TGIF. It's Friday. Time to relax, let one's hair down, and ... wait: isn't that Kemal Atatürk on that swing?
Atatürk has become such an iconic image in modern Turkey that I at least find it a little hard to picture him actually kicking back and having fun. As the deck chairs give away, the swing is on shipboard, aboard the steamer Ege during a voyage to Antalya in February 1935. (Picture is from here).
If the father of modern Turkey, usually portrayed on stamps and money with a stern, dignified visage, can kick back and enjoy a swing, well, all of you have a good weekend, too.
For no particular reason other than my training as a historian and my always looking for good blog topics, I was thinking about the Middle East 50 years ago, 1963. The world was in the midst of the Cold War, John Kennedy President of the US (until November) and Nikita Khrushchev running the USSR (with only a year to go). But in the Middle East there were still some real giants in the scene: some of the founders if the modern states and/or the prophets of a new era. They weren't all good men, and certainly they weren't all good leaders. Most were kings or dictators, and even the rare elected leaders leaned towards autocratic preferences.
Not all the leaders are memorable. Yemen was in the early days of its civil war. King Saud in Saudi Arabia was an embarrassment, soon to be deposed (the next year) by Prime Minister Prince Faisal. The Gulf was still under British rule, except for Kuwait. Iraq and Syria both had Baathist coups that year and new leaders had not yet emerged. Fouad Chehab in Lebanon is mostly remembered for steering the country out of the 1958 civil war, an early foreshadowing of what was to come in 1975-1990. Turkish Prime Minister İsmet İnönü was a man of an earlier era, a nationalist hero brought back after a 1960 coup. Sudan's Ibrahim Abboud is largely forgotten. King Idris I in Libya was no power player.
But the big names seem, somehow, bigger in retrospect than their counterparts today, whether for good or ill: Nasser, Ben Gurion, the Shah,Bourguiba, and two relative newcomers in the Maghreb in 1963, Hassan II and Ben Bella.
Though he was President of Egypt only half as long as Husni Mubarak, Gamal Abdel Nasser's career is iconic: though he created the national security state that protected Mubarak and was no democrat, his message of Arab nationalism and his symbolic defiance of Britain, France, and Israel at Suez made him a hero for the Arab world and a villain to many in the West. His "Arab socialism," despite dubious results, made him popular at home. His leadership was at its height between the wars of 1956 and 1967; Egypt's crushing defeat in the latter war dimmed Nasser's reputation, and he died just over three years later in September 1970, only 52 years old.
I've run this clip of Nasser making fun of the Muslim Brotherhood before (it has subtitles in English, but the delivery is what matters, and you probably can get a good sense of Nasser's way with the crowd even if you don't know Arabic):
Declaring Independence 1948
Nasser's frequent adversary, Israel's David Ben-Gurion, is another figure whose reputation still vastly overshadows the country's more recent leaders. Founding father and first Prime Minister, Ben-Gurion read the declaration of Israel's independence 65 years ago and was still politically active almost until his final illness in 1973. He served as Prime Minister from 1948-1954 and 1955-1964 (Moshe Sharett's Prime Ministership is remembered mostly by history buffs).
Ben-Gurion feuded with his successor, Levi Eshkol, split with his old party Mapai (ancestor of Labor), started a new party, Rafi, and eventually split with that as well. After retiring to his Negev kibbutz, Ben-Gurion remained active in politics, meeting with political figures before and during the 1967 war as if he were still in charge. He lived to see the 1973 war as well. Though in his last years he had withdrawn from political office he remained a powerful force to be reckoned with.
Many Egyptians still venerate Nasser; Ben-Gurion has the country's major airport, a university in his beloved Negev, and streets in most cities named for him. In contrast, another dominant figure in the region 50 years ago, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Shahanshah and Aryamehr (Light of the Aryans), lies buried in a mosque in Egypt, after dying in a troubled exile; he is excoriated in Iran. The second and last of the Pahlavi dynasty was installed by the allies in place of his father in 1941, restored to power after the coup against Mossadegh, and ruled until 1979, when, a few years after celebrating 2500 years of monarchy in Iran, he was driven from the Peacock Throne. But in the 1960s the Shah was reaching the height of his power; revolution and exile seemed remote possibilities.
In North Africa, Habib Bourguiba in Tunisia was already 60 years old in 1963, founding father of his country. A hero of the national independence effort against the French, and famously a vigorous secularist and Westernizer. He was widely respected and influential regionally at the time. Bourguiba would increasingly prove intolerant of opposition, jailing rivals and even disowning his own son and political heir; he had himself named President-for-Life, and clung to power stubbornly long after his faculties were badly impaired; finally deposed by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali on grounds of senility in 1987, he lived on until 2000, dying at the age of 98 (officially: some think he was older than admitted and may have been 100 or 101). His reputation would be healthier had he not hung on to power so long; but while his successor Ben Ali is disgraced and in (admittedly comfortable) exile, the most elegant boulevard in Tunis remains Avenue Bourguiba.
The other two leaders in the Maghreb were still new to power. King Hassan II of Morocco became King in February 1961 after the sudden death of his father during supposedly routine surgery at the age of only 51. He was still something of an unknown quantity in 1963, but his reign was to last until 1999, surviving plots and assassinations, crushing real or suspected rivals, and dominating the Kingdom. His son now sits on his throne.
The third Maghreb leader would serve for only two years, but he was a powerful symbol: after its bloody 12-year struggle against France, Algeria had finally won its independence in 1962, and Ahmed Ben Bella became its President in 1963. One of nine historic leaders of the FLN, based in Cairo during the war of independence, France notoriously intercepted his plane in 1956 and held him prisoner until 1962. He defined himself as an Arab Nationalist and an ally of Nasser's, but in 1965 he would be overthrown by his military chief, Houari Boumedienne.
Ben Bella in old age
Ben Bella spent decades in exile, eventually returning to Algeria. He survived to the venerable age of 95, dying just over a year ago in April 2012, and was given a state funeral by an Algeria whose population were mostly born after his overthrow and who did not remember him: but an Algeria still ruled by his old comrade-in-arms and first Foreign Minister, Abdelaziz Bouteflika.
Powerful figures. Their heirs and successors today, I would venture to say with confidence, remain in their shadows, though many of them ruled with an iron hand.
Laura Rozen at Al-Monitor's The Back Channel has a profile of Saeed Jalili, the Iranian National Security Council chief, nuclear negotiator and now, Presidential candidate. Since many believe that Jalili is the favored candidate of Ayatollah Khamenei, he may prove to be someone we all need to get to know.
The Middle East Institute has announced the official launch of its new Arab Transitions website, offering a wide range of news and opinion on the transitions in the Arab world, with an initial focus on Egypt. There's a lot of material there already, and more to come. Do take a look.
The new site is also part of s redesigned main MEI website, which I commend to you as well; you'll even find a link to this blog on there. Congratulations to our new Arab Transitions Project and to the general website as well.
May 15 is marked (certainly not "celebrated") as Nakba Day by Palestinians, the date in 1948 on which the British Mandate for Palestine formally ended and the first Arab-Israeli War/Israeli War of Independence began, still known among Palestinians as the nakba, the catastrophe. Israel had proclaimed its independence the day before, on May 14, but due to the differences between the (mostly lunar) Hebrew calendar and the solar Western calendar, the two dates today rarely coincide, since Israelis celebrate Yom Ha'Atzmaut or Independence Day on the Hebrew date of 5 Iyar (this year it was April 16, just about a month ago), Israel has already celebrated its 65th birthday, while Palestinians are marking 65 years of their own loss today. The Palestinian-Israeli conflict at age 65 has made a few faltering steps towards a solution, but is not yet ready for retirement.
Despite the difference in dates observing the same event, this year sees an interesting and perhaps ironic juxtaposition: the Jewish holiday of Shavuot began at sundown last night. And there are some interesting symbolic aspects to this coincidence of Nakba Day and Shavuot.
Shavuot (in English Bibles and the New Testament often translated literally as the "Feast of Weeks") comes seven weeks after Passover and traditionally marks the giving of the Torah to the Jewish People at Mount Sinai. But Shavuot also has a traditional linkage to the Biblical Book of Ruth. As the Wikipedia Shavuot article notes:
The Book of Ruth (מגילת רות, Megillat Ruth)
is read on Shavuot because: (1) King David, Ruth's descendant, was born
and died on Shavuot [Y Chagigah 2:3]; (2) Shavuot is harvest time
[Exodus 23:16], and the events of Book of Ruth occur at harvest time;
(3) The gematria (numerical value) of Ruth is 606, the number of
commandments given at Sinai in addition to the 7 Noahide Laws already
given, for a total of 613; (4) Ruth was a convert, and all Jews also
entered the covenant on Shavuot, when the Torah was given; (5) The
central theme of the book is loving-kindness, and the Torah is about
loving-kindness; (6) Ruth was allowed to marry Boaz on the basis of the
Oral Law's interpretation of the verse, "A Moabite may not marry into
the Congregation of the Lord." (Deut. 23:4). This points to the unity of
the Written and Oral Torahs.
What was once a familiar story may deserve a summary here: Naomi and her husband Elimelech had moved from Bethlehem in Judah to Moab, and their two sons married Moabite women. Naomi's husband and both sons then died, and Naomi determined to return to her own people. One of the daughters-in-law, Orpah, agrees. The other, Ruth, has other ideas.
Most Gentiles will best know Ruth for its famous line in Chapter I, verse
16 (KJV), which has entered the familiar phrases of the English
language:
16 And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee: for
whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy
people shall be my people, and thy God my God:
Returning to Bethlehem with Naomi, she marries a kinsman of Naomi named Boaz, and becomes the Moabite ancestor of the future royal line of Judah. Ruth carries much symbolism, not just of loyalty, but of the role of the outsider: Ruth is a direct ancestor of King David, yet a non-Hebrew Moabite; the gospel genealogies of Jesus, which trace him to David and beyond, also include Ruth, the Gentile ancestor of Jesus.
I'm not going to belabor the imagery here. But the coincidence of the 65th anniversary of Nakba Day and the major Jewish holiday that celebrates assimilation with an outsider seemed worth a comment. Especially lately.
Greetings to readers celebrating Shavuot, acknowledgment and sympathy to readers celebrating Nakba Day. May the reconciliation of outsiders not be merely a nice Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age legend, and the integration of the other be embraced.
Since tomorrow happens to be Nakba day (fuller post coming), some Palestinian readers might feel I'm being overly flippant by posting this piece tonight. Please accept my assurances that I intend it as the sort of quirky cultural story I frequently post, and the date is purely coincidental, at least on my part.
We have heard much about the Gaza tunnels, usually in connection with arms smuggling, infiltration, and the like, with both Israel and Egypt portraying the tunnels in a sinister manner, and I don't doubt some highly dubious material and personalities do pass through them. But, if this Xinhua Chinese news agency report is accurate, you can also use them for KFC delivery. Yes, since Colonel Sanders isn't available in Gaza, you can order from al-Arish in Egypt. The English, presumably translated from the Chinese by the same people who translate computer manuals and Chinese menus, is a little rocky, but the meaning is fairly clear:
At Al-Yamama delivery company in the Gaza City, the
floor is filled with boxes of fast food with the famous face of Colonel
Sanders, the founder of KFC.
However, there are no KFC restaurant in this Palestinian coastal
sliver of land as the regular absence of raw materials and Israeli
restrictions on Gaza crossings make it difficult to open an
international fast food branch here.
But ordering fast food from one of the world's most popular
restaurants has become possible in Gaza after Al-Yamama started to bring
the food from the Egyptian North Sinai, which borders Gaza.
The fried chicken make their [sic] way from one of the many underground smuggling tunnels beneath the Gaza-Egypt border.
As cheap fast food goes, it's neither cheap nor fast:
Since late last month, they have made four deliveries
of KFC food to Palestinians in Gaza, with every delivery including
about two dozens of combos.
The clients include both those who have traveled outside Gaza and the people who never stepped a foot out of Gaza.
"It's delicious even as it's not hot," said Aboud Fares, a 22-
year-old student, as he bit a mouthful of a chicken breast. His sister,
who traveled several times to Egypt, was enjoying the KFC apple pie.
The price of a KFC family meal is about 80 Egyptian pounds ( about 11
U.S. dollars) at el-Arish KFC restaurant, but getting it in Gaza costs
as much as 100 Israeli Shekels (30 dollars).
The delivery company says the higher price is due to the transportation and smuggling fees.
Those seem steep prices for Gaza. And there are other impediments:
Al-Madani also said that they do not face a lot
obstacles in bringing the food to Gaza, but the delivery may be delayed
due to various reasons.
"Sometimes Hamas checks the meal boxes and sometimes the taxi that picks up the orders from Sinai is late," he said.
I'm pretty sure KFC is halal unless it's cooked in lard (highly unlikely in al-Arish, I should think),but maybe Hamas inspectors like the Colonel's products too.
This interesting YouTube video shows a tram ride to the pyramids, dated in the "1910s," according to the caption. Village scenes, the tram, a couple of early cars.
The Carnegie Endowment's Thomas Carothers has an interesting piece on the beleaguered Egyptian opposition, "Egypt's Dismal Opposition: A Second Look." While admitting that the usual criticisms of the fractious non-Islamist opposition are valid, he suggests that a comparative approach considering the experience in other emerging democracies provides some perspective:
In fact, the Egyptian opposition does not
look so bad compared to the political opposition forces in other places
at similar historical moments, such as Romania’s famously feckless
opposition parties of the early post-Ceauşescu years, Serbia’s
notoriously fractious opposition parties of the late 1990s, and
Argentina’s political opposition for at least the last ten years. It
includes several politicians of genuine stature, such as Amr Moussa and
Mohamed ElBaradei, and others less well-known but of real political
energy and smarts. Cooperation among many of the opposition parties is
growing rather than diminishing. Last November’s formation of the
National Salvation Front, an alliance of opposition parties, was a
valuable step in this regard, even if it falls apart in the run-up to
the parliamentary election slated for later this year. Some opposition
figures and parties do have constituencies beyond Cairo and are making
efforts to build organizational structures in diverse parts of the
country.
The opposition parties may not have an adequate set of proposed
political programs to meet Egypt’s many challenges, yet neither are they
completely bereft on the policy front. When the parliament met in the
first half of last year, some of the opposition parties did engage in
meaningful reform efforts within various parliamentary committees, such
as the human rights committee. And overall the opposition evinces a
relatively low degree of demagogy or reckless populism, especially in
comparison to various political movements or parties in South Asia,
South America, southern Europe, and other parts of the world.
Add to the "[Stuff] Salafis Say" file this wondrous quote from a Salafi Nour Party MP in Egypt, according to Ahram Online:
"The Shi[‘]as are more dangerous than naked [women]," MP Tharwat Attallah of the Salafist Nour Party said during the meeting.
"They are a danger to Egypt's national security; Egyptians could be deceived into [converting to] Shi[‘]ism, giving it a chance to spread in Egypt," he added.
I hope you don't mind the bracketed ‘ayns. I'm not always pedantic, but I refuse to omit consonants.
Now, there are no doubt some dangerous Shi‘a. I'm not, personally, a great lover of Hizbullah or the Iranian Revolution Guards Corps, but I've known plenty of Lebanese and Iraqi Shi‘a who were fine people. Similarly, I suppose naked women can be dangerous, since it was just last month that, during the so-called International Topless Jihad Day, the Ukrainian feminist group Femen proclaimed that their bare breasts (they actually said "tits" but I'm euphemizing) "are deadlier than your stones," and "deadly" = "dangerous" seems fair. But I'm not sure these are really comparable threats. (Or, well, threats at all.)
But then, since this was a case of the Shura Council questioning the Tourism Ministry, by "naked women" the Salafi speaker may have meant "tourists in bikinis," a perennial threat to Salafism, since in Egypt, actual naked women are as thin on the ground as actual Shi‘a. Aliaa Elmahdy left the country some time back (and has most recently gotten naked in Sweden, but I don't think it's considered dangerous there), easing the terrible danger of anyone being naked in Egypt.
My own answer to the "Shi‘a" versus "naked women" debate is, "why can't we have both?"
Though I read Ahram Online daily I nearly missed this gem, so a hat tip to Khalil Al-anani for linking to it, though he has absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for my comments on said link.
The US Congress May be focused on events in Benghazi several months ago, but Libyans are much more focused on what happened in Benghazi today. A car bombing outside a hospital killed at least three, possibly more, and wounded many, and across the country this latest act of violence seems to have awakened a sense of unity transcending regional rivalries and partisan quarreling, as people deplore the instability that still plagues the country and the lack of security. More here and here.
Old Cairo hands will recognize the joys of the sandstorm known as the Khamsin, when the desert moves into town and turns everything sand colored. The other side of the Nile is in there somewhere, I think.
The fact that 78-year-old former Iranian President (and former just about everything else) Hashemi-Rafsanjani has again thrown his turban into the ring, and that a key backer of outgoing President Ahmadinejad also registered for the Presidential elections at the eleventh hour, could make for an interesting election this summer — but not necessarily. The Guardians Council has yet to vet the candidates and may cut several. Assuming Rafsanjani's credentials are solid enough to stay in the race, his page, his past record, and his defeat in 2005 by Ahmadinejad when he last attempted a comeback suggest that we should not put too much weight on the likelihood of his returning to power. (It also says something about Iran's ideological evolution that this one time right-hand-man to Ruhollah Khomeini is being billed as the reformist candidate.
Rafsanjani is better known than most of the candidates, but a number of them (Ali Akbar Velayati, Saeed Jalili, Ali Baqer Qalibaf) have widespread name recognition, and Qalibaf was apparently popular as Tehran Mayor. Ahmadinejad ally Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei was another late entry. As a result, the field includes most of the political spectrum that the regime allows to function politically. But Rafsanjani may have dissuaded others on the reformist wing from standing.
The aftermath of the 2009 elections and the birth of the Green movement still evoke some bitterness. Will these elections be viewed as fair? Of course, it's a loaded question given the Council of Guardians' ability to disqualify candidates.
And work on the official statements in which we avoid discussing the differences that have separated the churches for over 1500 years, but congratulate each other on becoming Pope:
I'm working on some longer posts that will go up later, I hope, but for now here's your weekend nostalgia: Some pictures (photos or old lithographs) from the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, from various sources:
Though he (or she) only mentions Egypt and Sumeria in the very last line of their first post at a new blog called Ancient Ale, given the Middle East's clear priority in the field, this new blog by an archaeologist of the brewer's art may just fill an important need in the blogosphere. Looks like a bookmark.
I hope this doesn't seem too risquéto come right after a post about a gathering of Popes.
Popular media sometimes over-dramatize archaeological finds, and oversimplify what archaeologists and Egyptologists tell them in interviews, so I'm not sure if this is a case of a quotation out of context, or what. This Los Angeles Times article starts with a sensational headline: "Uncovered: Ritual Public Sex and Drunkenness in Ancient Egypt." It quotes Egyptologist Betsy Bryan of Johns Hopkins, and gets off to an unpromising start:
I'll bet you that archaeologist Betsy Bryan's perspective on
reality-show behavior is a little longer than most. Since 2001, Bryan
has led the excavation of the temple complex of the Egyptian goddess Mut
in modern-day Luxor, the site of the city of Thebes in ancient Egypt.
And the ritual she has uncovered, which centers on binge drinking,
thumping music and orgiastic public sex, probably makes "Jersey Shore"
look pretty tame.
Well, that doesn't suggest sensationalism in any way. She's discussing ritual mass drinking and public sex in conjunction with the legends of the goddess Hathor and her related form Sekhmet (both assimilated to some extent with Mut). Mut is a mother goddess; Hathor a cow goddess seen as a fertility symbol; Sekhmet is a lion goddess with fertility aspects. She associates the practice with bringing back the Nile flood, and says:
The destruction wrought by Hathor is the background to the level of
drinking that goes on in the festival: It's not just to drink but to
drink to pass out. A hymn inscribed in a temple associated with the lion
goddess describes young women, dressed with floral garlands in their
hair, who serve the alcohol. It is described as a very sensual
environment.
Okay. Fertility rituals. But then comes this curious (if correctly quoted) exchange:
Q. And what was the sex about?
A. The sex is
about the issue of fertility and renewal, and about bringing the Nile
flood back to ensure the fertility of the land as well. The festival of
drunkenness typically occurred in mid-August, just as the Nile waters
begin to rise.
We don't have the same kind of clarity as to why
the sex is included as we have with the drinking. When I first
speculated there was a sexual component to these rituals, I got a lot of
push-back from colleagues who didn't believe it.
Since the expert seems not to "have the same kind of clarity as to why
the sex is included as we have with the drinking," perhaps a non-Egyptologist can offer a wild theory:
The men, we are told, are drinking "not just to drink but to
drink to pass out."
They are surrounded by "young women, dressed with floral garlands in their
hair, who serve the alcohol. It is described as a very sensual
environment." There is no indication these young women are in any way unwilling participants.
It is associated with the Nile flood, the profound symbol of fertility in Egypt for millennia.
It is celebrated in temples and stories of three goddesses associated with motherhood, fertility, and sex.
You do the math.
Where's the lack of clarity as to "why the sex is included"? It's a Bacchanalia or other similar Dionysian fertility rite in which drink, sex, and fertility are all intermixed. I suspect the professor either was misquoted or misspoke. This sounds like familiar stuff all the way back to The Golden Bough. And I'm not condoning it and no, it really did have a religious component; it's not just an excuse for an orgiastic frat house party. (Well, maybe it was, but apparently they did it in temples.)
It is 40 years since Pope Shenouda III went to the Vatican and met with Pope Paul VI in 1973; that was the first meeting of the Coptic and Catholic leaders since the churches split after the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD. Pope John Paul II also met with Pope Shenouda in Cairo in 2000 while visiting the Middle East, but it is the first trip to the Vatican by a Coptic Pope since that 1973 visit.
If we could have gotten Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI to drop by they'd have had three Popes in the Vatican at once.
The great animator Ray Harryhausen died yesterday at the venerable age of 92. Members of my generation will remember him as the man who made monsters come alive in the movies in the era before CGI. Any graying male, and probably a few of the females, of a certain age will remember the dueling skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts(1963); he made dinosaurs and cyclops and such like believable through stop-motion rubber models in the days before computer graphics; his work probably looks primitive to kids today (it does to mine), but it stretched the minds of a whole generation. And it inspired George Lucas, Tim Burton, and others of a generation who would take special effects to new levels. In Pixar's Monsters Inc. the fancy restaurant is named "Harry Hausen's," one of many tributes slipped into later animators' movies.
See? Middle Eastern!
Rubber Monster
What, if anything, does this have to do with the Middle East? Well, I managed to write an obit for the great bluegrass genius Doc Watson here on the grounds that some if his spirituals mentioned the river Jordan; and I don't have to reach nearly so far for Harryhausen: he did the special effects for the 1958 film The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad (also see here) and later, in the 1970s, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad(1974) and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977). The latter opened in the same summer as the first Star Wars, when the torch had clearly been passed to a new generation of special effects. And while it still had rubber monsters, it also had Jane Seymour in a harem outfit (left), suggesting the core audience had matured a bit since the 50's.
Jane Seymourin Eye of the Tiger
The Sinbad movies have only the most tenuous connection to the 1,001 Nights version: mostly the hero's name, the vaguely Middle Eastern settings, and, well, that's about it. But when I was ten years old, the first of them (the only one I saw) was a wonder, and the rubber monsters seemed real.
But the only real way to pay tribute to Ray Harryhausen is to remember his monsters. He did it all without computer graphics, and in those less-jaded days, it seemed wondrous. Here's a collage that claims to have clips of all of them:
Here's an interesting Tumblr for our Middle East nostalgia theme: Zamaaan ‐ Your Passport to the Past, which describes itself as a crowdsourced site for old family pictures of the Middle East. Many seem to be Levantine or Gulf in origin; it's worth a look. Yes, they spell Zamaaan with three a's.
Egypt's long-anticipated Cabinet reshuffle has brought in nine new ministers, but anyone hoping for national unity government will be disappointed. It's as solidly Muslim Brotherhood/Freedom and Justice Party as its predecessor.
All the ministers responsible for the economy and petroleum were replaced, in the midst of the negotiations with the IMF; the new Justice Minister is a supporter of the beleaguered Prosecutor General. Ahram Online reports on the reshuffle here, and profiles the new ministers here.
Ultimately, I fear the makeup of the Egyptian Cabinet is as faceless and irrelevant as in the Mubarak years.
One element in the debate over what to do about Syria has been the argument that a no-fly zone would be difficult to implement, given Syria's sophisticated air defense system. Clearly the two Israeli strikes over the weekend raised questions about the effectiveness of Syria's air defenses, and Anthony Cordesman at CSIS assesses that effectiveness in "Syria's Uncertain Air Defense Capanilities," while noting that there would still be challenges to mounting an effective no-fly zone.
Sham al-Nassim, as I've noted in earlier years (most detailed posts here and here)
is a spring festival that coincides with the Monday after Coptic
Easter, but is celebrated by all Egyptians, Muslims and Christians alike
(and the Jewish community before its disappearance). Families picnic
along the Nile, color eggs, eat certain traditional spring vegetables
and dried fish. The name Sham al-Nassim, "smelling the breeze" in
Arabic, may also distantly echo the ancient Egyptian feast of Shemu,
also a spring festival. In any event it is generally considered one of
only two traditional holidays (the other being Wafa' al-Nil in August,
celebrating the Nile Flood before the Aswan High Dam was built, but
still celebrated today) with roots in Pharaonic times.
I am myself personally unsure of the best course of action for the US in Syria; I am appalled by the horrendous war crimes of the Asad regime and its unrestrained war on its own people; I certainly support US humanitarian aid and even arms supplies to the rebels, but I have doubts about more overt assistance. If Turkey or NATO could provide a no-fly zone it would probably make a difference, but that seems unlikely unless the US takes the lead. Syria is not Libya (assuming you consider the Libyan intervention a success), and the war will last longer and be far more likely to spread than was the case in Libya. But the debate may soon be overtaken by events.
First there were the reports of chemical weapons use, and the debate about the so-called US "red line." Then, last week, Hizbullah acknowledged that it has had fighters engaged inside Syria. Then, this weekend,. Israel struck twice inside Syria, allegedly at missiles en route to Hizbullah, but possibly also aimed at degrading Syria's own missile stocks, which would be a major delivery system for chemical weapons. We may not know all the details for some time. But Hizbullah and Israel have both ante'd up in this game of bloody regional poker.
Iran on one side (with Iraq sympathetic) and Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan on the other have been in the game all along. Lebanon, as always, doesn't really have a hand to play but is nonetheless part of the stakes.
At first the Syrian civil war seemed to be an outgrowth of Arab Spring; then a Sunni-Shi‘ite sectarian conflict, then a geopolitical fight between Iran/Syria and the conservative Sunni states. But as the up-escalator accelerates it's moving into an area where all the parties may be losing sight of what the fight was originally about. There's a story that after World War I the deposed Kaiser Wilhelm II was asked what the thought the Great War had really been "about," and he replied, "I'll be damned if I ever knew." By the time you get to the Somme or Gallipoli, it's not about an Austrian Archduke any more (if it ever was).
I am still uncertain what the best way may be to end the Syrian atrocities, but the stakes were raised this weekend. Both the dangers of widespread war and unforeseen consequences have risen. I don't recommend dithering unduly, but one also needs to think carefully before taking precipitate action. Caution, yes, but it may also be time to find ways to short circuit this escalator before the war metastasizes. The addition in less than a week of both Hizbullah and Israel adds to both the need for caution and the need for action to defuse this or decide it before the escalator goes through the roof.
Yesterday, of course, was Orthodox Easter. (And today is Sham al-Nassim in Egypt and Sudan, but that post is coming.)
As we already knew on Friday, President Morsi of Egypt did not attend Coptic Pope Tawadros II's first Easter service at St. Mark's Cathedral in Cairo. Instead, the senior civilian government official attending was Prime Minister Hesham Qandil.
M. Lynx Qualey at Arabic Literature (in English) notes that the Library of Arabic Literature project is still looking for "Someone Crazy Enough to Translate al-Mutanabbi." The great poet is considered by many Arabs the greatest of them all, but notoriously difficult. I took a graduate course on al-Mutanabbi once, in Cairo. I not only never understood the poetry, I didn't always understand even the explanations. Best of luck to them.
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(Note: This is MEI's feed, not mine. I can't limit myself to 140 characters. But I do post my blog headlines as they go up.)
"Michael Collins Dunn is the editor of The Middle East Journal. He also blogs. His latest posting summarizes a lot of material on the Iranian election and offers some sensible interpretation. If you are really interested in the Middle East, you should check him out regularly." — Gary Sick, Gary's Choices
"Since we’re not covering the Tunisian elections particularly well, and neither does Tunisian media, I’ll just point you over here. It’s a great post by MEI editor Michael Collins Dunn, who . . . clearly knows the country pretty well." — alle, Maghreb Politics Review
"And bookmark that blog! Good posts, long posts, fast pace." — Maghreb Politics Reviewagain.
"I’ve followed Michael Collins Dunn over at the Middle East Institute’s blog since its beginning in January this year. Overall, it is one of the best blogs on Middle Eastern affairs. It is a selection of educated and manifestly knowledgeable ruminations of various aspects of Middle Eastern politics and international relations in the broadest sense." — davidroberts at The Gulf Blog
"Michael Collins Dunn over at the indefatigable and ever-informative Middle East Institute Blog puts forward an intriguing case focusing on what he sees to be some level of distortion of coverage of the Yemani conflict." — davidroberts at The Gulf Blog
"Michael Collins Dunn, editor of the prestigious Middle East Journal, wrote an interesting 'Backgrounder' on the Berriane violence at his Middle East Institute Editor’s Blog. It is a strong piece, but imperfect (as all things are) . . ." — kal, The Moor Next Door
Un de mes blogs préférés - vraiment honte à moi de ne pas l'avoir nommé - MEI Editor's Blog. On y trouve que des posts pertinents, bien documentés. Ce que j'aime beaucoup sur ce blog, c'est que lorsque l'auteur s'attèle à un sujet sous-médiatisé (souvent lié à l'Arabie Saoudite), il est une source d'informations très complète.
In North Africa, Habib Bourguiba in Tunisia was already 60 years old in 1963, founding father of his country. A hero of the national independence effort against the French, and famously a vigorous secularist and Westernizer. He was widely respected and influential regionally at the time. Bourguiba would increasingly prove intolerant of opposition, jailing rivals and even disowning his own son and political heir; he had himself named President-for-Life, and clung to power stubbornly long after his faculties were badly impaired; finally deposed by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali on grounds of senility in 1987, he lived on until 2000, dying at the age of 98 (officially: some think he was older than admitted and may have been 100 or 101). His reputation would be healthier had he not hung on to power so long; but while his successor Ben Ali is disgraced and in (admittedly comfortable) exile, the most elegant boulevard in Tunis remains Avenue Bourguiba.
The Middle East Institute has announced the official launch of its new Arab Transitions website, offering a wide range of news and opinion on the transitions in the Arab world, with an initial focus on Egypt. There's a lot of material there already, and more to come. Do take a look.
Add to the "[Stuff] Salafis Say" file this wondrous quote from a Salafi Nour Party MP in Egypt, according to Ahram Online: 
Old Cairo hands will recognize the joys of the sandstorm known as the Khamsin, when the desert moves into town and turns everything sand colored. The other side of the Nile is in there somewhere, I think. 
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