Egypt is throbbing with resistance. Cairo is cloven between the forces of revolution and those of counterrevolution. Hundreds of thousands of people — on Tuesday, February 1, well over a million — have been streaming each day into Tahrir Square, the largest plaza in the Arab world, located in the heart of downtown Cairo. Army […]
Geography Archives: Middle East
Islam as Democracy against the Dictatorships of the Western Powers
The West has financed dictatorships in the Middle East and Arab World for more than a century. The pro-democracy protests against Western-backed dictatorships in the Arab world have shown, once again, the immense hypocrisy of our rulers. Which side are the Western governments on — the side of protesters or the side of dictators? The […]
Support the Revolution in Egypt
Mohamed Gaber is a graphic designer and photographer in Cairo, Egypt. Check out his blog at . Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. | Print
Egypt: “If We Decide to Give In Now, They Will Hunt Us One by One”
Al Jazeera and Mona Seif
Because we can’t go. We’ve lost a lot of people and we lost them for a cause. The cause is that we want Mubarak to be out. We owe it to them to stick it to the end. We have many injured people; it will be very hard to move them. . . . […]
Will There Be War on Iran? Two Divergent Views
In 2002 Iran was added to the neoconservative-designed ‘Axis of Evil’ and thus declared ripe for US military intervention. The threat of war in the ‘greatest crisis of modern times’ (John Pilger in the New Statesman, July 12, 2007) was at its height in 2006-2007. With President Obama assuming office in 2009, a great hope […]
Egypt: Defending the Revolution
“No trusting the army for their security anymore, protesters started putting up barricades around Tahrir Square and started forming security committees to protect their occupation from attacks by Mubarak’s thugs.” — Hossam el-Hamalawy “Tahrir is regaining its strength. It’s getting lively again after yesterday’s brutal assault.” — Sharif Kouddous Graffiti sprayed on an army tank: […]
Iran Is Neither Egypt Nor Tunisia
What explains the diametrically opposed stances of the imperialist powers and corporate media: promoting regime change in Iran while endeavoring to preserve the fundamentals of the regimes, with or without modification, in Egypt and Tunisia? In part, the increasingly anachronistic legacy of the policy and ideology about Israel developed in the wake of the […]
Egypt: On the Barricades
2 February 2011 Every revolution, sooner or later, has to stand on the barricades and fight a counter-revolution. The scenes today at the Tahrir Square are nothing short of a scene that we imagine from the French revolution: the people holding ground against hordes of militiamen of a dying regime. Young and old, women and […]
Movements in Egypt: The US Realigns
Egypt is a cornerstone in the US plan of control of the planet. Washington will not tolerate any attempt of Egypt to move out of its total submission, also required by Israel in order to pursue its colonisation of what remains from Palestine. This is the exclusive target of Washington in its ‘involvement’ in the […]
Women Protesting in Tahrir Square
Protests sweeping Egypt have done more than raise hopes of democratic change. Egypt’s women are hoping this might mark the start of a new era for them as well. Women have been on the frontlines of the demonstrations, braving tear gas and gunfire, to call for the unseating of President Hosni Mubarak. They helped […]
Nawal El Saadawi: “I’m 80 Years Old But I’m Ready to Fight”
“They gave them bribes to beat us, to beat us here. . . . My friends here, my friends, my daughter and son, who are here among the people, who are here together, they want me to go home. I said no. I have to stay here, because . . . we have to […]
Egypt: Vodafone Supports Dictatorship
So not only did Vodafone have a disgraceful role during the April 2008 Mahalla uprising, now also the company is sending out text messages announcing pro-Mubarak’s protests. Massive demonstration to start at noon this Wednesday from Mustafa Mahmoud Square, in support of President Mubarak Can activists in the UK sue the mother company? Hossam el-Hamalawy […]
Egypt: Retrofitting “Operation Ajax” to Support the Pharaoh against the People
“As soon as I saw the defiant tone and substance of Mubarak’s speech, I realized that he is not speaking for himself but for the US/Israeli sponsors. . . . I just read the speech by Obama: it confirmed my suspicion, that basically Mubarak was permitted by the US to do with the Egyptian […]
On Recent Attacks on Civil Liberties
GEB Statement on Recent Attacks on Civil Liberties On September 24, 2010, the FBI carried out coordinated raids on the homes and offices of fourteen anti-war activists in Minnesota, Illinois and Michigan. During the raids, the FBI confiscated everything from computers and mailing lists to children’s drawings and photos of Martin Luther King. Ten of […]
Tomorrow’s Tunisia and Egypt: Reform or Revolution?
Arab uprisings are taking place with the historical speed of light. I began writing this piece following the downfall of Tunisian dictator Ben Ali and closed with the imminent downfall of the Egyptian one Hosni Mubarak. The Tunisian and Egyptian uprisings are not, as some armchair pundits called the Tunisian one, Jasmine Revolutions. They […]
Germany: Yet Another Vote for War in Afghanistan, Amidst Guttenberg Scandals
“Guttenberg trotz Ansehensverlust beliebtester Politiker” [Guttenberg, Germany’s Most Popular Politician, Despite Scandals] (AFP, 28 January 2011). The German man of the hour is Baron Karl-Theodor von und zu Guttenberg. Actually he has eight other given names, which modestly prohibits him from using, but the title shows that his family traces back to 1158. He is […]
On the Arab Revolt: Interview with Vijay Prashad
Vijay Prashad is a prominent Marxist scholar from South Asia. He is George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College, Connecticut. He has written extensively on international affairs for both academic and popular journals. His most recent book The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the […]
Egypt to Mubarak: Your Time Is Up
Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. Cf. Nancy A. Youssef, “Why Has Egypt’s Army Not Confronted the Protests?” (McClatchy Newspapers, 30 January 2011). | Print
“They Want to Abort This Revolution, But We Will Win”: Interview with Nawal El Saadawi
Amy Goodman: Your feelings today in the midst of this popular rebellion against the Mubarak regime, calling on Mubarak to leave? Do you agree? Nawal El Saadawi: We are in the streets every day, people, children, old people, including myself. I am now 80 years of age, suffering of this regime for half a […]
The Showdown in Cairo!
Tomorrow the Egyptian people will go to the streets en masse to give the final blow to the regime. The people are talking of a rally of millions, and people have been pouring into Midan Atahrir, Tahrir Square, today and heading towards Cairo from the provinces. The regime closed all the roads and stopped the […]
