Manal and Alaa's bit bucket

Cairofreeze 

So after a long silence, the Vatican spoke. It seems that in recent years it had been busy with book-condemnation and busy reading Harry Potter. It probably goes something like this:Happiness can be found [ahh.. happiness? meaning sins of the flesh], even in the darkest of times [darkness… they said darkness as in Prince of [...]

..wait a minute. I am confused.Nasrallah just said that if he had known that the kidnapping would lead to this war, he wouldn't have kidnapped the 2 israeli soldiers. "We did not think that there was a 1% chance that thekidnapping would lead to a war of this scale and magnitude," SheikhNasrallah said."Now you ask me [...]

The syrians, in order to pressure Lebanon over spreading UNFIL forces on its borders, has cut off the electricity it provided Lebanon. Then, in true Bisho (I am a giant gaping Vagina) Aassad fashion, denied doing so, and claimed that there was a problem inthe electrity line from Egypt, which Egypt has denied.The Iranians, [...]

Michael Young thinks that the world got hoodwinked by the Party of the Allmighty!Well, since it's all settled that Hezbollah has won, let's just open asix-pack of non-alcoholic beer and drink to the health of the party'ssecretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, the Arab world's latest Che Guevara.But what kind of victory is this that, even by [...]

OH…MY….GOD…Over years people symbolized Che Guevara as the symbol if fighting for freedom.Now we have our own example to follow ..Ibelieve that this person is one of us, not a cubian guy who fought USAfor freedom, he's 10000000 times more worth symbolizing Please spread itOn this note, I would like to mention [...]

Sameh Naguib, a Socialist activist with Kefaya, speaks on Hizbollah and how the war transformed the region. You can find the interview here.

A lot of people, many egyptians and arabs included, have believed the Hype that Hezbollah is "the most effective arab fighting force". Well, this report compares its perfromance with that of the Egyptian army in 1973 and the Jordanian army in 67.More serious misperceptions are equally obvious.For example, instead of dismissing Nasrallah's boasts, manycommentators [...]

In an article entitled “Prepare for Iranian Strike, Israelis told,” a senior Israeli official said that Israel has to be ready for an impending attack [link].  “We are liable to face an Iranian missile attack. The Iranians have said very clearly that if they come under attack, their primary target would be Israel,” said Rafi Eitan, a [...]

(Via The Blubbering Corner)These posters are circulating the Arab cyberspace, depicting Hizbollah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah as the new Ché Guevara.

Raja has seen those signs, and he is not very happy!

No prizes for guessing where this is.

Fisk’s latest bit has an interesting fifth paragraph—he claims that Hizbullah is encouraging erstwhile residents of the now flattened southern suburbs of Beirut to rent, not buy. Seems that someone’s thinking tactically here, and has decided that there’s no point in rebuilding quite yet.Lebanon and Iraq are beginning to look like a giant fire sale, [...]

Ehud Danoch, Israel’s consul general in Los Angeles, has been “cultivating relationships with a number of film industry insiders”, i.e. Hollywood-ians, according to the Jerusalem Post. He held meetings with actors, producers and directors over the last several days “to describe damage sustained by Israel and to explain the country’s position on the current cease-fire and [...]

I came across an excellent post on a Lebanese blog describing a wounded Hizb’Allah fighter’s story. Regardless of how you feel about Hizb’Allah, I think the post is well worth your time for how well written it is, if nothing else.Excerpt:Suddenly I asked, “were you scared?”He looked at me. The mysterious and piercing look in [...]

The picture below was taken by John Waterbury, president of the American University in Beirut. More here.

That Amr Hamzawy — he’s so hot right now (you have watched Zoolander, haven’t you?):This widening ideological divide between ruling elites and oppositions will make it more difficult to adopt political reform measures, which require at least some consensus and flexibility on both sides. More troubling is that the positions of putatively democratic Arab opposition [...]

Forget road maps, peace accords and negotiations and UN resolutions. Here is one person’s amusing suggestions for solutions, and you even get to choose which one of those three final solutions you want .. [and YES it IS a joke.. but isn’t the beauty of a joke in how much it touches upon the truth?] [link]:Final Solution [...]

“There’s only one solution for him. This man must die.” [link]Those were words spoken by an Israeli commander [on condition of anonymity] regarding Hassan Nasrallah. So what’s new? we know that already. The Israelis did it to Sheikh Yassin before.. and to others. All those targetted assassinations they have been conducting over the past 5 years. They [...]

French specialist on Islamist movements Olivier Roy has a very interesting op-ed in the FT, reproduced below.Hizbollah has redrawn the Middle EastPublished: August 17 2006 20:29 | Last updated: August 18 2006 01:49The perceived victory of Hizbollah in Lebanon may be short term but has highlighted some new and important developments. For the first time, [...]

- شفت يا دكتور ال حصل ؟ بكل حماس و سعادة قالها عامل العمليات

- خير يا عبد الكريم ؟

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The Li-Beirut solidarity campaign for Lebanon will be launched on Sunday, 20th August at 8 pm at CiC – Contemporary Image Collective (20 Safeya Zaghloul off Kasr El Aini St., Mounira).Related posting:Li-Beirut: Cairo activists needed for solidarity campaign

Youth for Change, Kefaya’s youth wing, has called for a demonstration tomorrow Saturday, 6pm, in front of the Lawyers Syndicate, to celebrate Hizbollah’s victory and to denounce any planned move to disarm the resistance group.

SP sent me links to some cool and funny Bollywood music remixes of Arabic songs.Check it out:Ya Ali - Original Ya Ghali in Arabic by GuitaraYa Ali - GANGSTERNew Gangster Yaali ya ali remix By StolenAnd here is a Pakistani Amr Diab singing for his mehbooba in front of the pyramids:Haroon MehboobaAnd here is an [...]

The Skeptic posted the following public service announcement to the Lebanese people. Shokran ya Elijah.

Tell me this is an elaborate spoof.Two websites claim they can arrange delivery of pizza and burgers to IDF units on the Lebanese border and “around Gaza,” and boast that they coordinate with the security forces so that there’s no “security risk.”Imagine the hassle these guys could have saved in Lebanon—all that unloading from ships, [...]

I have an op-ed piece on TomPaine.com, the progressive website, titled After Lebanon, What’s Left?. It discusses the long-term impact this war will have on Arab moderates, which the Bush administration and its allies have spoken about a lot but done little to reassure. I appreciate any feedback.

My friend Nadia Abou El-Magd of AP wrote this report today:For the majority of Arabs, Hezbollah won, Israel is no longer the undefeatable armyCAIRO, Egypt (AP) _ Babies have been named “Hezbollah” and “Nasrallah.” Even some die-hard secularists are praising the Shiite fundamentalist militia in the wake of its cease-fire with Israel _ saying its [...]

Interesting story in the Boston Globe about a Shia intellectual who has sparked a storm with an essay denouncing Hizbullah. If anyone has the link to her original essay, please share.Meanwhile, here in Cairo, last night I walked past a car that had a poster of Hassan Nasrallah on its side window. I looked closer [...]

I thought Arabist readers would be interested in reading a translation of Hassan Nasrallah’s recent “victory speech.” It’s reproduced below (from BBC Monitoring). I found the passage about where he condemned some of the statements of parts of the political elite particularly interesting: they express both a great deal of anger at unnamed politicians (Jumblatt [...]