position:commentator

#Facebook bans Milo Yiannopoulos, Alex Jones, other ’dangerous’ figures | TheHill
▻https://thehill.com/policy/technology/441854-facebook-bans-dangerous-figures-including-milo-yiannopoulos-and-alex

Facebook announced Thursday that it has permanently banned a host of prominent figures it described as “dangerous” from its platform, including right-wing commentator and former Breitbart News editor Milo Yiannopoulos, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.

The platform said it has determined that those figures are “dangerous,” and removed them under their policy barring individuals and groups that promote hateful and violent messages.

Zero Percent of Elite Commentators Oppose Regime Change in Venezuela
▻https://fair.org/home/zero-percent-of-elite-commentators-oppose-regime-change-in-venezuela

A FAIR survey of US opinion journalism on Venezuela found no voices in elite corporate media that opposed regime change in that country. Over a three-month period (1/15/19–4/15/19), zero opinion pieces in the New York Times and Washington Post took an anti–regime change or pro-Maduro/Chavista position. Not a single commentator on the big three Sunday morning talkshows or PBS NewsHour came out against President Nicolás Maduro stepping down from the Venezuelan government.

Of the 76 total articles, opinion videos or TV commentator segments that centered on or gave more than passing attention to Venezuela, 54 (72 percent) expressed explicit support for the Maduro administration’s ouster. Eleven (14 percent) were ambiguous, but were only classified as such for lack of explicit language. Reading between the lines, most of these were clearly also pro–regime change. Another 11 (14 percent) took no position, but many similarly offered ideological ammo for those in support.

The Times published 22 pro–regime change commentaries, three ambiguous and five without a position. The Post also spared no space for the pro-Chavista camp: 22 of its articles expressed support for the end to Maduro’s administration, eight were ambiguous and four took no position. Of the 12 TV opinions surveyed, 10 were pro-regime change and two took no position.

Saudi Arabia Declares War on America’s Muslim Congresswomen – Foreign Policy
▻https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/12/11/saudi-arabia-declares-war-on-americas-muslim-congresswomen

https://foreignpolicymag.files.wordpress.com/2018/12/gettyimages-1052288526.jpg

The rise of politicians like El-Sayed, Omar, and Tlaib also undermines a core argument advanced by dictators in the Middle East: that their people are not ready for democracy. “People would not have access to power in their countries but they would if they leave; this destroys the argument by Sisi or bin Salman,” El-Sayed said, referring to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. “What’s ironic is there is no way I would aspire to be in leadership in Egypt, the place of my fathers.”

American allies in the region also fear that the Democratic Party’s new Arab leaders will advocate for political change in their countries. Having spent millions of dollars for public relations campaigns in Western capitals, the Persian Gulf countries feel threatened by any policymakers with an independent interest in and knowledge of the region. They have thus framed these officials’ principled objections to regional violations of human rights and democratic norms as matters of personal bias. One commentator, who is known to echo government talking points and is frequently retweeted by government officials, recently spread the rumor that Omar is a descendent of a “Houthi Yemeni” to undermine her attacks on the Saudi-led war on Yemen.

The most common attack online by the Saudi-led bloc on the Muslim-American Democrats has been to label them as members of the Muslim Brotherhood, or more generally as ikhwanji, an extremist catch-all term. These attacks started long before this year’s elections. In 2014, the UAE even announced a terror list that included the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) for its alleged links to the Muslim Brotherhood.

The attacks attempting to tie Omar and Tlaib to the Muslim Brotherhood started in earnest after CAIR publicly welcomed their election to Congress. One UAE-based academic, Najat al-Saeed, criticized Arabic media for celebrating the two Muslim women’s victories at the midterms, and pointed to CAIR’s support for them as evidence of their ties to the Brotherhood.

Donald Trump Spell-Check : Why Does Our Leader Insist on Capitalizing ’Country’ ? | Alternet
▻https://www.alternet.org/donald-trump-spell-check-why-does-our-leader-insist-capitalizing-country

https://www.alternet.org/sites/default/files/story_images/screen.jpg

Trump’s bizarre spelling choices may seem amusing. But stop laughing: His use of “Country” has a hidden meaning

By Chauncey DeVega / Salon
October 26, 2018, 3:06 AM GMT

There is nothing funny about Donald Trump. Like other autocrats and political thugs he thrives on being underestimated. Last week there was another example of this error by Donald Trump’s detractors and others who oppose him.

On Twitter, his preferred means of communication, Donald Trump proclaimed last week:

When referring to the USA, I will always capitalize the word Country!

Trump was mocked by comedians on late night television for this supposed gaffe. Other prominent voices pointed to Trump’s “misspelling” as further proof that he is a dolt and a fool. By implication, his voters are fools and dolts as well. This version of liberal Schadenfreude is a defining feature in the Age of Trump.

It is small comfort which ignores the fact that Donald Trump’s grammatical errors and odd spelling are — as admitted by White House insiders some months ago — strategic choices designed to make him appear more “folksy” and “authentic.” Trump’s faux-populist appeal depends upon his ability to relate to his supporters by sharing their grievances and hostility toward those liberals and progressives they perceive as looking down on “real Americans.”

To understand Donald Trump, one must begin with the fact that he is an American fascist — an autocrat and authoritarian by instinct, behavior, and values. This is the nucleus of his being. This is the prism through which to best understand Donald Trump.

I asked several leading experts on fascism and authoritarianism to help me understand Trump’s conversion of “Country” into a proper noun.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, author of the forthcoming book “Strongmen: How They Rise, Why They Succeed, How They Fall,” and featured commentator in Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 11/9”:

Trump’s statement that he’ll capitalize the word Country represents yet another attempt to polarize the American population and set up one half as “moral,” "just" and politically and, above all, racially acceptable. It is a technique used by every authoritarian leader, often with success. Some may look at this tweet as just another quirky Trump language proposition, but nothing he does is accidental, including his capitalization strategies.

Richard Frankel, professor of modern German History at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, an expert on the rise of Nazism in Germany whose work has also been featured in Newsweek and on the History News Network:

I see it as another way of saying “America First.” He’s putting the emphasis on country, on nation, on America before anything else. He’s contrasting himself and his followers with those who see America as part of a much larger community of nations, in which cooperation, not confrontation, is what is what’s best for everyone. Those who see it his way are the “real Americans.” Those who don’t are the enemy. It’s the pitting of “America Firsters” against the dreaded “Globalists.” It’s another way to divide the country — inclusion through exclusion.

Jason Stanley, professor of philosophy at Yale University and author of “How Propaganda Works” as well as the new book “How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them”:

Via linguistic style and repetition, Trump is inculcating his followers with an ethic of authoritarian nationalism. Organized religion is a local authoritarian structure; the authority of God is signaled linguistically, by capitalizing “God” or not completely spelling out the word. According to Trump, like “God,” "Country" should be capitalized. This is a linguistic means of signalizing the quasi-religious authority of the nation. And since the nation is not a person, or even a person-like figure, that religious authority should be transferred to its leader, Donald Trump.

It (again) reminded me of this quote from Victor Klemperer’s “Language of the Third Reich”: “Nazism permeated the flesh and blood of the people through single words, idioms and sentence structures which were imposed on them in a million repetitions and taken on board mechanically and unconsciously … language does not simply write and think for me, it also increasingly dictates my feelings and governs my entire spiritual being the more unquestioningly and unconsciously I abandon myself to it.”

Several days after Trump made his declaration about the correct spelling of our “Country,” he announced that he was a proud “nationalist.” Because Trump is a racial authoritarian — and a student of “alt-right” guru Steve Bannon as well as White House adviser Stephen Miller, principal architect of his nativist immigration policy — his brand of nationalism is in no sense “neutral.” It is in reality white nationalism, whether called by that name or not. Donald Trump may evade or deflect from that fact. But it is true nonetheless. This is evident through his repeated and overt hostility toward nonwhites and Muslims.

An embrace of nationalism by Donald Trump fits neatly within his logic for capitalizing the word “Country” when referring to the United States of America.

Benjamin Hett, professor of history at Hunter College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York, author of “Burning the Reichstag: An Investigation into the Third Reich’s Enduring Mystery” as well as the new book “The Death of Democracy: Hitler’s Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic”:

This is language I do not remember hearing from any other president. And this is where the significance of “Country” comes in. Trump the “nationalist” with his capital C in “Country” uses “globalist” as a pejorative. He is step by step dismantling the international infrastructure which the United States created after the Second World War to maintain a democratic and prosperous global order. Just recently he has begun dismantling the key INF treaty with Russia, another horrifically dangerous step. This is all reminiscent of the nationalism of the German administrations of the early 1930s, up to and including Hitler — turn away from the world, turn away from crucial international connections, turn away from peace and democracy. We know, or should know, that this cannot and will not lead anywhere good.

*

Some people laugh when they are terrified. It is not that the situation is funny; rather, their brains process existential dread through the physical act of laughter. This is why so many of us laugh at Donald Trump’s supposed gaffes and misspellings, and his other crude and boorish behavior. Donald Trump’s America is a real thing. We are stuck in it and many of us still cannot believe this has all come to pass. In the final analysis, laughter provides some short-term relief during the walk to the political gallows. The laughter feels good. The noose is still waiting.

#Trump #Fascisme #Typographie #Histoire #Linguistique

Plus de 140 artistes (dont une vingtaine de français) de 18 pays, dont des participants à l’Eurovision signent une lettre appelant au boycott de l’Eurovision 2019 si elle a lieu en israel:

Eurovision, ne blanchissez pas l’occupation militaire et les violations des droits humains par Israël
The Guardian, le 7 septembre 2018
▻https://www.bdsfrance.org/plus-de-140-artistes-signent-une-lettre-appelant-au-boycott-de-leurovisio

Boycott Eurovision Song Contest hosted by Israel
The Guardian, le 7 septembre 2018
▻https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2018/sep/07/boycott-eurovision-song-contest-hosted-by-israel

L-FRESH The LION, musician, Eurovision 2018 national judge (Australia)
Helen Razer, broadcaster, writer (Australia)
Candy Bowers, actor, writer, theatre director (Australia)
Blak Douglas, artist (Australia)
Nick Seymour, musician, producer (Australia)
DAAN, musician, songwriter (Belgium)
Daan Hugaert, actor (Belgium)
Alain Platel, choreographer, theatre director (Belgium)
Marijke Pinoy, actor (Belgium)
Code Rouge, band (Belgium)
DJ Murdock, DJ (Belgium)
Helmut Lotti, singer (Belgium)
Raymond Van het Groenewoud, musician (Belgium)
Stef Kamil Carlens, musician, composer (Belgium)
Charles Ducal, poet, writer (Belgium)
Fikry El Azzouzi, novelist, playwright (Belgium)
Erik Vlaminck, novelist, playwright (Belgium)
Rachida Lamrabet, writer (Belgium)
Slongs Dievanongs, musician (Belgium)
Chokri Ben Chikha, actor, theatre director (Belgium)
Yann Martel, novelist (Canada)
Karina Willumsen, musician, composer (Denmark)
Kirsten Thorup, novelist, poet (Denmark)
Arne Würgler, musician (Denmark)
Jesper Christensen, actor (Denmark)
Tove Bornhoeft, actor, theatre director (Denmark)
Anne Marie Helger, actor (Denmark)
Tina Enghoff, visual artist (Denmark)
Nassim Al Dogom, musician (Denmark)
Patchanka, band (Denmark)
Raske Penge, songwriter, singer (Denmark)
Oktoberkoret, choir (Denmark)
Nils Vest, film director (Denmark)
Britta Lillesoe, actor (Denmark)
Kaija Kärkinen, singer, Eurovision 1991 finalist (Finland)
Kyösti Laihi, musician, Eurovision 1988 finalist (Finland)
Kimmo Pohjonen, musician (Finland)
Paleface, musician (Finland)
Manuela Bosco, actor, novelist, artist (Finland)
Noora Dadu, actor (Finland)
Pirjo Honkasalo, film-maker (Finland)
Ria Kataja, actor (Finland)
Tommi Korpela, actor (Finland)
Krista Kosonen, actor (Finland)
Elsa Saisio, actor (Finland)
Martti Suosalo, actor, singer (Finland)
Virpi Suutari, film director (Finland)
Aki Kaurismäki, film director, screenwriter (Finland)
Pekka Strang, actor, artistic director (Finland)
HK, singer (France)
Dominique Grange, singer (France)
Imhotep, DJ, producer (France)
Francesca Solleville, singer (France)
Elli Medeiros, singer, actor (France)
Mouss & Hakim, band (France)
Alain Guiraudie, film director, screenwriter (France)
Tardi, comics artist (France)
Gérard Mordillat, novelist, filmmaker (France)
Eyal Sivan, film-maker (France)
Rémo Gary, singer (France)
Dominique Delahaye, novelist, musician (France)
Philippe Delaigue, author, theatre director (France)
Michel Kemper, online newspaper editor-in-chief (France)
Michèle Bernard, singer-songwriter (France)
Gérard Morel, theatre actor, director, singer (France)
Daði Freyr, musician, Eurovision 2017 national selection finalist (Iceland)
Hildur Kristín Stefánsdóttir, musician, Eurovision 2017 national selection finalist (Iceland)
Mike Murphy, broadcaster, eight-time Eurovision commentator (Ireland)
Mary Black, singer (Ireland)
Christy Moore, singer, musician (Ireland)
Charlie McGettigan, musician, songwriter, Eurovision 1994 winner (Ireland)
Mary Coughlan, singer (Ireland)
Luka Bloom, singer (Ireland)
Robert Ballagh, artist, Riverdance set designer (Ireland)
Aviad Albert, musician (Israel)
Michal Sapir, musician, writer (Israel)
Ohal Grietzer, musician (Israel)
Yonatan Shapira, musician (Israel)
Danielle Ravitzki, musician, visual artist (Israel)
David Opp, artist (Israel)
Assalti Frontali, band (Italy)
Radiodervish, band (Italy)
Moni Ovadia, actor, singer, playwright (Italy)
Vauro, journalist, cartoonist (Italy)
Pinko Tomažič Partisan Choir, choir (Italy)
Jorit, street artist (Italy)
Marthe Valle, singer (Norway)
Mari Boine, musician, composer (Norway)
Aslak Heika Hætta Bjørn, singer (Norway)
Nils Petter Molvær, musician, composer (Norway)
Moddi, singer (Norway)
Jørn Simen Øverli, singer (Norway)
Nosizwe, musician, actor (Norway)
Bugge Wesseltoft, musician, composer (Norway)
Lars Klevstrand, musician, composer, actor (Norway)
Trond Ingebretsen, musician (Norway)
José Mário Branco, musician, composer (Portugal)
Francisco Fanhais, singer (Portugal)
Tiago Rodrigues, artistic director, Portuguese national theatre (Portugal)
Patrícia Portela, playwright, author (Portugal)
Chullage, musician (Portugal)
António Pedro Vasconcelos, film director (Portugal)
José Luis Peixoto, novelist (Portugal)
N’toko, musician (Slovenia)
ŽPZ Kombinat, choir (Slovenia)
Lluís Llach, composer, singer-songwriter (Spanish state)
Marinah, singer (Spanish state)
Riot Propaganda, band (Spanish state)
Fermin Muguruza, musician (Spanish state)
Kase.O, musician (Spanish state)
Soweto, band (Spanish state)
Itaca Band, band (Spanish state)
Tremenda Jauría, band (Spanish state)
Teresa Aranguren, journalist (Spanish state)
Julio Perez del Campo, film director (Spanish state)
Nicky Triphook, singer (Spanish state)
Pau Alabajos, singer-songwriter (Spanish state)
Mafalda, band (Spanish state)
Zoo, band (Spanish state)
Smoking Souls, band (Spanish state)
Olof Dreijer, DJ, producer (Sweden)
Karin Dreijer, singer, producer (Sweden)
Dror Feiler, musician, composer (Sweden)
Michel Bühler, singer, playwright, novelist (Switzerland)
Wolf Alice, band (UK)
Carmen Callil, publisher, writer (UK)
Julie Christie, actor (UK)
Caryl Churchill, playwright (UK)
Brian Eno, composer, producer (UK)
AL Kennedy, writer (UK)
Peter Kosminsky, writer, film director (UK)
Paul Laverty, scriptwriter (UK)
Mike Leigh, writer, film and theatre director (UK)
Ken Loach, film director (UK)
Alexei Sayle, writer, comedian (UK)
Roger Waters, musician (UK)
Penny Woolcock, film-maker, opera director (UK)
Leon Rosselson, songwriter (UK)
Sabrina Mahfouz, writer, poet (UK)
Eve Ensler, playwright (US)
Alia Shawkat, actor (US)

#Palestine #BDS #Boycott_culturel #Eurovision

The late Inas and Bayan Khammash
Haaretz.com - Gideon Levy - Aug 12, 2018 2:50 AM
Imagine the reaction if Hamas had killed a pregnant Israeli woman and her baby daughter. But Inas and Bayan were Palestinians from Dir al-Balah

▻https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-the-late-inas-and-bayan-khammash-1.6365468

https://www.haaretz.com/polopoly_fs/1.6365470.1534030949!/image/4175247254.jpg_gen/derivatives/headline_1200x630/4175247254.jpg

For Uri Avnery

While the thirst for blood overtook social media; while commentator Shimon Riklin tweeted, “We want you to kill terrorists, and as many as possible, until the cries of their families overcome their sick murderousness”; while Minister Yoav Galant, a man whose hands are stained with a great deal of Gazan blood, declared with Biblical lyricism, “I’ll pursue my enemies and catch them, I won’t come back until they’re finished”; while Yair Lapid was writing, “The IDF must hit them with all its force, without hesitating, without thinking” – while all this was happening, Inas and Bayan Khammash were killed.

They were mother and daughter. Inas was 23, in her ninth month of pregnancy; Bayan was an 18-month-old baby. They were killed when a missile hit their home, a rented apartment in a one-story building in Dir al-Balah in the Gaza Strip. The father of the family, Mohammed, was seriously wounded.

Their killing didn’t slake the thirst for blood on social media in the slightest. It barely earned a mention in the mainstream Israeli media, which were far more concerned by the cancellation of a wedding in Sderot. That’s always Israel’s order of priorities.

It’s not that the suffering of residents of Israeli communities near Gaza shouldn’t be given abundant coverage, but the complete disregard for the victims on the other side, even the killing of a pregnant mother and her daughter, is an act of collaboration with wartime propaganda. The complete public indifference to every killing, coupled with the thirst for blood that has become politically correct, is also evidence of an unparalleled nadir.

It’s not hard to imagine what would have happened, both in Israel and abroad, if Hamas had killed a pregnant Israeli woman and her baby daughter. But Inas and Bayan were Palestinians from Dir al-Balah.

Are there still any Israelis who glanced for a moment at their own loved ones and imagined the atrocity of killing a pregnant mother with her baby in her arms? Does the thought still pass through anyone’s mind here that Inas and Bayan were a pregnant mother and her baby daughter, like the neighbors across the way? Like your daughter and granddaughter. Like your wife and daughter.

Can thoughts like these still arise even for a moment, given the onslaught of dehumanization, propaganda and brainwashing, which justifies any killing and blames the entire world, with the sole exception of those who committed it? Given the media, most of which just wants to see more and more blood being spilled in Gaza, and even does everything in its power so that blood will actually be spilled? Given the usual excuses that the Israel Defense Forces never intend to hit a pregnant woman and her daughter, they merely happen to do so, again and again and again and again?

Given all this, is there still any chance that the killing of a mother and daughter will shock anyone here? That it will touch anyone?

For almost 12 years, Gaza has been closed to Israeli journalists on Israel’s orders, and Israel’s fighting media accepts this submissively, even gladly. How badly I wish I could go to Inas and Bayan’s house right now, to tell their story and, above all, to remind the reader that they were human beings, people – a very difficult thing to do in the atmosphere of today’s Israel.

On one of our last trips to Gaza, in September 2006, photographer Miki Kratsman and I went to the Hammad family’s house in the Brazil refugee camp in Rafah. A huge crater had opened up a few hundred meters from the miserable tin shack we entered. In the dim room, we saw nothing but a crushed wheelchair and a crippled woman lying on the sofa.

A few nights earlier, the family heard airplanes overhead. Basma, then 42 and completely paralyzed, was lying in her iron bed. She quickly told her only daughter, 14-year-old Dam al-Iz, to rush to her so she could protect the girl with her own body. A concrete roof crashed down on them and killed Dam, her only daughter, who was lying curled up in her mother’s arms.

Ever since Inas and Bayan were killed, I’ve been thinking about Dam al-Iz and her mother again.

Inthe year of the pig
directed and produced by Emile de Antonio. Presented by Pathe Contemporary Films. At the New Yorker Theater, Broadway and 88th Street. Running time 103 minutes. (This film has not been submitted to the Motion Picture of America’s Production Code and Rating Administration for rating as to audience suitability.)

▻https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sz8H_oi1ck0

Vietnam
In the Year of the Pig
at Symphony II
By JIM FROSCH, March 7, 1969
▻http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1969/3/7/in-the-year-of-the-pig
EMILE DE ANTONIO’S documentary “In the Year of the Pig” has done something it’s getting harder and harder to do—it has made the Vietnamese War real. This is no easy task now that 1965-style moral indignation has waned and the War has become an idea. The film succeeds brilliantly because its director has exploited the possibilities of the documentary form and seen its relevance to our perception of the war as part of our lives.

The magic of the documentary is that it depends on something most films try to avoid—detachment. It sustains a tension between involvement and detachment which is very much like the normal tension of our lives. In life there are events and detached observations, actors and analyzers. The difference between talking and acting is more subtle than it seems. Comment, the willed use of the mind, demands distance—the commentator toys with his own responses and tries to isolate consciousness from living. This hurts very often because it is unnatural; you have to learn how to do it. And, by definition, it is alienating.

The genius of de Antonio is that he realizes that we see the actual War as a sort of documentary film. The same tensions between involvement and detachment that we experience looking at a film we also experience “looking” at the war or, for that matter, any contemporary historical event.

Modi’s Strongman Economics - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/09/opinion/narendra-modi-india-strongman.html

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2017/07/06/opinion/08roberts-inyt/06roberts-inyt-facebookJumbo.jpg

Especially worrying are the consequences of Mr. Modi’s political character. For all his strongman economist posturing, he never repudiates his longstanding Hindu nationalist views. Members of religious minorities fear growing intolerance. Mob violence has increased. Mr. Modi, a lively Twitter commentator, remains quiet for too long and does little to stop the violence.

Sectarian strife and instability, a worry in itself, also matters for the economy. Who wants to invest if arbitrary political decisions can threaten whole industries? Crackdowns on alcohol sales in much of India badly hurt the tourism industry. Attacks on the trade in cow and buffalo meat threaten an industry that creates jobs for many and that last year earned India much-needed exports worth $4 billion.

India’s tolerant, secular character forms the bedrock on which a strong economy can be built. You need not be a big economist to grasp that it would be crazy to weaken that foundation.

#Economie #Inde

Remembering Hans Rosling, the visualization pioneer who made data dance - The Washington Post
▻https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/02/08/remembering-hans-rosling-the-visualization-pioneer-who-made-data-dan

Professor Hans Rosling, the statistician and epidemiologist who brought dramatic flair to animated visualizations of dry public health data, has died in Finland of pancreatic cancer, according to the foundation he started with his children.

For much of the public not steeped in the arcana of epidemiological data sets or data visualization techniques (a.k.a. normal people), Rosling burst onto the scene in 2010 as part of the BBC special “The Joy of Stats.” “Hans Rosling’s famous lectures combine enormous quantities of public data with a sport’s commentator’s style to reveal the story of the world’s past, present and future development,” the BBC wrote at the time.

#visualisation #développement #hans_rosling

@Leb12er sur Twitter: Egyptian TV commentator roasts Wahhabi Imam of Mecca’s Grand Mosque ??
▻https://mobile.twitter.com/Leb12er/status/771916411388235776

Women-led mosque opens in Denmark
▻https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/12/women-led-mosque-opens-in-denmark

(Février 2016)

https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/27f0ca486cc0fbe9a7d9bd4105b39bc36e3a0f4a/0_135_2280_1367/master/2280.jpg?w=1920&q=55&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=6d0c4158454bcfdeccd70797b793fb95

Scandinavia’s first female-led mosque has opened in Copenhagen in a bid to challenge “patriarchal structures” and create debate and dialogue, its founder has said.

Sherin Khankan, born in Denmark to a Syrian father and a Finnish mother, said that while all activities at the Mariam mosque except Friday prayers would be open to both men and women, all imams would be female.

“We have normalised patriarchal structures in our religious institutions. Not just in Islam, but also within Judaism and Christianity and other religions. And we would like to challenge that,” she said.

Reactions from the city’s Muslim community have mostly been positive, with negative feedback “moderate”, she said.

Khankan, a well-known commentator and author in Denmark, said there was “an Islamic tradition allowing women to be imams” and that most of the criticism was based on ignorance.

Egypt Suspends 8 Female TV Anchors, Saying They Are Overweight - The New York Times
▻http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/18/world/middleeast/egypt-suspends-8-female-tv-anchors-saying-they-are-overweight.html

Alaa el-Sadani, a commentator for Al-Ahram, said that she was “sickened by the disgusting and repulsive” appearance of the eight suspended anchors, and that she believed the rest of the country agreed with her.

Fatma al-Sharawi, another Al-Ahram writer, welcomed the move as a way to improve the abysmal ratings of the state channels. “Is a ban for eight enough?” she asked.

Viewership of state television, long dismissed by many Egyptians as a comically biased news source, fell significantly after the uprising that removed President Hosni Mubarak from power in 2011.

“They don’t understand that people don’t watch them because they have no credibility, skills or quality,” said Mostafa Shawky, a free-press advocate with the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression. “It has nothing to do with looks. But it goes to show that actual skill is not something they care about.”

Décès du journaliste égyptien Mohamed Hassanein Heikal à l’âge de 93 ans.

Mohamed Hassanein Heikal n’est plus
▻http://www.businessnews.com.tn/Mohamed-Hassanein-Heikal-n%E2%80%99est-plus,520,62529,3

L’écrivain et journaliste égyptien, Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, est décédé ce mercredi 17 février 2016 à l’âge de 93 ans, après un long combat avec la maladie.
 
Mohamed Hassanein Heikal était l’un des journalistes les plus connus en Egypte. Il a été le rédacteur en chef du journal Al Ahram de 1957 à 1974.

Mohamed Hassanein Heikal
▻https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed_Hassanein_Heikal

Mohamed Hassanein Heikal (Arabic: محمد حسنين هيكل‎) ( 23 September 1923 – 17 February 2016) was an Egyptian journalist. For 17 years (1957–1974), he was editor-in-chief of the Cairo newspaper Al-Ahram and has been a commentator on Arab affairs for more than 50 years.

Heikal articulated the thoughts of President Gamal Abdel Nasser earlier in his career. He worked as a ghostwriter for the Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and represented the ideology of pan-Arabism.

Are the U.S. and Allies Getting Too Cozy With Al Qaeda’s Affiliate in Syria?
▻http://blog.peaceactionwest.org/2015/07/24/are-the-u-s-and-allies-getting-too-cozy-with-al-qaedas-affilia

Reporting on al Nusra’s recent victories in Idlib, Charles Lister at Brookings reported:

“Several commanders involved in leading recent Idlib operations confirmed to this author that the U.S.-led operations room in southern Turkey, which coordinates the provision of lethal and non-lethal support to vetted opposition groups, was instrumental in facilitating their involvement in the operation from early April onwards. That operations room — along with another in Jordan, which covers Syria’s south — also appears to have dramatically increased its level of assistance and provision of intelligence to vetted groups in recent weeks.

Whereas these multinational operations rooms have previously demanded that recipients of military assistance cease direct coordination with groups like Jabhat al-Nusra, recent dynamics in Idlib appear to have demonstrated something different. Not only were weapons shipments increased to the so-called “vetted groups,” but the operations room specifically encouraged a closer cooperation with Islamists commanding frontline operations.” [emphasis added]

As news of the coalition victories spread, the Wall Street Journal published a piece entitled “To US Allies, Al Qaeda Affiliate in Syria Becomes the Lesser Evil” that reinforces the possibility some U.S. military leaders also see such collaboration with al Qaeda as a legitimate option. The author of the article spoke with retired US Admiral James Stavridis , a recent Supreme Allied Commander of NATO who oversaw the 2011 Libya campaign. Discussing the new role of key US allies backing a coalition that includes the al Qaeda affiliate, the Admiral compared the relationship to partnering with Stalin in World War II:

“It is unlikely we are going to operate side by side with cadres from Nusra, but if our allies are working with them, that is acceptable. If you look back to World War II, we had coalitions with people that we had extreme disagreements with, including Stalin’s Russia,” said Mr. Stavridis, now dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Boston.

“I don’t think that is a showstopper for the U.S. in terms of engaging with that coalition.” [emphasis added]

It is important to note that the head of al Nusra though indicating an unwillingness to attack the West for now, still pledges allegiance to Ayman Zawahiri, the long time deputy to Osama Bin Laden, and currently the official head of Al Qaeda. In addition, human rights groups have pointed to al Nusra’s “systematic and widespread violations including targeting civilians, kidnappings, and executions.” Al Nusra has engaged in lethal car bombing attacks targeting civilians and they have actively recruited child soldiers. Like ISIS, al Nusra has treated women and girls in areas they control particularly harshly. In addition to strict and discriminatory rules on dress, employment and freedom of movement there have been abductions of women and even executions of at least one woman accused of adultery.

Despite all this, retired Adm. Stavridis isn’t the only commentator who finds our allies’ involvement with al Nusra ‘acceptable’. The prominent foreign policy journal, Foreign Affairs published a piece this year entitled “Accepting Al Qaeda: The Enemy of the United States’ Enemy.” The author, Barak Mendelsohn, makes the case that al Qaeda staying “afloat” is better for US interests, citing threats to US allies from Iran and the Islamic State. A couple weeks later Lina Khatib , the director of the Carnegie Middle East Center, wrote in a piece that “Nusra’s pragmatism and ongoing evolution mean that it could become an ally in the fight against the Islamic State”.

#blanchiment_de_Qaïda

Saudis jail Pakistani who allegedly criticized Yemen airstrikes
▻http://www.latimes.com/world/afghanistan-pakistan/la-fg-saudis-pakistan-arrest-blogger-20150703-story.html

Les citoyens des pays qui acceptent l’argent des Saoud doivent la fermer.

controversial Pakistani commentator has been jailed in Saudi Arabia and reportedly sentenced to receive 1,000 lashes for allegedly criticizing the Saudi government while on a religious pilgrimage.

Saudi authorities have so far denied consular access to Zaid Hamid, who was arrested last month in the holy city of Medina while traveling with his wife.

The #Gambia Gambit
▻http://africasacountry.com/the-gambia-gambit

“Everybody who is written about has an image of what he will look like on the printed page. He is always disappointed,” wrote the South African commentator Jonny Steinberg … …And.....

#AFRICA_IS_A_COUNTRY #Conservative_Party #Ema_Solberg #immigration #JOURNALISM #MEDIA #Norway #Prime_Minister #racism #Scandalnavia

The forgotten coup - how America and Britain crushed the government of their ’ally’, Australia
▻http://johnpilger.com/articles/the-forgotten-coup-how-america-and-britain-crushed-the-government-of-the

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/E1276-8_PM_Australia_Whitlam_tone.jpg

Australia briefly became an independent state during the Whitlam years, 1972-75. An American commentator wrote that no country had “reversed its posture in international affairs so totally without going through a domestic revolution”. Whitlam ended his nation’s colonial servility. He abolished Royal patronage, moved Australia towards the Non-Aligned Movement, supported “zones of peace” and opposed nuclear weapons testing.

Although not regarded as on the left of the Labor Party, Whitlam was a maverick social democrat of principle, pride and propriety. He believed that a foreign power should not control his country’s resources and dictate its economic and foreign policies. He proposed to “buy back the farm”. In drafting the first Aboriginal lands rights legislation, his government raised the ghost of the greatest land grab in human history, Britain’s colonisation of Australia, and the question of who owned the island-continent’s vast natural wealth.

Latin Americans will recognise the audacity and danger of this “breaking free” in a country whose establishment was welded to great, external power. Australians had served every British imperial adventure since the Boxer rebellion was crushed in China. In the 1960s, Australia pleaded to join the US in its invasion of Vietnam, then provided “black teams” to be run by the CIA. US diplomatic cables published last year by WikiLeaks disclose the names of leading figures in both main parties, including a future prime minister and foreign minister, as Washington’s informants during the Whitlam years.
...
When Whitlam was re-elected for a second term, in 1974, the White House sent Marshall Green to Canberra as ambassador. Green was an imperious, sinister figure who worked in the shadows of America’s “deep state”. Known as the “coupmaster”, he had played a central role in the 1965 coup against President Sukarno in Indonesia - which cost up to a million lives. One of his first speeches in Australia was to the Australian Institute of Directors - described by an alarmed member of the audience as “an incitement to the country’s business leaders to rise against the government”.
...
On 11 November - the day Whitlam was to inform Parliament about the secret CIA presence in Australia - he was summoned by Kerr. Invoking archaic vice-regal “reserve powers”, Kerr sacked the democratically elected prime minister. The “Whitlam problem” was solved, and Australian politics never recovered, nor the nation its true independence.

L’article de John Pilger cite une richesse de documents qui détaillent les activités du MI 6 et de la CIA contre le premier ministre démocratiquement élu Gough Whitlam.

Sur Wikipedia on trouve un récit du coup d’état orchestré par la CIA qui évite de mentionner les information disponibles aujourd’hui. Dans l’encycopédie de crowd on ne parle que d’une crise constitutionnelle. Va savoir pourquoi.

1975 Australian constitutional crisis
▻http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional_crisis

#Australie #politique #USA #CIA #MI6 #histoire

Donc #el-Sissi est le “nouveau Nasser”,

Egypt: Hamas ’could have saved dozens of lives’ with truce | News , Middle East | THE DAILY STAR
▻http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2014/Jul-17/264252-egypt-hamas-could-have-saved-dozens-of-lives-with-truce.ashx#ax

CAIRO: Egypt’s foreign minister said Thursday that Hamas could have saved dozens of lives if it had accepted a Cairo-mediated truce earlier this week in its conflict with Israel.

“Had Hamas accepted the Egyptian proposal, it could have saved the lives of at least 40 Palestinians,” Sameh Shoukri said, quoted by state news agency MENA.

Follow Friday: #sarah_kendzior, commentator, and the ‘full Kendzior’ | Crikey
▻http://www.crikey.com.au/2014/01/24/follow-friday-sarahkendzior-commentator-and-the-full-kendzior

Central Asian studies is a dying field, and many of the experts of the region are now unemployed or doing work that has nothing to do with Central Asia. Without money and jobs, the research stops. One of the best-known analysts of Central Asia is training to become a dentist. The world’s foremost scholar of Tajikistan is unemployed.

The reason is that the money is gone. [US government] funding supporting scholars of Russia and Eurasia was cut. The [2013 budget sequestration] resulted in lay-offs for Central Asia analysts working for the government. Because of the drawdown in Afghanistan, think tank positions dedicated to Central Asia were eliminated. News outlets that covered the region lost funding. There is nowhere for the younger generation of Central Asia scholars to go.

The implications of this are greater than the effect on the scholars in question. Before the Soviet Union collapsed, Central Asia was rarely studied (other than by Soviet researchers forced to censor and manipulate their own findings). Westerners who studied Central Asia tended to do so through a Soviet lens that privileged Russian language and Russian speakers. This changed in the 1990s and 2000s, when scholars traveled to the region, learned local languages, collaborated with local scholars and produced ethnographically rich work that valued Central Asia in its own right. Historians translated forgotten texts that changed not only perceptions of Central Asia, but how Central Asia relates to the world. (Adeeb Khalid’s work on Islamic intellectual history is a great example.)

And now it is ending. It is a loss for knowledge and also a deeply stupid move on the part of the US government, who will inevitably be looking for analysts if and when the region experiences turmoil, and may not be able to find people with up-to-date language skills and regional knowledge.

I’m happy to say there are a few exceptions to this trend. One is George Washington University, with whom I’m working on an initiative to translate Uzbek online works and publish them, with annotated commentary, on the internet. My favourite commentators on Central Asia are Uzbek poets. If you want to learn about Central Asia, read a report; if you want to understand Central Asia, read a poem.

#Asie_centrale #recherche

Michael Oren joins CNN as Middle East commentator

And he will be, of course, “balanced”
Haaretz
▻http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/1.569021

Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States, has joined CNN as a commentator on the Middle East, JTA reported Thursday, quoting the news channel. 

The U.S.-born Oren, who handed over his ambassadorial post in September to Ron Dermer, was very popular with American Jewish groups during his four-year stint in Washington. Before that, he wrote two best-selling books of history - “Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East,” and “Power, Faith and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present.”

Saudi looking for new allies in Europe | GulfNews.com
▻http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/saudi-arabia/saudi-looking-for-new-allies-in-europe-1.1260382

Iran’s nuclear deal with global powers is “more dangerous than 9/11,” according to a commentator in the Saudi-owned Asharq Al Awsat newspaper, who likened the impact of last weekend’s historic pact to the terrorist attacks on the US in 2001. The startling comparison underscores the depth of fear among Gulf states about Iran’s potential rise as a regional superpower. “Obama sold the region, abandoning the US’s historic alliance with the Gulf,” Tariq Al Homayed wrote in the pan-Arab newspaper.

The Chinese commentator’s observation is not entirely novel. In 1999, political analyst Samuel P. Huntington warned that for much of the world, the U.S. is “becoming the rogue superpower,” seen as “the single greatest external threat to their societies.”

A few months into the Bush term, Robert Jervis, president of the American Political Science Association, warned that “In the eyes of much of the world, in fact, the prime rogue state today is the United States.” Both Huntington and Jervis warned that such a course is unwise. The consequences for the U.S. could be harmful.

▻http://www.alternet.org/world/chomsky-who-wants-be-us?paging=off
#post-american world

Israeli commentator: I would give murderous blows to conscientious objectors if allowed
▻http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/features/updates/6582-israeli-commentator-i-would-give-murderous-blows-to-conscienti

Israeli analyst and commentator Ben Caspit said he would give “murderous blows” to conscientious objector Natan Blanc, Ishai Menuchin (one of the founders of Yesh Gvul) and other conscientious objectors “if it was permitted”.

(Ben Caspit est notamment chroniqueur sur Al Monitor.)

The photos Saudi Arabia doesn’t want seen – and proof Islam’s most holy relics are being demolished in Mecca - Middle East - World - The Independent
▻http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/the-photos-saudi-arabia-doesnt-want-seen--and-proof-islams-most-holy-

The authorities in Saudi Arabia have begun dismantling some of the oldest sections of Islam’s most important mosque as part of a highly controversial multi-billion pound expansion.

Photographs obtained by The Independent reveal how workers with drills and mechanical diggers have started demolishing some Ottoman and Abbasid sections on the eastern side of the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca.

Plenty to Hide
►http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty-national-security/plenty-hide

A commentator on my recent post about the DEA installing license plate scanners on the nation’s interstate highways asks, “If you aren’t doing anything illegal why would you care if someone captures your license plate number?”

Another commentator countered: “If I’m not doing anything illegal, why do the police need to record my license plate number?”

It’s a great response. In essence, it points to our civilization’s core principle that the government is not supposed to look over our shoulder unless it has particularized suspicion that we are involved in wrongdoing.

But the original poster’s point is a frequent refrain: “Why should I care about surveillance if I have nothing to hide?” As a privacy advocate I have heard this question for many years, and over time developed my own list of answers, aided by the sharp thinking of others who have grappled with this question, such as Dan Solove and Bruce Schneier.

Here are the answers to this question that I have settled upon over time:

Some people do have something to hide, but not something that the government ought to gain the power to reveal. People hide many things from even their closest friends and family: the fact that they are gay, the fact that they are sick, the fact that they are pregnant, the fact that they are in love with someone else. Though your private life may be especially straightforward, that should not lead you to support policies that would intrude on the more complicated lives of others. There’s a reason we call it private life.

You may not have anything to hide, but the government may think you do. One word: errors. If we allow the government to start looking over our shoulders just in case we might be involved in wrongdoing—mistakes will be made. You may not think you have anything to hide, but still might end up in the crosshairs of a government investigation, or entered into some government database, or worse. The experience with terrorist watch lists over the past 10 years has shown that the government is highly prone to errors, and tends to be sloppily overinclusive in those it decides to flag as possibly dangerous.