Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

"As fledgling postcolonial states committed to the Palestinian issue, the two countries had a just cause and a sound aspiration to prosperous independence. But beyond brute patriarchal force – a force embodied in the stinginess and cruelty of Deeb’s maternal grandfather – they had no way of articulating either. Moral certainty made them impotent, the film implies, and so they ended up hurting their own citizens more than the enemy."

"A Quiet Revolution" by Leila Ahmed I personally disagree with the word veil and hijab because they are not specific. They both mean a cover, but they don't specify what is covered. "Hijāb" in Arabic means "to cover"/"to hide". "Headscarf" is a more accurate term. 

Jerusalem is your Arab nationalism's pride?

From the archive (2016) A good overview on the MENA region. Making and Unmaking of the Greater Middle East

Jerusalem is Arab nationalism's pride By the Iraqi poet Muzaffer Al-Nawwa'b

This was written by a student two years ago and available in English and Arabic . There is a good point about both Arab nationalism and Islamism being a reaction to the "West". This "West" is not defined though.  In addition, this highlighting of "reaction" ignores or marginalises the action. "Islamism" is neither defined nor specified. The assumption is that ot is homogenous. Islamist currents have not attacked "the West". Even the violent currents have not carried out violent attacks/reacted violently against Israel. Others have always been satified with verbal attacks. Some of them have worked with  Western regimes to undermine the left and the nationalists. Some others have not. Recently, after the Arab uprisings, both the main Islamist parties in Tunisia and Egypt openly demonstrated their friendly relationship with imperialism and have not challenged or tried to question capitalism.  The socio-economic context is excluded f

Classical Syrian cinema The film was released in 1972 and based on a story by Haydar Haydar, a prominent Syrian writer and Arab nationalist. The events of the film/story take place in the aftermath of the formal independence of Syria. The film is subtitled in English.

Radical Arab Nationalism and Political Islam

Leila Ahmed

Anti-semitism and reactionary anti-capitalism

"By 2003, the Libyan government had entered into relations with the International Monetary Fund, privatizing a number of state-owned enterprises. In 2004, Libya opened up 15 new offshore and onshore blocs to drilling. Campbell also chronicles the burrowing actions of the “Western-educated bureaucrats [who] worked to bring Libya into the fold of ‘market reforms,’ and the deepening commercial relations with British capital.”  In 2007, British Petroleum inked a deal with the Libyan Investment Corporation for the exploration of 54,000 square kilometers of the Ghadames and Sirt basins. It also signed training agreements for Libyan professionals, helping create a base for neoliberalism within the government. By 2011, 2800 Libyan professionals were studying in the United Kingdom, learning “Western values” of destatization and thus the removal of the possibility for production and power to be responsive to the demands of the people.  Libya under Qadhaffi was mercurial, but against the

" The post-67 radical movements in the Arab world can also be called 'creeping': no 'big nights,' no general strikes or coordinated revolution ..."  Actually, there were general strikes (in 1978 in Tunisia, for example) and there were "bread uprisings" in Tunisia and Egypt. The problems was that the left was already weak as a pole of attraction, the Islamist organization had attracted more members and had more money. The balance of forces was significantly in favour of the regimes (there were brutal and also supported by external powers to maintain stability). Despite their superiority, a few Islamist organisations either adapted to the regimes repression and containment or were crushed (Algeria with the help of the French), or both (i.e. they joined the regimes parliament in spite of being repressed, e.g. the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt). Also missing in the summary the blunder of the Iraqi Communist Party in the 1950s althought it was the bigg

Left-wing Perspectives on Political Islam (Free subscription may be required to access the article)