Mediterranean Politics

The Synagogue Street, a narrow pathway with a mishmash of colors and smells from fishmongers and spice-sellers, lies at the heart of Izmir, Turkey’s third largest city. The street starts at a stone’s throw from the Hellenistic-era agora and snakes through the historical commercial center. It derives its name from the nine synagogues in its vicinity, four of which were in ruins until half a decade ago. “Unlike many cities of Europe, the Synagogue Street — or better, the Synagogue District — is right at the heart of town,” Nesim Bencoya, the coordinator of the Izmir Jewish Heritage Project, told Al-Monitor. “It is a compact neighborhood with its synagogues, cortejos [houses where families lived together], a rabbinate and numerous shops and businesses on the crisscrossing streets of Kemeralti, the commercial center. It is also an area where synagogues stand side by side with mosques, where businessmen from the Muslim, Jewish and Orthodox community engage in trade and songs in Turkish, Greek and Ladino are sung one after the other from the nearby taverns.” For the last 12 years, Bencoya has been going door to door to drum up support for his plans to revive the area and build a Jewish heritage center that would draw in locals and tourists.

At its zenith in the mid-19th century, the 50,000-strong Jewish population made up the second largest community after the Greeks in the city known in the Ottoman Empire as “Izmir, the infidel.” The city had 34 synagogues, a sophisticated hospital, local Torah schools and a posh college offering a curriculum in French. The city’s first printing press was a Jewish one, printing books in Hebrew, Ladino and eventually in English, and boyoz, the Jewish pastry whose name "bollos" means “little bread” in Ladino, became one of the city’s staple foods. 

Today, thanks to support from German Consulate of Izmir and the  Israel-based Mordechai Kiriaty Foundation, the elaborate wooden carvings at the ceiling of Ets Hayim Synagogue, the sumptuous floor mosaics of Hevra and the corridors of the Foresteros that tie several synagogues to each other have reemerged.

Algeria has closed its airspace to French military planes, France's military said on Sunday, escalating the biggest row between the countries in years.

On Saturday, Algeria recalled its ambassador to Paris citing comments attributed to French President Emmanuel Macron, who was quoted in Le Monde as saying Algeria's "politico-military system" had rewritten the history of its colonisation by France based on "a hatred of France".

Macron was also quoted questioning whether there had been an Algerian nation before French colonial rule

Née en 1958 à Kairouan, la nouvelle résidante de la Kasbah est professeure de l’enseignement supérieur à l’École nationale d’ingénieurs de Tunis, spécialisée en géosciences.

Elle occupe actuellement le poste de chargée de mise en œuvre des programmes de la Banque mondiale au ministère de l’Enseignement supérieur et des Sciences Recherche.

Najla Bouden Romdhan est la première femme à occuper le poste de cheffe du gouvernement dans l’histoire de la Tunisie.

Twenty-five foreigners have been abducted in the Sahel since 2015 and 10 remain captive, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED). Blais and Tacchetto are the only two western hostages known to have escaped. Three have been killed, three were liberated by French and U.S. forces and seven were released, the organization said.

While the abductions of internationals garner significantly more attention, people aren’t only kidnapped for ransom and there are scores of locals from the Sahel also taken by armed Islamists, whether for extortion, intimidation or punishment, said Corinne Dufka West Africa director for Human Rights Watch.

he and the Italian, Tacchetto, were separated for most of their captivity, during which time they converted to Islam at the behest of their captors, she said. It was once they reunited that they escaped. Blais said she doesn’t forgive the men who took her, but understands they were just following orders, convinced they were doing the right thing thinking they’d be given a special place in heaven, she said.

French President Emmanuel Macron apologized Monday to Algerians who fought alongside French colonial forces in Algeria’s war for independence, and were then massacred and ostracized as traitors.In a solemn ceremony interrupted by the cries of one fighter’s daughter, Macron also promised a law guaranteeing reparations for the contingent known as the harkis. The distraught woman, who said she grew up in a camp where France sequestered harkis after the war, argued that the law wouldn’t go far enough to fix the damage.

Around 200,000 fought against fellow Algerians in the 1954-1962 war, and tens of thousands of harkis were killed after the French withdrawal.

It’s a difficult issue for Macron, who has sought to confront France’s colonial past — notably in Algeria, the most prized of France’s former overseas conquests. In Algeria, the harkis are widely seen as traitors, and wounds from the colonial era slice deep. Algerians today want their own apology from France for its actions during the war.

One month before Evangel, Valparaiso University, a Lutheran institution in Indiana, announced in February it was dropping its own Crusaders nickname. Last month, the school rechristened its sports teams the Beacons.

“As a Muslim, I was embarrassed to come to Valpo because the school’s mascot was a Crusader, even though my mom and older siblings went here before me,”

It is somewhat of a trend among Christian institutions, however. Wheaton College dropped its Crusaders nickname in 2000, followed by the University of the Incarnate Word in 2004, Northwest Christian (now Bushnell) University in 2008, Eastern Nazarene College in 2009, and Alvernia University and Northwest Nazarene University in 2017.

the island grew in some ways more cosmopolitan. Sicily had been something of a backwater under Byzantium, lying at the furthest reaches of the empire. Muslim Sicily was much more central to the Islamic world: it enjoyed easy communication with the friendly ports of Syria, Egypt, Spain, and North Africa.

The island’s governor transferred the capital to Palermo and undertook a major building program there. Palaces, mosques, baths, and public buildings were erected to make the city worthy of a great kingdom. The population swelled as Palermo drew people from all over, soon making it one of the largest cities in the Mediterranean.

Palermo soon began to rival Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo, and Cordoba.

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) said 23,000 immigrants have been intercepted at sea and returned to Libya after trying to reach safety in Europe - almost double the total for the whole of 2020 and the highest number on record since interceptions by the Libyan Coast Guard began in 2017

almost all survivors were sent to Libya’s notorious detention centres, where exploitation, abuse and multiple other violations of their human rights take place on a regular basis

without support from the international community to address the situations in Libya and other countries of origin that drive people to seek a better life - such as conflict, COVID-19 and climate change, as well as human rights abuses, food insecurity and economic constraints - the IRC is concerned that thousands more will continue to risk their lives at sea in search of safety