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Saturday
Dec312011

Iraq Feature: Counting the Cost of the American Occupation (al Rubei'i and Al-Diyali)

After all these years, there's still this one thing that I can't quite understand. How could the same people who put the first man on the moon -- people who are so intelligent, so good at politics, so important in international affairs -- have made the mistake of invading Iraq? I can imagine two third-world countries deciding to go to war with each other and failing to plan ahead. But the Americans? Americans are good at business, aren't they? Normally, people in business would do a feasibility study. You'd think that you'd do that too before invading an entire country. You should make sure you have the right tools, alternative courses of action, back-up plans. But that didn't happen. There was no plan at all, as far as we could see. They should have been able to see, in a country with so many sectarian and ethnic divides, what would happen. But they didn't. They didn't understand anything.

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Friday
Dec302011

The Latest from Iran (30 December): We're Tough, All is Well, We're Tough, Repeat

See also Iran Feature: The Bluster That Hides Human Rights
The Latest from Iran (29 December): Ahmadinejad on the Campaign Trail


A Hovercraft in This Week's Naval Exercises2055 GMT: Sedition Watch. Mohammad Reza Khatami, a prominent reformist and the brother of the former President, has issued a public statement challenging the "false, baseless, and repetitive claims" in the report sent to Parliament, claiming a foreign-backed plot at "velvet revolution" after the 2009 Presidential election.

2045 GMT: Sanctions Watch. Lawyers for Iran’s Central Bank are preparing to file a motion in a New York federal court to release nearly $2 billion of frozen funds at Citigroup Inc.’s Citibank unit.

The assets were frozen in 2008 after a group of 1,000 victims of international terrorism sought the money as partial payment for a $2.7 billion judgement made against Tehran for its alleged role in the 1983 bombing of a Marine Corps barracks in Beirut that killed 241 people.

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Friday
Dec302011

Syria Video Special: Friday's Protests Beyond the Observers --- Set 2

Friday
Dec302011

Syria Video Special: Friday's Protests Beyond the Observers

Friday
Dec302011

Bahrain 1st-Hand: The Café Where Lattes Have an Extra Shot of Tear Gas (Ellick)

Bahraini security forces fire tear gas outside Costa Coffee on 15 December


The repression has hardly let up, even as the kingdom says it is instituting reforms. And with no place to legally organize, this coffee shop has become an unlikely gathering place for human rights activists and opposition leaders. Indeed, the manager says business has recently increased by 50 percent.

“We disappeared because we had never seen tanks and bullets,” said Ala’a Shehabi, 31, an economics lecturer who avoided the cafe until recently. “But now we have removed the cape of fear and come into the public once again.”

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Friday
Dec302011

Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: The Futility of the Observers?

2049 GMT: There are impressive videos pouring in, and along with eyewitness reports, they show that protests continue into the night across Syria. So far, one of our favorite videos shows a protest taking place, almost completely in the dark after power was cut, in Khirbat al Ghazalah, Daraa. But perhaps the best-lit video shows a large protest in Irbeen, an important suburb of Damascus, and is posted by the Coalition of Free Damascenes For Peaceful Change:

2044 GMT: Two videos claim to show the moment security forces opened fire on protesters in Daraya, a Damascus suburb:

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Friday
Dec302011

Iran Feature: The Bluster That Hides Human Rights (Ebadi)

It's clear that the leadership in Tehran is wracked by internal strife, with divisions deepening between Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his allies. Iran's economy is in tatters, with inflation and unemployment soaring thanks to decades of mismanagement. While popular discontent is not at a high pitch as it was after the June 2009 presidential election, the fundamental conflict between citizens and dictators continues to smolder. Externally, the regime's defiance of international norms—such as this week threatening to close the Strait of Hormuz—have left Iran more isolated than ever.

In response, the regime has created an atmosphere of fear and intimidation, renewing its crackdown against students, civil society leaders and human-rights defenders like my friend and colleague Nasrin Sotoudeh.

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Friday
Dec302011

The Real Net Effect: The Strange Cases of The Cyber-Hoaxers in Syria and Uzbekistan (Doherty & Kendzior)

Tom MacMaster, the real "Gay Girl in Damascus"On July 28, 2011, a 32-year-old Uzbek woman studying in Munich named Gulsumoy Abdujalilova joined Facebook, except she didn't. Then, earlier this month, after horrific abuses from the Uzbekistan government, she tragically and spectacularly took her own life, except she didn't, because she had never existed in the first place.

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Thursday
Dec292011

Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Mr Al-Dabi, Can You See the Violence Now?

A woman paints her message on a street in Deir Ez Zor in northeast Syria: "Down with Bashar"

See also Syria Special: Observing the Observers --- Evidence of The Abuses in Homs
Egypt Video: Alaa Abd-El Fattah Speaks Out After Release from Prison
Egypt Feature: "The One Citizen" --- Political Prisoner Maikel Nabil's Powerful Critique
Egypt Special: Are Writing and Walking Really Such a Threat to the Regime?
Wednesday's Syria (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Will Arab League Observers Make a Difference?


1815 GMT: Egypt. With reports that the march swelled to 1000 demonstrators, protesters on the Free Maikel Nabil are now rallying outside the Supreme Court. On twitter, Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi relays some of the chants:

Bring Maikal from the cell!' "Maikal Maikal you hero, your imprisonment sets the nation free.

O freedom where are you? Scaf is standing between us.

Continuing a strategy increasingly being seen in Egypt, activists are projecting footage of crimes and beatings committed by SCAF onto the Supreme Court walls:

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Thursday
Dec292011

Syria Special: Observing the Observers --- Evidence of The Abuses in Homs

Residents of Homs show observers the body of a 5-year-old child killed by gunfire


Looking at the evidence of the last two days, witnessed by the observers on the ground, the situation in Syria is unsustainable. This evidence clearly implicates the Assad regime, but regardless of who is at fault, this situation is clearly a humanitarian disaster. Contrary to earlier statements by Mohamed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi, nothing about what we have posted above is "reassuring."

To borrow from the Latin phrase, "who is watching the watchers?" As it turns out, thanks to the citizen journalists, the Arab League will now find it very difficult to create their own narrative without mentioning these scenes.

And as these amateur videos spread through the media, the Arab League is likely to feel more international pressure to finally act to end the crisis in Syria.

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