Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

I would suggest one amendement to the article: no support to the UK regime and no trust in it. The political solution Shlaim is proposing has to come from the Palestinians and all those who oppose the Western regimes involved. In other words, the change has to come from the struggle of the Palestinians and Arabs against the corrupt and complicit Palestinian Authority, the toppling of the Arab regimes and the struggle in the West for regime change. Shlaim's 'support' of the UK to change its position on Hamas means appealing to the same political and imperialist structure for a political solution. The same regime that when tomorrow the genocide comes to an end will continue to support the Istaeli state, but now under ‘a democratic liberal Israeli government'. Let's not forget that previous UK governments did not support the Palestinain struggle. On the contrary, they supported Israel to the hilt and perpetuating and maintaining, along with the US, Israel's its chi...

“Among all world regions, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) holds the worst record for workers’ rights. The index data by the  International Trade Union Confederation “ shows that  every country  in the MENA region has blocked the formation or membership of  independent trade unions . In other words, the legal and administrative systems in these countries are deliberately structured to prevent any form of autonomous labor organization.  95%  of countries in the region violate the right to strike, and  89%  restrict freedom of assembly and speech. Even when rights exist on paper, the actual space to exercise them is closed off. In  84%  of MENA countries, workers have  no effective access to justice —meaning that when their rights are violated, there is no real legal or institutional recourse. “In 2014, Europe had an average score of  1.84 , suggesting relatively strong protections. But by 2024, the average has fallen to...

A very good analysis in an accessible language “This article starts with considering AI as a GPT and argues why we need to focus on power when thinking about the impact of AI. I explain the contribution of  critical political economy (CPE) for analysing AI capitalism. CPE investigates control and ownership of communication systems and its impact on society (Hardy  2014 ). Using CPE as a framework, this article analyses the tendencies of concentration and monopolisation in AI capitalism. The article then considers the commons as an alternative framework for enabling that the benefits of AI can be shared with society at large.” ****** “Economists study the impact of GPT in terms of the emergence of winners and losers. The  winners  are those associated with the emerging GPT, whereas the  losers  are those who cannot benefit from the unfolding GPT. We need to be aware that AI can facilitate a further polarisation of already unequal societies (Crawford  20...

“Since 18 May 2025, truck drivers across Iran have turned off their engines — not out of road fatigue, but out of deep frustration with broken promises, rising costs, and an economy shaped by corruption and neglect. What started in the southern port of Bandar Abbas quickly spread to more than 100 cities, marking one of the largest and most sustained labour actions in recent Iranian memory .“

“How to relate to the Leninist tradition? How to extract its truth? The basis of Lenin’s success was the perfect adaptation of his political strategy to the historical terrain of late Tsarist Russia, with its still quasi-feudal agrarian structure, its absolutist state and its supine bourgeoisie. But the Bolsheviks mistakenly drew from this experience the conclusion that they had discovered a general formula for revolutionary transformation: a cadre party of full-time revolutionaries aimed at the seizure of state power. This generalization was of course a distortion since Lenin was a highly sophisticated political thinker, who understood the importance of linking the socialist project to the democratic movement against the Tsarist autocracy. But after the revolution a certain schematism set in, especially with the establishment of the Communist International and the demand that all affiliated parties adhere to the 21 points. This forced an unhealthy process of splitting which severely w...

Every empire, however, tells itself and the world that it is unlike all other empires, that its mission is not to plunder and control but to educate and liberate. — Edward Saïd

Gold

Via Middle East Eye After Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that his government would allow a 'basic amount of food into Gaza', right-wing Israelis headed down to the Kerem Shalom aid crossing between Israel and Gaza to protest against the decision and attempt to block the trucks from going into the strip which, according to human rights organisations, is near complete starvation levels. Activist Sofia Emuna spoke to ITV News near the Kerem Shalom crossing, telling the UK broadcaster that "it doesn't matter who your enemy is, you need to destroy their offspring to prevent them from creating more offspring." Related “General Leclerc had written to his brother-in-law Napoleon in 1802, soon after taking prisoner the slave armies’ leader Toussaint L’Ouverture, 'Here is my opinion about this country [Haiti]: all the blacks in the mountains, men and women, must be suppressed, keeping only the children under twelve; half the blacks in the plains mus...

علىٰ أيُّ جُرحٍ تَشدُّ الوِثاقا وأيُّ القُبورِ تريدُ عِناقا وكلُ الّذي حَولكَ الآنَ مَقبرةٌ هٰكذا أمةٌ تَتَلاقىٰ تَنادتْ فلمّا إنتَضىٰ فارِسٌ سَيفهُ ذَبَحتهُ إِتفاقا وأوجَعُ من قاتِلٍ يَمسحُ المُديةَ أنَّ القَتيلَ يَموتُ نِفاقا لكِ اللهُ من أمةٍ نَحرَتْ حينَ جَدَّ القِتالُ إِزدِواقا* —مظفر النواب *لا أظن أن كلمة إزدواق موجودة في العربية

It is good to stay up to date with 'geopolitics', but political science without political economy does not reveal a more accurate picture of the world.

An excellent piece

Western values.

“ [A] capitalist social system is not only property relations ; it is also a set of unspoken values common to the society. These values are stronger than any army and they are the main force maintaining capitalism today.”

Reality and perspectives after Trump has announced lifting the sactions

I watched Papillon. A fantastic movie. “The penal colony was the setting of French writer Henri Charrière's book Papillon, which was later made into a Hollywood film starring Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman.” A high security prison in Amazon jungle

At last, the time has come in which all that human beings had considered as inalienable has become the object of exchange, of traffic, and may be alienated. It is a time when the very things which before were conveyed, but never bartered; given, but never sold; conquered, but never purchased — virtue, love, opinion, science, conscience etc. — when, in short, everything has finally become tradable. It is a time of generalized corruption, universal venality or, to speak in terms of political economy, the time when anything, moral or physical, receives a venal value, and may be taken to market to be appraised for its appropriate value. —Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy , 1847

From a long investigative report “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 marked Europe’s single-biggest weapons procurement rush since the second world war. While Ukraine’s Nato allies delivered vast amounts of military aid, the country’s own officials were also forced to find ways to supply troops fighting across a 1,000-kilometre front line. A Financial Times investigation, based on leaked Ukrainian state documents, court filings and dozens of interviews with procurement officials, weapons dealers and manufacturers, and detectives, has uncovered how hundreds of millions of dollars Kyiv paid to foreign arms intermediaries to secure vital military equipment has gone to waste over the past three years of war. “As Ukraine continues to battle against Russia’s ammunition production superiority, the country has been left exposed to the ruthless vagaries of the international weapons market. In several cases Kyiv paid out large amounts in advance to little-known companies for materiel that to t...

Road to October 7

The latest of 'our values' “Giving their accounts publicly for the first time, the veterans described seeing members of the SAS murder unarmed people in their sleep and execute handcuffed detainees, including children. “The new testimony includes allegations of war crimes stretching over more than a decade, far longer than the three years currently being examined by a judge-led public inquiry in the UK.” “[L]aws state that on such operations people can be deliberately killed only when they pose a direct threat to the lives of British troops or others.”  “They pose direct threat.” Where? Was Afghanistan at the time in the North Sea or part of UK territories? And is this really separate from funding the killing of children and women in Gaza? The cover up: “ The testimony, as well as new video evidence obtained by the BBC from SAS operations in Iraq in 2006, also supports previous reporting by Panorama that SAS squadrons kept count of their kills to compete with one another.” And ...