It was only two months since the fighting ignited in Bosnia. Scary, but not yet out of control. But food was already getting tight so the spring air – and rumors of bread available – brought the citizens of Sarajevo out to the market for a hastily formed bread line. That was May 27, […]
Shifting red lines in Syria undermines the tough rhetoric toward Tehran Many observers have connected the civil war raging in Syria to the broader U.S. standoff with Iran. Critics of the Obama administration’s extremely cautious approach on Syria argue that pushing more forcefully for the demise of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, Tehran’s main ally in the […]
Beirut, the Paris of the Middle East and the region’s capital for assassinations and attempted political slayings. The latest of which in this bloody saga targeted Brigadier General Wissam al-Hassan, the head of the Information Branch of the Internal Security Forces. Hassan, who was tapped to become the Head of the ISF at the […]
A large part of advocating for human rights comes involves bearing witness. While we will never be able to prevent all the atrocities in the world, the hope is that by bringing these realities to light we can gather the political will to make them stop. In this regard, the media plays a huge role […]
Syria appears to be reaching a boiling point. A series of significant events and trends have emerged in the past month. Heavy fighting has erupted in Damascus, the capital, and Aleppo, the largest city — both places of privilege and, until now, stability in Bashar al-Assad’s Syria. High-level officials have begun to defect. These have […]
As Russia vetoed a Western-backed UN resolution imposing non-military sanctions on Syria as “unilateral” and directed only against the regime, it once again demonstrated that its position on the Syrian crisis remains unchanged, emphasizing its split with the West. The repetitive pattern of the Kremlin’s refusal to pressure regime change is often explained by […]
Googoosha: When Totalitarianism isn’t Enough I first discovered Googoosha through The Daily Beast. At first, it was impossible not to laugh; after all, one of the world’s worst dictators having daughter aspiring to be a pop diva is a bit hard to believe. Perhaps as a music lover and, I guess, a former radio DJ, I […]
By Majid Rafizadeh The world may have been able to pretend that it was not aware of the genocides taking place in Germany or in Rwanda in the 1990s. However, considering all the communication technology that exists today–international news outlets, social media, YouTube, etc.–in the future we won’t be able to claim that we didn’t […]
The following piece was originally published in YOUR MIDDLE EAST. Reprinted with Permission by Eliot Benman I was standing in the kitchen of an old Damascene house in the Christian quarter of Bab Touma when a figure burst through the door, brandishing a gun and crying “Kill the Islamists, kill the Islamists!” He pointed the gun […]
These images are photographs of the Syrian activist shot real-time video footage of the then ongoing attacks in rebel-held Houla. These images are a partial record of what must have been the stunting confusion, deafening noise, and blinding dust that marked that day. And even if removed from the widely-circulated devastating images that make something […]
Interesting news from Iraq… the Christian Science Monitor is reporting that violence has dropped precipitously as al-Qaeda affiliates quit the field to battle President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. The effects of egress have been most pronounced in Nineveh Province – the Iraqi governate borders Syria and once served as served as home to as many as […]
Twilight on the corniche in Beirut in February The chatter in the news and on Twitter today is about President Obama’s big speech on the Middle East at the State Department tomorrow. What will he say? There is no question this is a serious opportunity to get the Arab Spring back on track. It has veered […]