Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

In ‘Egyptian Arabic’ with English subtitles. The original lyrics can be read here .

Although I don’t agree with the use of some of the language such as ‘the international community’ by a supposedly a radical leftist magazine, it is a history and context, power struggle and geopolitics, internal dynamic and social forces that help us understand a movement and its actions .   An interview with Yemen scholar Helen Lackner

The BBC drenching the conflict and the war in Yemen in (neo-)orientalist narrative. After all, the Houthis are directly attacking ‘our interest’ and interrupting ‘the free market’ as well as they might slow down the Israeli terror and destruction.  " They [the Houthis] are generally more war-like, violent and cruel ," says Edmund Fitton-Brown, who was UK ambassador to Yemen from 2015-17.  "I encountered astonishing instances of brutality in Aden and Taiz. The Houthis consider themselves an elite from an elite (the Zaidi sect). Some of their casual viciousness towards Sunni civilians in central and southern Yemen has been remarkable: a readiness to deploy snipers and kill non-combatants for fun." Now let’s compare that to the narrative deployed to describe the Australian elite troops in Afghanistan: “And it wasn't just that these alleged executions took place, it was the manner of impunity by which they happened. In fact, according to the report, there was an air

An entire academic industry has developed around attempting to explain the apparent persistence and durability of Middle East authoritarianism. Much of this has been heavily Eurocentric, seeking some kind of intrinsic “obedience to authority” inherent to the “Arab mind.” Some authors have focused on the impact of religion, tracing authoritarian rule to the heavy influence of Islam, and the fact that “twentieth-century Muslim political leaders often have styles and use strategies that are very similar to those instituted by the Prophet Muhammad in Arabia some 1400 years ago. The history of the region is thus characteristically recounted as a long-standing struggle between the “authoritarian state” and “economic and political liberalization. Instead of viewing the Arab uprisings as protests against the “free market” economic policies long championed by Western institutions in the region, they were framed as essentially political in nature. The state/civil society dichotomy serves to “con

Accurate description of the state of the major trade unions and the Labour Part y.  However, there is no self-criticism of the Stop the War Coalition, especially the way it managed the protests prior and after the 2003 war on Iraq. There is no self-criticism of the undemocratic procedures they pursued, the selected, speakers, etc and most importantly, Stop the War Coalition’s timidity in radicalising the movement. There is also the almost-usual-exaggeration and overoptimism you read in the speeches and articles by Stop the War leaders/organisers. Are not the components of the coalition themselves a hindrance towards radicalism in the face of compromises and in the face of cooptation? Lindsey German repeats the same clichés about elections, which contradicts what the she herself states about the continuation of the UK imperialist actions in the Middle East and elsewhere regardless of the party running the British regime*. One should note how the interview completely ignored the war in U

“At a very simple level, that means one of the pleasures of reading the  Manifesto  is that it’s beautiful. It’s remarkable. Whether one agrees or not with some of its claims and its positions, it is just a joy to read this incantatory prose. Marshall Berman famously really stresses this, and it’s something that even critics of Marx will often allow. This is a remarkable piece of almost apocalyptic literature. If you read it critically, of course, but also generously and thoughtfully, you may gain, as I did, a great deal more out of it politically and intellectually than you might assume if you only think of it as an introductory text.” China Miéville’s stimulating reading of The Manifesto and its authors

A definition according to Encyclopaedia Britannica An elaboration by the Internet Encyclopaedia of Philosophy Related Top 10 books on neocolonialism China: a form of neocolonialism?