Middle East Research and Information Project: Critical Coverage of the Middle East Since 1971
Aruri, Naseer, ed. Palestinian Refugees: The Right of Return (London: Pluto Press, 2001).
Afshari, Reza. Human Rights in Iran: The Abuse of Cultural Relativism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001).
B’Tselem. Standard Routine: Beatings and Abuses of Palestinians by Israeli Security Forces During the al-Aqsa Intifada (Jerusalem, May 2001).
B’Tselem. No Way Out: Medical Implications of Israel’s Siege Policy (Jerusalem, June 2001).
“The saviors of religion [in Kashmir] ordered all Muslim women to adopt the hijab by September 10, 2001. Women did because they did not want acid to be thrown in their faces…. When Roop Kanwar became a Sati with her husband, the event was glorified by the guardians of Hinduism. When it comes to women’s oppression, all religions are masculinist…. The man who proves the superiority of his own religion is a hero, and the man who destroys the follower of another is a jihadi….
On October 19, 2001, Iran agreed to build camps to accommodate new refugees fleeing US bombing and internal chaos in Afghanistan. This was the first piece of good news for relief workers concerned that Operation Enduring Freedom is accelerating the descent of Afghanistan's decades-old refugee crisis into a humanitarian disaster of untold proportions.
In the first few days after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, it became clear that the United States was going to seek out allies in the region to assist efforts to destroy al-Qaeda bases and networks of support in Afghanistan. Very quickly that objective was expanded to include dislodging or crushing the Taliban, who have ruled most of Afghanistan in recent years and who have provided Osama bin Laden safe haven since 1997.
When Osama bin Laden evoked the Palestinian cause in his widely viewed statement October 7, he split Palestinians between those who appreciated the support and those who were horrified by the association. At the same time, the new world “coalition against terror” has deployed the Palestinian Authority (PA) to smother the embers of Palestinian resistance against the Israeli occupation. This PA suppression is destined to either end the uprising — or make it much more unpredictable and lethal.
I
there have been no words.
i have not written one word.
no poetry in the ashes south of canal
street.
no prose in the refrigerated trucks
driving debris and dna.
not one word.
today is a week, and seven is of
heavens, gods, science.
evident out my kitchen window is an
abstract reality.
sky where once was steel.
smoke where once was flesh.
fire in the city air and i feared for my
The hijackings and mass murders of September 11 were horrible and momentous, but the world did not suddenly change on that crystal-clear morning. Existing cracks in the US-led world order widened and deepened, and lurking insecurities strode forth from the shadows.
Books
Booth, Marilyn. May Her Likes Be Multiplied: Biography and Gender Politics in Egypt (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2001).
B’Tselem. Tacit Consent: Israeli Law Enforcement on Settlers in the Occupied Territories (Jerusalem, March 2001).
Charrad, Mounira M. States and Women’s Rights: The Making of Postcolonial Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2001).
Americans who voted for “compassionate conservatism” in the November 2000 presidential election have been disappointed. George W. Bush has proven to be much more radical than his moderate campaign rhetoric implied. In the area of environmental policy, Bush’s moves to lift regulations on pollutants, promote the use of nuclear power and “clean coal” and encourage oil exploration off the coast of Florida and in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge have triggered opposition even on the right. Where Ronald Reagan sought to overturn the social policies of Franklin Roosevelt, George W. seems to seek an even wider reversal of the health and labor regulations instituted by Theodore Roosevelt.
Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, one of the most significant and articulate Palestinian-American intellectuals of his generation, died on May 23, 2001 at his home in Ramallah, Palestine, at the age of 72. A scholar, educator, activist and institution builder in both North America and the Middle East, Abu-Lughod was a charismatic and passionate advocate for Palestinian human and political rights, as well as for progressive politics throughout the Middle East.
From May to early July 2001, massive protests rocked the Berber areas (Upper and Lower Kabylia) of Algeria, spreading on several occasions to Algiers and other major cities. On June 14, perhaps a million Kabyles “marched for democracy” in the capital, sparking clashes with police and leading the government to ban demonstrations. Middle East Report asked Daho Djerbal, editor of Naqd, an Algerian journal of critical inquiry, and a prominent intellectual, to comment on the portent of the unrest.
In the past ten years of political crisis, Algerians have been wary of public protest. Terrorized by relentless violence and impoverished by structural adjustment, they have repeatedly given the impression that what they want most is the chance to get on with their lives quietly. Despite the cancellation of one election and the staging of several fraudulent ones — not to mention wholesale public sector downsizings and devaluation of the currency — the streets remained calm and mass protest looked like an unlikely prospect.
Palestinian women played a major role in the intifada of 1987-93, but have not, so far, in the current uprising. In January 2001, the Jerusalem-based magazine Between the Lines asked Eileen Kuttab, director of the Women’s Studies Institute at Birzeit University in the West Bank, to talk about the widely noted lack of women’s participation, and prospects for change. An excerpt from her comments is reprinted here with permission.
Has the women’s movement participated as a movement in the current intifada?
