري؟
نقول: بقدر جبروت الطاغية بقدر هشاشته الداخلية. والمستكبِر (بالكسر) هو الوجه الآخر للمستضَعف (بالفتح).
ومن مرض بالاستكبار حمل بذرة الاستضعاف في أعماقه. وكلا من المستكبر والمستضعف من فصيلة واحدة.
ويوم القيامة يلعن بعضهم بعضا.
والصورة الملونة أصلها أسود.
وجايكل وهايد شخصيتان متناقضتان اجتمعتا في رجل واحد. مثل وجهي القمر فوجه مضيء يغلي بحرارة 150 فوق الصفر ووجه مظلم بارد لا يصلح للحياة 150 تحت الصفر.
والطاغية وحش مرعب ولكنه في حقيقته أحقر صعلوك.
ومن احتقر الناس احتقر نفسه.
ومن وظف المجرمين والمرتزقة كما فعل القذافي قلب المجتمع عاليه سافله فلم يظهر على السطح إلا السفلة، وخسف بالمجتمع في ليل التاريخ حتى حين، كما حدث مع بلدان البعث وديكتاتوريات الخوف. والطاغية جنسياً هو سادي ومازوخي في آن واحد. ومن انحرف فقد توازنه فعاش على الأطراف.
ونيرون أحرق روما ولكن لم يكن عنده من الجرأة أن يقتل نفسه حينما أحدق به الناس فقتله خادمه. والطاغية ليس رجل مبدأ ليموت من أجل مبدئه بل هو متعلق بالحياة أكثر من حرص الضفدع على حياة المستنقع. ولذا سلم صدام نفسه.
ولتجدنهم أحرص الناس على حياة يود أحدهم لو يعمر ألف سنة وما بمزحزحه من العذاب أن يعمر والله عليم بالظالمين.
ومن يقتل أصهاره يدفع ببناته إلى الترمل وأحفاده إلى اليتم.
وحسب شهادة جمال المجيد فقد قتل صدام كل عائلته فقتل والده وثلاثا من إخوانه وأخته وفي النهاية أرسل من ذبح والدته من الوريد إلى الوريد ليلا على عادة الطغاة.
والسلطة تميل إلى الفساد. وقليل من السلطة تعني قليلا من الفساد. وسلطة مطلقة تعني عمى مطبقا وفسادا كاملاً وظلاما دامساً إذا أخرج يده لم يكد يراها.
ومن لم يجعل الله له نورا فما له من نور. وحينما يخسر الإنسان نوره الملائكي يستبدله بظلمة الشياطين.
ومن باع نفسه للقوة ارتهن للقوة فظن نفسه إلهاً مع امتلاك القوة، وعبدا ذليلا مع خلع القوة من يديه. وهي مشكلة التوحيد، والقضية التي كافح من أجلها الأنبياء، لإخراج نموذج جديد لا يركع للقوة ولا يحرص على امتلاكها.
وإنكم ستحرصون على الإمارة وستكون ندامة يوم القيامة.
والغرب حل أعظم معضلة سياسية وهي مركزية السلطة فسحبها من أيدي البشر وحرر المجتمع من الوثنية السياسية.
وشيراك كان يوما صديق صدام الحميم ولا يمنعه في فرنسا أن يكون مثل صدام لولا الشعب الفرنسي. وتنطبق نفس القاعدة على بن علي وساركوزي وميركل والقذافي.
والسلطة ألذ من كل اللذائذ مجتمعة لأن فيها سر الإلوهية.
ومن ختم على رياض الترك في زنزانة إفرادية سبع عشرة سنة كان يرسل الناس إلى الموت بكلمة ويصرف الملايين بإشارة فمن يقف أمام هذا الإغراء؟
والملكة فكتوريا كما تحدث عنها الكواكبي في كتابه طبائع الاستبداد ومصارع الاستعباد كانت تتمنى أن تحكم مثل الباديشاه العثماني، وما حجزها البرلمان البريطاني بعد أن طار رأس الملك تشارلز الأول عام 1649 م بحد السيف على يد كرومويل فلا داعي للتكرار.
وعندما يسألنا سائل عن ثقافتنا المريضة نقول إن هذه الأشياء موجودة في ديننا وأن الشورى أساسية في الإسلام، ونحن لم نشم رائحة الشورى لحظة في تاريخنا منذ سيف معاوية؟
والمشروطية التي نادى بها رجال الإصلاح في العراق في مطلع القرن الفائت لم تأت إلا من خلال الاحتكاك بالغرب.
ولم يكن عبد الرحمن الكواكبي ليكتب كتابه عن طبائع الاستبداد لولا احتكاكه بفكر الثورة الفرنسي. والأنبياء جاؤوا لتحرير الإنسان من علاقات القوة؛ فلا يتحول الفرد إلى إله مع امتلاك القوة وتافه مع فقدانها.
والتحليل النفسي يجعلنا نفهم لماذا ظهر صدام البطل في منظر البؤساء، كما يجعلنا نفهم سطحية أكثر العقول السياسية العربية التماعاً في المحطات الفضائية حينما قالوا إن هذا ليس صدام أو أنه مخدر. والحقيقة أنه ليس مخدر وهو هو ولكنه طاغية انكشف فيه جانب الحقيقة الثاني؛ فرأينا صدام بدون سلطة لأول مرة. وما كنا نرى من قبل صدام في السلطة.. فهو قاتل ومسكين.. جبار وتافه.
وسيتكرر نفس المشهد للطاغية الليبي؟
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