Blog

  • Uprisings: Online Resouces

    With protests continuing, here is a partial list of online resources: For Libya: #Feb17; CNN’s Ben Wedeman; @EnoughGaddafi; For Bahrain: #Feb14, @OnlineBahrain; For Yemen: #Feb3; @JNovak_Yemen; Palestinian: #Mar15 Gulf: @dr_davidson, @tobycraigjones For Saudi Arabia: on Twitter: #Mar11; Webpages and blogs: rasid.com, ysoof.com/blog/?p=242, saudiwoman.wordpress.com, alasmari.wordpress.com, saudijeans.org To translate: translate.google.com Based in the U.S., but with extensive contacts…

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  • “A New Bipartisan Consensus Against Low Income People”

    The president’s budget is a prosaic austerity plan that inflicts disproportionate pain on low income Americans. Fundamental questions about the costs of war and the fairness of tax cuts for the rich have been avoided by the decision to narrowly target non-security “discretionary” spending to bear the weight of deficit reduction. It used to be…

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  • Challenges for Change in Algeria

    Tunisia and Egypt are relatively centralized states, Algeria not so, neither politically, nor culturally, nor geographically. Historically, the interior has been difficult to control, and there is no guarantee that the rest of the country would rally to the protests taking place in the capital as in the case of Egypt. The Algerian regime is…

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  • “Mubarak has fallen. The regime didn’t”

    CAIRO — Mubarak has fallen. The regime didn’t. We still have the same cabinet appointed by [Mubarak]. The emergency state is still enforced. Old detainees are still in detentions and new ones since the 25th of January remain missing. There is no public apology for the killing. We hear several executives are being prosecuted, including…

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  • Time to forge new, democratic system

    CAIRO — Last night, February 11, Cairo was the scene of what may well have been the largest street party in world history.  It was incredibly powerful and moving.  Of course, the night’s festivities marked both an end and a beginning. Now is the time for Egypt’s judges, other legal professionals, diplomats, other negotiators, intellectuals,…

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  • Our Man in Cairo

    With Mubarak’s departure, the focus now falls on his chosen successor, Omar Suleiman. According to a classified American diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks, Suleiman was Israel’s pick to succeed Mubarak. But there’s little doubt that he was also the choice of the United States, or at least of one particular American agency with which he…

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  • Online Resources on Egypt and Beyond

    With protests against the Egyptian regime continuing, here is a partial list of resources: A critical Facebook page is “We are all Khaled Said” — also see the associated webpage elshaheeed.co.uk. (For background on Khaled Said, see IPA news release.) See: egyprotest-defense.blogspot.com; live updates at guardian.co.uk; Al-Jazeera English live blog and video, or via YouTube:…

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  • Hungry Gazans Feed Egyptian Troops

    RAFAH, Feb 9, 2011 (IPS) – Mustapha Suleiman, 27, from J Block east of the Rafah crossing with Egypt, crosses through gaps in the iron fence on the border carrying bread, water, meat cans and a handful of vegetables for Egyptian soldiers stationed on the other side. [See at Inter Press Service]

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  • Egypt’s military-industrial complex

    With US-made tear gas canisters fired on protesters in Cairo, Washington’s role in arming Egypt is under the spotlight In early January 2010, Bob Livingston, a former chairman of the appropriations committee in the US House of Representatives, flew to Cairo accompanied by William Miner, one of his staff. The two men were granted meetings…

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  • Uprising Pays Off -– Sort of

    Today I went to a town only 23 kilometers south of Tahrir Square. The plan was to see if the 11-day uprising in Egypt has produced any benefits so far – just by way of finding something different from the insecurity and chaos in Cairo. Kirdasa, a small town known for its flower nurseries and…

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  • Could Rand Paul Force the PATRIOT Act to Lapse this Week?

    The Hill reported Tuesday that Sen. Rand Paul’s, R-Ky., actions in the Senate “might cause the Patriot Act to lapse at the end of the week.” BRUCE FEIN, bruce at thelichfieldgroup.com Fein was deputy attorney general under President Ronald Reagan and is author of “Constitutional Peril: The Life and Death Struggle for Our Constitution and Democracy”…

  • Supreme Court California Prison Ruling

    The New York Times reports today on the Supreme Court’s ruling on California’s prison system: “Conditions in California’s overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday, ordering the state to reduce its prison population by more than 30,000 inmates.”

  • Obama, Netanyahu and AIPAC: Professional Wrestling or Real Fight?

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address a joint meeting of Congress tomorrow. NOURA ERAKAT, nourae at mac.com Erakat works as an adjunct professor of international human rights law in the Middle East at Georgetown University and is the U.S.-based legal advocacy coordinator for the Badil Center for Palestinian Refugee and Residency Rights. She is…

  • Progressives Respond to Obama

    AIMEE ALLISON, aimee at rootsaction.org Co-Executive Director of RootsAction, Allison said today: “Obama will need the support of progressives in his reelection bid, but the biggest issues — from closing Guantanamo to ending war in Iraq to protecting the social safety net haven’t been addressed.” The group released a video today titled “Louder Than Words”…

  • Beyond Obama’s Speech: A “U.S.-Saudi Axis” Backing Counter-Revolution

    JOSEPH MASSAD, jam25 at columbia.edu Massad is associate professor of modern Arab politics and intellectual history at Columbia University. He said today that Obama’s “silence on demonstrations in monarchies (Saudi Arabia, Oman, Jordan, Morocco) and the mild criticisms of Yemen stood in stark contrast with the vehemence of his criticisms of Syria and Libya. The…

  • Obama on Mideast — Chomsky: More Deceptive Rhetoric?

    The Huffington Post reports of Obama’s speech tomorrow: “Obama will outline ‘a single standard’ to apply to Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood and other parties that seek to engage with the United States, the official said. “‘He will say we are happy to engage with any group that renounces violence as a tool for political change,’…

  • Japan Nuclear Disaster: Danger for U.S.

    A New York Times piece titled “In Japan Reactor Failings, Danger Signs for the U.S.” reports: “Emergency vents that American officials have said would prevent devastating hydrogen explosions at nuclear plants in the United States were put to the test in Japan — and failed to work, according to experts and officials with the company…

  • Egypt: Attacking Protesters and Military Convicting Over 5,000

    AP is reporting: “Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak will issue an apology to the Egyptian people on-air in a bid for amnesty.” Democracy Now this morning featured a report on Egypt about the “military court system, which has been used to convict and jail more than 5,000 civilians since January 25, the first day of…

  • The New Yorker’s “Damning” Investigation of NSA Whistleblower Case

    The Government Accountability Project released a statement today: “This week, GAP client Thomas Drake is prominently featured in the May 23 issue of The New Yorker magazine, in an explosive article on widespread corruption and wrongdoing within the National Security Agency. The piece, ‘The Secret Sharer,’ highlights Drake’s legal and proper attempts to expose massive…

  • Israel Firing on Refugee Protesters

    AFP is reporting: “Thousands of bereaved Palestinians in camps in south Lebanon on Monday laid to rest victims of a cross-border Israeli shooting, as shops and schools in the camps closed for a day of mourning. “In the Al-Bass refugee camp, thousands of people gathered for the burial of 17-year-old Mohammed Salem, one of 10…

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