Cruise missile attack in Yemen kills 49 civilians
Given what a prominent role "terrorism" plays in our political discourse, it's striking how little attention is paid to American actions which have the most significant impact on that problem. In addition to our occupation of Iraq, war escalation in Afghanistan, and secret bombings in Pakistan, President Obama late last week ordered...Hard line on Hizbullah clashes with political reality
WASHINGTON (IPS) — Lebanese President Michel Sleiman visited Washington last week for his first visit with President Barack Obama. The meeting was a quick one, tucked in amongst the myriad of domestic issues that are demanding Obama's attention. Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah speaks via a giant screen...
Trouble in north and south of Yemen
December 18th, 20090 SANAA— Facing growing international concern that Yemen is becoming a new haven for Al Qaeda operatives, Yememi security forces struck back hard this week against suspected militants. In separate attacks, they arrested 17 Al Qaeda suspects and killed 34, including a top leader and four operatives who had planned suicide bombings abroad,...Report: Human rights deteriorated throughout Arab World in 2009
NEW YORK — Human rights abuses in Arab countries increased throughout the Middle East and North Africa during 2009, according to the annual report of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, released earlier this week. Egypt and Syria were singled out as leading offenders in the torture report. ...Lebanon not ready for radical reform
In attempting to reform their state, the Lebanese fear the unraveling of their nation. President Obama was well briefed on Lebanon's fragile, "national unity" government when he received Lebanese President Michel Suleiman on December 14 at the White House. Vehicles are seen in a traffic jam along a main road after a heavy...
Dispute over veil spreads across Egypt
December 12th, 20090 CAIRO — A decision by the government to ban the veil in some academic institutions has reignited debate about personal rights. "The niqab (Islamic face veil) is certainly one of the more extreme manifestations of Islam," Hossam Bahgat, director of the Cairo-based Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights tells IPS. "But according to...Lebanese tension is expressed in demand for reform
The Lebanese have worked hard to rebuild their country after a fifteen-year civil war that ended in 1990. They do not seem ready now to take radical steps of reform. A Lebanese government official carries a ballot box in a polling station in Beirut ahead of last June 7th’s parliamentary elections. In order of size, the three...
Nasrallah: Sectarianism impeding democracy
December 4th, 20090 BEIRUT — Hizbullah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah said on Monday the major problem facing Lebanon's political regime was political sectarianism, which hindered the establishment of a true democracy. He also stressed the continued need for the resistance, given the absence of a strong Lebanese state. Lebanon's Hizbullah...Palestinians building institutions of statehood
RAMALLAH (IPS) — The Palestinian Authority (PA) appears to be successfully countering the Israeli government's refusal to work towards a two-state solution to end the decades-long conflict. A Palestinian demonstrator uses a tennis racket to return an empty tear gas canister at Israeli soldiers during a protest against the...U.S. urged to increase aid and involvement in Yemen
WASHINGTON (IPS) — As President Barack Obama ponders escalating Washington's military and political investment in Afghanistan, a think tank close to his administration is urging Washington to ramp up U.S. aid and involvement in strife-torn Yemen, as well. Children sit outside a tent in al-Mazraq camp in the western Yemeni...Palestinian children face daily settler attacks getting to school
AT TUWANI, West Bank (IPS) — Being able to travel to school in relative safety is something children all over the world take for granted. But, for Palestinian children living in the shadow of the ubiquitous and illegal Israeli settlements dotting the West Bank, simply walking to school can be a terrifying...Israeli Jews and the one-state solution
"Anyone who rejects the two-state solution, won't bring a one-state solution. They will instead bring one war, not one state. A bloody war with no end." — Israeli President Shimon Peres, 7 November 2009. A Palestinian child looks out of a window during the demolition of a house in the Arab neighborhood of Isawiyeh in east...Iraqi MPs to reconsider vote law
Iraq's parliament is to meet at the weekend to decide whether to amend a crucial election law vetoed by the vice-president. Ayad al-Samarie, the parliamentary speaker, said MPs would meet on Saturday to discuss Tariq al-Hashemi's veto and could send it back to the three-member presidency council for approval without changes. "We have...
House demolitions go on
November 19th, 20090 OCCUPIED EAST JERUSALEM — "Make sure your father gets this," the municipal inspector tells a ten-year-old boy at the gate of the concrete house in an alleyway in the Al-Bustan quarter of Silwan, a Palestinian neighborhood right under the shadow of the walled Old City. A Palestinian woman sits next to belongings removed from her...
Lebanon rivals form unity government
November 18th, 20090 Members of Lebanon's new cabinet pose for an official group photo at the presidential palace in Baabda, November 10, 2009. PHOTO: Dalati Nohra BEIRUT - Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri formed a new unity government on Monday that includes two ministers from Hizbullah. Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri......
Beirut’s Shi’a bastion revives after ’06 war
BEIRUT — The sprawling Shi'a suburb of south Beirut has made a comeback after the destruction wreaked by Israel during 2006 fighting, a symbol of the community's resilience at a time when its political patron, Hizbullah, is seeking a greater voice in Lebanon's government. Women walk in the Dahiyah district. The district,...
Abbas: I’ll not seek re-election
November 7th, 20090 Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has said he will not run in presidential elections he has called for in January, saying he had had enough after years of frustration fighting for an independent homeland. "I have told our brethren in the PLO ... that I have no desire to......
Egypt makes cultural clout count
CAIRO (IPS) — Egypt has long been recognized as the cultural trendsetter of the Arabic- speaking world. Despite recent challenges to this role with the advent of satellite television, experts say that contemporary Arab culture remains largely defined by Egyptian literature, music, film and television. Iconic Egyptian...Lebanese banks flourish as ailing world looks on
BEIRUT — A healthy suspicion of the subprime market appears to have paid off, as Lebanese banks flourish in the face of the global economic crisis. A recent report released by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) on the Lebanese banking sector said that Lebanese banks are continuously attracting inflows of deposits, which in current...U.S. diplomatic adviser’s troubling role in oil politics
WASHINGTON (IPS) — In 2003, U.S. diplomatist Peter Galbraith resigned at the end of a distinguished, 24-year government career. Over the years that followed, he worked as a contract-based adviser to leaders in Iraq's Kurdish community, while also arguing passionately in public media that Iraq's Kurds should be given maximum...Lebanon needs both security and freedom
In Lebanon, the rulers are proud of existing freedoms and the reformers are obsessed with national security. All summer the Lebanese have been waiting for a new cabinet of ministers to emerge, with no results yet. For the people it feels like going through a ten-month pregnancy. Lebanon's sectarian formula of power sharing offers a......
Rift developing between PA and Fatah
October 17th, 20090 RAMALLAH (IPS) — An increasingly isolated and unpopular Palestinian Authority (PA) has again made a 180-degree turn in the Goldstone Report fiasco as it tries to fend off mounting criticism from all and sundry, including its own organization. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gestures during his visit to the West Bank city...Children flee fighting in Yemen
AMRAN, Yemen (IPS/AJ) — As the conflict between government forces and Houthi fighters grinds on in the mountains of Saada in northern Yemen, thousands of Yemeni civilians, many of them children, are being forced from their homes by the fighting. The latest U.N. figures estimate that 150,000 have so far been displaced by the bloodiest......
Abbas and the Goldstone Report: Our shame is complete
As Israeli bombs fell on the Gaza Strip during its one-sided war between Dec. 27, 2008 and Jan. 18, 2009, millions around the world took to the streets in complete and uncompromising outrage. The level of barbarity in that war, especially as it was conducted against a poor, defenseless and physically trapped nation, united people of...Celebrating healthy living
A marching strawberry might not be what most people imagine when they think of refugee camps. But if you were visiting the war-damaged Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr el Bared in northern Lebanon last year, you would have seen children in colorful, fruit-themed costumes marching in a parade down the camp's narrow and cluttered streets.......