Newsletter Archive – CA Test Dev Form

Newsletter Archive

Below are all the Arab Digest newsletters going back to 17 June 2013

Tunisians on the streets holding 'black lives matter' banners, and chanting 'no to facism, Tunisia is an African country' as part of a massive anti-racism demonstration, February 28, 2023 [photo: @MiddleEastMnt]

A Tunisian take on the migrant crisis

Summary: a western media focus on the ill-treatment of sub-Saharan migrants ignores another harsh reality, the desperation  of young Tunisians seeking to escape the economic crisis engulfing their country.

Armed members of Iranian Kurdish opposition group Komala on June 25, 2015. Exact location unknown. [Photo credit: Kurdishstruggle via Wikimedia Commons]

Saving face

Summary: diplomacy rather than bullets marked the end, at least for the time being, of a dispute between Iran and Iraqi Kurdistan that had it not been resolved had the potential to explode into a major military confrontation.

MbS’s army: growing signs of discontent

Summary: the execution of two army pilots signals all is not well in the Saudi military as discontent festers and resentment is quelled with harsh measures.

In an historic first, last year Armed Forces general Salah Al Ruwaini took a seat on the bench of Egypt’s highest court [photo credit: MAda Masr]

Egypt, Pakistan and the military

Summary: Sisi has transformed the military in Egypt from a security institution into the sole guardian of the state but the story of the military establishment in Pakistan and the fate of Imran Khan should serve as a warning to the Egyptian president about what can happen should he run afoul of the generals to whom he has assigned ultimate power.

The systematic and widespread use of unlawful lethal force at Rabaa, resulting in the deaths of well over 1,000 protesters, in a manner that was not only anticipated, but planned by Egyptian government leaders, likely constitutes crimes against humanity [photo credit: X/Twitter]

Rabaa: a massacre revisited

Summary: the destruction of Egypt’s brief democracy and the mass repression that has followed was enabled by the 2013 Rabaa massacre and those who supported it, among them secular liberals and leftists and a broad swathe of the Egyptian public who bought into a rabidly nationalistic narrative.

Libya's Derna on 12 September after Storm Daniel hit and disaster struck [photo credit: Planet Labs PBC]

A climate battle MENA is ill-prepared for

Summary: even though the Middle East and North Africa are on the frontlines of climate change the structures of governance are ill-suited to manage arguably the greatest threat the region and its people have ever faced.

Mass graves for victims of those killed in the devastating earthquake in Morocco [photo credit: @Angryman_J]

Of fathers and daughters

Summary: a Moroccan father grieves for his daughter; a Bahraini daughter risks all to save her father.

Sonatrach CEO Toufik Hakkar paid a two day inspection visit to the Hassi Messaoud and Hassi Bahamou gas fields this week [photo credit: aps.dz/]

Algeria’s leaders: incapable of strategic economic thinking

Summary: Giorgia Meloni’s Made in Italy fund is seeking investment from MENA energy players and Algeria has an opportunity and history on its side to engage with the Italians and invest in the fund.  What’s lacking is the political will and the economic nous to seize the opportunity.

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