Salah Badi, an ultraconservative Islamist and former lawmaker from the coastal city of Misurata.
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Strife in Libya Could Presage Long Civil War - NYTimes.com - 1 views
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Mr. Badi’s assault on Libya’s main international airport has now drawn the country’s fractious militias, tribes and towns into a single national conflagration that threatens to become a prolonged civil war. Both sides see the fight as part of a larger regional struggle, fraught with the risks of a return to repressive authoritarianism or a slide toward Islamist extremism.
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the violence threatens to turn Libya into a pocket of chaos destabilizing North Africa for years to come.
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Ansar al-Shariah, the hard-line Islamist group involved in the assault on the American diplomatic Mission in Benghazi in 2012
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The ideological differences are blurry at best: both sides publicly profess a similar conservative but democratic vision.
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Motorists wait in lines stretching more than three miles at shuttered gas stations, waiting for them to open. Food prices are soaring, uncollected garbage is piling up in the streets and bicycles, once unheard-of, are increasingly common.
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In Benghazi, Libya’s second-largest city, the fighting has closed both its airport and seaport, strangling the city.
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the rush toward war is also lifting the fortunes of the Islamist extremists of Ansar al-Shariah, the Benghazi militant group.
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The United Nations, the United States and the other Western powers have withdrawn their diplomats and closed their missions
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Until now, a rough balance of power among local brigades had preserved a kind of equilibrium, if not stability
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the transitional government scarcely existed outside of the luxury hotels where its officials gathered, no other force was strong enough to dominate. No single interest divided the competing cities and factions.
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But that semblance of unity is now in tatters, and with it the hope that nonviolent negotiations might settle the competition for power and, implicitly, Libya’s oil.
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In May, a renegade former general, Khalifa Hifter, declared that he would seize power by force to purge Libya of Islamists, beginning in Benghazi. He vowed to eradicate the hard-line Islamists of Ansar al-Shariah, blamed for a long series of bombings and assassinations.
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he has mustered a small fleet of helicopters and warplanes that have bombed rival bases around Benghazi, a steep escalation of the violence.
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moderate Islamists and other brigades who had distanced themselves from Ansar al-Shariah began closing ranks, welcoming the group into a newly formed council of “revolutionary” militias
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a broad alliance of Benghazi militias that now includes Ansar al-Shariah issued a defiant statement denouncing relative moderates like the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood. “We will not accept the project of democracy, secular parties, nor the parties that falsely claim the Islamic cause,”
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the general’s blitz has now stalled, it polarized the country, drawing alarms from some cities and tribes but applause from others.
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the loudest applause came from the western mountain town of Zintan, where local militia leaders had recruited hundreds of former Qaddafi soldiers into special brigades
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the rival coastal city of Misurata, where militias have allied with the Islamists in political battles and jostled with the Zintanis for influence in the capital
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the Misurata and Islamist militias developed a reputation for besieging government buildings and kidnapping high officials to try to pressure the Parliament. But in recent months the Zintanis and their anti-Islamist allies have stormed the Parliament and kidnapped senior lawmakers as well.
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the newly elected Parliament, led at first, on a seniority basis, by a member supportive of Mr. Hifter, announced plans to convene in Tobruk, an eastern city under the general’s control.
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Tripoli’s backup airport, under the control of an Islamist militia, has cut off flights to Tobruk, even blocking a trip by the prime minister.
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a spokesman for the old disbanded Parliament, favored by the Islamists and Misuratans, declared that it would reconvene in Tripoli
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In Tobruk, a spokesman for the new Parliament declared that the Islamist- and Misuratan-allied militias were terrorists, suggesting that Libya might soon have two legislatures with competing armies
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Each side has the support of competing satellite television networks financed and, often, broadcast from abroad, typically from Qatar for the Islamists and from the United Arab Emirates for their foes.
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Hassan Tatanaki, a Libyan-born business mogul who owns one of the anti-Islamist satellite networks, speaking in an interview from an office in the Emirates. “We are in a state of war and this is no time for compromise.”
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Fighters and tribes who fought one another during the uprising against Colonel Qaddafi are now coming together on the same side of the new fight, especially with the Zintanis against the Islamists. Some former Qaddafi officers who had fled Libya are even coming back to take up arms again.
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“It is not pro- or anti-Qaddafi any more — it is about Libya,” said a former Qaddafi officer in a military uniform
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Beneath the battle against “extremists,” he said, was an even deeper, ethnic struggle: the tribes of Arab descent, like the Zintanis, against those of Berber, Circassian or Turkish ancestry, like the Misuratis. “The victory will be for the Arab tribes,”
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Article explains the civil war that is erupting in Libya. Islamist extremists are trying to take over the country and towns and tribes of Libya are choosing sides. Tripoli has been the biggest battle ground and its airport was destroyed.
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This NYT article gives an excellent outline of the prominent factions fighting in Libya, and the purpose and goals of those factions as of Aug, 2014.
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This NYT article gives an excellent outline of the prominent factions fighting in Libya, and the purpose and goals of those factions as of Aug, 2014.
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Tunisia Museum Attack: Tourism, Economy will take a hit nationally regionally, Experts say - 0 views
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In 2011 the number of tourists dropped by a third, by 2013 Tunisia was showing signs of a comeback, with income from tourism. The total contribution of the industry to Tunisia's economy was 15.2 percent of its gross domestic product. With the attack on the museum it was a major setback to the growth and promise of tourism and not just in Tunisia.
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United Nations Investigators Accuse ISIS of Genocide over Attacks on Yazidis - 0 views
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Iran's Nuclear Program - Then and Now: Documents from 1970s Presage Issues Surrounding ... - 0 views
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ISIL aims to launch cyberattacks on U.S. - 0 views
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ISIL's Hacking Division as of late December have tried penetrating the U.S. national electricity grid. Two hackers were caught, having accessed over 1,305 U.S. military personnel's addresses, locations, numbers and family information. Recent ISIL bloggers have discussed crashing passenger jets by hacking into on-board electronics. Other extremists have discussed triggering a lethal radiation release by sending rogue commands to nuclear power plants.
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US, France accuse Assad of scuppering Syria peace talks - 0 views
www.timeslive.co.za/...f-scuppering-Syria-peace-talks
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Addressing Women's Access to Education in the Middle East - 1 views
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A New System for K-12 Education in Qatar | RAND - 0 views
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The leadership of the Arabian Gulf nation of Qatar, like that of many other countries, views education as the key to future economic, political, and social progress.
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In summer 2001, the State of Qatar’s leadership asked the RAND Corporation to examine the K–12 (kindergarten through grade 12) school system in Qatar
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Qatari K–12 edu-cation system served about 100,000 students, two-thirds of whom attended schools that were financed and operated by the government. The highly centralized Ministry of Education oversaw all aspects of public education and many aspects of private education.
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Finally, although Qatar has a high per capita income, the national investment in education was small. Teachers received low pay and little professional development, many school buildings were in poor condition, and classrooms were overcrowded.
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he most fundamental need was for clear curriculum standards oriented toward the desired outcomes of schooling. The new system’s curriculum, assessments, and professional development would all need to be aligned with these clear standards
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AND presented three governance options to the Qatari leadership for discussion: (1) a Modified Centralized Model, which upgraded the existing, centrally controlled system by allowing for some school-level flexibility with or without parental choice of schools; (2) a Charter School Model, which encouraged variety through a set of schools independent of the Ministry and which allowed parents to choose whether to send their children to these schools; and (3) a Voucher Model, which offered parents school vouchers so that they could send their children to private schools and which sought to expand high-quality private schooling in Qatar.
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Qatar now possesses curriculum standards in Arabic, mathematics, science, and English for all 12 grades — and these standards are comparable to the highest in the world.
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These tests and surveys were then upgraded and repeated in 2005 and 2006 as part of the ongoing accountability system. The tests are the first standardized measures of student learning available in the Arabic language.
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from a pool of 160 initial applicants; all 12 opened under three-year renewable contracts. In 2005, 21 additional Independent schools opened, and in 2006, 13 more opened.
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Increased expertise is needed in Qatar’s teaching workforce and among the Institutes’ staff. Non-Qatari specialists are likely to be required in the future, but it is important that they find the means to transfer knowledge to Qataris to build local human resources.
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The emirate of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates recently adopted a strategy of public financing for private providers of education that is similar to that of Qatar. Also, the Secretary General of the Gulf Cooperation Council praised Qatar’s initiative, especially its curriculum standards. Since these standards are the foundation for teaching, learning, and accountability, the Secretary General’s praise, motivated by concern throughout the region about preparing students for later life, represents a major endorsement of the approach taken in Qatar.
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Iraq divisions undermine battle against IS - BBC News - 0 views
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More than in any other country, Iraq's future is intimately bound up with the fate of self-styled Islamic State (IS).
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But even if initially successful, such an ambitious project, indeed, any further moves to oust IS, could go badly wrong if the foundations are not sound
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The IS fighters were able to lodge so easily in the Sunni Arab heartlands because the people there had been largely alienated by the sectarian policies and practices of the Shia Arab-dominated Baghdad government under Nouri al-Maliki, who was finally prised out of the prime minister's office in August 2014.
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gislation to empower the Sunnis by devolving security and financial responsibilities to the provinces has not happened.
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Nor have measures to reverse the persecution of former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, or the random arrests, detentions, and to assuage other Sunni grievances.
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he US, who have about 3,500 military personnel training and advising Iraqi government forces on the ground, also seems to be aware that military muscle is not enough.
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If that process continues and the militants are defeated, the way Iraq fits together - if it does - will be decided by who pushes them out, and how the resulting vacuum is filled.
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Some residents may still see IS - about 85% of whose fighters in Iraq are believed to be Iraqi - as their protectors against an Iranian-backed, Shia-dominated Baghdad government.
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When the Iraqi army collapsed like a house of cards in the face of the IS eruption in June 2014, it was a motley array of hastily-assembled Shia irregulars, loosely banded into the Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilisation) that prevented the militants reaching Baghda
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Ramadi gave a boost to the embattled Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi.He has scant support even from his own Shia Daawa party, and is seen across the board by Sunni, Shia and Kurdish politicians as weak, hesitant, lacking in leadership and unable to stand up to the militias.But there was a down-side to the Ramadi victory too: heavy destruction, and the displacement of the entire population.
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Nor can the formula that finally and slowly worked in Ramadi simply be applied at Mosul. It took government forces with coalition backing seven months to regain Ramadi. Mosul is 10 times bigger.
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He omitted to mention coalition air support, which would also clearly be crucial to the campaign.Some Iraqi analysts believe outside ground forces would also be needed. US military leaders, while reticent, clearly want to up the pace and have not ruled out more boots on the ground. In the absence of serious moves towards national reconciliation, one senior government figure also saw a campaign to retake Mosul as a vital way of forging national unity.
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Iran launches cyber offensive after nuclear deal - 0 views
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After an international agreement involving Iran the nature of their cyber program has shifted. The change was from flagrant cyber attacks to cripple other nations and business' computer networks to cyber espionage, focusing on infiltrating and accessing documents relevant to Iran. Due to the softer nature it is harder for nations to respond with retaliation or outrage to Iran's cyber offensive.
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Why Isis fights | Martin Chulov | World news | The Guardian - 0 views
The Death of the Most Generous Nation on Earth | Foreign Policy - 0 views
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Lebanon - Educational System-overview - Schools, Private, Students, and Lebanese - Stat... - 0 views
education.stateuniversity.com/...UCATIONAL-SYSTEM-OVERVIEW.html
lebanon system overview schools private public
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The Lebanese educational system is divided in two sectors: private schools and universities, for which there is a charge for admission, and public (government) schools and universities that are practically free of charge.
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Education was once almost exclusively the responsibility of religious communities or foreign groups, but because the number of students in public schools has risen to more than two-fifths of the total school enrollment, the government was pressured to open more public schools to meet the demands of the general public.
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While public schools have not paid much attention to the preschool phase and have required students to be five-years-old to be accepted in kindergarten until the 1990s, private schools have always had a preschool phase and have accepted students as young as three-years-old
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The total duration in school remains intact, 12 years. The primary cycle of general education has been increased by one year, and is divided into two modules of three years each, while the intermediary cycle was reduced to three years instead of four. The first year of general education's secondary cycle must be considered common for all four different series of instruction, and the second year is common to only two out of four series. Lebanese students are not allowed to enter formal technical education before age 12, which is the age limit of obligatory education. The scholastic year was changed to 36 weeks, and 4 supplementary hours per week were added at the intermediary and secondary cycles.
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The new school curricula was launched in September 1998, and the Educational Center for Research and Development had trained 16,000 teachers in public schools and 6,000 teachers in private schools on the new uses and principles of the new program. The new system took into account economic, social, and national perspectives. The principle characteristics of this new system consist of the following:
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The Lebanese educational system has usually relied heavily on private schooling to accommodate the evergrowing demand for learning in the country
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In short, the new formal educational system of Lebanon, like in many other countries, divides the years of instruction as follows: 6-3-3 (six years for the primary cycle, three years for the intermediate cycle, and three years for the secondary cycle), followed by the higher education cycle. Primary school education is followed either by a six-year intermediary and secondary program, leading to the official Lebanese baccalaureate certificate, which was originally based on the equivalent French school diploma, or by a three- to six-year technical or vocational training program.
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There are 1508 public and private intermediary and secondary schools for the general instruction program in Lebanon, while there are only 262 schools for the technical and professional instruction program divided between the public sector (29 schools) and the private sector (233 schools).
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Education is compulsory until the end of the intermediate cycle, is available to all Lebanese students, and is attended by nearly 95 percent of school-age children
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The school year starts in early October and ends in late June. The school day consists of six hours starting at 8:00 a.m. with two hour lunch break and ends at 4:00 p.m. The length of class periods ranges from 50 to 55 minutes. Both public and private schools are supposed to observe official holidays, which are decided by the government; however, Christian-administered, religious private schools take Saturday and Sunday off every week, while Moslem-run religious private schools take Friday and Sunday, and Jewish-run private schools take off all of Saturday and Sunday afternoon only.
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As to special education concerning handicapped students, there were about 10,000 handicapped people in 1975 (prior to the Lebanese civil war). During the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, this number reached 13,000; it is more than 15,000 in 2001. About 2,500 handicapped people were being educated and made ready to enter the work market.
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In addition, females appeared to have a slightly higher percentage than males with regard to attending schools and universities. After age 25 male attendance becomes almost double that of female attendance.
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ue to the Lebanese people's negative attitude toward manual work, especially in industry and agriculture, students of lower socioeconomic status enroll mostly in vocational and technical schools. Therefore, there is a big difference between the two major types of instruction, as well as the relative numbers of schools and students enrolled in each of these types
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The brevet certificate is only required by public schools, vocational schools, and teacher training institutes. The baccalaureate part I exam has two main tracks: literary and scientific. The baccalaureate part II has four main tracks: literature and humanities, which includes language, literature, history, philosophy, education, arts, and religion; sociology and economy, which includes economic sciences, politics, business and management, law, and sociology; general sciences, which includes mathematics, physics, chemistry, and their applications at the level of engineering; and life sciences, which includes biology and life sciences, chemistry and their applications in the area of medicine, health, agriculture, and other related subjects.
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Most institutions of higher education require entrance examinations besides the baccalaureate part II, which is required by law.
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The grading system is generally based on scales of 0 to 20 or 0 to 100, with 10 or 60, respectively, as passing grades
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he curriculum in Lebanese schools is somewhat rigid, for all students must pursue the same programs in all three cycles
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rivate schools can choose textbooks that meet their syllabi, except in the civics area where the Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sport requires them to use the center's textbooks.
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The United Nations Reliefs and Works Agency (UNRWA) provides funds supporting a private nonsectarian school system for Palestinian Refugees in the Middle East. This type of private schooling has been very effective in offering education and social services for children of Palestinian Refugees residing in Lebanon
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This article gave a great general overview to the education in Lebanon. One of the major components of Lebanon's education system is when they changed it 1999 to reflect the style of French education systems. Additionally, Lebanon has a high rate of 95% attendance for its students and it also has a high rate of literacy at 89%
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What is the Muslim Brotherhood? - CNN.com - 1 views
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is a religious and political group founded on the belief that Islam is not simply a religion, but a way of life
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advocates a move away from secularism, and a return to the rules of the Quran as a basis for healthy families, communities, and states.
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slamic Sharia (way of life or principles) as the basis controlling the affairs of state and society and working "to achieve unification
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is government failed to keep order as the economy tanked and crime soared, including open sexual assaults on women in Egypt's streets. The chaos drove away many tourists and investors.
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The issues surrounding the brotherhood and the fear surrounding the idea that all of Egypt would be expected to become part of the brotherhood are discussed on this page. The original foundation of the brotherhood was based on the idea of "liberating them from foreign imperialism" as well as forming "unification" as a nation. Issues presented with the brotherhood include: a "poor economic stability or growth, increased crime, and assaults on women."
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The issues surrounding the brotherhood and the fear surrounding the idea that all of Egypt would be expected to become part of the brotherhood are discussed on this page. The original foundation of the brotherhood was based on the idea of "liberating them from foreign imperialism" as well as forming "unification" as a nation. Issues presented with the brotherhood include: a "poor economic stability or growth, increased crime, and assaults on women."
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The Muslim Brotherhood is the oldest and largest opposition group group in Egypt. It's members control many of the country's professional organizations.
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This article gives background information regarding who and what the Muslim Brotherhood is. It provides historical significance of the group as well as give suggestions as to why there is interest in learning about the group and their ideals.
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U.S. Special Ops Troops Aim To Round Up ISIS Leaders In Iraq : The Two-Way : NPR - 0 views
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'Hezbollah still far from realizing its goal of attacking Israel from Syria' - Middle E... - 0 views
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Ultimately, Hezbollah's goal is to turn Syria into an extended springboard for attacks against Israel, but it is still far off from being able to realize this vision, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Yaakov Amidror, a former national security adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.
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ALGERIA APPROVES NEW CONSTITUTION - NYTimes.com - 1 views
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a new Constitution in balloting Thursday, paving the way for a multiparty system for the first time since independence from France in 1962.
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More than 70 percent of the 10.4 million people who voted favored the constitutional change, the Interior Ministry said.
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He said it will allow his country ''to know more democracy, to assure public and individual liberties, and to establish the sovereignty of the law.''
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Although it does not specifically authorize political parties to compete with the ruling National Liberation Front, the new Constitution declares ''the right to create associations of a political character.''
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In November, 92 percent of the voters approved political changes that began reducing the power of the ruling party, the only legal political organization in the nation of 25 million people.
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ALGIERS, Feb. 24- The Government announced today that Algerian voters overwhelmingly approved a new Constitution in balloting Thursday, paving the way for a multiparty system for the first time since independence from France in 1962. More than 70 percent of the 10.4 million people who voted favored the constitutional change, the Interior Ministry said.