Operating on consular-like hours (10 a.m. to 2 p.m.), what might be called the Fatwa Desk of Al Azhar University in Egypt pumps out religious decrees. One can imagine a sort of DMV-esque scene, with weary patrons padding along Cairo’s streets to get to the university early, trundling to the front of the line to [...]
Archive for the ‘Human Rights’ Category
What the fatwa?
Posted in Egypt, Human Rights on June 12, 2007 | 1 Comment »
“Can you understand now why we HATE U.S. politicians?” – H Con Resolution 152
Posted in Human Rights, Israel, Palestine, The Big Picture, The United States in the Middle East on June 7, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Hundreds of pieces of legislation pass through Congress on a daily basis.
But, as Palestinian blogger Sabbah writes, H. Con Resolution 152 really has a special place in Arab hearts: “Can you understand now why we HATE U.S. politicians?”
Passed by a voice vote on the anniversary of Israeli’s victory in the Six-Day War, HRes. 152 [...]
Nigeria and Sharia
Posted in Human Rights, Nigeria on April 15, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Welcome to Nigeria, population 131,859,731, 50% Muslim, 40% Christian (10% indigenous beliefs), facing the dual-threat of those aiming to impose Islamic Sharia law and a political reality that the Council on Foreign Relations calls the “Godfather Syndrome.” More on Godfather Syndrome in posts to come.
If you’re unsure as to the dictates of Sharia, I won’t [...]
A Wish, and How It Grew
Posted in Human Rights on April 15, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Happy Sunday, everyone. I’ve been watching the Sunday morning yak shows and have heard way too much about Don Imus (including Pat Buchanan and Tony Brinkley saying that Imus was “lynched”).
In a much needed diversion, I picked up today’s Washington Post to find this fabulous story on the front of the Style section.
Here is the [...]
Your Iraqi Claims Pocket Card
Posted in Human Rights, Iraq, The United States in the Middle East on April 13, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
The American Civil Liberties Union has built an online database of 500 “claims” by Iraqi citizens on the American armed forces due to death or injury caused by U.S. troops. The database is extremely extensive, attaching the PDF-ed claim files to each of the cases.
OWGA came by this database via this excellent article in the [...]
Mapping Darfur’s Pain
Posted in Darfur, Human Rights on April 12, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
While not exactly a part of what I’m trying to do on this blog, the current crisis in Darfur deserves a little bit of time considering this work by Google and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. (The USHMM has an excellent page dedicated to genocide all over the world.)
All you need is the [...]
The Right of Return: Moot?
Posted in Human Rights, Israel, Jordan, Palestine, Syria on April 11, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Question: What is the only issue in the Palestinian conflict that has its own interest group here in the U.S.?
That would be the Right of Return (the group is Al-Awda.) And they should find new jobs, according to Saudi columnist Yousef Nasser al-Sweiden. While al-Sweiden doesn’t call out al-Awda, he does argue, in two separate [...]
Worse Than Apartheid?
Posted in Human Rights, Israel, Palestine, The United States in the Middle East on April 10, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Robert Novak details his visit to Jerusalem and the surrounding towns, writing that the Palestinians feel their situation is worse than the apartheid imposed upon Black citizens of South Africa. As evidence, he points to the hardship imposed by the Israeli security wall, the rough treatment of Palestinian youth by the Israeli government and the [...]
The Unrecognized
Posted in Human Rights, Israel, Palestine on April 8, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
Check out this five-minute documentary on the plight of Bedouin Arabs living in the Naqab (Negev) Desert in southern Israel. It’s one thing to talk about socio-economic disparity and quite another to see two towns, Omer (established 1950), an Israeli settlement, and Tarabin al-Sana, a Bedouin town across the highway, where the former looks like [...]
