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Showing posts with the label “French colonialism”

Quote of the Week: Killing Innocent People

Journalist : M. Ben M'Hidi, don't you think it's a bit cowardly to use women's baskets and handbags to carry explosive devices that kill so many innocent people? Ben M'Hidi :  And doesn't it seem to you even more cowardly to drop napalm bombs on defenseless villages, so that there are a thousand times more innocent victims? Of course, if we had your airplanes it would be a lot easier for us. Give us your bombers, and you can have our baskets. — The Battle of Algiers ,  a 1966 movie   Related The Rebel’s Clinic
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The Great Camouflage by Suzanne Césaire

Note there is an error here: “In keeping with the patriarchal norms of colonial and Caribbean life, Suzanne’s own ambitions came second to Aimé’s, who eventually became the first president of Senegal.” Aimé Césaire was never a president of any country. I have emailed the editors to rectify it. Uncensoring the subconscious
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Between the Politics of Life and the Geopolitics of Death: Syria 1963-2024 (Part 9)

[The following is a crucial historical analysis focusing on nationalism. With the demise of the Ba’ath nationalism in Syria, are we witnessing a triumph of a version of Islamist nationalism? Is it an emancipatory nationalism, a nationalism subordinated to class, social justice, women liberation, or just another instrumentalist nationalism – a bourgeois nationalism of the state veiled in religion and led by pious ‘middle men’ at the service of neocolonial powers and capital?]   Nation Against State: Popular Nationalism and the Syrian Uprising (1) [The Bourgeoisie has] come to power in the name of a narrow nationalism […]; they will prove themselves incapable of triumphantly putting into practice a programme with even a minimum humanist content […]. —Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (1963) The current Syrian revolts “One, one, one, the Syrian people are one!” In 2011, this was one of the most popular chants during protests. Syrians used it to counter the sectarian discourse o...
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Documentary: Frantz Fanon – Black Skin White Mask

 But why a British actor as Fanon? Related A review of Concerning Violence
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The Mythology of the Sectarian Middle East

I wonder how I missed this excellent article on ‘sectarianism’ in the Middle East when it was published in 2017. It reminds me of at least a statement and a question by two English who did History at the London School of Economics. One said: “Now I understand why there are many conflicts in the Arab world. It is because there are many dialects.” The other asked me when the split between the Sunnis and Shi’a took place, implying that it is ‘a millennium-long conflict’.  Related Coexistence, sectarianism and racism – an interview with Ussama Makdisi Boundary making and sectarianisation in Syria 2011-2013 Making and unmaking of the greater Middle East
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Syria: Mapping Lessons

“Syria is associated with war, terrorism and Islamist extremism. Is it possible to find another thread that links it to other diverse radical struggles in other regions and different times? Can Syria become a point of reference or inspiration for class, subaltern, post-colonialist and anti-liberal struggles around the world? For many people this would be almost unimaginable.” Leila al-Shami: “ It's unfortunate that people in general are unable to learn and study, or even be aware of the lessons from Syria because the presentation of Syria in the West has overwhelmingly been channeled through the discourses that Western culture is already comfortable with.” Land, Revolutions and Lessons from Syria
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