Since this election has been one of the great guessing games of the age, I only spent the first of the two days of voting plodding the streets and stalking voters as they came in and out of schools. For what it’s […]
Walking around Cairo on the eve of the presidential election – the first free one, as media are calling it – and the sense of hope, anxiety and waiting is palpable. The city is of course crammed full of election posters, as […]
A few days after the great event, I finally watched the first debate between Amr Moussa and Abd al-Moneim Abu al-Futuh. Here are my thoughts on it. Tweet
The Shi’ite Khalas group – set up via London after the clashes in Medina in 2009, along lines of the Bahraini opposition group of same name – responds to the Saudi government’s declaration of 23 “wanted” people over the recent unrest in the Qatif […]
Debate has raged in recent days over an article in Foreign Affairs in which Matthew Kroenig of the Council on Foreign Relations argues that the United States should not flinch from launching a military operation, and soon, to take out Iran’s nuclear facilities before Iran achieves nuclear […]
The Imam Mohammed bin Saud Islamic University organised a conference this week titled “al-Salafiyya: manhaj shar’i wa matlab watani” (Salafism: Legal Path, National Demand) where recently appointed crown prince Nayef and the state’s official spokesman and advisor on religious affairs, the Mufti […]
The rise of Islamist groups in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya as a result of the revolutionary movement in Arab countries this year has generated much angst about the fate of the arts, in Egypt in particular. The regimes in Egypt and Tunisia […]
Tunisia’s election is finally over and we have the first post-uprising victory of a Brotherhood calque. But the events in Sidi Bouzid certainly marred the process. I turned up there mid-Friday afternoon when the town courthouse and National Guard building were still burning furiously. […]
Although Saudi Arabia has been manoeuvring to stymie the “Arab Spring” wherever it can, with the drama of an apparent Iranian conspiracy to murder Adel al-Jubair one might say, taking a bad metaphor further, its Springtime in Riyadh. Quite a few bottles of champagne […]
One of the critical things the Bahraini government has done since this year’s uprising set off panic that it was nearly game over is to create a discourse challenging the narrative of an oppressed majority demanding democracy and an end to discrimination. […]