By George Friedman GEOPOLITICAL WEEKLY, STRATFOR Lebanon was created out of the Sykes-Picot Agreement. This agreement between Britain and France reshaped the collapsed Ottoman Empire south of Turkey into the states we know today — Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, and to some extent the Arabian Peninsula as well. For nearly […]
More than 1.3 million foreign pilgrims are expected to perform Haj this year, according to the Haj Ministry. South Asian countries will send the largest contingent of 410,000 Hajis followed […]
by Robert Fisk, The Independent So once again, the Fairy Godmother of the Middle East steps on to the stage. Qatar, the nation which supposedly paid £40m to free 13 […]
216. And every one has a goal which dominates him; vie, then, with one another in good works [2:149] And every one has a goal which dominates him; vie, then, with one another in good works. Wherever you be, Allah will bring you all together. Surely, Allah has the power […]
Guardian: Two weeks ago, nine of us from the London Palestine Action networktravelled to the village of Shenstone in Staffordshire and occupied the roof of an Israeli-owned drone engine factory. We closed […]
Summary by Charles Krauthammer, The Daily Star Baghdad called President Barack Obama’s bluff and he came through. With the support of U.S. airstrikes, Iraqi and Kurdish forces have retaken the Mosul dam. In following through, Obama demonstrated three things: the effectiveness of even limited U.S. power, the vulnerability of the […]
MARIA ZAIN Every human being comes into this world by decree of Allah, and with him or her, carries a life journey that has been pre-ordained, written and endorsed by […]
215. Help not one another in sin and transgression. [5:3] O ye who believe! profane not the Signs of Allah, nor the Sacred Month, nor the animals brought as an offering, nor the animals of sacrifice wearing collars, nor those repairing to the Sacred House, seeking grace from their Lord, […]
Fareed Zakaria| The Daily Star Hillary Clinton was expressing what has become Washington’s new conventional wisdom when she implied, in her interview with Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic, “moderates” might have prevented the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS). In fact, America has provided massive […]
Source: Huff Post Amidst the ongoing violence in the region, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia prodded Muslims “to stand in the face of those trying to hijack Islam,” alluding to the advance of the extremist group, the Islamic State (IS/ISIS). A debate on Islam, however, is exactly what the Muslim […]
The Daily Star, Lebanon Palestinian officials and negotiators who have been shuttling around in Cairo recently have for the most part focused on a demand championed by people in Gaza, namely ending the Israeli blockade. But the latest round of military hostilities between Israel and Palestinian factions in Gaza has […]
by Rami G. Khouri, Daily Star, Lebanon Summary There is neither symmetry nor equivalence in the capabilities or the suffering of Palestinians and Israelis who have battled each other nonstop since 1947-48 . The almost equal number of attacks by each side against the other was not matched by the […]
Daily Mail: Saudi Arabia has officially identified atheists as terrorists in sweeping new laws that threaten up to 20 years in prison for almost any criticism of the government or Islam. The regulations place secular citizens who commit thought crimes in the same category as violent terrorist groups such as […]
Epigraph: At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” He called a little child to him, and placed […]
Sky News: The threat posed by Islamic State militants, who have seized control of large parts of Syria and Iraq, is “beyond anything we’ve seen”, according to US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. READ MORE…
by Rami G. Khouri, Daily Star, Lebanon Summary The dramatic expansion of the territory controlled by the “Islamic State” in Syria and Iraq in the last few months has generated a historic moment of reckoning in several arenas in those two countries, which mirror similar trends across the entire region. […]
Summary Visiting the Kurdish capital Irbil, Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai called Wednesday on the international community to help Iraq’s minorities, asking the country’s Christians to stick to their roots and […]
Telegraph: The president of the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country, Indonesia, has called the actions of Islamic State militants “embarrassing” to the religion and urged Islamic leaders to unite in tackling extremism. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said the scale of the slaughter wrought by the extremists in overrunning large swathes of […]
Global Post: BERLIN, Germany — European leaders reacted to the execution of an American journalist with shock and horror Wednesday. A spokeswoman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she was “horrified” by the video depicting James Foley’s beheading by members of the militant group Islamic State, or IS, released on YouTube on […]
Gaza’s strategic position—the key to controlling access to Sinai, to Palestine and the wider Middle East—has made it an enviable prize for thousands of years. Jean-Pierre Filiu explains why during […]