Anti-terrorism and uprisings: North African leaders have worked with the West against Islamists and migrants - becoming more repressive as a result.
by Yasmine Ryan
Al Jazeera
The string of uprisings in North Africa have laid bare Western governments' relationships with regimes in the region, which pro-democracy activists argue have long been fixated on anti-terrorism, immigration and oil.
Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, appears to be on the brink of joining Tunisia's Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak - both ousted by their own people. In Algeria, meanwhile, Abdelaziz Bouteflika's government is holding firm, clamping down on protests and carrying out limited reforms in a bid to lull anti-regime rage.
The four men have co-operated to varying degrees with the West in the post 9/11 era, offering their services against the perceived twin menaces of political Islam and migration from the African continent to Europe.
Salima Ghezali, a well-known Algerian journalist and rights activist, says that politicians have used these supposed threats to justify state violence. Elites in the West, she argues, have attempted to distract voters by playing up threats to security, whilst sidestepping debate on their economies. Their counterparts in the developing world have used the same arguments to draw attention away from "institutional chaos".
"It is this chaos which is provoking and fuelling the anger of the people," she says.
By focusing on security, leaders have found a means to legitimise state violence, withhold rights and freedoms and neglect political and social management, Ghezali says. "Violence has even become a means of social and political advancement. Murderers have become heroes and hold power in public institutions."
Jeremy Keenan, a professorial research associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, agrees that the uprisings are, in some way, related to the prevalence of anti-terrorist policy.
"I think that whole 'war on terror' syndrome has had a potentially significant role in what we're seeing today," Keenan says. "These states have become more repressive in the knowledge that they have the backing of the West."
Demographic disconnect
Many youthful protesters are no longer willing to swallow their leaders’ use of anti-colonialist ideology to justify their political power.
Far from fighting imperialism, these leaders, their opponents say, have been complicit with the West: Acting as its torturers, buying its arms and patrolling the Mediterranean Sea to stem the tides of young people desperate to flee their homelands. All were partners in the CIA's controversial 'extraordinary rendition programme' and Libya has been a pro-active partner in a secretive Rome-Tripoli deal, signed in 2009, to intercept boats carrying migrants. In return for the sea patrols, Italy pledged to pay Libya $7bn over 20 years.
"The young generation of Algerians, and the not-so-young, don’t have any illusions about the convictions of their leaders," Ghezali explains.
Despite being sceptical of their leaders' ideological leanings, Ghezali says the youth do still respect authentic symbols of the Algerian War of Independence. Anti-government protesters in Libya have taken to waving the pre-Gaddafi, post-independence flag - a reference to the country's struggle against colonial rule.
With the exception of Ben Ali, all of these leaders have been in government since before most of their people were born. Bouteflika, for example, first became a minister in 1962, yet rules over a country where the average age is 27, according to the CIA World Factbook. Gaddafi took power in 1969, while the average Libyan is just 24.
Playing the 'Islamist card'
The region's leaders have repeatedly tried to portray the current wave of uprisings as somehow terrorist-related.
In a recently released report, Martin Scheinin, the UN special rapporteur on the protection of human rights while countering terrorism, details how Tunisia's counterterrorism laws and policies played a central part in the former government's crushing of political opposition.
And, as Scheinin notes in an interview with Al Jazeera, this was the very language Ben Ali turned to when he responded to the Tunisian uprising.
"I think it is important that when the people started to revolt in Tunisia, the initial reaction by the president and by the government was to say this is terrorists," the UN Rapporteur says.
Ben Ali accused demonstrators in the centre of the country of "unpardonable terrorist acts" on January 10, two days after Tunisian security forces had begun deliberately killing protesters in the centre of the country. The Libyan leader's son, Saadi Gaddafi, told the Financial Times on Wednesday that bombing in the east of Libya was necessary because "thousands" of al-Qaeda fighters were taking control of the region. His father elaborated on these allegations in a speech on Thursday night, accusing Osama bin Laden of brainwashing, and even drugging, the country's youth.
Ghezali points to Gaddafi's most recent threats to end his co-operation on immigration, as well as his attempts to blame protests on al-Qaeda, as a particularly "ludicrous" example of what has become a standard form of blackmail.
Tunisian activists interviewed by Al Jazeera cited ending corruption and tyranny and the right to employment, democracy and freedom of expression as the motivations that drove their uprising, while Libyans likewise dismissed Gaddafi's assertion that Osama bin Laden was working to incite dissent against his rule.
Keenan says that the absence of Islamist ideology in the protest movements has underlined the extent to which the "Islamist card" has been overplayed by politicians and the media. "These revolts have nothing much to do with Islamism, they are to do with young people fighting for their rights.
"All of these countries, to varying degrees, have exaggerated the menace of terrorism," says the author of The Dark Sahara: America's War on Terror in Africa.
To Read the Rest of the Article
Showing posts with label Tunisia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tunisia. Show all posts
Friday, February 25, 2011
Sunday, February 06, 2011
Paul Mason: Twenty reasons why it's kicking off everywhere
Twenty reasons why it's kicking off everywhere
by Paul Mason
BBC
We've had revolution in Tunisia, Egypt's Mubarak is teetering; in Yemen, Jordan and Syria suddenly protests have appeared. In Ireland young techno-savvy professionals are agitating for a "Second Republic"; in France the youth from banlieues battled police on the streets to defend the retirement rights of 60-year olds; in Greece striking and rioting have become a national pastime. And in Britain we've had riots and student occupations that changed the political mood.
What's going on? What's the wider social dynamic?
My editors yesterday asked me put some bullet points down for a discussion on the programme that then didn't happen but I am throwing them into the mix here, on the basis of various conversations with academics who study this and also the participants themselves.
At the heart of it all are young people, obviously; students; westernised; secularised. They use social media - as the mainstream media has now woken up to - but this obsession with reporting "they use twitter" is missing the point of what they use it for.
In so far as there are common threads to be found in these different situation, here's 20 things I have spotted:
1. At the heart if it all is a new sociological type: the graduate with no future
2. ...with access to social media, such as Facebook, Twitter and eg Yfrog so they can express themselves in a variety of situations ranging from parliamentary democracy to tyrrany.
3. Therefore truth moves faster than lies, and propaganda becomes flammable.
4. They are not prone to traditional and endemic ideologies: Labourism, Islamism, Fianna Fail Catholicism etc... in fact hermetic ideologies of all forms are rejected.
5. Women very numerous as the backbone of movements. After twenty years of modernised labour markets and higher-education access the "archetypal" protest leader, organizer, facilitator, spokesperson now is an educated young woman.
6. Horizontalism has become endemic because technology makes it easy: it kills vertical hierarchies spontaneously, whereas before - and the quintessential experience of the 20th century - was the killing of dissent within movements, the channeling of movements and their bureaucratisaton.
7. Memes: "A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes, in that they self-replicate, mutate and respond to selective pressures." (Wikipedia) - so what happens is that ideas arise, are very quickly "market tested" and either take off, bubble under, insinuate themselves or if they are deemed no good they disappear. Ideas self-replicate like genes. Prior to the internet this theory (see Richard Dawkins, 1976) seemed an over-statement but you can now clearly trace the evolution of memes.
8. They all seem to know each other: not only is the network more powerful than the hierarchy - but the ad-hoc network has become easier to form. So if you "follow" somebody from the UCL occupation on Twitter, as I have done, you can easily run into a radical blogger from Egypt, or a lecturer in peaceful resistance in California who mainly does work on Burma so then there are the Burmese tweets to follow. During the early 20th century people would ride hanging on the undersides of train carriages across borders just to make links like these.
9. The specifics of economic failure: the rise of mass access to university-level education is a given. Maybe soon even 50% in higher education will be not enough. In most of the world this is being funded by personal indebtedess - so people are making a rational judgement to go into debt so they will be better paid later. However the prospect of ten years of fiscal retrenchment in some countries means they now know they will be poorer than their parents. And the effect has been like throwing a light switch; the prosperity story is replaced with the doom story, even if for individuals reality will be more complex, and not as bad as they expect.
To Read the Rest of this Outline
by Paul Mason
BBC
We've had revolution in Tunisia, Egypt's Mubarak is teetering; in Yemen, Jordan and Syria suddenly protests have appeared. In Ireland young techno-savvy professionals are agitating for a "Second Republic"; in France the youth from banlieues battled police on the streets to defend the retirement rights of 60-year olds; in Greece striking and rioting have become a national pastime. And in Britain we've had riots and student occupations that changed the political mood.
What's going on? What's the wider social dynamic?
My editors yesterday asked me put some bullet points down for a discussion on the programme that then didn't happen but I am throwing them into the mix here, on the basis of various conversations with academics who study this and also the participants themselves.
At the heart of it all are young people, obviously; students; westernised; secularised. They use social media - as the mainstream media has now woken up to - but this obsession with reporting "they use twitter" is missing the point of what they use it for.
In so far as there are common threads to be found in these different situation, here's 20 things I have spotted:
1. At the heart if it all is a new sociological type: the graduate with no future
2. ...with access to social media, such as Facebook, Twitter and eg Yfrog so they can express themselves in a variety of situations ranging from parliamentary democracy to tyrrany.
3. Therefore truth moves faster than lies, and propaganda becomes flammable.
4. They are not prone to traditional and endemic ideologies: Labourism, Islamism, Fianna Fail Catholicism etc... in fact hermetic ideologies of all forms are rejected.
5. Women very numerous as the backbone of movements. After twenty years of modernised labour markets and higher-education access the "archetypal" protest leader, organizer, facilitator, spokesperson now is an educated young woman.
6. Horizontalism has become endemic because technology makes it easy: it kills vertical hierarchies spontaneously, whereas before - and the quintessential experience of the 20th century - was the killing of dissent within movements, the channeling of movements and their bureaucratisaton.
7. Memes: "A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes, in that they self-replicate, mutate and respond to selective pressures." (Wikipedia) - so what happens is that ideas arise, are very quickly "market tested" and either take off, bubble under, insinuate themselves or if they are deemed no good they disappear. Ideas self-replicate like genes. Prior to the internet this theory (see Richard Dawkins, 1976) seemed an over-statement but you can now clearly trace the evolution of memes.
8. They all seem to know each other: not only is the network more powerful than the hierarchy - but the ad-hoc network has become easier to form. So if you "follow" somebody from the UCL occupation on Twitter, as I have done, you can easily run into a radical blogger from Egypt, or a lecturer in peaceful resistance in California who mainly does work on Burma so then there are the Burmese tweets to follow. During the early 20th century people would ride hanging on the undersides of train carriages across borders just to make links like these.
9. The specifics of economic failure: the rise of mass access to university-level education is a given. Maybe soon even 50% in higher education will be not enough. In most of the world this is being funded by personal indebtedess - so people are making a rational judgement to go into debt so they will be better paid later. However the prospect of ten years of fiscal retrenchment in some countries means they now know they will be poorer than their parents. And the effect has been like throwing a light switch; the prosperity story is replaced with the doom story, even if for individuals reality will be more complex, and not as bad as they expect.
To Read the Rest of this Outline
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Common Sense with Dan Carlin: Cyber-Lynching the Troublemakers
Show 192 - Cyber-Lynching the Troublemakers
by Dan Carlin
Common Sense
Dan expresses a concern about reform-minded political troublemakers being digitally "framed" by governments around the world. "Ben" thinks that's nutty conspiracy talk. What do you think?
1. Privacy Information
2. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Speech "Why I am opposed to the war in Vietnam"
3. "Analysis: A warning to Arab dictators" by Khaled Abu Toameh, January 15, 2011.
4. "Arab League chief says Tunisia is dire warning" by Maggie Michael for the Associated Press, January 19, 2011.
5. "Egyptian, Algerian, Mauritanian set selves alight" by Hamza Hendawi for the Associated press, January 17, 2011.
6. "Trends analyst predicts global youth uprising, ‘progressive libertarians’ in 2011" by Stephen C. Webster for The Raw Story, January 11th, 2011
To Listen to the Episode and Access Sources
by Dan Carlin
Common Sense
Dan expresses a concern about reform-minded political troublemakers being digitally "framed" by governments around the world. "Ben" thinks that's nutty conspiracy talk. What do you think?
1. Privacy Information
2. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Speech "Why I am opposed to the war in Vietnam"
3. "Analysis: A warning to Arab dictators" by Khaled Abu Toameh, January 15, 2011.
4. "Arab League chief says Tunisia is dire warning" by Maggie Michael for the Associated Press, January 19, 2011.
5. "Egyptian, Algerian, Mauritanian set selves alight" by Hamza Hendawi for the Associated press, January 17, 2011.
6. "Trends analyst predicts global youth uprising, ‘progressive libertarians’ in 2011" by Stephen C. Webster for The Raw Story, January 11th, 2011
To Listen to the Episode and Access Sources
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Guardian: Protests in Egypt and unrest in Middle East – as it happened
Protests in Egypt and unrest in Middle East – as it happened
by Haroon Siddique, Paul Owen and Adam Gabbatt
Guardian (United Kingdom)
12.30am:
• Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters have clashed with police in Cairo and other cities in the largest demonstration in Egypt in a generation. Demonstrators want an end to the authoritarian president Hosni Mubarak's near 30 years of power.
• Three people have been killed in the protests. Reports say two protesters were killed in Suez, while a police officer died after being hit by a rock in Cairo. An Egyptian official said one protester died of respiratory problems after inhaling tear gas, while another was hit by a rock.
• Waves of protesters filled Cairo's central Tahrir Square, vowing to remain in place until the government fell, however police used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear the area at around 1am. Protesters fled to side streets and bridges across the river Nile, some pledging to continue protesting on Wednesday.
• The Egyptian government has reportedly blocked Twitter – which protester used to coordinate movements – and shut down mobile phone and internet networks. Elsewhere unconfirmed reports suggest Mubarak's son, Gamal Mubarak – who is unpopular in Egypt – has fled to the UK with other family members.
10.58pm: Tim Marshall, who is reporting in Egypt for Sky News, tweets:
@ITwitius Cairo Protestors split up and chased towards bridges and side streets. Sirens everywhere. Occasional tear gas still being fired.
10.19pm: My colleague Jack Shenker is still on the ground in Cairo, but reports that his phone access has been blocked, as has internet access in many areas. Here's his latest file from the Egyptian capital:
As midnight approaches in Cairo thousands of protesters are still occupying the Tahrir Square, vowing to remain in place until the government falls. News has reached Egyptians here of deaths in Suez and the capital, as well as unconfirmed reports that Gamal Mubarak – the president's wildly unpopular son and presumed heir apparent – has fled to London, and they appear more determined than ever to hold their ground.
"We will stay here all night, all week if necessary," said Youssef Hisham, a 25 year old filmmaker. "There are too many people on the streets for the police to charge – if they did, it would be a massacre. I came here today not as the representative of any political party, but simply in the name of Egypt. We have liberated the heart of the country, and Mubarak now knows that his people want him gone."
As fresh waves of protesters broke through police cordons to join the throng in Tahrir, a festival atmosphere took hold – groups were cheered as they arrived carrying blankets and food, and demonstrators pooled money together to buy water and other supplies. "The atmosphere is simply amazing – everyone is so friendly, there's no anger, no harassment, just solidarity and remarkable energy," added Hisham.
Drums were banged and fires started as night moved in; having established their lines, hundreds of security forces stayed put and kept their distance, although alarmingly police snipers were seen to be taking up position on nearby buildings. "They are waiting for numbers to dwindle, and then they will switch off the street lights and charge," warned Ahmed Salah, a veteran activist.
"We must hold Tahrir through the night and tomorrow, so that every corner of Egypt can take us as an inspiration and rise up in revolt," claimed Salah. "It's a matter of life and death now – what happens over the next 24 hours will be vital to the history of this country. It's a very emotional moment for me."
Pamphlets widely distributed amongst protesters declared that 'the spark of intifada' had been launched in Egypt. "We have started an uprising with the will of the people, the people who have suffered for thirty years under oppression, injustice and poverty," read the Arabic-language texts. "Egyptians have proven today that they are capable of taking freedom by force and destroying despotism."
They went on to call for the immediate removal of President Mubarak and his government, and urged Egyptians nationwide to begin a wave of strikes, sit-ins and demonstrations across the country until these demands were met. "Long live the struggle of the Egyptian people," the pamphlets ended.
9.29pm: The We are all Khaled Said Facebook group which I linked to earlier is reporting that the two civilians killed are Suliman Saber Ali and Mustafa Reda.
This is unconfirmed as yet.
8.27pm: An Egyptian interior ministry official has confirmed reports that two protesters and one policeman have been killed in demonstrations in Cairo and Suez.
The unnamed official, speaking to AP, said the two protesters were killed in Suez. The official said one of them had respiratory problems and died as a result of tear gas inhalation, while the other was killed by a rock thrown during the protest.
The policeman died during the protest in Cairo after being hit on the head by a rock, the official said.
8.10pm: Reuters is reporting that three people have been killed during protests in Egypt – two in Suez and one in Cairo.
State television also said a security officer died in central Cairo in a square where thousands of protesters had gathered and clashed with police.
A medical source in a Suez hospital said the two bodies had arrived there. Sources blamed rubber bullets.
An Interior Ministry official in Cairo said he had no information about the deaths in Suez but was checking.
The sources said more than 60 people in Suez suffered the effects of inhaling teargas.
7.20pm: The video journalist Mohamed Abdelfattah has posted some distressing tweets – using the Twitter for Blackberry app – from the scene of the protests, where he says he has been arrested. Here's some of his posts – all filed within minutes of each other and presented here in chronological order.
@mfatta7 Tear gas
@mfatta7 I'm suffocating
@mfatta7 We r trapped inside a building
@mfatta7 Armored vehicles outside
@mfatta7 Help we r suffocating
@mfatta7 I will be arrested
@mfatta7 Help !!!
@mfatta7 Arrested
@mfatta7 Ikve been beaten alot
7.01pm: There are reports that Twitter has been blocked in Egypt in a bid to quell the demonstrations. The protests have been organised in part throught Twitter and Facebook, but TechCrunch says the Twitter website and mobile site have been blocked in the country.
Demonstrators are still able to use third party applications – like Tweetdeck and Hootsuite – however, the US technology website reports. Facebook is still working in Egypt, however, with the group We Are all Khaled Said posting updates every fifteen minutes or so.
Khaled Said was an Egyptian activist who died in 2010, allegedly at the hands of police. One of the recent updates on the group reported that restaurants in Tahrir square – where thousands of protesters are gathered as night falls – are giving away free food to protesters.
To Read the Rest of the Timeline
by Haroon Siddique, Paul Owen and Adam Gabbatt
Guardian (United Kingdom)
12.30am:
• Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters have clashed with police in Cairo and other cities in the largest demonstration in Egypt in a generation. Demonstrators want an end to the authoritarian president Hosni Mubarak's near 30 years of power.
• Three people have been killed in the protests. Reports say two protesters were killed in Suez, while a police officer died after being hit by a rock in Cairo. An Egyptian official said one protester died of respiratory problems after inhaling tear gas, while another was hit by a rock.
• Waves of protesters filled Cairo's central Tahrir Square, vowing to remain in place until the government fell, however police used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear the area at around 1am. Protesters fled to side streets and bridges across the river Nile, some pledging to continue protesting on Wednesday.
• The Egyptian government has reportedly blocked Twitter – which protester used to coordinate movements – and shut down mobile phone and internet networks. Elsewhere unconfirmed reports suggest Mubarak's son, Gamal Mubarak – who is unpopular in Egypt – has fled to the UK with other family members.
10.58pm: Tim Marshall, who is reporting in Egypt for Sky News, tweets:
@ITwitius Cairo Protestors split up and chased towards bridges and side streets. Sirens everywhere. Occasional tear gas still being fired.
10.19pm: My colleague Jack Shenker is still on the ground in Cairo, but reports that his phone access has been blocked, as has internet access in many areas. Here's his latest file from the Egyptian capital:
As midnight approaches in Cairo thousands of protesters are still occupying the Tahrir Square, vowing to remain in place until the government falls. News has reached Egyptians here of deaths in Suez and the capital, as well as unconfirmed reports that Gamal Mubarak – the president's wildly unpopular son and presumed heir apparent – has fled to London, and they appear more determined than ever to hold their ground.
"We will stay here all night, all week if necessary," said Youssef Hisham, a 25 year old filmmaker. "There are too many people on the streets for the police to charge – if they did, it would be a massacre. I came here today not as the representative of any political party, but simply in the name of Egypt. We have liberated the heart of the country, and Mubarak now knows that his people want him gone."
As fresh waves of protesters broke through police cordons to join the throng in Tahrir, a festival atmosphere took hold – groups were cheered as they arrived carrying blankets and food, and demonstrators pooled money together to buy water and other supplies. "The atmosphere is simply amazing – everyone is so friendly, there's no anger, no harassment, just solidarity and remarkable energy," added Hisham.
Drums were banged and fires started as night moved in; having established their lines, hundreds of security forces stayed put and kept their distance, although alarmingly police snipers were seen to be taking up position on nearby buildings. "They are waiting for numbers to dwindle, and then they will switch off the street lights and charge," warned Ahmed Salah, a veteran activist.
"We must hold Tahrir through the night and tomorrow, so that every corner of Egypt can take us as an inspiration and rise up in revolt," claimed Salah. "It's a matter of life and death now – what happens over the next 24 hours will be vital to the history of this country. It's a very emotional moment for me."
Pamphlets widely distributed amongst protesters declared that 'the spark of intifada' had been launched in Egypt. "We have started an uprising with the will of the people, the people who have suffered for thirty years under oppression, injustice and poverty," read the Arabic-language texts. "Egyptians have proven today that they are capable of taking freedom by force and destroying despotism."
They went on to call for the immediate removal of President Mubarak and his government, and urged Egyptians nationwide to begin a wave of strikes, sit-ins and demonstrations across the country until these demands were met. "Long live the struggle of the Egyptian people," the pamphlets ended.
9.29pm: The We are all Khaled Said Facebook group which I linked to earlier is reporting that the two civilians killed are Suliman Saber Ali and Mustafa Reda.
This is unconfirmed as yet.
8.27pm: An Egyptian interior ministry official has confirmed reports that two protesters and one policeman have been killed in demonstrations in Cairo and Suez.
The unnamed official, speaking to AP, said the two protesters were killed in Suez. The official said one of them had respiratory problems and died as a result of tear gas inhalation, while the other was killed by a rock thrown during the protest.
The policeman died during the protest in Cairo after being hit on the head by a rock, the official said.
8.10pm: Reuters is reporting that three people have been killed during protests in Egypt – two in Suez and one in Cairo.
State television also said a security officer died in central Cairo in a square where thousands of protesters had gathered and clashed with police.
A medical source in a Suez hospital said the two bodies had arrived there. Sources blamed rubber bullets.
An Interior Ministry official in Cairo said he had no information about the deaths in Suez but was checking.
The sources said more than 60 people in Suez suffered the effects of inhaling teargas.
7.20pm: The video journalist Mohamed Abdelfattah has posted some distressing tweets – using the Twitter for Blackberry app – from the scene of the protests, where he says he has been arrested. Here's some of his posts – all filed within minutes of each other and presented here in chronological order.
@mfatta7 Tear gas
@mfatta7 I'm suffocating
@mfatta7 We r trapped inside a building
@mfatta7 Armored vehicles outside
@mfatta7 Help we r suffocating
@mfatta7 I will be arrested
@mfatta7 Help !!!
@mfatta7 Arrested
@mfatta7 Ikve been beaten alot
7.01pm: There are reports that Twitter has been blocked in Egypt in a bid to quell the demonstrations. The protests have been organised in part throught Twitter and Facebook, but TechCrunch says the Twitter website and mobile site have been blocked in the country.
Demonstrators are still able to use third party applications – like Tweetdeck and Hootsuite – however, the US technology website reports. Facebook is still working in Egypt, however, with the group We Are all Khaled Said posting updates every fifteen minutes or so.
Khaled Said was an Egyptian activist who died in 2010, allegedly at the hands of police. One of the recent updates on the group reported that restaurants in Tahrir square – where thousands of protesters are gathered as night falls – are giving away free food to protesters.
To Read the Rest of the Timeline
Three dead in Egypt protests: Police disperse crowd of thousands in Cairo at night, while two protesters and a police officer have died.
Three dead in Egypt protests: Police disperse crowd of thousands in Cairo at night, while two protesters and a police officer have died.
Al Jazeera
To Read the Report
Al Jazeera
To Read the Report
Saturday, January 22, 2011
On the Media: Tunisia's Twitter Revolution?; Tunisian Blogger Lina Ben Mhenni
On the Media (New York City: WNYC)
Tunisia's Twitter Revolution?
Demonstrators flooded the streets in Tunisia this week calling for an end to corruption and ousting President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Many have attributed the wave of protests to the rise of the internet and social media in a country notorious for its censorship but Foreign Policy blogger Marc Lynch says it’s not that simple. He says the internet, social media and satellite channels like Al Jazeera have collectively transformed the information landscape in the Arab world.
To Listen to the Episode
Tunisian Blogger Lina Ben Mhenni
Blogging in Tunisia has traditionally been a risky business. Online activists have been subject to harassment, imprisonment and targeted “phishing” attacks by the government in the past. But this week's turmoil has ushered in a period of relative openness. Lina Ben Mhenni runs the blog A Tunisian Girl, which, until now, was banned in her own country. During the protests, she risked her safety, criticized the government on her blog and published images of the dead.
To Listen to the Episode
Tunisia's Twitter Revolution?
Demonstrators flooded the streets in Tunisia this week calling for an end to corruption and ousting President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Many have attributed the wave of protests to the rise of the internet and social media in a country notorious for its censorship but Foreign Policy blogger Marc Lynch says it’s not that simple. He says the internet, social media and satellite channels like Al Jazeera have collectively transformed the information landscape in the Arab world.
To Listen to the Episode
Tunisian Blogger Lina Ben Mhenni
Blogging in Tunisia has traditionally been a risky business. Online activists have been subject to harassment, imprisonment and targeted “phishing” attacks by the government in the past. But this week's turmoil has ushered in a period of relative openness. Lina Ben Mhenni runs the blog A Tunisian Girl, which, until now, was banned in her own country. During the protests, she risked her safety, criticized the government on her blog and published images of the dead.
To Listen to the Episode
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Tunisia -- Fears of Insecurity Overshadow the Joys of Freedom
(This report of Tunisian responses to the ongoing revolution is a lot more optimistic than the title makes it appear)
Tunisia: Fears of Insecurity Overshadow the Joys of Freedom
by Hisham
Global Voices
On January 14, 2011, President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali abruptly fled the country he ruthlessly ruled for more than two decades. The people of Tunisia took to the streets to celebrate the dawn of a new independence. The euphoria rapidly gave way to fear about the security situation. News spread about vandals rampaging across major cities, looting shops and homes and setting fire to properties and buildings. The sound of gun bursts echoed in the deserted streets of the capital city, while the Army deployed its troops around key areas in the capital, Tunis. The mood among citizens remained joyful. They formed vigilante groups to defend their families and properties. Some of those have been sharing their thoughts on their blogs.
To Read the Report and Collection of Tunisian Responses
Tunisia: Fears of Insecurity Overshadow the Joys of Freedom
by Hisham
Global Voices
On January 14, 2011, President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali abruptly fled the country he ruthlessly ruled for more than two decades. The people of Tunisia took to the streets to celebrate the dawn of a new independence. The euphoria rapidly gave way to fear about the security situation. News spread about vandals rampaging across major cities, looting shops and homes and setting fire to properties and buildings. The sound of gun bursts echoed in the deserted streets of the capital city, while the Army deployed its troops around key areas in the capital, Tunis. The mood among citizens remained joyful. They formed vigilante groups to defend their families and properties. Some of those have been sharing their thoughts on their blogs.
To Read the Report and Collection of Tunisian Responses
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Bab'Aziz: The Prince Who Contemplated His Soul (Tunisia: Nacer Khemir, 2008)
(I bought this film last year in San Francisco and finally had the opprotunity to watch it. Stunning visual poem by the Tunisian filmmaker/poet Nacer Khemir--powerful meditation on the human spirit, the great unknown, longing/belonging, belief/faith and the power of stories.)
Bab'Aziz: The Prince Who Contemplated His Soul (Tunisia: 2008)
Released by Typecast Films
Bab'Aziz: The Prince Who Contemplated His Soul (Tunisia: 2008)
Released by Typecast Films
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