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EU Foreign Policy Archives
March 09, 2008
Favouring Religous Minorities in Emigration - MENA, US, EU & Iran
An issue without an easy answer, with respect to "what is right" as such, raised by a Washington Post arty on US favouring religious minorities in emigration from Iran which to follow the article, has drained the communities.
The essential message from the article, in grosso modo, most Xian and Zoroastrians, etc seeking to leave have largely economic motivations. Hardly news, saw everywhere really. However, the community leaders see their people being drained away (and of semi-amusing note, to a land of immorality... US of A where gays can marry [ahem, well no, but...], horrors to the priest quoted). One wonders what would happen to Iranian Sunni communities given the same chances. What is right here? Rather like the priest, one has to say, well, given a chance...
Posted by The Lounsbury at 01:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 18, 2008
Don't Worry, the French Military is En Garde Duty in the Gulf
France just announced plans to establish a military base in the UAE.
Continue reading "Don't Worry, the French Military is En Garde Duty in the Gulf"
Posted by dubaiwalla at 08:11 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
October 24, 2007
MENA Reform: Reform is Dead, Long Live Reform
In part provoked by stunningly irritating conference call with idiots (aka known as 'funders") and in part by getting this piece of silliness emailed to me by some of the same participants, the recent naming of a government in Morocco (for which you can see some useful French commentary chez Ibn Kafka, whose 2nd home at Aqoul sadly awaits the intervention of a mystery writer coming out with a stunning review of some Somali chick...) is a moment to reflect on reform, via this flawed although not entirely useless article in FT (if one closes one's eyes to the idiocy of quoting the USFP). I will add that yes it is clear that England is clearly stringing together his series of quotables, poor bastid is a bit at sea.
First, in preface, let me say that I have long held the opinion that political reform can not really take place except when driven by economic change. At the same time, my dear Ben Ali in Tunisia shows that economic progress without political reform in our MENA region, well can go down a blind alley to be polite.
Continue reading "MENA Reform: Reform is Dead, Long Live Reform"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 08:20 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
September 07, 2007
Bin-Laden Versus Bin-Laden, same day
Osama bin-Laden on Sept. 7 2007* -- "19 young men were able, by the grace of [God], the Most High, to change the direction of [America's] compass."
Osama bin-Laden on, um, Sept 7, 2007 -- "burning living beings is forbidden by our religion, even if they be small like the ant, so what of men?"
In addition to terrorist, criminal, fanatic, and other filth-and-foul words, we can now add "what a fatuous dick".
Continue reading "Bin-Laden Versus Bin-Laden, same day"
Posted by Matthew Hogan at 08:11 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 03, 2007
Dar Fur: Not So Simple as Arabs attacking "Blacks"
As longer-term readers of Aqoul know, I have rather long been beating away at a point re Dar Fur: that the nice little story packaged up for college activists and Islamo / Arabophobes re Dar Fur fundamentally mis-characterises tribal resource war as genocide and that the real story is desertification and excessive population pressure on an environment that can't support the combination of population lifestyles and numbers. And that the simplistic narrative of Black Africans versus Arabs (imagined to be people looking rather like Saudis, rather than the said Arab elders in the photo... who are rather obviously Arabised locals of a most "Black" genotype....)
The New York Times in a generally decent article, Chaos in Darfur on Rise as Arabs Fight With Arab makes me point, if belatedly. Of course, it contains certain idiocies, such as referring to Arab tribes in the plural but the Fur as a single tribe - they are of course a linguistic group about as much a single tribe as "the Arabs." Which is to say, they are tribes, plural. The article is very much worth a read and promotion. As I am an optimist by nature, perhaps it can help correct some of the delirious whanking on about Arab genocide on the Blacks, and maybe refocus on the real tragedy of an ecological and economic catastrophe and a spiral of destruction as clan and tribal warfare becomes bloodbaths via guns (not that history of the Maori should be forgotten in reminding one and all this is hardly a new phenomena).
Posted by The Lounsbury at 01:50 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
May 07, 2007
Sarkozy: The Mediterranean Union
Sarkozy’s proposal of a Mediterranean Union have been discussed a lot by French media, but with little substance. The fact is, there aren’t many details in the proposal anyway. From his party’s website:
Je favoriserai le développement des pays pauvres, en cessant d’aider les gouvernements corrompus, en mettant en place une Union méditerranéenne avec les pays du SudI will favor the development of poor countries, by stopping aid to corrupt governments, by creating a Mediterranean Union with southern countries
Since most countries of the South happen to be Arab and corrupt regimes, I wonder how his pro-colonial, pro-Israeli, “anti-corrupt” attitude is going to help him cooperate in building any kind of union with them.
Continue reading "Sarkozy: The Mediterranean Union"
Posted by Shaheen at 02:54 PM | Comments (13) | TrackBack
April 28, 2007
France reflections: elections, Beurs, MENA, economy
As per The Lounsbury's suggestion, and following Ibn Kafka's extensive coverage of French elections, here are my two cents about them, Beurs, France and the MENA region and related economic bits.
Sunday's [May 6th] second round will most probably bring Sarkozy to French presidency. I have to say I'm very mixed up about this election. This round's vote is a matter of either gambling on Sarkozy, and risking what happened with Arab Americans, who happen to have voted George Bush in 2000, or choosing an economically destructive but marginally more risk averse community-wise choice with Segolene.
Continue reading "France reflections: elections, Beurs, MENA, economy"
Posted by Shaheen at 04:21 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
April 06, 2007
My Inner Neocon & Iran's Shatt Across the Bow
No, I don't want us or Britain to go to war with Iran. Heck, I'm a "cut and runner" on Iraq from before it happened. But am I the only one not of neoconnish-hawkish outlook who is a little perturbed that uniformed professional British sailors and Marines, engaged in lawful patrolling and probable legitimate intelligencing, roll over and "confess"? (Side note to antiwar folks: the coalition presence is now lawful, regardless of other moral or prudential non-rectitude.) Civilians, I understand. Me, I'll give away your social security number when faced with a nail clipper. But what happened to stiff upper lip; name, rank and serial number? If they were tortured or threatened I won't judge, but at least I'd want to know. UPDATE: Rolling over does make a little more sense after these revelations of mock executions, etc..
Posted by Matthew Hogan at 10:49 PM | Comments (16) | TrackBack
April 05, 2007
Well, Golly: Egyptian Finance Comes to Town
Youssef Boutros Ghali, Egypt's Minister of Finance, will be giving his take -- perhaps a bad choice of words -- on the economy of Nile-dom right here in Potomac River City, aka Washington D.C., on Thursday, April 12 (reserve at the CATO Institute by 11 April). Full details are below the break, and here, the most important of which is "Cato Forums and luncheons are free of charge." D.C area Aqoulites are required to go, if they are below 32 and in any kind of University. Meanwhile, informed comments from all on the subject, including from our own regional finance hyperinformed but Masrophobic resident Id, are welcome.
Continue reading "Well, Golly: Egyptian Finance Comes to Town"
Posted by Matthew Hogan at 08:16 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
January 14, 2007
War with Traditional Islam
An interesting blog post from military specialist and commentator Col. Pat Lang (a real colonel, unlike my old Col appellation, a mere shortening of my name) on War Against the Boogey Men, critiquing the American approach to the Iraq war and the larger engagement with the Middle East.
The item that caught my eye was this:
"Freedom" and "Islamic Fascism" clearly have "special" meanings here. I say that "freedom" as the bushies use the term is code and really means westernization and "globalization" in the sense that we want to see the world "ironed out" flat so the it meets the egregious Friedman's dream of a homogeneous world. "Islamic Fascism" means, I think, simply "Islam." That is, Islam as it has been understood by millennia of Muslims. That is, as an all encompassing view of the world and man's relationship to God. "Ah, but these are not real Muslims," I can hear the outcry now. Rubbish. We non-Muslims can not dictate to any particular group of Muslims what Islam means to them. We want an Islam similar in its role in life to the emasculated role that Christianity plays for most Americans in their lives? Sorry! We do not get to choose for them. There wil be a reaction to what I have written here. It will be similar to the outrage vented on me by a former congressman from the Midwest who went on and and on about the nice ladies who come to his office to tell him that Muslims are a peaceful lot. Peaceful? Yes? Within limits.My analysis leads me to the belief that we are fighting against traditional Islam.
Emphasis added.
Continue reading "War with Traditional Islam"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 03:06 PM | Comments (77) | TrackBack
December 29, 2006
Islamist Election & Moving MENA Forward: Any Real Meaning in "Moderate" Elections?
A somewhat Arab News-ish article from FT on the Moroccan PM - who's on shaky ground according to the movers and shakers of the Maghreb biz community - comments that the Islamists can't really win in the upcoming elections, given they're structured against them.
I continue to be frustrated with this short-sightedness.
Returning to the question posed in the title, is there any real meaning in "moderate" elections? Am I the only observer that feels this sort of game has the tendency to bring long term discredit on the concept of "secularism"? (well, actually my opinion is that it already has.)
Posted by The Lounsbury at 10:30 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
September 27, 2006
Solidarity, Reg: Maghreb, Outsourcing and Reaction
One of the issues that the United States has gotten right in MENA is its sometime concentration (when the gross fabulists that are political leadership of the Bush Administration are not dreaming up imaginary and magical transformations of a New Middle East, in time to render themselves ridculous and fools, e.g. Lebanon) on economic liberalisation as means to grow the region and provide new opportunity. It would do better to focus more on seeing real liberalisation see the day, and let its completely magical thinking about democratisation fall by the wayside.
The political support for such liberalisation contrasts favourably with the absurd double talk Europe engages in with respect to economic policy, above all France (which of course is no worse and in many ways better informed than the self-decieving fabulism the Americans are engaging in on the political 'democratisation' front). The Financial Times has an important article, although one not likely to be noticed by many, on the clash between Axa unions in France and the company over its plans to outsource to the Maghreb.
Continue reading "Solidarity, Reg: Maghreb, Outsourcing and Reaction"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 05:47 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 27, 2006
Losing and Winning: Constituency Service
Roula Khalaf, who I may add is simply one of the must-read journos on Middle East has a fine profile in FT on Hezbullah's reconstruction efforts
I know from work I am engaged in right now that this will send France, US and others into a tizzy.
But there is no beating them. Quick roll out of Western institutional aid is simply not going to be competitive, because the networks are not there.
Where the damage is, the institutions are Hezbullah.
Continue reading "Losing and Winning: Constituency Service"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 06:59 PM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
August 11, 2006
Lebanon & Regional Blowback (Updated)
The rising chorus of commentators horrified at the American-Israeli desire to play a self-indulgent Thelma & Louise drive-off-the-cliff policy in MENA continues to grow.
Ranging from a late echo to my own "Guns of August" allusions, in the Washington Post yesterday (although the lunatic Thelma & Louise approach is reaffirmed by Gingrich and Krauthammer today), to Roula Khalaf's analysis in the Financial Times last week, to intelligent Israeli analysts realising that this 1982 business is not going to get any better, whatever the utterly magical thinking going on in Bush and Olmert governmental quarters, to The New York Times (in a generally decent if somewhat superficial review) noting the disastrous impact this useless war is having on American policy interests.
Continue reading "Lebanon & Regional Blowback (Updated)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:49 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
August 06, 2006
Sarkozy, Lebanon & French Arabs
[Editor's Note: Our occasional contributor Shaheen sent us this interesting note on Euro-Arab developments re Lebanon and French policy]
French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy's recent remarks about Lebanon (for those who don't understand French, he's basically siding with Israel) infuriated quite a few French Arabs (once more). Yet, the ascending interior minister and probable next president is the story of a big failure from French Arabs' part, first and foremost.
Continue reading "Sarkozy, Lebanon & French Arabs"
Posted by Shaheen at 12:04 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
August 03, 2006
Creative Destruction & Own Goals - "The New Middle East is Already Dead"
Text: "Uncle Sam wants to 'educate' our political parties"
TV: "War in Lebanon - Massacre"
US: "Lesson 1, turn off the telly."
The entry title comes from a radio report I just heard on RFI. The above is from a Moroccan business journal online, l'Economiste, normally a fairly liberal publication. Fairly amusing in the end, and illustrative of the spill over effects of the public US diplomatic position.
Continue reading "Creative Destruction & Own Goals - "The New Middle East is Already Dead""
Posted by The Lounsbury at 12:55 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
August 01, 2006
Baalbek (Updated: 2 Aug)
The madness continues.
Sats (Arab and Euro) are reporting Israel is attempting an air-mobile operation in Baalbek (Mid-Lebanon, Beqaa).
The sole value in this entire madness is a near perfect illustration of tactical considerations, poor leadership and domestic politics getting the better of cold-blooded rational calculation of state interest.
[Update: watching Hezbullah spokesman on al Jazeerah, I found it interesting that in ranting on about Arab occupied lands he finessed the issue of Israel - i.e. cited Golan, Chebaa, Gaza, but not Israel qua Israel. Artful that was. Added further, caught on BBC World Service interview w Leb rep, who ostentatiously refused to take a bait to whinge on about Syria but was highly US critical]
Continue reading "Baalbek (Updated: 2 Aug)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 06:19 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
July 26, 2006
Slowly, Slowly into the Morass We Return (Updated)
The agonising replay (is it farce this time or tragedy?) of 82 continues. The New York Times article Israel Finding a Difficult Foe in Hezbollah amply illustrates the idiocy that is this Guns of August replay.
It is hard to decide what is most depressing. The predictability of the slow, inching back into the morass only exited in 2000, the delusional commentary from America which seems to have utterly abandoned critical thought, or the certainty of nasty blow-back as time goes on in this utterly (except for Hizbullah) Pyrrhic battle.
Continue reading "Slowly, Slowly into the Morass We Return (Updated)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:18 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
July 24, 2006
Skillful Asymmetry & Spin (Israel-Lebanon Land War)
In the twilight realm that is the competing spin on the Israeli-Leb crisis, it is hard even to know where to begin, when our own yellow satire barely outdoes actual American commentary justifying civilian massacres.
However, I would suggest that the Superpower's bizarro-world approach to the crisis, infected as it is with utterly magical thinking as it reportedly is shopping for a 'coalition of the willing' [my term my dears] to "disarm" Hizbullah, and uniquely confirm its own allies as Quislings... [link restored]
The Financial Times, with fine understatement reports this evening that Rice ideas for peace disappoint in Beirut, although that may be about as much news as Israeli and Arab leaders don't see eye to eye.
Continue reading "Skillful Asymmetry & Spin (Israel-Lebanon Land War)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 06:36 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
July 21, 2006
Lebanon-Israel Crisis: The Demos Start (Updated)
Although less impressive than the scenes you can catch of the Arab Sats, this Al Jazeerah arty (Arabic) Continued Criticisms of Israeli Hostilities Against Lebanon and Palestine / استمرار التنديد بالعدوان الإسرائيلي على لبنان وفلسطين conveys in pictures (and of course text) the Islamic world reaction after the Friday prayers. The demos shown on the telly in Amman, Cairo, and Damascus were particularly large relative to the security presence. The article also notes the khutub (sermons) in particular in Baghdad; oddly perhaps the Israelis will provide Iraqis an inter-ethnic rally point.
Continue reading "Lebanon-Israel Crisis: The Demos Start (Updated)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 04:24 PM | Comments (18) | TrackBack
June 18, 2006
Somalia: Islamic Courts & Women's Progress
A quick note on a interesting arty in The Washington Post on the role of women in backing The Islamic Courts movement that seems to be well on its way to taking power in Somalia and displacing the "secular" warlords.
If there is one item that most at once irritates and amuses me about Western and American commentary specifically is the weird gullibility in the usage of "secular" versus "Islamist" - although in a sense it is relavatory of why secularism has or is failing in the MENA region and many parts of the Islamic world - where "secular" seems to mean "any corrupt bunch of idiots presently in power who are not overtly and ostentatiously 'Islamist' in political orientation."
If this is the "secularism" being offered, and indeed backed by the West and America specifically, does anyone think it should be suprising that, whatever bitter individuals like Hirsi Ali Magaan say for the consumption of the fearful Westerner, secularism is losing ground?
Posted by The Lounsbury at 04:36 PM | Comments (15) | TrackBack
March 05, 2006
Bedfellows & Commerce: Israel's Zim Lines Supports DPW (Updated)
Sadly my work is distracting me from the fun of the ongoing Bigotted Know Nothing Nativist Ignoramus Mob Madness surrounding DPW's takeover of UK's P&O and the incidental acquisition of the operating leases for port operations at six major US ports (although in the UK and globally sanity has prevailed*), I wanted to augment my dear friend and colleague, Secret Dubai's post on Israeli support for Dubai and DPW with specific reference to the Israeli shipping line Zim's statement of support; I should say it comes as no surprise to anyone with experience in the region that some Israelis would step forward on this, even in a politically delicate situation - not so oddly it is the moderates on all sides trying to do business that know each other.
Continue reading "Bedfellows & Commerce: Israel's Zim Lines Supports DPW (Updated)"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 03:57 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
January 29, 2006
Democracy, Liberalism, Consequences
The election of Hamas has set off quite a lot of overdone hand wringing with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and with respect to 'democracy promotion.'
I am going to ignore the I-P conflict as an endless toothache, although frankly in the medium term this is probably a boon as Hamas seems likely to be a more effective player than the corrupt and broken PLO/Fatah.
Rather, a few words on democracy promotion in the Middle East and North Africa.
The first words are, I am no fan of it, and frankly largely do not believe in it on the terms that it is pimped to the general public, etc. However, the handwringing post-Hamas victory requires some comment.
Continue reading "Democracy, Liberalism, Consequences"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 02:03 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
January 26, 2006
Palestine: Hamas
The results appear to give Hamas a strong electoral position, which is not surprising if one had one's ears to the ground - despite the Bush Administration apparently sad and Johnny come lately intervention on the side of the sick old man, Fatah.
Here is the rub made clear, really democratic elections are going to produce these kinds of results. If one is going to pimp simple minded democracy, than one has to ive with them. I have met enough Hamas people to suspect that they can in fact be dealt with. It's better optics in the end to try and fail, the exclude which merely feeds into Hamas cycle of popularity.
Posted by The Lounsbury at 01:53 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
January 18, 2006
Al Hayat: Maghrebine - Euro -Iraq connexions, the new Afghan al-Arab?
al Hayat has an interesting article on what is described as something of a major network علومات تكشفها تحقيقات الشرطة في الرباط ... خلايا اوروبية تجند المغاربة الانتحاريين وترسلهم الى العراق ... قبل «خلايا الزوجات»
الرباط – محمد الأشهب الحياة - 18/01/06/ش
Posted by The Lounsbury at 03:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 30, 2005
Orhan Pamuk and the Turkish Officer
Once a month or so, my good friend Turkish (nickname to be explained shortly) and I meet up for lunch to discuss both local and Mideast politics. Turkish is very serious, intelligent and articulate, the sort of person who thinks more than he speaks and measures every word carefully. He is also an ex-officer in the Turkish military and an avowed Kemalist, which makes for an interesting perspective. Once I asked him what he thought about Kurds and he replied with an enigmatic smile: “Kurds are Turks too, they just haven’t realized it yet”. I think he was joking, but I'm not entirely sure.
When we last met, Turkish author Orhan Pamuk was due to appear in court shortly, charged with the “public denigration of Turkish identity” for making a pointed observation in a Swiss newspaper about his country’s silence over Kurd and Armenian deaths. From FT (subscription, but I quote extensively for the uninitiated):
"Thirty thousand Kurds and a million Armenians were killed in these lands and almost nobody but me dares to talk about it."
His comment referred to the two most traumatic events in Turkey's modern history: the struggle against Kurdish separatism in the 1980s and 1990s and the massacre of Ottoman Armenians by Ottoman Turkish forces as the empire collapsed during the first world war. The Armenian question is especially sensitive in Turkey. Armenians say the event marked the twentieth century's first genocide. Turkey rejects any such assertion, though it does not deny that many Armenians and Turks died in those terrible days…
Mr Pamuk is being tried under article 301 of the Turkish penal code, which criminalises "insulting Turkishness, the republic, and the institutions and organs of the state". If found guilty, he faces three years in jail, part of which is an extra punishment for committing his "crime" abroad.
Continue reading "Orhan Pamuk and the Turkish Officer"
Posted by eerie at 09:33 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
December 20, 2005
On Iraq, Elections, Spying and US Media Coverage
Being back in the land of tubby supersized people is reminding me what completely atrocious news coverage is available in the US broadcast media. The shrieking exageration that seems to be the baseline for any and all stories is painful to watch.
Truly painful. It doesn't seem particularly ideologically focused, despite the endless whinging I have read online in blogs and the like (which one may take, including I may add this one as mere navel gazing, and the pretension among some in the "blogosphere" that they are bringing new standards is absurd and laughable... although given broadcast media in the US of A....). Rather, it strikes me as simply bad professional practice.
Continue reading "On Iraq, Elections, Spying and US Media Coverage"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:26 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
November 20, 2005
Surfacing on Iraq
Having begun this weekend with some fine work on valuation documents for Gulf area firms, a little bit of coughing up blood, and the tedious work of creating a matrix to figure out what the bloody hell I have among pile of bloody Arabic financial reporting, I thought I might take a moment to comment on the chatter about Iraq and the US policy optoins.
Frankly, most of the discussion rather strikes me as surreal navel gazing delusionally disconnected from the evident reality in Iraq.
As I have been indicating for a rather long time, Iraq long ago (say early 2004) entered into a 'Lebanese logic' which rather made the creeping civil war situation in Iraq, that is clear for anyone with eye to see, inevitable.
Now, the simple minded I suppose expect(ed) this to explode all at once. It has not and will not. Rather, as in Lebanon, it will creep forward in fits and starts until it is undeniably there for even the most deluded. The self segregation, the inter-community killings and hardening of lines despite decades of friendship, etc., that is already ongoing and there is frankly nothing substantial in terms of Iraqi dynamics counter-weighing this. Iraqi dynamics are all that count, not Americans running around claiming idiotic body counts, not hand waving pseudo-political excercises masquerading as democracy to please the gullible Westerners who think such things have meaning in such circumstances, not anything but Iraqi social dynamics.
There is, in short, nothing that is substantively running against the power dynamic of the hard men with guns. Nothing, period, regardless of the idiotic self-deluded happy talk I have seen now for three fucking years running. Good news from Iraq, indeed. Even in the depths of any civil war one can find "good news" - it's intelligent analysis that gets one understanding.
Continue reading "Surfacing on Iraq"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 03:37 PM | Comments (13) | TrackBack
November 14, 2005
One more on France, riots --- and a memorable opening sentence
While I tend to think this full Reason Online article by Tim Cavanaugh is a good commentary on the France upheavals and certain literary matters, it is the opening sentence that is worth its word-weight in gold, and deserving of extended airplay and replay:
Here's a good rule of thumb: If you come across the phrase "Islamo-fascist" unironically deployed in an article, there's a 99-percent the author doesn't know what he or she is talking about.
Posted by Matthew Hogan at 11:31 PM | Comments (25) | TrackBack
November 11, 2005
Last item on France, Muslims & the Maghreb
Sadly I have little time to devout to what is clearly an important topic at present, which is indeed the riots in France, their meaning and the storm of ill-informed English language commentary on the same. Unfortunately such trivial issues as valuing illiquid assets pledged as capital contributions, fund structures and other fine things require my time.
Continue reading "Last item on France, Muslims & the Maghreb"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 04:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
France and the Riots - The (Partial) Myth of the 'Arab' 'intefada'
I briefly, in lieu of more extended commentary, draw attention to this article from the conservative Le Figaro regarding the makeup, per the police, of rioters at present: Davantage de Noirs chez les émeutiers:
Au-delà des rivalités entre ces différentes vagues d'immigration qui se rejettent la responsabilité de la dégradation de leurs quartiers, policiers et travailleurs sociaux ont maintes fois signalé, sans jamais pouvoir la chiffrer, l'augmentation de la délinquance des jeunes issus de l'immigration africaine.Au cours des dernières nuits d'émeutes, «il y avait plus de Noirs que de Maghrébins», confirment les policiers de la Seine-Saint-Denis.
For those who do not read French, the quote indicates that leaving aside rivalries between different waves of immigration, each of which reject responsibility for the degradation of their neighborhoods, police and social workers have frequenly noted that, without being able to give figures, the augmentation of deliquency among youth from the African immigrant community. In recent nights of rioting, 'There were more Blacks than Maghrebines' confirmed police from Seine-Saint-Denis.
I have noted consistently the mirage and delusional quality of the bigotted assertions in the Anglo blog world about the Arab-Muslim character of the riots (assertions that continue even now), when anyone with a decent familiarity with the 'immigrant' (albeit native born 'immigrants' but this being France, native born darkies are, well 'immigrants.') districts knows the
Continue reading "France and the Riots - The (Partial) Myth of the 'Arab' 'intefada'"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 06:54 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
November 08, 2005
France, Riots and Online Commentary: Islamophobia Demasked
This will be a brief post, as unfortunately (or fortunately) I have mountains of work that must be addressed.
However, in the guise of a comment I thought I would, after reading Andrew Sullivan's ludicrously ignorant banging on about France and the riots as an Islamic intefada (and via Fist Full of Euros, Pipes' equally ludicrous assertion of the same, whanking bigotted fool that he is) as well as other comments, make an assertion.
The Anglophone commentary, essentially American on this subject I think is demasking a deep reservoir of fear and loathing directed at Muslims and Islam in general. Polite bigotry, if you will, dressed up in terms like "extremist Muslims" and Islamists versus "moderate Muslims" when the real meaning is "niggers/scum we fear and despise for their difference" versus "good niggers who know their place."
Continue reading "France, Riots and Online Commentary: Islamophobia Demasked"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 01:12 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
October 28, 2005
Ahmadinejad and Israel
What's going on in Iran? First the country's president calls for Israel to be "wiped off the map." Naturally, this doesn't go down well at all internationally, with the Israelis going so far as to call for Iran's expulsion from the UN. So Iran's Moscow embassy issues a statement saying the president didn't mean to "speak up in such sharp terms," and we are reminded that such statements are made all the time during rallies but don't really mean anything.
So the new president made a stupid diplomatic error, not realizing his new position makes his words carry more weight. And after his country's ambassadors are summoned to various European capitals to explain their government's actions, all this will die down, right? So then why is Iran stupidly upping the ante by ordering its diplomats in Western countries to launch protests there against Europe's attitudes towards 'Zionist crimes'? My own take is that Iran's foreign policy, more or less directionless since Ahmadinejad came to power a few months ago, is starting to go down the tubes.
Posted by dubaiwalla at 06:18 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
October 17, 2005
Dar Fur (aka Darfur): Round and round and round again
I see there is another “Dar Fur” attention thing going on, wherein bloggers who a year ago or two had no bloody clue as to where the bloody hell the place is or who the Fur are (of course they still don’t – for all that the history of the Sultanate of Fur is actually rather intriguing) pontificate about the issue.
At the risk of being the perennial naysayer – well actually why not? Naysayers are useful, we drag the deluded back to reality. – let me again comment on Dar Fur (or if you must, Darfur).
Continue reading "Dar Fur (aka Darfur): Round and round and round again"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:58 AM | Comments (14) | TrackBack
October 12, 2005
Migration, Economics & MENA-African pileups
While I may be banging away at an issue of little general interest, I was encouraged to find something of relevance to the rising issue of Euro-African migration and the Maghreb in the last issue of the Economist.
Economics focus
Be my guest
The economic case for temporary migration is compelling; the historical record less so
Oct 6th 2005
(Yes subscription, don't like it? Fuck off then and read some free twaddle.)
For those puzzled, my reference is to the recent problem emerging in the Maghreb and especially Morocco with its land border with the Spanish enclaves Ceuta and Mellila, which I mentioned in my typically light weight Illegal Immigration - Borders & Madness and The Maghreb-African Immigration Problem
Continue reading "Migration, Economics & MENA-African pileups"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 04:49 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
October 09, 2005
On Arabic, Translation, Training and Spying
Being conflicted as to whether this is a purely personal rant or something of wider interest, but on rereading thinking I may have accidentally said something of wider interest, let me refer 'Aqoul readers to Lounsbury - 'Aqoul and a small post on issues related to traning in Arabic, translation, and spying.
Posted by The Lounsbury at 05:59 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The Maghreb-African Immigration Problem
It appears the issue which I first started noting roughly two weeks ago (see esp. Illegal Immigration - Borders & Madness: Mass Attempts at the Spanish-Moroccan border) has hit the big time with live European and al-Jazeerah coverage of explusions today, Sunday and round-ups of what is said to be thousands of 'illegal' migrants.
It appears, per al-Jazeerah reporting, that Algeria has closed its borders amidst reports that Moroccan authorities have been dumping expelled non-citizens from Mellila and Ceuta across the border.
Continue reading "The Maghreb-African Immigration Problem"
Posted by The Lounsbury at 12:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 04, 2005
Aden, 1967
Via Lenin's Tomb, an article in the Socialist Worker points out that the other occupying power in the Iraq war was ALSO involved in a dirty little counterinsurgency war in the 1960s. So skip past the obligatory British political infighting and the "colonialist butcher" reference, and you get to the meat:
One British army officer in Aden in 1967 describes the developing disaster in the following familiar terms:
“A major problem which was to recur throughout the campaign was the lack of any specific, reliable intelligence about the enemy — where they were, what their organisation was, what their aims and objectives might be, or indeed, who they were”...
Readers of British newspapers at the time were treated to a bewildering array of acronyms to describe the competing factions of the resistance in Aden, as well as tales of “foreign extremists” from Egypt and Yemen.
These militias, strangely, appeared set on killing British soldiers as well as each other, despite the fact that Britain had promised them independence as soon as the trouble had stopped.
What made it worse was that the security forces themselves appeared to be arming various organisations — and there were growing fears of clashes between the local police and militia and the British army.
Posted by tomscud at 01:41 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
September 30, 2005
Illegal Immigration - Borders & Madness: Mass Attempts at the Spanish-Moroccan border
Recently The Father of Aardvarks made a comment on some recent apparent censorship in Morocco with regards to press comments about illegal immigrants in Morocco attempting to reach Europe. Or as the Father of Aardvarks put it:
Here's a story of an Arab government clamping down on the media with an unusual twist. Al-Jazeera reports that the Moroccan government confiscated the press run of a local newspaper because it ran a "racist" and "inflammatory" article about African immigrants "invading northern Morocco."
While I understand the Father of Aardvarks is a media critic by interest and trade, my first thought was to the underlying crisis (the second being it would be nice to know which paper; there are some in Morocco I am familiar with which I have no problem suspecting of racist and inflammatory yellow journalism).
This past week saw rather dramatic events underlining precisely the level of bubbling tension on all sides that might well justifiably provoke action by the government: a series of mass assualts by "thousands" of African would be immigrants to Europe on the frontier fences of the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Mellila.
The crisis effectively is a rather large accumulation of sub-Saharan Africans building up in the Moroccan north - in the region called the Rif - along the border areas with the Spanish enclaves. This has been fairly little mentioned in the local press, although one does see time and and again in some areas clots of what are clearly sub-Saharan migrants begging and travelling north. Something most people do not trouble themselves about as Moroccans try to emmigrate in much the same way.
However, in the last few years, Morocco has been under intense pressure from the EU to "do more" with regards to stopping the flow of illegal immigrants to Spain and onwards and has taken stepped up measures to block transits via the Mediterranean and the enclaves.
Posted by The Lounsbury at 05:47 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
July 23, 2005
Combating Islamist Terrorism: Policy Approaches
Militant Islamist ideology is not a recent phenomenon, the concepts have been around for decades. It was popular with Muslim youth in the 1960-70s, particularly after Sayyid Qutb published Signposts on the Road, a bestseller in the Islamic world that continues to influence Islamist ideology today. At the time, enthusiasm for nationalism was waning and writers like Qutb were disgusted with the corruption of secular authoritarian governments and the perceived erosion of Islamic principles in Egypt and across the Middle East. The answer was of course a return to religion, and a firm rejection of jahiliyya, the state of ignorance and barbarism that occured in the absence of Islam (historically, this term refers to the pre-Islamic period).
So why has this sort of thinking been adopted more recently by a segment of young European Muslims? What is the source of their disenchantment and frustration and how can European (and North American) governments address this issue without compromising ideals such as tolerance and multiculturalism?
Continue reading "Combating Islamist Terrorism: Policy Approaches"
Posted by eerie at 12:04 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
