Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

“The question has never been whether individual acts of sexual assault may have occurred  on October 7.  The central issue is whether the New York Times presented solid evidence that Hamas deliberately and systematically deployed sexual violence as a weapon. And to this day, neither the Times nor any other institution has presented compelling proof to back that explosive assertion.” Full email from The Intercept, 15 March 2024: Over the last few weeks, The Intercept has exposed massive holes in the New York Times’s marquee front-page exposé on alleged sexual violence committed  on October 7. Instead of addressing the gaping flaws in the story and issuing a correction, the Times has launched an internal “witch hunt” targeting employees based on their national origin, ethnicity, and race to track down anyone who may have talked to The Intercept about the story, according to the union that represents the Times newsroom employees. The Intercept is continuing to inve...

At issue is not an accidental, negligible or ‘unfortunate’ streak of racism in the works of a stellar European philosopher.

El Mahala Textile in Egypt has been in turmoil

An interview with Malaika Jabali Correction:  “I feature Frida Kahlo, who was a part of the Communist Party.” She was in the Mexican Communist Party, not the American one.

The colour of economic anxiety

“Adenauer’s language at their meeting was unambiguous: Israel, he said, is a ‘fortress of the West’ and ‘I can already now tell you that we will help you, we will not leave you alone.’ Six decades on, Israel’s security is Germany’s Staatsräson, as Angela Merkel put it in 2008. The phrase has been repeatedly invoked, with more vehemence than clarity, by German leaders in the weeks since 7 October. Adenauer determined that his country needed greater sovereignty and a greater role in Western economic and security alliances; Germany’s long road west lay through Israel. West Germany moved fast after 1960, becoming the most important supplier of military hardware to Israel in addition to being the main enabler of its economic modernisation. Commenting on Israel’s successes in the 1967 war,  Die Welt  regretted German ‘infamies’ about the Jewish people: the belief that they were ‘without national sentiment; never ready for battle, but always keen to profit from somebody else’s war ef...

Verbal gymnastics

Free yourselves from the indoctrination presented to you as innate knowledge. My generation lived through war and fascism. Through this experience, we reached the conclusion that there should never be war again. My generation experienced fascism, which at first we accepted. We didn’t know about what was going on in the concentration camps — there were no Jews in my Pomeranian village, and we didn’t know what was happening to Jewish people. These were all realizations that I had to come to later. It was then that I came to the conclusion that this fascism — which was, of course, also an outgrowth from humanity — had an economic base supporting it. Where did the cannons come from, who built the bombers, who desired this? And who is alive today and profiting from war? Where do new developments come from? Anyone sitting in their car today with their sat nav should be aware that this is a by-product of the production of weapons for war. So, the only advice I can give is to critically qu...

A liberal summary of the political economy of Britain  “Britain has been a  high-inequality, high-poverty nation  for most of the last 200 years, with significant consequences for life chances, social resilience, and economic strength. With the exception of the immediate post-war era, the struggles for share over the last 200 years have been won by the richest and most affluent sections of society, often with the compliance of the state. Under extraction, economic activity becomes detached from new wealth creation, with the boost to profitability and rising corporate surpluses of recent times used to reward executives and investors rather than boost productivity.” *** Unsurprisingly, not a single mention of Britain’s ‘extractive’ capitalism within its functioning as imperialist state, analysing the British economy in isolation of the global economy and global sociology. (e.g. defeat and weakening of social forces/struggle at home and abroad,‘neoliberalism’ as a global for...

 واشنطن والسوريالية

The Intercept reported on how the American Israel Public Affairs Committee delivered a series of donations worth $95,000 to Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson in the days after he passed $14 billion in military aid for Israel in November. Meanwhile, AIPAC plans to spend upward of $100 million to oust progressive Democratic members of Congress who have dared challenge Israel’s brutal bombardment of Gaza. It’s all part of a yearslong effort to purge any Democrat who dares question Israeli policy from Congress, while elevating the most radical right-wing pro-Israel Republicans. And with 30,000 Palestinians dead and Israel readying a brutal ground assault in Rafah, it’s more important than ever for The Intercept to keep digging to expose AIPAC’s lobbying activity and how the organization leverages its deep pockets to make sure the U.S. continues funding Israel’s brutal war in Gaza. There’s no way to fully understand why the U.S. keeps pouring guns and money into Israel’s barbaric war on...

The reality of the Palestinian struggle

A very interesting article.  Some language is very inaccurate though: “Israel-Palestine confrontation.” (?) Available in English, Français and فارسي

Muslims who cannot bring themselves not to legitimise a murderous regime.  If they think they are punishing Biden, they are not.

It is as old as Zionism itself

'I earn £1,600 a month and two-thirds goes on bills' Households earning more than £60,000 on how they are struggling financially

Outside interference, ostensibly on behalf of these 'revolutions', reduced Libya to anarchy and condemned Syria to a devastating proxy war now in its twelfth year. In Egypt, the Free Officers' state was re-booted in its most brutal ever form. The Americans and Europeans did not vainly try to help the Egyptians or anyone else escape from authoritarian rule. Instead, they contrived to seal them up in it. The long oppression of these societies, Kipling’s 'loved Egyptian night', is not going to be ended by the Western powers; these days it is guaranteed by them. Hugh Roberts 's new book political history of the risings in Egypt, Libya and Syria explains how the Western powers manipulated them all .

It is a mistake to talk of Islam as if it were one homogeneous movement or ideology, or as if it could be treated as an autonomous social force. As a religious belief, Islam has some uniform characteristics, but as a political and social movement it is diverse, varying in each country in its social context and political significance. —Fred Halliday, New Left Review, December 1987 There are as many Islams as there are situations that sustain it  [sic]. —Aziz Al-Azmeh, Islams and Modernities

LSE aims at educating students From 2004 to the present Morris “claims objectivity , even if a careful reading of almost all of Morris’ writings reveals a very simplistic and one-dimensional view on the Jewish-Arab conflict.  Despite all his “discoveries” about moral wrongs perpetrated by the Israelis, on the bottom line, he always tended to adopt the official Israeli interpretation of the events . Morris devoted a very salient and extensive discussion to the centrality of idea of “transfer” (i.e., ethnic cleansing) in Zionist thought, but concluded that the Palestinians had not been expelled by the Israelis in compliance with a master plan or following a consequential policy. This was not precise. What the new material shows [– says Morris –] is that there were far more Israeli acts of massacre than I had previously thought. To my surprise, there were also many cases of rape…  They are just the tip of the iceberg." So far it is the “old good” and expected Morris. The restless...

Berlin International Film Festival “ The current German state is gleefully complicit in the atrocities in Gaza .”