Refreshing Lebanese Memory by Yeghig Tashjian

http://neweasternpolitics.wordpress.com/2012/05/19/refreshing-lebanese-memory-by-yeghig-tashjian/ “For your freedom we have lived and for your independence we are dying”, Abdul-Karm al Khalil, with the rope around his neck, May 6, 1916. The outbreak of World War I in August 1914 brought Lebanon further problems, as Turkey allied itself with Germany and Austria-Hungary. The Turkish government abolished Lebanon’s semiautonomous status (al-Mutasarifiah)…

Update from Latakia, Syria

For the last week we heard that the FSA and other Radical Islamic terrorists in Turkey were meeting and actively planning another attack on Kassab.   Kassab has suffered missile and mortar attacks, but no deaths in the recent past. Several days ago, on or about Christmas eve (24th) the terrorists began a push to attack…

Cairo’s moral panic by Ursula Lindsey.

On December 7, the police raided one of Cairo’s few working hammams, a run-down bathhouse in the center of the city where gay men sometimes cruised. They marched over twenty nearly naked, cowering patrons out into the street. A female reporter, Mona El Iraqi, and her investigative team instigated and filmed the raid for a…

Persecution of the Gay Community in Egypt

Arresting gay people isn’t the way to deal with AIDS Today is the first hearing for the trial of at least 26 men alleged to be taking part in sexual activities at a bathhouse in central Cairo. Over the last two weeks, Egypt’s human rights activists have responded with furore at the sting operation and…