Le_Nouvel_Ordre_du_Monde_Arabe. Al Jazeera and Others Visualizing Twitter and Unrest. Qatar-based Al Jazeera may be completely responsible for the lack of productivity amongst university students, in many different disciplines, all over the world. Walking through the halls of a local university you may hear, at any one point, one student saying to another “Al Jazeera ate my homework.” The reason for this is what the LA Times has coined Al Jazeera’s ‘CNN moment’ (referring to the network’s coverage of the Gulf War, which catapulted it into popularity). Al Jazeera’s around the clock news and live updated coverage of the protests and revolutions throughout the Middle East and Africa, has in many ways changed the rules of the media game.
Al Jazeera has led news media outlets down a path that forces all others to be very conscientious of not only what they report but also in keeping up with real-time events. With the speed, quantity, accuracy and availability of data coming out of Al Jazeera it’s no wonder many students and followers of the network are becoming overwhelmed.
Ethan Zuckerman What if Tunisia had a revolution, but nobody watched? On December 17, a 26 year old Tunisian man named Mohamed Bouazizi reached the end of his rope. An unemployed university graduate, Bouazizi had become a seller of fruits and vegetables in the southern Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid. When authorities confiscated his wares to punish him for selling without a license, Bouazizi set himself on fire. He died in hospital on January 4, 2011. Video of protests in Sidi Bouzid on YouTube Bouazizi’s suicide struck a chord with other frustrated Tunisians. Despite the crackdown, it seems increasingly possible that the Ben Ali government might fall. If you’re in the US, there’s a good chance you haven’t heard what’s going on in Tunisia unless you follow news from North Africa and the Middle East closely.
One explanation is that the tragic shooting in Tucson has (understandably) captured the US’s attention at present and that the Christmas and New Years’ holidays prevented the early chapters of the story from gaining attention. Tunisia and Egypt promised G8 help on path to democracy | World news. G8 leaders has promised $20bn (£12bn) of loans and aid to Tunisia and Egypt over the next two years and suggested more will be available if the countries continue on the path to democracy. David Cameron revealed he had intervened to prevent the package from being presented as more generous than it was in reality, suggesting that some at the G8 had wanted to present it as worth as much $40bn. "I argued through my officials that we should stick to the lower figure," said the prime minister, warning that if the higher figure had been used, "people go through it, realise that it falls apart, and that is actually very damaging to the whole process, which is why the lower figure is in there.
" The $20bn is being provided by multilateral institutions such as the World Bank, the IMF and, for the first time, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). Cameron described the money as an investment in success and part of an enduring partnership.
Egypt. The Online Islamic Academy. Twitter network of Arab protests - interactive map | World news. Tahrir Squared | Multiplying the Tahir Square effect. Tahrir Squared (tahrirsquared) Middle East Protest Tweets Mapped. Arab spring: an interactive timeline of Middle East protests | World news. I Love The Warm Colors on This Map....The Redder They Are The Better [Middle East Revolution Map] L’exil des réfugiés de Libye raconté par les données. Près d'un demi-million de réfugiés de toutes nationalités ont quitté la Libye depuis février, principalement vers la Tunisie et l'Égypte. Retour sur cet exil massif, à l'aide des données du HCR et de l'OIM. Il sont 448 000. Plus de 448 000 réfugiés, toutes nationalités confondues, ont fui la Libye depuis le début du conflit en févier, selon le Haut Commissariat aux Réfugiés des Nations Unies (UNHCR) et l’Organisation Internationale pour les Migrations (OIM) [en].
Premiers pays d’exil: la Tunisie et l’Égypte, qui viennent de pousser leur despote respectif vers la sortie. La Tunisie accueille à elle seule près de la moitié du nombre total de réfugiés, et l’Égypte environ 40%. Le Niger, pays frontalier au Sud, vient loin derrière avec un nombre plus restreint, environ 29 000 personnes. La carte ci-dessous, réalisée avec Google Public Data Explorer [en], permet de visualiser les évolutions dans le temps du nombre de réfugiés dans les pays limitrophes. Crédits Photo FlickR CC : magharebia. Amnésie européenne » Article » OWNI, Digital Journalism. Les réactions inquiètes des Européens aux révolutions en cours de l'autre côté de la Méditerranée ont parfois des relents d'islamophobie. Elles témoignent surtout d'une vision revisitée de leur propre histoire. Jamais la défiance envers les révolutions n’aura été si forte. En 1989, l’Occident avait salué l’émancipation des pays du bloc soviétique dans un concert de louanges.
En France, où, par coïncidence, on commémorait le bicentenaire de la révolution locale, 1989 avait été, tout comme le « printemps des peuples » de 1848, salué à la lumière de 1789. Aujourd’hui, la peur a succédé à la fête. Le 11 septembre 2001 a irrémédiablement changé notre lecture de l’histoire. 2011 est donc lu à travers le prisme de 1979… et de 1996, deux révolutions catastrophiques pour cette version occidentale de l’histoire mondiale. Révolutions sans ou contre la religion ? Il serait irresponsable de nier le risque de l’islamisme. . « Déchristianisation » imaginée. Moyen-Orient : la note que le gouvernement a ignorée. Il y a tout juste six ans, le Centre d’analyse et de prévision (CAP) du ministère des Affaires étrangères rédigeait une note qui annonçait largement les événements actuels dans le monde arabe. Elle est restée lettre morte. De quoi alimenter les critiques de certains diplomates sur le mépris dont fait preuve l’exécutif à l’égard du travail d’expertise.
Ce document de deux pages, daté du 24 février 2005, a été rédigé par le chercheur Olivier Roy. Il nous indique que le directeur du CAP jusqu’en 2010, Pierre Lévy, l’a approuvé avant de le transmettre à sa hiérarchie. Ces avertissements visionnaires du CAP n’ont pas plus été écoutés par la suite. . « Nous risquons de nous trouver en décalage » Roy rappelait d’abord les trois motifs de réticence française face à la politique de démocratisation soutenue par Washington. Puis il livrait en une phrase son analyse, avant de la développer : C’est exactement ce qu’il s’est passé. . « Des intellectuels [parlent] avec les ambassades américaines » The First WikiLeaks Revolution? | WikiLeaked. Call to arms. CAIRO - When Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak resigned after 18 days of public demonstrations here last winter, Tahrir Square instantly took its place in the world’s iconography of peaceful protest.
Young men and women brandishing nothing more lethal than shoes and placards had toppled a dictator. One subversive slogan - “The people want the fall of the regime” - in the mouths of a million people overpowered a merciless police state. It was not bloodless; some 846 people were killed by police and regime thugs, according to an Egyptian government inquiry. But for the protesters, and for people watching around the world, Egypt’s uprising appeared a heartening entry in the history of successful nonviolent movements stretching from Gandhi and Martin Luther King to the “velvet revolutions” that unraveled the Iron Curtain in 1989. That was half a year ago. Recent events, however, have convinced some revolutionaries to feel otherwise. “I will kill his son and not give him the body,” Goma says. Don’t credit Bush for Arab Spring. U.S. Mideast policy in a single phrase - Glenn Greenwald. The CIA’s spokesman at The Washington Post, columnist David Ignatius, recently announced that the glorifying term “Arab Spring” is no longer being used by senior intelligence officials to describe democratic revolutions in the Middle East.
It has been replaced by the more “neutral” term “Arab transition,” which, as Ignatius put it, “conveys the essential truth that nobody can predict just where this upheaval is heading.” Note that what was until very recently celebrated in American media circles as a joyous, inspirational awakening of ”democratic birth and freedom” has now been downgraded to an “upheaval” whose outcome may be odious and threatening. That’s not surprising. By removing Mr. That word “loyal” makes the phrase remarkable: to whom was Mubarak ”loyal”? Not to the Egyptian people whom he was governing or even to Egypt itself, but rather to Israel and the United States.
And, of course, it wasn’t the case that the U.S. Trois révolutions arabes, trois flops français » Article » OWNI, Digital Journalism. Visite de Kadhafi à Paris en 2007, réaction tiède au changement de régime et tribulations de Michèle Alliot-Marie en Tunisie… Depuis 2007, la France s’est ringardisée dans le monde arabe. Comment en est-on arrivé là ?
« La France n’a rien vu venir », « on pensait que Ben Ali tiendrait », « on n’a toujours rien compris de ce qui s’est passé en Tunisie ». Deux mois après la chute du président tunisien Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, on se remet doucement, dans les allées du pouvoir français, de la surprise causée par la révolution tunisienne. Et le manque de discernement de l’ambassadeur de France alors en poste à Tunis, Pierre Menat, qui prédisait que Ben Ali pouvait reprendre la main quelques heures avant sa fuite en Arabie Saoudite, a bon dos. Diplomate de l’ombre Lui aussi souffre pourtant de cette « cécité mentale » (l’expression est du président algérien Abdelaziz Bouteflika) qui caractérise la diplomatie et l’exécutif français. Jean-David Levitte, à droite sur la photo.
Wadah Khanfar: A historic moment in the Arab world. Islam et démocratie : la Turquie peut-elle être un modèle ? Has the Arab Spring Stalled? Autocrats Gain Ground in Middle East - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International. According to the "Fundamental Law of Revolution," regimes fall when those at the bottom are fed up with the status quo and those at the top are no longer capable of remaining in power. That was the experience of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. But difficulties arise when there is one thing those at the top are still quite capable of doing, namely deploying tanks to deal with their opponents -- as is the case in Syria and Libya.
Last week, the Syrian regime sent heavy artillery into the rebel city of Dara'a, while its forces attacked protesting students with clubs in the previously calm city of Aleppo, in Banias on the Mediterranean coast and in the northwestern Syrian town of Homs. According to Amnesty International, by last Tuesday 580 Syrians had died in the unrest. The United Nations human rights office puts the number of deaths at up to 850. In Libya, Colonel Moammar Gadhafi is attacking the rebels with snipers and mortars. Revolutions Can Fail Three Different Approaches. Egyptian Activists Stage ‘Second Revolution' Rally | North Africa. Thousands of Egyptians are gathered on Cairo's Tahrir Square for a so-called "second revolution" just three months following President Hosni Mubarak's ouster. The activists are demanding the ruling military government quicken the pace of democratic reforms, including rooting out official corruption. They say military-leaders have included too many members of Mubarak's ruling party in the reform process.
However, Egypt's best organized political force has criticized the demonstration. The Muslim Brotherhood cautioned protest organizers against "driving a wedge" between the military and the people. The ruling military council echoed that sentiment in a message posted Thursday on its Facebook page, warning of "suspicious elements" who want to divide the two sides. Meanwhile, Egyptian authorities have been carrying out a sweeping investigation of state land sales in country's lucrative property market since Mubarak's February departure. This item is part of. Social Networks, Social Revolution. and Anonymous (Al Jazeera Empire) Livni's guidance on Arab democracy. Unrest in the Arab world. Arab Revolution - Economist Shoe-thrower’s Index and Ranking.
The toppling of governments in Egypt and Tunisia sparked protests across Arab countries in Africa and the Middle East leaving us hanging on the question of what will happen next? We examine the Economist’s Shoe-thrower’s Index and alternate approaches to ranking countries’ vulnerability to political unrest, instability and possible revolution. The Shoe-thrower’s Index is based on a set of indicators thought to feed unrest and political instability. After assigning weights to each indicator and crunching the numbers, the Economist arrived at the chart below of Arab countries’ vulnerability to revolution.
(Click on the image below to see a larger version.) The index produces some interesting results. The Economist’s Shoe-thrower’s chart is based on the following indicators and weightings. o 35% – Share of the population under age 25 o 15% – Number of years the government has been in power o 15% – Corruption index (source: Transparency International) o 10% – GDP per person Related articles: AL-BAB: an open door to the Arab world. The Arab spring: protest, power, prospect. The great contest between democracy and tyranny in the middle east and north Africa is unresolved. Among the questions David Hayes asks openDemocracy authors to consider are: * After three months of protest, changes of leadership, violence, and (in Libya) international intervention, where is the Arab spring going?
* What ideas are coming to the fore? * Can a coherent pattern be discerned amid the flux of diverse events in a dozen countries? * Is there a common dynamic, or merely a set of national trajectories with some shared features? * How does and will the Libyan imbroglio affect developments elsewhere, and what does Libya reveal about the role of the United States, Europe, and the "international community"? * How does Iran and its post-2009 situation relate to the Arab revolts? * What does the current balance of forces - from Yemen to Syria, Egypt to Morocco, Bahrain to Tunisia - say about the political prospects over the next year? * Faisal al Yafai * Paul Rogers * Hazem Saghieh Shadi Hamid.
Les femmes, actrices essentielles dans les révolutions arabes. Arab insurgencies, women in transition. The events of 2011 show how much democracy is wanted and needed by the people of the Arab world. The Tunisian and Egyptian dictators have already fallen, the Libyan one is shaking, and others too will surely follow in their train. In all cases it may be a long way to democracy, both in the formal sphere of politics and representation and in the new social spaces that are emerging. The experience and status of women are a test of progress in both areas. Here, commonalities in the waves of change over the region contain grounds for optimism. The mutually reinforcing protest movements in Tunisia and Egypt, Bahrain and Algeria (to name only these) express the aspirations of a predominantly young, modern and urban population for freedom, jobs and a modern democracy.
They are notably inclusive, with all sections of society represented; and their ethos is admirably unprejudiced, courageous and unflinching - a historic instance of politicisation in the best sense. The adaptive moment. "The rising of the women means the rising of us all" In the 1970s, the women’s liberation movement had a badge that proclaimed: women who seek equality with men lack ambition. We don’t want to participate as equals in the violence, oppression and greed of patriarchal power, says Rebecca Johnson. Yesterday, women crossed bridges all over the world to celebrate International Women’s Day. I joined them too, but to demonstrate more than celebrate.
Despite significant gains in the hundred years since Clara Zetkin proposed International Working Women’s Day to focus on our rights and needs, we still have a long way to go. Economic improvements over the century have not done as much for women as for men. In far too many countries and societies women’s security and economic conditions have been sliding backwards in the past 25 years. This year also marks the anniversary of the demand for ‘bread and roses’, which was reproduced on many banners and turned into a stirring song.
Security is the missing link. The women of Benghazi.