Archive | June, 2009

  • Death on the Nile

    Juan Cole.  Napoleon’s Egypt: Invading the Middle East.  New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.  Illustrations, maps.  xi + 279 pp.  $16.95 (paper), ISBN 978-0-230-60603-6. Juan Cole’s Napoleon’s Egypt tells the story of revolutionary France’s attempt to conquer Egypt and the cultural interchanges that resulted.  Although various aims drove the effort, the main motive was a prerevolutionary […]

  • Unemployment Climbs to 9.4 Percent, Rate of Job Loss Continues to Slow Moderately

    Though employment losses have slowed in May, many sectors have already lost large numbers of jobs over this recession and therefore have fewer jobs left to lose. The economy lost another 345,000 jobs in May.  For the first time in a year, there were upward revisions to the past months’ data, with March and April’s […]

  • Obama Administration Seeks Supreme Court Review of Decision Declaring Patriot Act Provision Unconstitutional

    Lower Courts Unanimously Declared Law Unconstitutionally Vague Washington, DC, June 4, 2009 — The Obama administration today sought Supreme Court review of a decision declaring a USA Patriot Act provision unconstitutional.  The case, Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, originally brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) in 1998, challenges the constitutionality of the law […]

  • Resistance in Gaza: Young Palestinians Find Their Voice through Hip-Hop

    The Maqusi Towers in Gaza City look a bit like US housing projects.  The neighborhood consists of several tall apartment buildings grouped together in the northern part of town.  It is also ground zero for Gaza’s growing Hip-Hop community.  On a recent evening in one small but well-decorated apartment, a dozen rappers and their friends […]

  • Cinema as a Democratic Emblem1

    Philosophy only exists insofar as there are paradoxical relations, relations which fail to connect, or should not connect. When every connection is naturally legitimate, philosophy is impossible or in vain.

    Philosophy is the violence done by thought to impossible relations.

    Today, which is to say “after Deleuze,” there is a clear requisitioning of philosophy by cinema — or of cinema by philosophy. It is therefore certain that cinema offers us paradoxical relations, entirely improbable connections.

  • Appeals Court Rules against Shell Nigeria, Allows Plaintiffs to Seek Further Information to Establish Connections to United States

    New York, June 3, 2009 — Today, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the District Court decision dismissing the Wiwa v. Shell plaintiffs’ claims against Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria, Ltd. (Shell Nigeria).  The District Court had dismissed the case against Shell Nigeria on March 4, 2008, finding it did not have jurisdiction […]

  • García Lorca

      نصير شمة يعزف غارسيا لوركا Naseer Shamma was born in 1963, in Al Kut, Iraq.  He is one of the greatest oud players.

  • “Welcome, Obama”

      Ashraf Omar is a socialist cartoonist from Egypt.  This cartoon was published by Revolutionary Socialism, an Egyptian Web site, under a Creative Commons license.  The title given by Revolutionary Socialism reads: “Caricature: Welcome, Obama” (Caricature: Marhaba Obama).

  • Jeff Madrick’s Case for Big Government

    Jeff Madrick.  The Case for Big Government.   Princeton University Press, 2009.  205 pp.  ISBN 978-0-691-12331-8 (Hardcover). In The Political Economy of Growth, Paul Baran argued that the increased role of the US government in post-New Deal America did not solve the contradictions of monopoly capitalism but merely “removed the onus for the malfunctioning of […]

  • Egyptian Public to Greet Obama with Suspicion

    June 3, 2009 Questionnaire/methodology (PDF) A new WorldPublicOpinion.org poll finds Egyptians continue to view US foreign policy quite negatively and see President Obama as closely aligned with it.  At the same time, Obama has much better ratings than Bush had, and there are signs of thawing feelings toward the US. Asked how much confidence they […]

  • Chomsky on Obama Speech

    June 4, 2009 Chomsky, whose recent books include Interventions and The Essential Chomsky, sent the following to the Institute for Public Accuracy this morning: “A CNN headline, reporting Obama’s plans for his June 4 Cairo address, reads ‘Obama looks to reach the soul of the Muslim world.’   Perhaps that captures his intent, but more […]

  • Union Busting Getting Worse, Study Shows

      A new five-year study reveals that private sector employer opposition to the efforts of American workers to form unions has intensified and become more punitive in recent years. Conducted by highly-regarded labor expert and Cornell University professor Kate Bronfenbrenner, the study concludes that employers are using much more aggressive tactics — including threats of […]

  • Debate: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir-Hossein Mousavi

    A debate between Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir-Hossein Mousavi, candidates for the tenth presidential election of the Islamic Republic of Iran. UPDATE A debate between Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mir-Hossein Mousavi, dubbed in English by Press TV Afshin Salimpour, “The Ghost of Elections Past” (Tehran Bureau, 3 June 2009). Shahrazad, “Did Ahmadinejad Win the Debate?” (5 June […]

  • Life In Gaza: As President Obama Visits Cairo, Gaza Remains Devastated

    More than four months after Gaza was devastated by a massive Israeli military bombardment, rebuilding has been slow to come.  The problem is not a lack of funding or will.  However, an Israeli-led blockade has kept all rebuilding materials, including concrete or any tools that could be used to rebuild the hundreds of homes and […]

  • MK Afo Agbaria’s Letter to UN Secretary General on War Crimes in Gaza

    Member of the Knesset, Dr. Afo Agbaria (Hadash fraction) on Wednesday (June 3, 2009) wrote to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, asking that he be allowed to assist the UN investigation on war crimes during the Israeli military’s Operation “Cast Lead” in the Gaza Strip.  International prosecutor Richard Goldstone and his team of investigators arrived […]

  • How the Media Annexed East Jerusalem to Israel

    Talks between Barack Obama and the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships over the past fortnight have unleashed a flood of media interest in the settlements Israel has been constructing on Palestinian territory for more than four decades. The US president’s message is unambiguous: the continuing growth of the settlements makes impossible the establishment of a Palestinian […]

  • An Open Letter from the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies to President Barack Obama on the Occasion of His Cairo Speech to the “Blacks” of the Twenty-first Century

    June 2, 2009 Mr. President, The Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) hopes that your speech to the Arab and Muslim worlds will contain practical steps to uphold your administration’s stated intention to seriously deal with the problems that have inflamed resentment and fostered a sense of humiliation among peoples, individuals, and ethnic and […]

  • Caterpillar under Fire for Human Rights Abuses for Sixth Year in a Row

    Chicago, IL (June 3) — For the sixth year in a row, members of Jewish, Christian, and human rights organizations will be present at Caterpillar, Inc.’s annual shareholder meeting to demand that Caterpillar end its complicity with violations of human rights and international law in the occupied West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem. Concerned […]

  • The Trojan Horse

    President Rafael Correa of Ecuador, in a visit to Honduras on the eve of the OAS meeting stated: “I think that the OAS has lost its reason to exist; perhaps it never had a reason to exist.” The news carried by ANSA adds that Correa “predicted ‘the death’ of that organization because of the many errors it had committed.”

  • Second Issue of Jafa Now Available!

      Labour for Palestine is pleased to announce the second issue of Jafa – Labour Bulletin in Solidarity with Palestine. This second issue has a special focus on Israel’s war on Gaza.  We publish here a range of solidarity resolutions that were passed by unions around the world, analysis of the aftermath, and discussion around […]