Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Omar Ahmed
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Casting of Israel’s Gal Gadot as Cleopatra prompts debate on social media
Israeli actress Gal Gadot confirmed yesterday that she will be playing the role of Egyptian Queen Cleopatra...
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It’s a challenge to support Azerbaijan when its government is pro-Israel
The renewed conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region has the propensity to draw in regional powers such as Iran, Russia and Turkey, and thus become a proxy war in the South Caucasus. The conflict is one that is already progressing towards outright war as fighting has...
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Biden to Trump: ‘Inshallah’ we'll see your tax returns
Although the Arabic phrase literally means “God willing” it is also popularly used in an informal way across the Middle East to denote something that is unlikely to happen....
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Incarcerated Childhood and the Politics of Unchilding
Whilst literature on Israel’s state violence against Palestinian children is nothing new, there are apparent limitations on the current discourse which tends not to extend beyond theories of childhood trauma in conflict zones; nor do they form part of a critique of the ideologies underpinning Israel as a settler-colonial...
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If Pakistan is unwilling to protect its Shia citizens, they may look to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards
The world’s largest population of Shia Muslims outside Iran is found in neighbouring Pakistan where they account for an estimated 15 to 20 per cent of the population. Although a sizeable minority in the country’s four provinces and major cities, they are the majority in the northernmost autonomous region...
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Baba, What Does My Name Mean? A Journey to Palestine
Most people would agree that it is important for parents to instil a sense of national and cultural identity in their children in order to preserve their heritage for future generations, especially for those from immigrant or refugee families. The Palestinian diaspora and others living in the western world...
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Hamas-Hezbollah talks and Iran-Turkey cooperation come at a crucial time
The recent meeting in Beirut between Hamas and Hezbollah leadership where the threats to the Palestinian cause and normalisation between Israel and Arab states were discussed is the latest sign that the two resistance movements have revived relations. The reconciliation between the Hamas and Hezbollah has been in the...
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Only Arab states aligned with Iran will oppose Zionism
The agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Israel to establish full diplomatic relations in exchange for the suspension (or from Israel’s point of view, merely the postponement) of the annexation of the occupied Palestinian West Bank follows nearly two decades of unofficial ties between the occupation state and...
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Political Thought in Contemporary Shi‘a Islam: Muhammad Mahdi Shams al-Din
When one thinks of contemporary political Shia Islam the Islamic Republic of Iran tends to spring to mind, a theocracy which those familiar with the subject know is based on the theory of Wilayat Al-Faqih or “guardianship of the jurist” as revived and expanded upon by Ayatollah Khomeini. Over...
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Turkey may have reclaimed the leadership of Sunni Islam from Saudi Arabia
The Hagia Sofia Grand Mosque was opened for public worship last Friday for the first time in 86 years following a top court’s ruling that the historic building, originally a church, had been converted into a museum illegally by the founder of modern Turkey’s secular state. I had expected...
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Abbasid-China contacts revolved around the Silk Road; so does Beijing’s anti-Uyghur clampdown
In the year 751 CE, the largely Arab-Persian army of the Abbasid Caliphate met the Chinese imperial forces of the Tang Dynasty on the banks of the River Talas near today’s Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan border in Central Asia. Initiated by a border dispute between client states, the conflict soon...
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Hagia Sophia will become a mosque again, it is both Turkey’s and an Islamic right
Turkey’s top administrative court, the Council of State is likely to announce today the restoration of the Hagia Sophia from a museum to a mosque reversing an 86-year-old decree by the Council of Ministers under the presidency of the republic’s secularist founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Once the largest and most...
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Israel’s ambitions in south Yemen increase risk of conflict with Houthis
Israel’s involvement in the Yemen war throughout its five year duration is an open secret. In 2015, when the Saudi Arabian Embassy in the capital Sanaa was seized by the Houthi forces in retaliation for the Saudi-led coalition’s aggression, a large cache of Israeli-made weapons and ammunition was discovered,...
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After Libya, will Turkey defeat the UAE in Yemen?
Turkey achieved a strategic success in breaking the year-long siege on the Libyan capital, Tripoli. With Turkish support, the internationally-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA) pushed back the forces of renegade Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar and regained full control of the city two weeks ago. A campaign is currently...
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Was the ‘desecration of Caliph Umar II’s tomb’ fake news?
Sectarianism is a salient feature of contemporary warfare in the Middle East, especially in multi-religious societies. The ongoing conflict in Syria is no exception. The rapid online spread of information and misinformation has added to the problem, promoting propaganda and adding credence to competing narratives aimed at a global...
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Saudi cleric: ‘It is prohibited to protest in Islam’
A prominent Saudi cleric, Shaikh Assim Al-Hakeem, has come under fire on Twitter over his response to a question posed to him by a user regarding the permissibility of protesting in Islam, specifically in light of the on-going demonstrations in the US over the murder of an unarmed black...
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With unrest across the US, asks the Twittersphere, where is the ‘Free American Army’?
The scenario is all too familiar: the almost casual murder in Minneapolis of an unarmed African American citizen — say his name: George Floyd —by police officers has sparked a wave of social unrest and protests across the country. Since Floyd’s killing on 25 May, we have seen what...
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Saudi Arabia’s puppet Yemen government is hanging by a thread
Last Friday, 22 May, was Unity Day in Yemen, a national holiday marking the unification of the North and South which took place on that date in 1990. The 30th anniversary of this event was a milestone overlooked — understandably — by the international community and Yemen itself because...
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Pro-Sistani factions leave Shia forces, but Iraq’s PM signals they are here to stay
Much has been written about the growing rifts between the Shia seminary cities of Najaf in Iraq and Qom in Iran, centred on the role of politics and religion. While the Najaf school is known for its quietist stance, Qom advocates the theocratic ideology of Wilayat Al-Faqi. These tensions...
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Germany’s ban on Hezbollah bows to Zionist pressure but is of little real importance
Last week, Germany finally caved in to US and Israeli pressure to ban Hezbollah outright by outlawing the Lebanese movement’s political wing. Berlin declared the group to be a “Shiite terrorist organisation”, despite it being a legitimate part of the Lebanese government and having no official branch in Germany. The...
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Remembering Nizar Qabbani (21 March 1923 - 30 April 1998)
Nizar Qabbani is arguably the most popular and widely read poet in the Arab world, renowned particularly for his poems on themes such as religion, love and femininity, which challenged taboos about eroticism. As a former Syrian diplomat, he was also deeply political, spurred on by the failures suffered...
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Profile: Sheikh Mahmud Shaltut, the reformist head of Al-Azhar University
Sheikh Mahmud Shaltut was a renowned Muslim scholar, reformer and rector of the esteemed Al-Azhar University in Cairo who was notable for seeking to bridge the gap in the Sunni-Shia divide and modernising Al-Azhar’s establishment. From humble beginnings, he was born on 23 April 1893 in a farming village...
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Covid-19 and the oil market crash spell the end for US hegemony and the petrodollar
The combined impact of the oil war between Russia and Saudi Arabia and the fall in demand for crude oil during the coronavirus pandemic has led to the collapse of the oil market. Prices have plunged down to unchartered territory, from $18 a barrel to as little as minus...
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Israel’s main virus threat comes from its ultra-Orthodox community
Israel’s first confirmed case of the Covid-19 virus was on 21 February, after a citizen returned from Japan, since then the number has increased steadily, standing currently at 9,248 with 65 recorded deaths. These figures are modest when compared to the likes of Italy, Spain and the US, which...