Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Muhammad Hussein
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Remembering the 1979 Siege of Makkah
What: Religious extremists in Saudi Arabia under the charismatic leadership of man disgruntled with Western access to the Kingdom, took over the Grand Mosque of Makkah for two weeks. When: 20 November – 4 December 1979 Where: Makkah, Saudi Arabia Some years are quiet, and others are filled with incidents that send...
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In Turkey, Erdogan is temporary, but Ataturk is forever
Turkey has long been perceived to be undergoing a struggle between the secular and the religious. The population in its Anatolian heartland and east is generally more religious and conservative, while people in the coastal areas and major cities tend to be more liberal. The local election results in...
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Iran: the eternal geopolitical empire
A current has swept throughout the Levant from a subtly-felt but well recognised influence. From the protests in Iraq and Lebanon to the Sunni insurgents and opposition groups in Syria, public dissatisfaction with the direct and indirect interference of Iran in the region has been exposed. This influence may...
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Opposition to Turkey’s operation is opposition to Sunni power in the Middle East
“Who created you? Who is your God? Who do you pray to?” asked a Syrian regime soldier to a man he was torturing and beating in a small dank room. The prisoner shouted back, “Bashar Al-Assad!” His torturer then asked him, “Who is better, God or Bashar?” The prisoner...
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Remembering the death of Muammar Gaddafi
Muammar Gaddafi’s overthrow and death left a void in the region as well as Libya, which has yet to be filled....
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A Microsoft genius and a digital Palestine offer hope for the future
A nation’s image is usually only as good as its achievements, so it is a sad time when the image that appears in many minds when hearing the name “Palestine” is one of bombs, ruined buildings, stone-throwing children and a corrupt authority which arrests its own people on behalf...
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Old sheikhs, new caliphs and the myth of a centralised Muslim authority
According to US-based Imam Siraj Wahhaj, “We need a centralised leadership, and that’s the key.” He said this in a speech at a recent event in New York, hosted by the Turkish American National Steering Committee (TASC). In his usual fiery and animated style, Wahhaj prompted wild applause when...
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Palestinian Women’s Activism: Nationalism, Secularism, Islamism
When discussing the Palestinian cause from the Nakba to the Great March of Return, many things spring to mind: the phenomenon of Zionism and its gradual takeover of Palestine; the rise of “Islamism”; the splitting of Palestinian national identity along factional lines; and even the possibility of a fourth...
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Assad and Israel: the resurgence of political Darwinism
What makes a regime and its ruler legitimate? The question has long been on the minds of the greatest philosophers and political scientists stretching from ancient Greece to the Enlightenment; from Plato to Kant; and covers an entire discourse within political science. Is a government or ruler legitimate solely...
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Is post-revolution Tunisia the democratic leader of the Arab world?
When a twenty-six-year old Tunisian vegetable vendor set himself on fire in front of a government building after being slapped by a police officer for not having his cart authorised by the authorities, nobody could have expected that nationwide protests would follow his desperate act. Nor could anyone have...
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What’s next for Syria?
“There is no national feeling. Between town and town, village and village, family and family, creed and creed, exist intimate jealousies… to render a spontaneous union impossible. The largest indigenous political entity in settled Syria is only the village under its sheikh, and in patriarchal Syria the tribe under...
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Will conservative politics and Zionism continue to be inextricably linked?
When Boris Johnson was voted in as leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom by default last month, there was a lot of speculation about his premiership: Brexit, policing and youth services, global trade deals, and even the question of what do about Iran....
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The EastMed pipeline is another front in the encirclement of Turkey
Imagine an Atlantic region where Canada, Mexico, Cuba and Venezuela teamed up to sign a new landmark NAFTA-like agreement, distributing amongst themselves the oil and natural gas reserves off the coast of the Americas. Such an alliance over so precarious an area for so valuable a resource would mean...
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Gaza revived: how an Irishman is giving hope to Palestinian amputees
Gaza. The very name evokes images of Israeli bombardment, crumbling infrastructure, keffiyeh-clad protestors standing defiantly with Palestinian flags and slingshots, and screaming children shot by snipers in a fog of tear gas and smoke from burning tyres. All of these images are the unfortunate reality of the Palestinians in...
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Will Turkey be kicked out of NATO?
A plethora of unflattering phrases litters the discourse surrounding relations between Turkey and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), including “strategic liability”, “loose cannon”, “reckless, aggressive ally” and “fifth column”. For years, the country has been alienated by its fellow members — the EU, for example — which view...
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Has Turkey sold out Idlib to Russia?
When a ceasefire was negotiated in September last year between Russia and Turkey for the purpose of setting up a buffer zone in Idlib province – the last opposition-held stronghold in Syria – there was little doubt that an assault on the area and attempts by the regime to...
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Israel’s war against press freedom: The plight of Palestinian journalists
Imagine your home being raided at pre-dawn hours by gun-wielding soldiers, your laptop and devices which connect you to the world being confiscated, your dignity stripped from you as you are arrested and taken to a prison to undergo “enhanced interrogation techniques”, and then you discover the crime you...
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Remembering the revelations of US torture at Abu Ghraib
The infamous Abu Ghraib prison complex in Iraq was revealed to be the centre of an extensive network run by the US military after the coalition’s invasion of the country in 2003. Abuse and torture of largely innocent civilian Iraqi detainees at the hands of American soldiers were common....
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What the student debating culture could mean for a future Palestinian state
Between 16 and 20 March, the debating team of Jerusalem’s Al-Quds University was at the forefront of the 5th International Universities’ Debating Championship held in Qatar. The team, made up of five Palestinian students studying at the university – Dalia Alayassa, Yasmin Arda, Ahmad Toukan, Amani Ahmad and their...
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America’s New Year’s resolution: Kill off the Palestinian potential for statehood
To make a resolution for self-development and personal aims at the start of the New Year is a natural thing. Those resolutions, however, usually range from going to the gym to starting a long overdue diet plan. Rarely, if ever, do those resolutions consist of degrading an entire people...
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Identity, Conflict and Politics in Turkey, Iran and Pakistan
Imagine that you were a state in which the unruly masses of an ethnic minority rebelled in one of your provinces. Would you crush it with your own security forces or would you set another minority under your control to do the job for you? Put another way, if...
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Saudi Arabia: the new Kingdom of secular morals and Israeli tactics
Throughout the last month the world has been gripped by the murder of the acclaimed Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. After his disappearance on 2 October, when he entered the consulate in order to obtain documents for his marriage to his Turkish fiancée, there...
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Propaganda, kebabs, and international sex scandals: Turkey’s soft power at play
As the call to prayer echoed throughout the vast valley that encompasses the city of Bolu, I thought to myself how 1,000 people from all around the world being mixed up, separated into groups of around 20, assigned roommates at random, made to learn Turkish and live by a...
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Is Turkey’s destiny in Syria that of a saviour or a tyrant?
Turkey has thought long and hard about intervention in neighbouring countries. Throughout the first five years of the conflict on its southern border in Syria, for example, it was cautious about direct intervention, and it was right to be so. In a conflict tainted by the involvement of the...