Links December 30th to January 1st

Links from my del.icio.us account for December 30th through January 1st:

• The Daily Star - Opinion Articles - The Middle East as a nagging irritant - Rami Khouri looks at stagnation and worse in the Middle East.


• Eyeless in Gaza II—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine) - Scott Horton asks: could the true purpose of this whole exercise be to hamstring the incoming Obama administration as it moves to implement a new Middle East policy?


• Genève : les esclaves des Kadhafi parlent - Europe - Le Monde.fr - Details on the scandal Hannibal Qadhafi (Muammar#039;s fourth son) holding of two domestic servants against their will, and the practice of importing and entrapping slave labor from the Maghreb.


• Donkeys ordered to wear diapers in Egypt - Why o why?


• TelQuel : Le Maroc tel qu'il est | Enquête sur les Forces armées royales - Interesting article on Moroccan military policy under M6.


• Oh the humanity - The National Newspaper - Review of Faisal Devji#039;s quot;The Terrorist in Search of Humanityquot; -on the inner life of Jihad.


• Neighbors / The Muslim Brotherhood - Iran's brothers-in-arms? - Haaretz - Israel News - Rather lame analysis of Iran-Egypt rift: it#039;s not that Iran is trying to get a quot;footholdquot; in Egypt via the MB, but that the regime has so thoroughly discredited itself it is making unlikely ideological alliances possible. If this continues, despite the state media attacks on Iran, most Egyptians and indeed Arabs will begin to see the Iranian model of confrontation as the only legitimate policy being acted out in the region.


• AFP: Egypt cancels New Year's Eve over Gaza 'massacres' - Mubarak regime makes token gesture but still keeps the Rafah border closed.


• ANALYSIS-Hezbollah chief stirs Arabs to turn on rulers | Reuters - Hassan Nasrallah, the most feared man among the Arab regimes.


• Ali Abunimah: No words left to describe latest Gaza catastophe | Comment is free | The Guardian - quot;But the bombs dropped on Gaza are only a variation in Israel#039;s method of killing Palestinians. In recent months they died mostly silent deaths, the elderly and sick especially, deprived of food, cancer treatments and other medicines by an Israeli blockade that targeted 1.5 million people - mostly refugees and children - caged into the Gaza Strip. The orders of Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, to hold back medicine were just as lethal and illegal as those to send in the warplanes.quot;


• Nir Rosen: Gaza: Israel, Hamas and the logic of colonial power | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk - Nir Rosen comes out as a one-stater.