Documentary: The Regime

Bashar al-Assad came to power by inheritance from his father, Hafez al-Assad. And since then, the Syrian regime has been linked with the fate of the Assad family itself, as it has survived in power for four decades.

This film endeavors to analyze the experience of Bashar in power, the reasons for his survival, and how he has managed to face of the revolution that has been claiming his departure for more than eight months. 

Why Afghani Women Walk behind Their Men

Barbara Walters of 20/20 did a story on gender roles in Kabul, Afghanistan, several years before the Afghan conflict. She noted that women customarily walked 5 paces behind their husbands.

She recently returned to Kabul and observed that women still walk behind their husbands. From Ms. Walters vantage point, despite the overthrow of the oppressive Taliban regime, the women now seem to walk even further back behind their husbands and are happy to maintain the old custom.

Ms. Walters approached one of the Afghani women and asked, "Why do you now seem happy with the old custom that you once tried so desperately to change?" 

The woman looked Ms. Walters straight in the eyes and without hesitation said, "Land mines."

The Implications of the Moroccan government’s denial of the necklace story

Maariv (7/14/2001) claimed that Princess Salma, the wife of King Mohammed VI, gave a valuable diamond necklace to Ms. Levni, the Israeli opposition leader, during a secret visit of hers to Morocco. Other Israeli media outlets spread the news. Israelnationalnews.com, for instance, wrote that “[n]o one can estimate the true value of the Knesset treasures. The diamond pendant necklace, for example, was given to Opposition Leader MK Tzipi Livni (Kadima) by the wife of the king of Morocco during a secret visit to the capital, Rabat, when she was Foreign Minister”.  

The news was angrily received by many Moroccan citizens who denounced the Princess’s generosity to a war criminal. Angry comments featured on Facebook and different blogs and platforms.  

 After a whole week of silence, the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs at last “categorically denied” the news and said that the Princess did not give Ms. Levni any present.

As a matter of fact, this is not the first time that the Moroccan Royal Palace was criticized for its clandestine relations with Israel. Late King Hassan II was criticized for repeatedly receiving Shimon Peres and other Israeli leaders. But, to my knowledge, this is the first time that the Moroccan government denies news of the Palace’s relations with Israel.

The denial, in my point of view, has got two implications. First, rumors about the Moroccan Palace or the political elite’s relations with Israel will no longer go unnoticed by the public. Thanks to new media, the Moroccan public opinion will from now on keep informed about what used to occur behind the curtain. Poor national media are no longer the public opinion’s sole source of information, which has already started to have a strong impact on the relations between the people and its leadership.

The second implication of the official denial of the necklace story is that the political elite and Royal Palace will be accountable in front of the Moroccan public whether they like it or not; they have therefore to watch out. The Moroccan Monarchy has capitalized on religion as a source of power for centuries. As a result, such rumors as the necklace story and its likes are very likely to bring the Monarchy’s reputation and credibility into question, which is very likely to make it more vulnerable in front of its opponents who are getting more and more numerous.

To sum up, whether we admit it or not, change is already taking place in Morocco. Neither the political elite nor the Royal Palace are as free to do what they please as they used once to be. What is needed, therefore, is a political leadership that grasps this truth.

The Sun Sets to Rise Anew

I sat alone by the seashore contemplating the sunset. The day was agonizing, it was in its last moments, bidding us farewell. In a few minutes, the world will be covered with deadly, cold and dark silence. It was a sad moment of the day, but not sad enough to spoil the beauty I was contemplating. It didn’t have enough power to eclipse the captivating image I still have in mind; the image of the shining, orange circle reflected on the surface of the sea which was too captivating to leave any chance to pay attention to the sad side of the coin. 

I believed that the sun, which was bidding us farewell, was going to embrace another part of the world, and to start a new day of other people than us. And after a long cold night, it will come back to us. This is the circle of life.

I passed my wrinkled hand upon my wrinkled face. My wrinkled skin says that I myself was at the sunset of my age. A man over the age of 60, turning the last pages of the story of his life, seems to be following the same path as the sun, traveling the same journey as it is. 

Many people think that death is the ultimate end of life. However, I believe that death is the beginning of the ultimate life. We die to be born in another world, just as the sun sets to rise in another part of the world. Mistaken you are if you think that you were created for death. Mistaken you are if you think that the end is completely dark. There is no everlasting darkness. Just look around you and you will get it; the sun sets to rise anew.

The Truth

All your armies, all your fighters All your tanks, and all your soldiers Against a boy holding a stone Standing there all alone In his eyes I see the sun In his smile I see the moon And I wonder, I only wonder Who is weak, and who is strong? Who is right, and who is wrong? And I wish, I only wish That the truth has a tongue By: Nael Talal El.Qtati

The Future of the MENA Region through Obama’s Lens

	Last Thursday President Barack Obama delivered his speech about his administration’s policy towards the turmoil of the MENA region, or Middle East and North Africa.
The US president outlined the strategy his administration intends to adopt to help the revolting peoples of the region to build democratic states, as he said. He also set forth a starting point to the negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis.

The Obama administration’s initiative in fact aims at finding a raison d’être for the United States in the post-revolution MENA region. Media and politicians in the United States are worried about the future of their country’s interests, and are afraid of the idea that these revolutions have come to pull the region out of the American sphere. 0n February 4, 2011, Liz Sly wrote an article entitled “Amid Arab protests, U.S. influence has waned”, Sly noticed that “[a]t the pro-democracy demonstrations on the streets of Cairo and elsewhere, references to the United States have been conspicuously absent”, and she interpreted that as “a sign of what some analysts are already calling a "post-American Middle East" of diminished U.S. influence and far greater uncertainty about America’s role”. This speech outlined the role of American in the region, which will not be a “post-American Middle East”. On the contrary, the region will need a strong American role to endorse the newly-born democracies, to help isolate the agonizing autocracies, and to give a push to a peace process between the Palestinians the Israelis, a peace process that has been at stalemate for a long time.


President Obama’s speech, however, was another instance of that incongruity between rhetoric and policy in the American politics. He said “[w]e have embraced the chance to show that America values the dignity of the street vendor in Tunisia more than the raw power of the dictator”. However, a considerable body of historical evidence testifies to the fact that America can turn a blind eye on the humiliation, not only of a street vendor, but of a whole people if need be. The U.S. foreign policy record in the region itself endorses this claim. President Obama showed a palpable admission of this when he said: “after decades of accepting the world as it is in the region, we have a chance to pursue the world as it should be”.


In fact the United States was not accepting the world as it was. Rather, it was making use of the world as it was. American administrations supported not only Tunisia’s dictator; they had supported such brutal regimes as the Philippines’ Marcos, Chile’s Pinochet, Indonesia’s Suhartu and many others. And in the region, they had supported the Egyptian dictator, the violations of human rights in Yemen, Algeria and many other countries ruled by friendly autocrats. Even worse, John Pilger’s documentary, War on Democracy, contends that the United States toppled down legitimate regimes and set up dictatorships in Latin America, its backyard, during the 70s and the 80s.


Obama showed a great generosity when he promised to “relieve a democratic Egypt of up to $1 billion in debt, and work with our Egyptian partners to invest these resources to foster growth and entrepreneurship”, and to work with Congress “to create Enterprise Funds to invest in Tunisia and Egypt”. What Mr. Obama did not say is what these huge financial aids are paid for.


According to an article of Noam Chomsky, it’s not radical Islam that worries the US; it’s independence. The post-revolution MENA region, therefore, should not be independent; instead, it should be dependent on US generosity and financial aids. And it is this dependency that would sustain the American control over the region. Egypt is the cornerstone of the American policy in the region. And an independent Egypt means much trouble both to the United States and Israel. But an Egypt dependent on American aids will have to be cooperative with the Americans and the Israelis, and will be useful to the American agenda in the region.


The demonstrators who have been going out demanding democracy in their countries, especially in Tunisia and Egypt, should hit the streets again demanding that their governments' decline of Obama’s offer to grant them financial support. This offer is a troll that will enable the United States to take the region hostage for the next decades. Social reforms in the region should depend on its peoples’ assets, not on foreign charity.


The peoples of the region will be naïve if they blind themselves to the agenda hidden behind Obama’s generous offers. If the region suffers from social problems, the United States is no better. Dennis Kucinich, a US Congressman from Ohio and a former presidential candidate in the United States, wrote an article in which he criticizes Obama’s initiative. Kucinich said that “[t]he President wants to ‘advance economic development for nations that transition to democracy.’ It would be good to advance economic development in the United States, since there are over 14 million Americans are out of work. Such a high level of unemployment degrades our own democracy”.


The talk about the thorny issue of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the occasion in which Obama looked less hypocritical. This is due to two reasons. The first is that Obama, as usual, admitted that the American “commitment to Israel’s security is unshakeable”, which makes his attitude clear and understandable even to his Arab partners. The second reason is that the task of defending Israel’s untenable policy towards Palestinian civilians, and attitudes towards the peace process, needs a bald faced, rather than a hypocritical, politician.


Insofar as he was less hypocritical, Obama’s double standards towards the Palestinians and the Israelis were blunt. An instance of these double standards is that while “Israel must be able to defend itself – by itself – against any threat”, the Palestinian state should be “non-militarized”. Will Palestinians accept to live side by side with a state like Israel in a non-militarized state? If they do, they will make their national security at stake, not because the Israelis are untrustworthy, but because Israel is a state unlike the states. All over the globe, there are states having armies. Israel, by contrast, is an army that has a state.


We have already heard Obama’s nice words in Cairo a few years ago. And nothing has changed since then. The Middle East and North Africa do not need fine words; they need fine actions. As Churchill said, “words are easy and many, while great deeds are difficult and rare”. And as long as America’s commitment to the security of Israel is unshakeable, all American presidents’ promises and nice speeches will remain invitations to eat a pie in the sky.

This article was published on Morocco Board

A Dialogue with an American Conservative

One day I was surfing some pages on Facebook when I came across a page of American conservatives. They had put a picture of President Ronald Reagan as a profile picture of their group. And they had put some slogans of theirs on the page. A status on the page caught my sight; it was "a strong America is a conservative America". 

It occurred to me to tease the group by typing a comment that would outrage the members of the group. I typed: "a strong America is a liberal America". 

A few days later, one of the members sent me offensive messages on Facebook, which brought about a discussion between us. The discussion was as follows:

C. B (I have opted for his name's intials in respect of his privacy): 

you do realize that the liberalism you speak of, is literaly socialism/marxism, everything obama stands for is marxism, high tax, socialist healthcare, big government, many many many un-needed regulations, a socialist is the enemy of the free world, if you want communism, go to north korea, because us americans with common sense, love freedom, right to life,free enterprise, right to private property, the liberal way? oh well the liberal way is, State run buisness, State run healthcare, State run agriculture, and by State, i of course mean Federal Government, with a big capital S, for the big Sacks of Shit they are(they being the "liberal"( all actually socialists).

Then he sent another message, which was as follows:

C. B: oh but of course, your a muslim, i understand why you no nothing of freedom now, you were brainwashed into believing everything the sack of shit muslim barack hussien obama says, GO ISRAEL,GO JEWS,GO JESUS,GO CHRISTIANS.

My response:  

Dear Sir,

Thank you for your message. As you said, may be I don't know what freedom is, but do you really think that this is due to my faith?

In fact I wanted to learn from you about freedom, but unfortunately I have discovered that what you have learnt about Muslims is no more than hatred. Do you think that Muslim say: "GO JESUS,GO CHRISTIANS"?

Ok, then read what my Holy Book, Quran, says about Christians:

"And thou wilt find the nearest of them in affection to those who believe (to be) those who say: Lo! We are Christians. That is because there are among them priests and monks, and because they are not proud. (82) When they listen to that which hath been revealed unto the messengers, thou seest their eyes overflow with tears because of their recognition of the Truth. They say: Our Lord, we believe. Inscribe us as among the witnesses. (83) " (Surat Al Maeda)

And read what my Holy Book says about Jesus and his mother:

"And make mention of Mary in the Scripture, when she had withdrawn from her people to a chamber looking East, (16) And had chosen seclusion from them. Then We sent unto her Our Spirit and it assumed for her the likeness of a perfect man. (17) She said: Lo! I seek refuge in the Beneficent One from thee, if thou art God-fearing. (18) He said: I am only a messenger of thy Lord, that I may bestow on thee a faultless son. (19) She said: How can I have a son when no mortal hath touched me, neither have I been unchaste? (20) He said: So (it will be). Thy Lord saith: It is easy for Me. And (it will be) that We may make of him a Revelation for mankind and a mercy from Us, and it is a thing ordained. (21) And she conceived him, and she withdrew with him to a far place. (22) And the pangs of childbirth drove her unto the trunk of the palm-tree. She said: Oh, would that I had died ere this and had become a thing of naught, forgotten! (23) Then (one) cried unto her from below her, saying: Grieve not! Thy Lord hath placed a rivulet beneath thee, (24) And shake the trunk of the palm-tree toward thee, thou wilt cause ripe dates to fall upon thee. (25) So eat and drink and be consoled. And if thou meetest any mortal, say: Lo! I have vowed a fast unto the Beneficent, and may not speak this day to any mortal. (26) Then she brought him to her own folk, carrying him. They said: O Mary! Thou hast come with an amazing thing. (27) O sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a wicked man nor was thy mother a harlot. (28) Then she pointed to him. They said: How can we talk to one who is in the cradle, a young boy? (29) He spake: Lo! I am the slave of Allah. He hath given me the Scripture and hath appointed me a Prophet, (30) And hath made me blessed wheresoever I may be, and hath enjoined upon me prayer and almsgiving so long as I remain alive, (31) And (hath made me) dutiful toward her who bore me, and hath not made me arrogant, unblest. (32) Peace on me the day I was born, and the day I die, and the day I shall be raised alive! (33) Such was Jesus, son of Mary: (this is) a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt. (34)" (Surat Mariam)

As a Muslim, I love Jesus and his true followers. And I believe that Jesus's message to humanity is peace. And I believe that his enemies who claim to have crucified him are the enemies of peace.

This is my faith.

Stay blessed, and take good care of yourself. 

After this message, my friend responded. And his message was as follows.

C. B: actually, i have no hatred for islam itself, i may not agree with it, but hatred i do not have, tho i do despise the radical extremist element that i believe the CIA and british MI6 actualy fueled, i appologize for the disrespect, but in all reality, peace is a mindset, because as physical beings, no peace as a whole will be seen until the day of judgement, im not sure how you feel about mixed cultures and all, but i believe in america, there should be only one culture, the american culture, weather you be of different religion or not, alot of people come to america and want to force their culture on us(not only muslim, but mexican culture as well) and the american culture to me means liberty, no government regulations as there are now, and a few less laws, please accept my humble appology, i only know of islam from what i hear on the horrible media system in the US, but real peace does not come through liberalism, peace can be sought through ones faith, but many battles must be fought to gain that peace.God bless you brother.

I sent him a response, which was as follows:

My response: Don't worry C. I accept your appology. And I believe that media have been playing a disrespectful role in staining Islam's reputation. I know that you don't have any idea about Islam and its Prophet. I join my voice to yours; I also despise radical extremism. However, I believe that this radical extremism has got many versions; and just as there is Islamic extremism, there are also Christian and Jewish versions of radical extremism. And just as Islamic radical extremism has nothing to do with the teachings of Muhammad, Christian radical extremism has nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus Christ, and Jewish extremism has nothing to do with the teachings of Prophet Moses.

Dear C.,

All God's messengers have got one words; Peace, and the belief in the One True God. Our enemy then is not each other. Our enemy is ignorance. And the more knowledgeable we get about our religions and our Creator, the more peaceful our co-existence gets.

Please listen to the voice of a woman I like and respect.

God bless you, brother. 

The woman I was talking about is Rev. Deborah Lindsay. And I sent him the link to this sermon of hers:

 

My friend seems to decide to stop this discussion at this level, and sent me no response.