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ccfuentez

Modern-day slavery ensnares millions worldwide - World - CBC News - 0 views

www.cbc.ca/...s-millions-worldwide-1.1204720

human-trafficking Syria abused International Labour Organization

shared by ccfuentez on 03 Feb 16 - No Cached
  • Millions of men, women and children around the world were victims of modern slavery last year, according to a new U.S. report of human trafficking.
  • he dark underbelly of human trafficking, an umbrella term that includes sexual exploitation, child prostitution, forced labour and debt bondage
  • First-hand accounts from victims highlighted the physical and psychological toll of modern slavery.
  • ccfuentez on 03 Feb 16
     
    Millions of women, children, and men fall victim to modern day slavery especially in the Middle East. Syria was listed as the worst offender in 2012. Victims of human trafficking suffer physical, mental, and emotional abuse while they are taken prisoner. 
nicolet1189

ISIS Tactics Illustrate Social Media's New Place In Modern War | TechCrunch - 0 views

techcrunch.com/...medias-new-place-in-modern-war

Isis media journalism Twitter hashtag

shared by nicolet1189 on 05 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • modern warfare, where online propaganda plays a central role.
  • ISIS makes use of its decentralized structur
  • propaganda tools is an app called “The Dawn of Glad Tidings,”
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • users consent to allowing ISIS to post to their social-media accounts. To avoid Twitter’s spam-detection algorithms, Berger noted, the app even spaces out its posts.
  • 27,000 Twitter accounts that mentioned the ISIS positively.
  • 40,000 tweets in a single day,
  • 700,000 accounts discussed the terrorist group.
  • ISIS tries to get its content to trend globally.
  • using a #worldcup2014
  • “When an account gets shut down, a new one is immediately created, and they use other guys to promote the [new] account,” Truvé tells me. “It’s kind of a whack-a-mole thing.”
  • “The volume of those tweets was enough to make any search for ‘Baghdad’ on Twitter generate the image among its first results,” Berger noted, “which is certainly one means of intimidating the city’s residents.”
  • , propaganda has one crucial deficiency: It’s not the truth.
  • nicolet1189 on 05 Nov 14
     
    Author Jillian Melchoir relates recent participation in groups like ISIS as spawning a new type of modern warfare. Melchoir continues, describing ISIS's presence on Twitter where they regularly get their content to trend globally for example hijacking popular hasthags like #worldcup2014.
micklethwait

Isis jihadis aren't medieval - they are shaped by modern western philosophy | Kevin McD... - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...d-by-modern-western-philosophy

modern western philosophy ISIS

shared by micklethwait on 09 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • micklethwait on 09 Sep 14
     
    Now, this looks terribly interesting.
allieggg

Libya has become the latest Isil conquest - Telegraph - 0 views

www.telegraph.co.uk/...-the-latest-Isil-conquest.html

ISIL militias armed groups syria Iraq Jihad Benghazi

shared by allieggg on 17 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • If the conditions remain unchallenged and, hence, unchanged, it will turn into another Syria or Iraq.
  • Nowhere is this threat more profound than with the rise of radical Islam in Libya
  • The ongoing low-level insurgency in Benghazi is driven by two factors. The first is the radical Islamist ideology of certain groups that refuse to recognise the modern state and its institutions. For example, according to the leader of AS’s Benghazi branch, Mohammed al-Zahawi, his group will not disarm and demobilise until its version of sharia is imposed. The realisation of such an Islamic state constitutes the group’s main aim. In other words, it is the nature of their Jihad.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • The second reason is the Islamists’ history with the state security forces. During the 1990s, Muammar Gaddafi unleashed a crackdown on all expressions of Islamism, which saw thousands of youths arrested and jailed as political prisoners. Many were incarcerated in the notorious Abu-Saleem prison. Today’s rejection of state institutions has its roots in that brutality.
  • However, Benghazi is not the only Islamist stronghold in Libya: the city of Derna, which has historically been a strong recruiting ground for Jihadi fighters to Afghanistan, Iraq, and more recently Syria, is of serious concern
  • Derna’s Shura Council of Islamic Youth and Ansar al-Sharia have decided to declare Derna an “Islamic emirate” and publicly announce their allegiance to ISIL and its leader and so called “Caliphate” of Abu Baker al-Baghdadi. This means that ISIL now has its terrorist tentacles in Libya.
  • If the international community continues to overlook the current Libyan crisis, the country is likely to become an incubator of militant Islamist groups.
  • In addition to a military response, however, we need a holistic and proactive approach that focuses on achieving reconciliation and stability. This involves forcing all rival political parties to the negotiation table to agree that a newly elected parliament is the sole representative body in the country.
  • allieggg on 17 Nov 14
     
    This article basically accentuates the driving factors to the ongoing insurgency of ISIL in Libya and how the threat is even more extreme than that of Iraq and Syria. One is the Islamist ideology in itself, rejecting any form of a modern state and the institutions that accompany its success. For example in Libya the leader of the AS branch declares that his militants will not disarm or demobilize until sharia law is imposed. Second, during Gaddafi's rule he unleashed a crackdown on all Islamic expression. The brutality shown towards Islamic groups during this time has fueled their resentment towards sectarian rule and has urged them to push for the rejection of state institutions even more so. The article explains how Islamic groups have claimed power in both Benghazi and Derna, the latter being the historic recruiting ground for Jihad fighters to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. The author makes it clear that both military and diplomatic force from the international community is crucial for the reconciliation of security.
stuartsayes

Russian Naval Base in Syria - 0 views

www.theatlantic.com/...408694

putin military syria middle east ports

shared by stuartsayes on 25 Apr 16 - No Cached
  • stuartsayes on 25 Apr 16
     
    This article offers a brief history of Russian naval bases and highlights modern day Russian ports in Syria. From these facts, an investigation is proposed regarding military actions by Russia in Syria against ISIS and the presence of the naval base.
mjumaia

The True Nature of the Saudi Succession "Crisis" - 0 views

csis.org/...nature-saudi-succession-crisis

saudi succession crisis international studies nature

shared by mjumaia on 21 Apr 15 - No Cached
  • mjumaia on 21 Apr 15
     
    Under King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia has modernized key aspects of the Saudi justice system and also other aspects. so this article talks about the crisis might happened when king Abdullah dies.
fcastro2

Syria keen on Russian expansion in Middle East - Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East - 0 views

www.al-monitor.com/...se-intervention-expansion.html

syria russia politics

shared by fcastro2 on 09 Apr 15 - No Cached
  • Syria has called on its Russian ally to expand in the Middle East, by expanding its small pier in the city of Tartus and turning it into a base
  • This has coincided with Saudi Arabia leading a coalition against Ansar Allah in Yemen, with a cover by the United States
  • meeting with a group of Russian journalists March 27, and in response to a question on Damascus’ desire to see a wider Russian activity in the Middle East, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said he certainly welcomes “any expansion of Russian presence in the Eastern Mediterranean, precisely on the Syrian shores and ports.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • Assad said: “The Russian presence in different parts of the world, including the Eastern Mediterranean and the Syrian port of Tartus, is very necessary, in order to create a sort of balance, which the world has lost after the dissolution of the Soviet Union more than 20 years ago.
  • Syrian president welcomed the Russian presence in his country and the region. “For us, the stronger this presence is in our region, the better it is for stability [in the region], because Russia is assuming an important role in world stability,”
  • Syrian nod is only a repetition of a former call made under the rule of late Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, who saw that the presence of a Russian military representation in Syria in the Mediterranean region contributes to the promotion of the idea of “the balance of terror” against Israel and the United States
  • The talk was, however, halted, until the last two years, when an actual need to promote Russian presence in the Mediterranean emerged in light of the reignition of the Cold War.
  • deployment of missile systems on the Mediterranean coast, as a sort of “symbolic deterrence.” The rumors were repeated as the NATO missile defense project was announced, which was supposed to be deployed in different countries, including Turkey and other countries bordering Russia
  • e US invasion of Iraq, as the US desire to change the face of the Middle East seemed free of any rational considerations. Assad made several visits to Moscow, and although this has not been publicly mentioned, Syrian diplomats and officials stressed to As-Safir that Syria expressed its desire to expand the Russian presence in the Eastern Mediterranean, particularly through Tartus, so that it turns into a military presence with limited standards
  • , Russia and Syria signed the biggest deal of its kind to explore oil in the Syrian waters, which covers a 2,190 square-kilometer surface area, and to achieve economic ambitions, namely extracting 2.5 billion barrels of oil and 8.5 trillion cubic feet of proven gas reserves, the oil and gas magazine said back then
  • is understandable, without neglecting the importance of other political and military issue
  • “any decision to modernize the infrastructure of the Russian Material-Technical Support Point in Tartus can only be made after a political decision is taken in this regard, in coordination with the Syrian side.” He explained that any modernization should “take into account the political and military situation in the Mediterranean region,” and therefore “it will include the promotion of all sorts of protection in the facility, including surface-to-air missiles and anti-riots weapons, and will be in coordination with the Syrian side.”
  • fcastro2 on 09 Apr 15
     
    Syria is determined to keep Russia in the loop when it comes to its presence in the Middle East. As the United States increases its presence so to those Russia and Syria claims that they encourage Russian presence solely to "keep the balance" in the Middle East. 
allieggg

Can Libya Rebuild Itself After 40 Years of Gaddafi? - 0 views

www.newsweek.com/f-after-40-years-gaddafi-68601

Gaddafi libya Arab Nationalism recontruction political tabula rasa Revolution politics middle east

shared by allieggg on 12 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • the man has hollowed out the Libyan state, eviscerated all opposition in Libyan society, and, in effect, created a political tabula rasa on which a newly free people will now have to scratch out a future.
  • Jamahiriya, a political system that is run directly by tribesmen without the intermediation of state institutions
  • the problem is, of course, that much like in the former Soviet satellites in Eastern Europe, virtually everyone at one point or another had to deal with the regime to survive.
  • ...25 more annotations...
  • Libya is truly a case apart.
  • the disastrous Italian legacy in Libya, has been a constant element in Gaddafi’s speeches since he took power
  • inspired by Gamal Abdel Nasser, neighboring Egypt’s president, whose ideas of Arab nationalism and of the possibility of restoring glory to the Arab world, would fuel the first decade of Gaddafi’s revolution.
  • he was unimpressed with the niceties of international diplomacy,
  • In a brilliant move that co-opted tribal elders, many of whom were also military commanders, he created the Social Leadership People’s Committee, through which he could simultaneously control the tribes and segments of the country’s military.
  • When it turned out that Libya, which was still a decentralized society in 1969, had little appetite for his centralizing political vision and remained largely indifferent to his proposals, the young idealist quickly turned activist.
  • Green Book, a set of slim volumes published in the mid-1970s that contain Gaddafi’s political philosophy, a blueprint is offered for a dramatic restructuring of Libya’s economy, politics, and society. In principle, Libya would become an experiment in democracy. In reality, it became a police state where every move of its citizens was carefully watched by a growing number of security apparatuses and revolutionary committees that owed loyalty directly to Gaddafi.
  • Having crushed all opposition by the mid-1970s, the regime systematically snuffed out any group that could potentially oppose it—any activity that could be construed as political opposition was punishable by death, which is one reason why a post-Gaddafi Libya, unlike a post-Mubarak Egypt, can have no ready-made opposition in a position to fill the vacuum.
  • The tribes—the Warfalla, the Awlad Busayf, the Magharha, the Zuwaya, the Barasa, and the smallest of them all, the Gadafa, to which he belonged—offered a natural form of political affiliation, a tribal ethos that could be tapped into for support. And perhaps, in the aftermath of Gaddafi, they could serve as a nucleus around which to build a new political system.
  • Gaddafi feared they might coalesce into groups opposing his rule. So, during the first two decades after the 1969 coup, he tried to erase their influence, arguing that they were an archaic element in a modern society.
  • comprehensive reconstruction of everything civic, political, legal, and moral that makes up a society and its government.
  • After systematically destroying local society, after using the tribes to cancel each other out, after aborting methodically the emergence of a younger generation that could take over Libya’s political life—all compounded by the general incoherence of the country’s administrative and bureaucratic institutions—Gaddafi will have left a new Libya with severe and longstanding challenges.
  • the growing isolation of Libya as international sanctions were imposed.
  • Lockerbie was the logical endpoint for a regime that had lost all international legitimacy.
  • while the regime still had the coercive power to put down any uprisings that took place in the 1990s, it became clear to Gaddafi’s closest advisers that the potential for unrest had reached unprecedented levels.
  • way out was to come to an agreement with the West that would end the sanctions, allow Libya to refurbish an aging oil infrastructure, and provide a safety valve by permitting Libyans to travel abroad once more.
  • intent to renounce weapons of mass destruction in December 2003—after a long process of behind-the-scenes diplomacy initially spearheaded by Britain
  • “The Revolution Everlasting” was one of the enduring slogans of his Libya, inscribed everywhere from bridges to water bottles.
  • regime that had, for four decades, mismanaged the country’s economy and humiliated its citizens
  • country was split in half, with eastern Cyrenaica and its main city Benghazi effectively independent—a demonstration of the kind of people’s power Gaddafi had always advocated. Reality, in effect, outgrew the caricature.
  • used a set of divide-and-rule policies that not only kept his opponents sundered from each other, but had also completely enfeebled any social or political institution in the country.
  • Beyond Gaddafi, there exists only a great political emptiness, a void that Libya somehow will need to fill.
  • the creation of a modern state where Libyans become true citizens, with all the rights and duties this entails.
  • the terrorist incidents
  • Regimes can use oil revenues strategically to provide patronage that effectively keeps them in power.
  • allieggg on 12 Nov 14
     
    This article from News Week basically paints a picture of Libyan history and how Gaddafi's reign devastated the state economically, socially, and politically. Author Dirk Vandewalle uses the phrase "a political tabula rasa" which in Latin means a blank slate, to describe the fate of Libya after Gaddafi's rule and convey the extent to which the country has to literally reconstruct every component that makes up a society and its government. He highlights major events that led to the downfall of both the Gaddafi regime and the Libyan state as a whole such as Arab nationalism, Jamahiriya, the Green Book, security apparatuses snuffing all opposition, terrorist incidents, isolation and international sanctions, the Lockerbie bombing, weapons of mass destruction, human right violations, divide and rule policies, and his use of oil revenue to fuel his insurgency. Vandewalle concludes the article with uncertain ideas thoughts towards Libya's future and the way the state is going to literally rebuild themselves from this "blank slate" that Gaddafi left behind. 
rlindse3

Iran and Modern Cyber Warfare | Global Research - 0 views

www.globalresearch.ca/...5421360

shared by rlindse3 on 23 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • rlindse3 on 23 Feb 15
     
    Iran is developing a new cyberstrategy to protect against the intrusion of important government programs, and to oppose any anti-iranian cyber warfare and fight back. Under their new strategy they have already launched attacks on Saudi Arabia and companies in the U.S. such as Bank of America and Citigroup which gives the U.S. reason to concern on Iran's cyber warfare development.
yperez2

Life in Modern Cairo - 0 views

www.laits.utexas.edu/...life.html

shared by yperez2 on 05 Apr 15 - No Cached
  • yperez2 on 05 Apr 15
     
    This article presents various things about Cairo, Egypt. Among them are education, marriage, customs and traditions in marriage, birth as well as death.
irede123

The ISIS Creation Myth - 0 views

www.newsweek.com/...-bush-barack-obama-342613.html

ISIS creation

shared by irede123 on 27 Jan 16 - No Cached
  • irede123 on 27 Jan 16
     
    Discussions about the roots of modern day ISIL.
cguybar

The many battles of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood - Al Jazeera English - 1 views

www.aljazeera.com/...otherhood-150604103022250.html

leadership muslim brotherhood battles

shared by cguybar on 01 Feb 16 - No Cached
  • cguybar on 01 Feb 16
     
    The internal power struggle present is causing, "the worst case of state oppression in modern Egyptian History, " according to analysts. This instability causes the other groups fighting against the regime to lose confidence in the Brotherhood. The lack of leadership also adds to the Muslim brotherhood having an uphill battle in the years to come.
ccfuentez

Human trafficking or modern-day slavery | Arab News - 0 views

www.arabnews.com/452941

human trafficking slavery guest workers criminal behavior international criminal law

shared by ccfuentez on 22 Feb 16 - No Cached
  • From a legal perspective “slavery” is categorized under criminal behavior. The elements of a criminal act, i.e. intent and knowledge as well as the act, are all applied in its analysis and judgment.
  • If forced labor is defined as modern-day slavery, almost the entire international community would be involved in this crime, especially those countries that invite “guest workers.”
  • ccfuentez on 22 Feb 16
     
    This article compares human trafficking to slavery and gives a stance not typical to my other articles. The author supports the notion of "guest workers" and says if it were known as slavery, then the host country and the respective home country would both be an accomplice to the crime. 
aromo0

Egypt News, Egypt Current Events, Modern Egyptian Society, Egyptian Tourism | Modern Eg... - 0 views

www.modernegypt.info/...womens-rights

women egypt rights voting

shared by aromo0 on 20 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • passed a law allocating a quota of 64 seats in the lower house to women
  • The new law will give women more than 12 percent of the seats in an expanded parliament after the next election in 2010.
  • women registered for voting increased from 18 percent in 1986 to 39.8 percent in 2007;
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • 25.7% of top management positions in the state are held by women
  • 30 women were appointed as judges presiding over family courts;
  • 49 percent of students enrolled in universities and higher education institutions;
  • • There was a significant increase in the proportions of mothers assisted at delivery by medical provider - from 61.5 percent in 2000 to 78.6 percent in 2006;
  • The percentage of women who gave birth at an age younger than 18 decreased from 23.7 in 1992 to 20.4 in 2000 then to 15.8 in 2005.
  • diamond03 on 20 Nov 14
     
    This site stats that women's rights have improved over the years. A new law made in 2010 gave women 12% of he seats in Parliament.
  • yperez2 on 12 Feb 15
     
    Information on women rights in Egypt are presented. Women political, voting, educational and health rights are included.
  • aromo0 on 24 Feb 16
     
    This piece talks about women in politics, voting, and it public positions. It also gives facts dealing with women's health and education.
ccfuentez

Human trafficking: The modern form of slavery eating up East Africa - People & Power - 0 views

www.monitor.co.ug/...index.html

human trafficking Tier 2 Uganda Kenya

shared by ccfuentez on 02 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • ccfuentez on 02 Mar 16
     
    Because there are many instances of human trafficking that go unreported, it is impossible to determine the amount of victims who have been part of human trafficking. Uganda is a major source and destination for human trafficking of men, women, and children. Kenya is another country that is a major source and destination and both of these countries are ranked as Tier 2.
aacosta8

Being Connected: Class and Cosmopolitanism in Cairo - 0 views

connectedincairo.com/...s-and-cosmopolitanism-in-cairo

Qatar Middle East Egypt

shared by aacosta8 on 31 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • aacosta8 on 31 Mar 16
     
    I spent part of last week in Qatar with a brilliant group of scholars, discussing digital media in the Middle East. The article discusses primary work in Egypt focused on the ways children grew up constructing identities in which they could be at once Egyptian and Arab and at the same time modern and global
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