Stories about Middle East & North Africa from February, 2006
Iran: Being American Iranian
Brooding Persian talks about in an ironic way about being American Iranian in a future US-Iran war: In a case I am taken as a prisoner of war by either side, I refuse to perform human pyramid tricks or commit suicide by downing hair removal creams. I also like to...
Iraq in Crisis – The Optimists Strike Back
As the crisis in Iraq rumbles on bloggers are divided on the whether there is civil war and how bad things really are. For the sake of balance here is the reports of those who are looking for lights at the end of the tunnel. If you want to understand...
This week in Israel: election campaigns, a kidnapping in France and more
Israel is now six weeks before general elections, and the campaigning is starting to heat up. Shai Tsur of Shaister has a concise and intelligent roundup of the campaign platforms of the major parties. He writes that he likes the ad campaign of Meretz, a leftist Zionist party, the best....
Blogging Presentation in Zaghouan, Tunisia
In the Tunisian monthly blogger meetups, one of the issues that always comes up is what we can do to spread blogging even more in Tunisia and get more people writing and sharing online. One of the ideas that we came up with is by giving presentations about blogging in...
A Look at the Syrian Blogsphere
After a tense month of anti-violence campaigns, the Syrian blogsphere seemed to be quite calm this week… Discussions revolved about the new step from the US to give a $5 million to promote democratic governance and reform in Syria. While Joshua Landis of SyriaComment.com sees this step as a good...
Turkey is Typing….
Well the Turkish roundup is back after a long hiatus, and as it has been so long there is no way to get fully caught up or cover everyone, so we are going to focus on the highlights. Let's get caught up a bit on our friends shall we? Amerikan...
Iran: Moslems & Buddha
HasanAgha asks Shiites Moslems (Persian) who are protesting against destruction of their shrine, why they did nothing when Taliban government in Afghanistan demolished Buddha’s statues in Bamyan?
From the Jordanian Blogosphere
The Jordanian bloggers are angry over the attack on Islamic, particularly Shi'aa, monument the Askariya Shrine, some of them are comparing the unneeded reactions from Muslims towards the Danish cartoon fiasco to the current apartheid at the ruination of a 1200 year old mosque. Mazen Arafat says, “Where is the...
Computer Crash: Food Overload
Was your umbilical cord attached to a computer when you were born? It may sound like a strange statement, but the truth is that some of us think that. Especially if you happen to be in the middle of the Ecuadorian Andes and there is no telephone or Internet for...
Update: Samarra Catastrophe
The developing situation in Iraq is moving too fast and filling more column inches than a roundup can satisfy. Here is a summary of the blog events since Thursday. It is at times like this you can see that blogging comes into its own above other journalism. There is no...
Pulse of the Saudi Blogosphere
Many different and interesting topics were discussed in the Saudi blogosphere this week, so let's start our roundup right away. What is the difference between democracy and American democracy? Hassan thinks he has the answer (Arabic). “In democracy, those who gain more votes should win. In American democracy, those who...
(South) Azerbaijan: Blogs
Onnik Krikorian takes a look at blogs from South Azerbaijan, the ethnic Azeri region of Iran.
This Week in Palestinian Blogs: Refugees Reloaded
News of the blogosphere… PSM (Palestine Solidarity Movement) Fifth Annual Divestment Conferece has taken place from February 17-19 in Washington DC, US attracting more than six hundred student and community activists from ninety different university and organization from across the US as mentioned in a report by The Hatchet. Witnesses...
Iran: Cutting Trees!
Hanouz, an Iran based journalist & blogger, talks about cutting thousands trees (Persian) in Levizan forest in neighbourhood of Tehran. According to the blogger, Tehran's municipality is cutting these trees to construct a highway. It is considered disastrous for Tehran and its air pollution.
Catastrophe in Samarra
I am devoting my Thursday post on Iraqi blogs to the bombing of the Shia Shrine in Samarra and I hope to cover the rest of the Iraqi Blogs in a later report. The subject is serious enough to dominate the Iraqi weblogs. The Shia shrine in Samarra is one...
Armenia: Traffickers & Ports
Ara Manoogian is angry with the Bush Administration's support for turning over US ports to a UAE company because of the country's major ties to human trafficking.
Found in Translation
One of the greatest challenges in curating the global online conversation is translation. To present ideas and reflections from one language and culture to another is no easy task and often ends up taking more time than writing the original post. Still, Global Voices is committed to presenting a plethora...
Kurdistance:
Wow, another week come and gone so quickly…I guess we better get to business then. A sad week for the Kurdistan Bloggers Union as they call for an official hiatus from their group work for their individual projects. However, not all group blogs are slowing. Roj Bash! has recently started...
Palestine: Differences in mideast media's coverage
Rami writes a comparative study, which looks into how different online mediums covered the Israeli force raid on Balata refugee camp, near Nablus, Palestine. The criteria for choosing the websites under study were based on the largest readership: The two largest Israeli online news services, the two largest Palestinian online...
Israel: A War of Religions? God Forbid!
With all the religiophobia going around, specially when it comes to Palestine/Israel conflict, Islam, Judaism and Christianity, Uri Avnery writes, A War of Religions? God Forbid!
Iraq: Samarra Shrine Destroyed
Men dressed as Iraqi police commandos slipped into Samarra‘s shrine of Imam Hasan al-Askari last night, set explosive and blew it up this morning, causing the golden dome to collapse and with it, hopes for a national unity.
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