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The Doha Industrial Area, already infamous for slum conditions and overcrowded camps, is now under strict police monitoring and effectively sealed off. The area mostly hosts workers building infrastructure for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, who even before the pandemic faced poor conditions and unsafe workspaces. The Qatari government has denied the allegations, but they’re part of a pattern of abuse of migrant workers not just in Qatar but across the Middle East—workers who are now dangerously exposed to the vagaries of authoritarian governments during the pandemic.

The oil-rich Middle East countries built their fortresses with the blood and sweat of foreign laborers, but during the pandemic the workers, who live in crowded dormitories, are seen as a source of infection.

1.5 million Nepalis work in the Persian Gulf and Malaysia, and 400,000 in Qatar. Most of the Nepali workers are stuck abroad due to Nepal’s closure of its borders until April 30, leaving them highly vulnerable—although foreign governments have forced Nepal to accept some flights of deportees.

the sense of relief, joy and pride Egyptians felt over their success. The dredger and a fleet of tug boats had worked day and night to unclog one of the world’s most important waterways, eventually refloating the Ever Given in a week — Egyptian can-do beat the expectations of experts who predicted it would take twice as long.

served as a reminder of how much of their potential is stymied by a political economy that deters experimentation, punishes innovation and ultimately pushes many Egyptians to seek opportunities abroad

Centered on a bigotry of low expectations is the idea that Egyptian workers are uniquely unimaginative and unindustrious, and that these traits — rather than the greed and grift of their rulers — are to blame for the country’s economic failings.

many of the non-oil exporting nations in the Middle East and North Africa are undergoing a process of redefinition of how they are linked with the global economy. It is not going well.

Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco and Jordan are becoming more dependent on external borrowing than on foreign direct investments compared to the pre-2008 period. This is visible with declining ratios of FDIs to GDP, in contrast with increasing ratios of foreign debt to GDP and total exports

The relative political stabilization in all four countries as of 2014/2015 did not allow them much room for full-fledged recovery due to the global economic slowdown. This made it harder for all of them to achieve export-led growth and attract FDI, leaving them with foreign borrowing as the only viable option. Foreign debt accounts for much of the apparent recovery, as expressed in growth rates.

The program has the ambitious objective of reducing the role of state-owned enterprises—in which the IMF includes military-owned companies—and encouraging their replacement with “inclusive private sector led growth.” Indeed, Egypt’s Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly called for just that last year, saying he is aiming for the share of private investment in Egypt’s economy to rise from 30 percent to 65 percent in the coming three years. However, when one examines the market conditions in Egypt and globally, it becomes clear that such an expansion of private investment is clearly unrealistic.

a massive parallel market for hard currency emerged, with its own exchange rate. The parallel market even operated internationally, with Egyptian expatriate workers paying their Saudi rials or Kuwaiti dinars to dealers in the countries where they worked, who then had partners in Egypt who would disburse Egyptian pounds to awaiting relatives at the black-market rate. In 2015, before new reforms were introduced, the central bank governor at the time Hisham Ramez estimated that as much as 90 percent of Egypt’s remittances were being lost to the parallel market, circumventing the country’s official banking system and starving banks of much needed hard currency liquidity. For perspective on the seriousness of this issue, remittances in recent years have brought more dollars to Egypt than Suez Canal revenue, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), and tourism combined.

Inflation already pushed past 20 percent last month and this is only the beginning of a year or more of price corrections as markets absorb the latest dramatic devaluation of the country’s currency. While in 2016 and 2017 consumers cut back on beef and chicken, replacing them with eggs as a source of protein and fats, eggs today are too expensive for many, leading the government to encourage the consumption of chicken legs.

As fear for the economy grows in Egypt, a comparison to the conditions faced in the ’70s and early ’80s becomes more plausible.

During the ’70s, Sadat had limited resources due to the closure of the Suez Canal and the occupation of Sinai. The tourism industry was badly hit, and cash remittance from Egyptians working abroad was not great (at least initially). He opted to manage the economy and prevent its collapse while aborting any revolts. The release of Islamists from prison in 1971 was not just intended to undermine the pro-Nasser side, but also to appease their supporters in rural Egypt. As part of his coping strategy, he turned a blind eye to their unregistered and unregulated charity works. He also assigned certain economic privileges to army personnel and policemen to guarantee their loyalties.

whatever economic policies Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood pursue, it will mostly affect the middle class — the urban communities that are already against him. Excitement about protests in this section of society has mostly dissipated and been replaced by a deep sense of despair, mainly due to divisions among the opposition. Even if some revolt, it will never be enough to turn the tide without the support of the wider rural community

Syrians have shown relentless ingenuity in adapting to every stage of a horrendous conflict, salvaging remnants of dignity, solidarity and vitality amid nightmarish circumstances

The decimation of Syria’s male population represents, arguably, the most fundamental shift in the country’s social fabric. As a generation of men has been pared down by death, disability, forced displacement and disappearance, those who remain have largely been sucked into a violent and corrupting system centered around armed factions

80 of the village’s men have been killed and 130 wounded—amounting to a third of the male population aged 18-50. The remaining two-thirds have overwhelmingly been absorbed into the army or militias

Peak demand for oil may still be years away, but covid-19 has given the Middle East and north Africa a taste of the future. Prices of the black stuff plummeted as countries went into lockdown. The region’s energy exporters are expected to earn about half as much oil revenue this year as they did in 2019; the IMF reckons their economies will shrink by 7.3%. Even when the virus recedes, a glut of supply will probably keep prices down. Faced with budgets that no longer add up, Arab states must adapt.

Around a third of exports from Jordan and Lebanon go to oil-rich states, which send back wealthy tourists. Kuwaitis, Saudis and Emiratis account for about a third of tourist spending in Lebanon.

Egypt exports little oil, but over 2.5m of its citizens work in oil-rich countries. Remittances are worth 9% of its GDP. As oil revenues fall and some of those jobs disappear, Egypt will suffer, too. The same is true of Jordan, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, which have long relied on the Gulf to absorb their jobless masses.

Millions of people are being pushed towards hunger by the coronavirus pandemic, which could end up killing more people through lack of food than from the illness itself, Oxfam has warned.

Closed borders, curfews and travel restrictions have disrupted food supplies and incomes in already fragile countries, forcing an extra million people closer to famine in Afghanistan and heightening the humanitarian disaster in Yemen, where two-thirds already live in hunger.

Oxfam said that up to 12,000 people could die from hunger every day globally – 2,000 more than died from Covid-19 each day in April

Aster left Ethiopia in search of work. But after a Lebanese family hired her as a live-in housekeeper in 2014, she found herself cut off from the outside world and labouring without pay. Aster’s family, unable to contact her, feared she was dead.

Driven by Ethiopia’s rising living costs and unemployment, hundreds of thousands have gone to Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and Kuwait. But what many find, activists and domestic workers say, is a cycle of exploitation and modern-day slavery that is hard to escape.

Rights groups have long documented cases like Aster’s, finding “consistent patterns of abuse” under Lebanon and other Middle Eastern countries’ “kafala” or sponsorship system. The system links a migrant domestic worker’s legal status to the contractual relationship with her employer.