By Golnaz Esfandiari via RFE/RL A friend of the Imam asks him, “Would you like to drink vodka or tequila?” Outraged at the indignity, the pious Imam slaps the man in the face. “What’s wrong with homemade aragh sagi?” he asks. This knee-slapper, which mocks Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s fierce rejection of alcohol and his promotion […]
Archives for September 2014
Elizabeth Warren: Taking on Entrenched Wall Street Interests that have Rigged the Game (Moyers)
Bill Moyers: “The Massachusetts senator talks to Bill about taking on the entrenched political and Wall Street interests that have rigged the game against the rest of us.”
Did Anyone win the Gaza Conflict? Was it even a “War”?
By Ramzy Baroud (Maan) In the rush to analyze the outcome of Israel’s 51-day war in Gaza, dubbed Operation Protective Edge, some may have neglected an important factor: this was not a war by traditional definitions of warfare, thus the conventional analyses of victory and defeat is simply not applicable. That being the case, how […]
Top 5 Signs the US is de facto allied with Iran versus ISIL
By Juan Cole 1. Karen DeYoung points out that the siege of the Iraqi Shiite town of Amerli could not have been broken without the help of Shiite militiamen from the Badr Corps, the Salaam Brigades (Mahdi Army) and the extremist Asa’ib Ahl al-Haqq. The US essentially provided them close air support against the Salafi […]
Can Obama Resist Hawks’ Pressure to Rush to Syria Quagmire?
By Adam Quinn, University of Birmingham via The Conversation US president Barack Obama has yet to work out exactly what America’s strategy is in confronting Islamic State (IS), and has been foolish enough to say so in public. Cue the foreseeable torrent of point-scoring from opponents. As Vox’s Zack Beauchamp perceptively pointed out, however, a […]
Putting the ‘Hero’ back in ‘Superhero’: How the Muslim Superhero Can Save the Genre
By A. David Lewis for for ISLAMiCommentary A. David Lewis Muslims don’t present a problem for superhero comics. They present a solution. A previous installment of “Comics & Dialogue” addressed an apparent awkwardness for Muslims as superhero characters. How could they fulfill the generic role of a typical superhero, while also being true to Islamic […]
What You won’t See on US TV: Iranians Sympathetic to US over ISIL Attacks
Channel 4 News Channel 4 News: “What does Iran make of Islamic State?” Meanwhile, although some Iranian sources deny it, the BBC’s sources say that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader has “authorised his top commander to co-ordinate military operations with the US, Iraqi and Kurdish forces.” Khamenei seems to be preparing the Iranian people […]
Elon Musk’s Nevada Gigafactory may Save the World
By Juan Cole KRQE: “Official: Tesla picks Nevada for Gigafactory” Clean Technica points out that the battery-making factory is on track to reduce battery prices by 30% by 2017, making EVs indisputably cheaper than fossil fuel-driven internal combustion, at less than $100 per kilowatt hour. (Of course, if externalities are taken into account, like the […]
Israel: Reverse Illegal Plans for West Bank
Human Rights Watch (Jerusalem) – Israel should immediately reverse its illegal appropriation of a large swath of land in the occupied West Bank south of Jerusalem, Human Rights Watch said today. The appropriation, announced on September 1, 2014, paves the way for substantial settlement construction near the West Bank town of Bethlehem. Transferring civilian settlers […]
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