Geography Archives: Middle East

  “Come to me, come to me / Oh beautiful, you charmed me with your dark complexion / You can have me and my love easily . . . They told me that we’ll get married / I cannot live without you . . .  You’re for me like the water and the air that […]

On September 18, 2013, a press release issued by the Ad Hoc Committee Against the Militarization of CUNY stated: “Six students were arrested in a brutal, unprovoked police attack during a peaceful protest by the City University of New York’s students and faculty against CUNY’s appointment of former CIA chief ex-General David Petraeus.  Students were […]

All summer the threat of violence was in the air in Hellersdorf.  This borough on the outskirts of East Berlin, once a huge site of modern high-rise buildings aimed at solving East German housing problems, provided homes for nearly 130,000 people.  After “the Wall went down” many high-rise buildings were cropped from eleven to five […]

Nicolás Maduro is the President of Venezuela.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com). | Print

The drums of war are beating again.  The Obama administration will reportedly launch a military strike to punish Syria’s Assad government for its alleged use of chemical weapons. A military attack would invariably kill civilians for the ostensible purpose of showing the Syrian government that killing civilians is wrong.  “What we are talking about here […]

The pro-SCAF, way down in the hole: “Strike them, O Sisi!”
The pro-MB, way down in the hole: “You are the enemies of Islam!”
On the red flag leading the way up and out:
“Bread, Freedom, Social Justice”

The following is an interview of me (MDY) conducted by Cedric Muhammad (CM), who is an aide to the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, the National Representative of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam.  An abbreviated version of the interview appears in The Final Call, the Nation of Islam’s newspaper (available at www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/Business_amp_Money_12/article_100637.shtml). […]

The drums of war are beating again.  The Obama administration will reportedly launch a military strike to punish Syria’s Assad government for its alleged use of chemical weapons. A military attack would invariably kill civilians for the ostensible purpose of showing the Syrian government that killing civilians is wrong.  “What we are talking about here […]

  CJP: What began as a financial crisis in 2007 has become one of the biggest unemployment crises in the advanced capitalist world.  Could this perhaps mean that the crisis of 2007-08 was not actually caused by finance itself but had its underlying causes in the real economy? JBF: No one doubts that it was […]

One of the most hotly debated aspects of #OccupyGezi has been the nature and degree of Kurdish participation.  Although from the beginning Kurdish activists have participated intensively in most of the #OccupyGezi protests in metropolitan cities in Turkey, and some MPs of the pro-Kurdish BDP have been closely involved in the movement, the participation of […]

To you at whose side we struggle, June 30th will mark a new stage of rebellion for us, building on what started January 25th and 28th, 2011.  This time we rebel against the reign of the Muslim Brotherhood that has brought only more of the same forms of economic exploitation, police violence, torture, and killings. […]

  Turkey has been witnessing one of the most vibrant and creative protests in its history since a group of protestors were subjected to brutal police violence a month ago in Gezi Park, Istanbul.  Primarily started as a reaction against the urban regeneration of Gezi Park, protests then proliferated in other parts of Istanbul and […]

Diyarbakir (Amed) After nearly three decades of war, Turkey’s Kurdistan region, home for an estimated 25 million stateless Kurds, warily awaits a long-lasting peace. For the last 29 years this region has been ravaged by a ferocious conflict between the Turkish army, the NATO’s second largest, and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a guerilla movement […]

  Turkey’s PM Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (now aka Recop Tazyik Gazdoğan, a pun on the PM’s name and the Turkish words for “truncheon,” “water cannon,” and “teargas”) issued an ultimatum at a so-called local election kickoff rally in a suburb of Ankara, which everybody knew was an attempt to counteract #OccupyGezi. Only a few hours […]

The Executive Committee of Local 3903 of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE 3903) declares ourselves in solidarity with the demonstrators throughout the Republic of Turkey.

The demonstrations which began on May 31, 2013 have been entirely peaceful and speak to the conscience of vast numbers of the population of Turkey.  The Turkish government’s response to the myriad grievances against its policies has been beyond disproportionate, with security forces using armoured personnel carriers to engage in mass-arrests, firing high pressure water cannons filled with pepper-spray, and utilizing tear-gas guns to fire large projectiles.  Thousands of demonstrators have been arrested and injured, some critically.

  When Wisconsin state workers were courageously occupying the state capitol to protest Governor Scott Walker’s attack on their unions’ right to bargain, AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka trumpeted a call for solidarity actions throughout the labor movement on April 4, 2011, the anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King, killed during the Memphis sanitation […]

Speaking about the then dictator of Nicaragua, US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt reportedly said: “Somoza may be a son of a bitch, but he’s our son of a bitch.”  Whether or not Roosevelt actually said it in so many words is disputable, but there is no doubt that it — i.e., dictatorship is licensed in […]

Dear comrades, friends, sisters, and brothers of our movement! This is an urgent call for more active international solidarity actions with people who are fighting for their democratic rights in all cities and towns of Turkey. Prime Minister Erdogan and his government are attacking people who are trying to voice their democratic demands in all […]

The KCK (Union of Communities in Kurdistan) Executive Council said that the Gezi Park protests, which began as social resistance, have sent a message calling for a new, democratic Turkey.  The KCK called on the Kurdish people to take initiative, saying that the Kurds should fulfill responsibility by working with the democratic forces in Turkey so that the Democratic Solution Process will develop on the right track.

The KCK Executive Council stated that the social resistance around Gezi Park has an important message.  Noting that the current situation poses significant consequences for Turkey’s transition into a democratic country, the council also warned against “opportunist” approaches.  The KCK called on the democratic and working-class sections of civil society to stand against potential barriers to the Democratic Solution Process.

  1. For days now Turkey has been witnessing a genuine popular movement.  The actions and protests, which have started in Istanbul and spread all over Turkey, have a massive, legitimate, and historic character.  The most important of all is the striking change in the mood of people.  The fear and apathy has been overcome […]