. Let’s begin with the title of that ejaculation of tendentious nonsense you and The New York Times have passed off as thoughtful commentary by a serious commentator on international affairs. “Is Israel Its Own Worst Enemy?” Really, you mean that? You haven’t heard that spoken around the block a time or two. It’s your […]
The State Solution: Yes, for South Sudan; No, for Israel
Hedar Sela has an incisive piece at The Propagandist that sharply zeroes in on the true nature of the so-called “one-state solution.” (H/T CiFWatch). Readers of political commentary on the Middle East will frequently see reference to the ‘one-state solution’ in relation to the Arab-Israeli conflict. What perhaps is often not sufficiently clear is what […]
A “Rose in the Desert” Smells Like Shit
I mean not to diminish but heighten in significance the state repression and murder currently being executed across Syria by reminding us all of what I had intended to write of at the time, the creepiest, most morally repugnant journalism of the year – Joan Juliet Buck‘s “A Rose in the Desert,” for Vogue, with […]
Egyptics
Among the many approaches to the study of literature are varied considerations of structure, form, and language, including archetypologies, symbologies, and rhetorical and verbal analysis. These differing hermeneutics can be brought to bear on the interpretation of more than just literature, as almost anything can be argued to show intention, in the sense of indications […]
Thinking about Egypt
We were thinking about it yesterday in more theoretical terms, about what makes a revolution and the act of rebellion legitimate and humane – true to the liberating spirit that animates it – and how revolutions betray themselves. To think about Egypt more practically is to recognize the social factors in Egypt that make the […]