Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

" A pact between M5s and the PD carries all manner of dangers for Italy. Should a deal between them prove impossible, the country faces early elections and a likely huge mandate for Salvini. This would finalise the Lega’s capture of the conservative middle classes, while reducing Berlusconi’s old party, Forza Italia, to a mere rump entity after its quarter-century domination of the right. Victory would also propel the Lega’s march into the once hostile southern regions." Oh, those "middle classes", the engine of progress!    Why Italy is heading for crisis once more

2019 presidential elections in Tunisia The lines below are from Reuters (21 August 2019) and what is between brackets is mine. The struggling economy is at the top of many voters' priorities and Ennahda [the Islamist Party usually dubbed "moderate" in the Western mainstream media which defines what "democracy" is and where it exists and doesn't exist] and other secularists [whatever that means] support market-oriented reforms urged on Tunisia by the International Monetary Fund [in order to industrialise the country and make it propserous and competitive with South Korea, Italy and Taiwan] but strongly resisted by unions and the population [who think they know their interests better than the IMF and World Bank men and women do]. And [Nabil] Karoui [a media tycoon, "Tunisian's Berlusconi"], backed by his Nesma TV station, has positioned himself as champion of the poor in the neglected hinterland outside the capital -- Ennahda's strongh

Vassal States "So Macron is worried that Britain might become a vassal state of the US. Which planet has he been on these last four decades and more? A process that began in 1956 after the Suez debacle was lovingly completed by Thatcher and Blair. Britain has been a fully-fledged vassal for a long time. And France, especially under Jospin and Hollande, was/is moving in the same way. Militarily, ideologically, culturally the US dominates most of Europe. Britain's vassal status is enshrined on many levels and partially explains the hysteria that greeted Corbyn's election as Leader of the Labour Party and the non-stop attempts to denigrate and defeat him, of which the 'anti-semitism' campaign is the most recent. Even Corbyn will find it very difficult to break the shackles." —Tariq Ali, 22 August 2019

"In September 2017 a YouGov poll commissioned by the Arab News and the Council for the Advancement of Arab British Understanding illustrated worrying attitudes and misunderstandings of Arabs and Muslims in Britain. Of the 2142 British voters polled in the survey, 63% stated that they believe Arabs have failed to integrate themselves into British Society, and 41% believed that their presence has not been beneficial. Despite these strong opinions, 81% admitted that they knew little or nothing about the region." (The British Arab Centre) 
Is it surprising? 
To my life experience in Britain, it is not. The sheer level of prejudice and lack of knowledge is horrifying. One begins with "oh, you don't look Arab!" Arabs are only brown-skinned people she thought. Another was when an educated person who told me in 2010, when I mentioned Edward Said and Orientalist views, "that was long time ago." Presumably because she felt we were living in a triumphing lib

Arab cinema In Papisha soon the "high energy wears off, as the story descends into repugnant cliches and orientalist pigeonholes. Meddour's world view is black and white: all men are bad, nearly all religious people are blood-thirsty monsters, and all the liberal-minded girls are valiant heroines. There is no subtlety in her characterisations nor hint of intelligence in how she tackles Islamic radicalism, which is personified by a bunch of liberal men-hating women and women obsessed with having every girl in the country veiled.  On the evidence of   Papicha , Meddou's world view comes over as little different from the average white Western film-maker in its antagonistic stance against non-white masculinity, a toxic feminist stance which frowns down on anyone who does not share its ideals. By a long margin,   Papicha  was the low point of the Arab selection at Cannes this year." Review of seven new Arab films " Cannes, after all, is an awfully cl

"More migrants are threatening to jump overboard" This should be considered use of violence by migrants who are terrorising the emotions of Europeans in order to force the latter to take them in. This use of blackmailing and arm twisting is not the method of a civilised people but a stronger race invading our shores.

Like the World Bank, the IMF and others, Google is deepening its involvement with Egypt's repressive regime

"Israel illegal arms trade in South Sudan" It would be interesting to find a study about which has been more destructive and criminal, "legal" or "illegal" arms trade .

The Financial Times calls it "free market liberal democracy" Costa Coffee is just one example. Two facts not mentioned in the article are: Costa is owned by Coca Cola and it does not allow trade unions. Not allowing trade union in some businesses to represent workers and defend their rights, etc has been going on for a long time in Britain, since the Maasricht Treaty in fact. That means EU labour rules have been applied differently in Britain. The zero-hour contract is another example. Related: What happens in order to maintain a minimum rate of profit and when productivity is not high enough. Ungrateful Costa workers, many of them are foreigners who came to our country and gave them jobs, but they dare complain, saying that " they are not treated like humans ."

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