Group items tagged

A trafficking ring has been taking Sahrawi children to Europe. The children are taken under the impression that they are going on a "vacation," but in reality they are taken to families in Europe who want to buy them to adopt.

The Muslim Brotherhood is defined and described from an individual who is close to the organization and closely affected by their actions. He answers the question of what the brotherhood is and what their movement is all about.

An interesting article about "dozens of Russian generals" being killed in Syria. I am very curious about this article because it comes from "The Jerusalem Post." From what I recall, Israel's relations with Syria are not the best. This brings me to question why no other news outlet has published such news, and how "The Jerusalem Post" is so well informed about the happenings in Syria.

An article from the firm's blog talking about World War II weapons being used in the Syrian Civil War. I found both the article and accompanying video very interesting. Besides showing a bunch of very old weapons being used and the essentially finding new life in this conflict, it also shows a government stockpile seized by rebels full of Stg 44s (assault rifles from Nazi Germany). For me this raises the question of how did they get there?

A video from YouTube showing Syrian rebels using a German 10.5 cm LeFH 18 which is a 105 mm howitzer from the 1930s. The info section of the video claims that the Syrian army supposedly operated a few of these so the rebels most likely captured it from a base. I tagged this because it ties into my question from last week of where did Syria get all of these formerly Nazi made weapons.

This article questions and takes into account the Muslim Brotherhood's role in shaping Egypt's future. Both the article and video concerning this topic interview individuals who experienced the Egyptian Revolution first hand.

Rumors are beginning to stir among anti-ISIS groups that the terror group is beginning to experience unrest and a stir in the ranks. Dutch ISIS members were said to be slaughtered by local ISIS command in Iraq. The story is said to be untrue but the question remains as to why did this story surface in the fist place.

There have been at least 15 reported breaches of the Syrian cease fire by Syrian and Russian government. Rebels say overall it is nice to see people safe and receiving aid, but the loophole of still being able to attack ISIS and al-Qaeda continues to concern the rebels. The 15 breaches in question are viewed as attacks against terrorists by some, and attacks against government opposition by others.

This article depicts a very real and recent trauma that Yemen is undergoing; their healthcare system and facilities, much like other poorer middle eastern countries, is on the brink of extinction. This raised the question that we have been discussing in class; would foreign aid eliminate poverty? While there are millions in Yemen starving, would it be justified to provide their country with aid as more developed countries are supplying refugee camps in Jordan and Syrian rebels?

Gives insight on the confrontation between the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist parties. Describes the Brotherhood as using their influences in the "electoral arena" because they can win elections. Also poses compromise as a question for the future and implies compromise wont happen due to all parties being very confrontational.

It's a secret of the vast U.S. Treasury market, a holdover from an age of oil shortages and mighty petrodollars: Just how much of America's debt does Saudi Arabia own? But now that question -- unanswered since the 1970s, under an unusual blackout by the U.S.

This is an opinion piece written by Cegniz Aktar, Senior Scholar at the Istanbul Policy Center, a director at the UN, and one of the leading advocates of Turkey's integration into the EU. In this piece, Aktar argues that Turkish politician "fearing the birth of a Kurdish nation-state more than anything but eager on the other hand to assert their regional supremacy, are ending up by alienating all three Kurdish communities" in Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. He is referring specifically to President Ankara making a speech comparing the PKK to ISIL, a few days after stating that the PKK should be fighting ISIL rather than Turkey. Even though the Turkish government has been an economic partner of the Iraqi Kurds, they have offered them no military support, and have also preventing Turkish Kurds from joining the fight against ISIL. The Turkish government's fear of a sovereign Kurdish state is leading to extremely poor diplomatic outcomes.

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. 

This article basically lays out the faults in US intervention in Libya during the fall of Gaddafi and condemns the US officials for their lack of hindsight in their agenda. The US claimed that they could not "turn a blind eye" to atrocities and human right violations in other countries and to intervene in Libya was a matter of upholding "universal values." After the successful ousting of Gaddafi, the US hypocritically turned their back on the country as a whole, leaving them to pick up the pieces and re-build themselves in the midst of socio-political and economic chaos. The US claims that military intervention is sometimes necessary to address human right violations, but in the case of Libya more violations have occurred as a result of a fallen regime rather than because of its reign. The author basically says that the US should have predicted that short-term intervention strategies achieves nothing without years of sustained support for rebuilding the civil institutions. 

Hafed al-Ghwell is a senior non-resident Fellow with the Rafik Hariri Center at the Atlantic Council in Washington, DC. On Monday, Libya's House of Representatives, whose legitimacy has been questioned since the day it was elected by a mere 15 percent of the country's eligible voters, decided to add more gasoline to the already raging fire that is the four-year civil war in the country.