Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

Statues Quo

Percent change in U.S. real wages by income percentile, 2007-2014

The End of Progressive Hegemony and the Regressive Turn in Latin America: The End of a Cycle?

" The former  Spitting Image  writer  John O’Farrell  says he adheres to the time-honoured maxim that the comic should always be “punching up”, not down. Laughing at the weak is never funny, and there is nobody weaker than a dead child washed up on a beach. As for the second rule, O’Farrell recalls David Attenborough’s advice to the Monty Python team: “Use shock sparingly.” And perhaps there is a third. If you’re aiming a lethal arrow, be sure to shoot straight at the target. Because if you miss, you might not hurt your enemy: you might just help him instead." Jonathan Freedland, the Guardian , 15 January 2016

What Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’ can teach us

Hadi al-`Alawi, Scion of the Two Civilizations

Palestinian poet and artist Ashraf Fayadh sentenced to death in Saudi Arabia As usual the Western powers will turn a blind eye on this. Not only because the Saudi Kingdom is their close friend, but because they themselves are major abusers of "human rights".

Has Belgium created 'a system of apartheid'?

Racism: the achilles heel of middle class liberalism " I sure as hell would not be able to sleep soundly if I thought my fate rested upon the European liberal middle classes." See also this analysis  The Red Flag and the Tricolore

The so-called 'revolution' that was applauded by the Western regimes and media including the Guardian, helped divert and domesticate the uprisings by supporting the forces which maintain the socio-economic status quo by limiting it to political rights, which themselves have been weak (cases of torture and other types of repression have been reported). And to add insult to injury, a Nobel Prize was given to some of the forces.

Will China Pull Down the World?

An open letter to Charlie Hebdo What if Aylan Kurdi Did Grow up in France

Funding, Capitalism and NGOs

NGOs: In the service of imperialism

36 Brilliant Paintings about the World

Nine truths about terrorism that nobody wants to hear. "Occasional terrorist attacks in the West are virtually inevitable, and odds are, we’ll see more attacks in the coming decades, not fewer. If we want to reduce the long-term risk of terrorism — and reduce its ability to twist Western societies into unrecognizable caricatures of themselves — we need to stop viewing terrorism as shocking and aberrational, and instead recognize it as an ongoing problem to be managed, rather than “defeated.” Politicians don’t like to say any of this. But we’re not politicians, so let’s look at 10 painful truths." It is a very good piece . You need a free registration to reead it though. Note : state terrorism, the major type of terrorism (by Western and non-western states), is ignored in the piece above. Also, Hamas and Hizb Alla are considered "terrorist" organisations.

This is excellent! "Our Wound is Not So Recent"   (pdf) Or "Notre Mal Vient de Plus Loin"

Towards a Radical Critique of Eurocentrism: An Interview with Alexander Anievas and Kerem Nisancioglu

In Turkey, the State Doesn't Talk — It Only Shoots

Meet The 80 People Who Are As Rich As Half The World

Joseph Messad: Islam in Liberalism

The Question of Sectarianism in Middle East Politics Over the centuries there have been many variations and mutations in the ‘orthodox’ as well as the sectarian formations, and the divisions only broke into conflicts when they were politicised into struggles for power or resources. For the most part, various Shi`ite sects lived quietly under Sunni rule, and were, mostly, left alone. Like elsewhere in the pre-modern world, communities were, typically, isolated in separate localities, except in the main cities  where they often occupied different quarters. Politicisation came with social conflicts, rebellions and geopolitical confrontations

U.S. Dropped 23,144 Bombs on Muslim-Majority Countries in 2015

David Bowie David Bowie and Eric Clapton Bowie performed in Zionist Israel in 1996

Very interesting. Therapy Wars: The Revenge of Freud

Iraqi Birth Defects Worse than Hiroshima

Steven Pinker is Wrong about Violence and War A new orthodoxy, led by Pinker, holds that war and violence in the developed world are declining. The stats are misleading, argues Gray – and the idea of moral progress is wishful thinking and plain wrong.

The culturalization of social antagonisms. Cologne, September 2014-January 2016 Anti-Muslim Racism from Above and From Below

Mobs and Counter-Mobs:   Pitfalls, Prejudice and the Cologne Sexual Assaults "The events in Cologne were perpetrated by a sexist criminal mob -- and have triggered the rise of racist digital mob in response. The incident has shown that much of the public doesn't care much about sexual violence, unless it comes from foreigners."

England:  Housing crisis hits 1960s levels as tenants battle to cope, says Shelter

The Closed Mind of Richard Dawkins