Since the month of June is about to end in a few hours, and I’ve seen little anywhere about it, I’d like to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the death of Jorge Luis Borges, my favorite writer, who died on 14 June 1986.

Does anyone find it weird that Pope Shenouda III was scheduled to Germany this week for an emergency spinal cord operation — the exact same pretext that Mubarak went to Germany last summer for? The pope’s kidneys are also in bad shape, apparently, and he might be heading to the US for treatment.
Nahdet Misr’s leading [...]

As I’m blogging now, 3alaa is speaking on MBC, about the bloggers community in Egypt, human rights abuses, prospects for activism in Egypt, and his encounter with the Muslim Brothers youth in detention.
Two released detainees are also to appear on Dream2 TV, Saturday 8pm (Cairo time), together with two Mubrak’s National Democratic Party MPs.
Kefaya [...]

I came across an interesting article on Marxism and Terrorism. I recommend reading all of it. I couldn’t help but drawing parallels between the behavior of some of the 1800s European anarchists (discussed by the author in the beginning of the article) and the current Islamist Takfiri groups, especially in their justification of civilian casualties [...]

This kind of takes you back to history class, Russia’s perennial search for a warm-water port, the Crimean War and all that:
In early June, the Russian newspaper Kommersant reported Moscow’s decision to establish naval bases in the Syrian ports of Tartus and Latakia. The Russian Defense Ministry officially denied the report, even though more than [...]

Al-Jazeera reported 10,000 took part in a Muslim Brothers-led demo at Al-Azhar Mosque today, denouncing the Israeli military operations in the Palestinian Occupied Territories. Dr. Mohamed Habib, the Supreme Guide’s deputy, spoke to protestors denouncing US support for Israel.

TODAY, FRIDAY, JUNE 30 (CAIRO)
The Muslim Brothers have called for a demo following the Friday prayers at Al-Azhar, to protest the Israeli invasion of Gaza, and the kidnapping of 64 Palestinians–including 21 elected Palestinian members of parliament and eight cabinet ministers–by Israeli occupation troops.
SATURDAY, 1 JULY (CAIRO)
-The Press Syndicate’s Council has called for a [...]

The US supreme court directed a blow to Bush’s “war on terror,” ruling today against the administration’s plans to prosecute Gitmo detainees in military courts. Already, the US president is in terrible unease about the island’s gulag, which has been denounced by virtually all rights groups across the globe as well as well as America’s [...]

The Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary and the Legal Professional (lovingly known by its user-friendly acronym ACIJLP) has sent out its critique of Egypt’s new judicial authority law approved by parliament on Monday, saying that while an improvement in some respects it is still lacking in 12 ways. These criticisms echo what [...]

In which he discusses (with editor Ghassan Charbel and Damascus bureau chief Ibrahim Hamidi)Syria’s relationship with Jordan, Egypt’s negotiation of behalf of mini-Hariri, Arab fears of Iran’s growing regional role, growing sectarianism in Lebanon, his willingness to deal with anyone in Lebanon (Aoun, mini-Hariri, Seniora, etc.) except Walid Jumblatt and maybe Jacques Chirac. Although the [...]

The lawyer of the Yemen Observer was threatened by extremists while he defended his client for publishing the Danish cartoons of Prophet Muhammad:
Two young bearded men threatened the defense lawyer of Yemen Observer in the court room that they would have killed him if they have power.
Khalid Al-Anesi, who defends Mohammed Al-Asaadi, editor-in-chief of the [...]

The Committee to Protect Journalists has issued a rare report on the state of the Saudi press:
Although newspapers are privately owned, the state exerts tremendous influence over what is reported. The government approves the appointments of editors-in-chief, a process that journalists say is done behind closed doors with the oversight of Prince Nayef bin Abdel [...]

Praktike points out that Rose Al Youssef, a recently started pro-government daily, is trying to tarnish Kifaya leader George Ishak’s reputation by alleging he met with Israelis during a conference last April.
Al-Masry Al-Youm reported yesterday on Ishaq’s denial that he met with Israelis at the Fourth Assembly of the World Movement for Democracy in Istanbul [...]

HRW, which has recently gotten unprecedented access into Libya, is calling for full disclosure on the 1996 massacre that took place at the Abu Salim prison:
In the summer of 1996, stories began to filter out of Libya about a mass killing in Tripoli’s Abu Salim prison. The details remained scarce, and the government initially denied [...]

Hugh Miles, who wrote a book on Al Jazeera, has a “Think Again” piece in Foreign Policy debunking various myths about the channel. Nothing much new in it, but it’s a good overview of the facts many get wrong.
One interesting issue is about Al Jazeera International, the English-language channel that should launch later this year. [...]

The Nation has a long look at the unusual Zionist that is Vladimir Jabotinsky. Some interesting stuff in there, such as Jabotinsky uncanny honesty to Arabs that the Zionist intended to carve out a state of their own from mandate Palestine, or contradictory positions on “transfer,” and the self-doubt that seems to be lacking on [...]

Unfortunate beginning to this NYT story on Algeria:
ALGIERS — In the 1990’s, Algeria was the Iraq of the Arab world, ripping out its own heart in a bloodbath that pitted a rising Islamist movement against military death squads, killing more than 100,000 people. It was a model of hell on earth.
Er… in the 1990s, Iraq [...]

For a while now, I’ve been somewhat uneasy about the presence of pro-Israel ads on this site. I don’t choose them, the near-sentient megacomputer at Google does. (In the future, it will send a robot back in time to kill me.) While I don’t think many of this site’s readers want to send flowers to [...]

Brian Whitaker posted on the Guardian’s blog an article on Alaa Farag Megahed, the high school student who failed her exam because of a composition she wrote critical of Bush.
How to pass your exams in Egypt
Brian Whitaker, June 27, 2006 11:13 AM
“Blessed with abundant supplies of water, fertile soil and a flourishing tourism sector, Egypt [...]

The Muslim Brothers’ website ran a feature on torture in Egypt, which included allegations that “torture machines” are imported from Western countries.

Around 300 activists demonstrated Tuesday evening in front of the press syndicate, calling for the release of pro-democracy detainees. The demonstrators included several of the recently released detainees, who showed up dressed in the white prison costumes they wore in Tora.
The scene was beautiful. Released activists who haven’t seen one another since they got out [...]

I came across an interesting AP report on Al-Qa3da’s As-Sahab media productions. We can never know for sure if the interviewed cameraman indeed met Dr. Ayman el-Zawahiri, as he alleges. After all, you would think those guys are under constant monitoring, by Pakistani and US intelligence services, and Zawahiri’s hideout could have been found a [...]

The NYT profiles Hassan Dahir Aweys, the new head of Somalia’s Islamic Courts movement. Aweys comes across as a more hardline leader than the Islamic Courts’ previous spokesman, Sharif Ahmed, and is on US terrorist lists.

Mauritania — yes, the poor, backward, drought-stricken, desert state of Mauritania — has voted for constitutional amendments in a national referendum that imposes term limits on the presidency. Early results on the 25 June referendum indicate that Mauritanians approved by 97% the reform, with at least 76% of eligible voters casting their votes.
The reforms they [...]

A judge has forced the US to grant Tariq Ramadan — who was barred from entering the US last year — a visa after the ACLU and others brought a lawsuit. Whether you like Ramadan and his crypto-Islamist beliefs or not, this is a good thing on principle, for as the judge in the case [...]

It’s final… The Egyptian parliament approaved the notorious new Judicial Authority Law, without amendments demanded by the opposition, nor reviews requested by the judges.
For more background on the struggle for an independent judiciary, check the fantastic Baheyya blog.

Ibrahim 3eissa, the popular liberal editor of Al-Dostour, has been sentenced today to one year in prison, for “insulting” the president in an article he published April last year, that included a copy of a lawsuit filed by an Egyptian lawyer against President Hosni Mubarak and his family.
The court sentenced also another Al-Dostour reporter, Sahar [...]

Around 20 activists held a silent protest today, from noon to 1pm, in front of the Sayyeda Zeinab Police station in Cairo, marking the International Day Against Torture.

MONDAY, 26 JUNE
The Egyptian Association Against Torture is organizing a conference, from 6pm to 9pm, at the Press Syndicate, to mark the International Day Against Torture.
At 7pm, the Society of Sheikh Imam’s Fans will hold a music memorial for the legendary people’s singer, also at the Press syndicate.
Meanwhile, Kefaya, Socialists, Workers for Change and labor [...]

Newsweek published a story on the post-Mubarak scenarios…
After the Pharaoh
Who, or what, will replace Hosni Mubarak? Some say democracy, others chaos. It’s the question all Egyptians are now asking. No one has an answer.

I previously posted on the blog a letter from a former Islamist detainee, narrating the torture he went through in prison, during our 1990s Dirty War. I was going through my inbox today, and came across a good article from last September by my friend Sara Khorshid, who writes for Islam Online, and other media [...]

I saw in one of Angry Arab’s recent posts from Lebanon that he was given a tour — by Joseph Samaha no less — of the new Al Akhbar offices there. He said he was pleased by what he saw. Al Akhbar is a new project headed by Samaha — former editor of As Safir [...]

Back to blogging freely, 3alaa posted something interesting yesterday on his blog, recalling his “release” experience in el-3omraniya police station, and more importantly, he sent strong message of solidarity to the Muslim Brothers’ detainees.
3alaa, the staunch secularist, bumped into the MB youth who were picked up during a summer beach trip in Marsa Matrouh. 3alaa [...]

See www.festival-gnaoua.co.ma

Ali Abdullah Saleh, who’s been ruling Yemen since 1978, is to run for a new presidency term, despite his earlier promise not to.
I read somewhere last year about anti-Saleh statements circulating Sana’a, signed by a Yemeni Kefaya. Does anyone have info on that?

Remember when George Bush highlighted reforming education in the region, as a way of fighting “terror,” giving young Arabs a chance for a bright future and bla bla bla bla bla? Well, it seems to be working.
A high school student in a Nile Delta province failed her Arabic language exam two weeks ago for criticizing [...]

So it’s official, Google has arrived in Egypt. I guess that explains why whenever I type www.google.com, I get automatically diverted to www.google.com.eg with the default search language switched to Arabic.
Anyhow, you are still given the option of clicking on a link that will take you to google.com proper. I tried google-ing anti-Mubarak websites on [...]

Kefaya, Socialists, Workers for Change and labor union activists will meet Monday, 26 June, 7pm at the Center for Socialist Studies, to discuss strategy and tactics for the coming national labor unions elections, scheduled 20 August. The meeting will be open for the press. The center is located at 7 Morad St., in Giza. The [...]

Al-Jazeera broadcasted Friday night a new video by Dr. Ayman el-Zawahiri, the deputy head of Al-Qa3da, where he acknowledged Zarqawi’s death, and hailed him as a “martyr.” The Doha-based Satellite channel had aired a video by Zawahiri, only a day before, where he denounced the “massacre” by US troops against Afghan civilians last month, suggesting [...]

Professor Joseph Massad wrote an interesting opinion piece in Al-Ahram Weekly, on the social groups–produced by the 1990s Oslo “peace process”–that have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo in Palestine, and work hard to undermine the current democratically elected Hamas government. He draws parallels between Hamas’ current position with that of Chile’s Salvador [...]