On 12 May, parliamentary elections were held across Iraq to decide the next holders of the 329 seats in the Council of Representatives. As the sole legislative body, parliament is responsible for appointing the country’s president and, by extension, the prime minister. This has been Iraq’s fourth national election since 2003, when then-President Saddam Hussein…
Many years ago, Edward Said, the towering Palestinian American intellectual who founded the academic field of post-colonialist studies said in Orientalism: ‘Every single empire in its official discourse has said that it is not like all the others, that its circumstances are special, that it has a mission to enlighten, civilize, bring order and democracy,…
The Syrian armed conflict entered its seventh year and the violence continues unabated, so much to become the world’s deadliest ongoing conflict. The multisided war has wracked a country whose survival is still at stake and since the beginning of the crisis in 2011, the humanitarian situation has deeply worsened. Syria has continuously witnessed human…
It is wrong at first to call it a struggle, because it arose as a doctrinal disagreement in some jurisprudential matters between the Sunni and Shiite communities. The beginning of the dispute came with the first sedition going through the Islamic nation, the sedition that led to the death of the third caliph Uthman ibn…
A new scandal breaks in the world of charities. After those surrounding Oxfam, aid workers operating in Syria in the behalf of the UN and international charities have been charged with sexual exploitation against vulnerable women in Syria. According to the UN report “Voices from Syria 2018”, indeed, sexual exploitation and harassment of women and…
For many Africans driven by hunger, war or lack of freedom or all three of these curses together, even Israel is an earthly paradise. It happened so that over the years, through the Egyptian desert, they have crossed the border of Sinai to seek fortune or simply a new life. But now Israel refuses them,…
A conflict covered by the media as thoroughly as the Syrian one – in ways which do fail at times to capture some nuances of the whole – cannot avoid to spark emotional reactions into public opinion. Seven years and countless killed, injured or displaced ones ahead, the theatre of the Syrian conflict does like…
Challenging the delicate status of the contested city and the international consensus, President Donald Trump has announced to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. This unprecedented move over the holy place can have a disastrous impact on the stability and security of the region, hindering the peace process. Before expounding what is happening now,…
In the south-eastern Idlib countryside, fierce battles are raging between the forces of the regime and the militias supporting them on the one hand, and the fighters of the “Sham Liberation” and the opposition factions on the other hand. More than 95 civilians have been killed and more than 200 wounded in three weeks of intense air…
Tuesday, January 3, 2018: the commander of the Iranian Pasdaran (Guards of the Revolution), Mohammad Ali Jafari, broke the news: “The revolt in Iran has been defeated”. This week of protests, clashes, violence and arrests will leave a long trace, marking the present and the future of the country. In the last week in Iran tens…
