Latest in Opinion Highlight
Latest in Opinion
Hard Turkey
By Shlomo Avineri JERUSALEM: The recent surge in Turkey’s military actions against the Kurds in northern Iraq is an indication that, somewhat surprisingly — but not entirely unpredictably — Turkish foreign policy has undergone a 180-degree turn in less than two years. The Turkish offensive is also an indication that these changes go beyond the current …
China’s crippled financial sector
By Yao Yang BEIJING: Even in the best of times, it is difficult for China’s small and medium-size enterprises to get bank loans. But with the current regimen of credit austerity, imposed to contain economic overheating and inflationary pressure, making conditions for SMEs worse, the financial sector — the least reformed sector in China — now …
Women in Saudi Arabia’s Shura Council, what next?
By Samar Fatany JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia: The recent decision by Saudi King Abdullah to allow women to run and vote in municipal elections and become members of the Shura Council, a parliament that acts as an advisory council to the King but has no legislative powers, has huge implications for the status of women in Saudi …
Back to square one
By Rania Al Malky CAIRO: In his final moments, a blood-smeared, emasculated Qaddafi begs his “children” not to shoot. The formerly larger-than-life 42-year Libyan tyrant appears small, manhandled by the National Transitional Council fighters who, according to one version of the capture story, found him hidden in a rancid, massive, concrete drainpipe. The irony is all …
By voting in elections, Tunisians can ensure everyone is a winner
By Navi Pillay The Tunisian revolution, begun just 10 months ago by young people determined to take the future of their country into their own hands, has inspired both young and old throughout the region — and beyond — to become aware of, and call for, their rights. We are still in the very early stages …
Recovery before reform
By Robert Skidelsky LONDON: The financial crisis that started in 2007 shrunk the world economy by 6% in two years, doubling unemployment. Its proximate cause was predatory bank lending, so people are naturally angry and want heads and bonuses to roll — a sentiment captured by the current worldwide protests against “Wall Street.” The banks, however, …
Social media: the new “must attend” school for Bahraini women
By Samah Hussain MANAMA: My interest in political and human rights and social media started recently with the revolution in Egypt. Before January 2011, politics and human rights never interested me. But like many other Arab youth, the changes in the Arab world opened my eyes and mind to a new world. And there is no …
Former Palestinian prisoners, future peacemakers?
By Robi Damelin TEL AVIV: The whole country is talking about it: over 1,000 Palestinian prisoners, many of whom were involved in suicide attacks in which lives were lost, were freed in exchange for the kidnapped Israeli solider Gilad Shalit who had been held in captivity in Gaza for over five years. Today the prisoner’s swap …
The other Horn of Africa
By Ahmed Mohamoud Silyano HARGEISA: Drought, famine, refugees, piracy, and the violence and terrorism endemic to the shattered city of Mogadishu, a capital ruined by civil war: these are the images that flash through peoples’ minds nowadays when they think of the Horn of Africa. Such perceptions, however, are not only tragically one-sided; they are short-sighted …
Qatar’s source of Arab Springs
By Khaled Hroub CAMBRIDGE: There’s a joke making the rounds in the Middle East these days: three of Egypt’s former presidents, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Anwar El-Sadat, and Hosni Mubarak, meet in hell and ask each other how they fell. Nasser replies “poison”; Sadat says “assassination”; and Mubarak answers “Al Jazeera.” During the 15 years that it …
Weaving a silver lining
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: On the heels of the prisoner swap, a new deal is afoot. According to the New York Times the American law student Ilan Grapel, a 27-year-old from Queens in New York who is also an Israeli citizen arrested in Egypt in June and charged with spying for Israel is expected to be …
India’s nuclear path
By Shashi Tharoor NEW DELHI: When the Commonwealth heads of government meet in Australia later this month, one prominent leader is almost certain to be conspicuously absent: India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. India is a strong backer of the association of former British colonies (and some new entrants without that shared heritage, notably Mozambique and Rwanda), …
The digital trial
By Richard Sherwin NEW YORK: On Oct. 3, an Italian appeals court overturned Amanda Knox’s murder conviction and ordered her immediate release from prison. In 2009, both Knox and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were found guilty of the 2007 sexual assault and fatal stabbing of Knox’s housemate, Meredith Kercher. Knox was sentenced to 26 years …
The global jobs challenge
By Michael Spence NEW YORK: Over the past three decades, hundreds of millions of new workers have entered the global economy. They arrived with various levels of education and skill, and over time have generally gained in terms of “human capital” — and in terms of value added and income. This has brought a tremendous, and …
Light at the end of the tunnels?
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: Credit where credit’s due. Mohannad Sabry, an enterprising correspondent for 30 or so American dailies filed a story this week describing the smugglers’ tunnels between Gaza and Egypt. Above ground, the exchange of prisoners of war is equally enthralling – choreographed, clandestine and complicated. Sabry’s millions of readers didn’t have to leave …
Milton Friedman’s magical thinking
By Dani Rodrik CAMBRIDGE: Next year will mark the 100th anniversary of Milton Friedman’s birth. Friedman was one of the twentieth century’s leading economists, a Nobel Prize winner who made notable contributions to monetary policy and consumption theory. But he will be remembered primarily as the visionary who provided the intellectual firepower for free-market enthusiasts during …
Afghanistan: A decade of war with no end in sight
By Scott Tankel In October 2001, the United States executed Operation Enduring Freedom. From the onset of the invasion, President Bush made clear that the main objectives of US military action in Afghanistan were to capture or kill senior Al-Qaeda leaders, destroy the organization’s infrastructure, and remove the Taliban from power. The US government repeatedly stated …
Deadly divide and rule
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: To cross the River Nile from the Corniche to Zamalek you would probably go by bridge. If the bridges were closed, you could take a boat. In theory if the boatman refuses you could swim. The three strategies address the same objective: to arrive in Zamalek. In military academies much emphasis is …
The death penalty – again
By Peter Singer PRINCETON: Three significant events relating to the death penalty occurred in the United States during September. The one that gained the most publicity was the execution in Georgia of Troy Davis, who had been convicted of the 1989 murder of Mark McPhail, an off-duty police officer. Davis’s death sentence was carried out despite …
A farewell to nuclear arms
By Mikhail Gorbachev MOSCOW: Twenty-five years ago this month, I sat across from Ronald Reagan in Reykjavik, Iceland to negotiate a deal that would have reduced, and could have ultimately eliminated by 2000, the fearsome arsenals of nuclear weapons held by the United States and the Soviet Union. For all our differences, Reagan and I shared …
Engagement between women key to rights’ campaigns
By Paola Salwan Daher BEIRUT: I have always thought that engaging with other women is one of the most beautiful and exciting parts of being a women’s rights activist. My last conversation about women’s rights took place via email, and was sponsored by the Common Ground News Service as a new initiative in which women’s rights …
In Egypt, it’s time for revolution
By Rania Al Malky CAIRO: When we say history repeats itself, we never mean recent history, never as recent as 10 months ago. But the Sunday massacre in Maspero has shattered all our references, taking us back to a dark place we thought we left behind not so long ago. Has anything at all changed? Is …
Remembering Gaza
By David Miliband LONDON: Government is all about statistics, but life is about people. That disjunction explains a lot about the cynicism and disaffection with politics that characterizes much of the world nowadays. And, while domestic problems may seem intractable, distance increases the confusion and fatigue induced by seemingly intractable international problems. As usual, the people …
Libya’s shadow on sovereign wealth funds
By Efraim Chalamish NEW YORK: As Libya’s citizens rebuild their lives and economy, undoing the corruption in the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA), the sovereign wealth fund in which Muammar El-Qaddafi’s regime allegedly stashed and misused Libya’s oil wealth, is becoming a priority. The National Transitional Council is debating who should take over Libya’s Central Bank and …
A perfect storm: reason and faith
By Philip Whitfield CAIRO: On the streets it’s observed as a contest between innocence and brutality. In the mind, however the revolution may be regarded in different lights. Is it authoritarianism’s valediction or a struggle for equality? While it’s premature to jump to conclusions, it is dereliction to dismiss the portents of a gathering perfect storm …
Israelis and Palestinians refusing to be enemies
By Haggai Matar TEL AVIV: “I personally don’t have a problem with Israelis, but for your own sake you’d better not tell others around here where you’re from,” a taxi driver said to me during my last visit to Amman. Little did it help to explain that I attend demonstrations against the Occupation regularly and came …
Failing the Syria test
By Javier Solana MADRID: On October 2nd in Istanbul, Syria’s disparate opposition movements gave the go-ahead for the formation of a “Syrian National Council.” This is the most important step yet taken by the fragmented forces that have been trying since May to lead a peaceful uprising against President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime. The council’s formation boosted …
The Euro’s hard rain falls
By Leif Pagrotsky SWEDEN: The blame game is in fashion as crisis and desperation spread across Europe. News reporting, as well as political and economic debate, now focuses on identifying the culprits, with bankers and politicians emerging as the prime suspects. Bankers are blamed because their irresponsible lending and speculation brought about the fall of economies …
Remembering race in occupied Wall Street
By Anita Sinha WASHINGTON, DC: The Occupy Wall Street movement protesting against corporate practices has me daring to hope that the striking disparities in the United States will change for the better. It takes a leap of faith to be hopeful, because substantial change has not come in response to the economic crisis, housing market crash, …
Obama’s Israel problem
By Ian Buruma NEW YORK: On a rare foray outside his native Texas, Governor Rick Perry accused US President Barack Obama of “appeasement” towards the Palestinians. Former New York City Mayor Edward Koch supported a Catholic Republican congressional candidate against a Jewish Democrat in New York, because the Republican supports Israel through thick and thin — …