Media in Middle East & North Africa

Nada, une éditrice web sourde et muette introvertie sans amis ni famille visibles. Chaque nuit, elle permet aux hommes de croire qu’ils peuvent l’avoir, avant de leur infliger des actes de violence.

Avec un minimum de dialogue, Nada devient un réceptacle vide pour la vanité des hommes, leur égocentrisme, leurs désirs sordides, leur mesquinerie.

Alors que la soif de sang devient sa raison d’être, elle trouve un répit avec Noura (Rym Hayouni), sa collègue algérienne et seule figure empathique, offrant une compassion et une chaleur désarmantes à une Nada fatiguée et méfiante. Mais ce n’est qu’un palliatif, car le chemin emprunté par Nada n’a pas de point de retour.

Black Medusa s’inspire du classique culte d’Abel Ferrara sorti en 1981, L’Ange de la vengeance, à propos d’une couturière new-yorkaise muette qui, après avoir été violée et agressée deux fois en l’espace d’une journée, se lance dans une folie meurtrière, tuant des hommes au hasard chaque nuit.

Pour leur premier long métrage, Chebbi et Ismaël ont voulu contourner la voie habituelle des coproductions internationales et des laboratoires de développement de scénarios, choisissant plutôt de financer eux-mêmes leur projet à petit budget et de le tourner rapidement.

Deux mois de préproduction et douze jours de tournage plus tard, le film était presque prêt. Cette liberté rare est ce qui a permis au duo de concrétiser leur vision

« Ces [films nord-africains] peuvent sembler émanciper les femmes, mais ils le font à travers un cadre bourgeois ou capitaliste. Nada se situe en dehors de ces cadres sociaux, moraux ou historiques. »

L’usage de la violence, chorégraphié sans un soupçon de sensationnalisme, se transforme d’un instrument de nettoyage en un travail répétitif ; une dépendance de plus en plus dénuée de sens mais dévorante.

Tunis est un autre personnage principal du film. Présentée principalement dans une série composite de panoramas nocturnes rudimentaires, la capitale tunisienne émerge comme une friche urbaine discordante – une série de façades éparpillées, structurées de façon aussi chaotique que la vie des gens qui les habitent.

Les mesures homicides méthodiques observées par Nada sont une réaction au désordre de sa ville.    

In the years after the Baath party came to power, writes Abdi, the budget for the Department of Antiquities increased by 80% and the number of excavations mushroomed, as did the renovation and reconstruction of historical sites

In Syria, too, Assad’s promotion of archaeology was, as the late journalist Patrick Seale described it, part of his exercise in nation building. Stéphane Valter, a French political scientist who specializes in Arab culture and civilization, studied Assad’s relationship to Syria’s archaeology in his 2002 book, “La construction nationale syrienne” (“The Syrian national construction”). He writes that because of the fragility of a social cohesion in Syria due to its varied ethnic and religious communities, it was important for Assad to establish a territorial and historical identity in which all minorities could find a legitimate place. The archaeological richness of Syria doubtless helped build a national identity based on a culture that was promoted as authentically Syrian.

Gadhafi’s view of Libya’s heritage was selective, but like the other dictators, it aligned with the message he wanted to transmit.“Libya links east to west, and north to south, and there are examples of all the cultures that were around us,” said Fakroun.But Gadhafi largely favored Islamic archaeology, in keeping with his Pan-Arab ideological preference at the time (vis-a-vis Pan-Africanism, which he embraced in later years), and after that, prehistory because it was far enough into the past to be relatively uncontested. In contrast, British archaeologist Graeme Barker, who spent many years in Libya, explained that “the country’s fabulous Greek and Roman archaeology represented to him simply the precursor of the hated Italian colonization of the 20th century.”

when Gadhafi saw that the museum staff had named some of the rooms “Greek” or “Roman,” his face fell, said Fakroun, “and he made us change the names to ‘Greek colonization’ or ‘Byzantine colonization.’ ”

“We couldn’t talk about our Amazigh heritage. Or objects that were Tuareg, we had to say they were Arab. We wanted to be scientific, but we couldn’t, because the only ethnicity that existed for him was Arab,”

the Baath regime in Iraq sought to “connect modern-day Iraq with its glorious Mesopotamian past, leaving aside any possible Sunni-Shia division or ethnic divide. Instead, it stressed that Iraq was one nation unified in a shared Mesopotamian-inspired culture.”

Iraq was flooded with propaganda posters, murals and sculpted reliefs in the style of ancient artworks, all depicting Saddam superposed with Mesopotamian rulers or symbols

Saddam rebuilt the site shoddily, most professionals agree, and built a palace for himself on top of it. He used new materials and inscribed his name on the bricks, as Nebuchadnezzar had done over 2,000 years before him. Moreover, said Almamori, “he dug three or four lakes, which damaged and removed part of the Persian cemetery near the northern lake. Many layers of different civilizations were removed. He constructed artificial mounds and built his palace on one of them. Archaeologists with high positions were afraid to say anything.”

“When Nebuchadnezzar II took over from his father, Nabopolassar, he ruled from the same palace which he rebuilt. The Baath party related to this — we have a long history, a strong civilization, that needs a strong army. Nationalists in other countries think the same way.”

the Umayyad period of history was useful to the party because of its multiethnic nature. The Umayyad Mosque in Damascus was one of the best symbols for the party, writes Valter, because of its specifically Syrian cultural traits — first an Aramean and then a Roman temple, then a church and finally a mosque. The mosque figured on Syria’s most valuable banknote at the time, behind an image of Assad. Banknotes included images of Aleppo’s Citadel, the Roman amphitheater of Bosra and Queen Zenobia of Palmyra, and clearly showed the regime’s wish to conflate ethnocultural Arab references with nationalist pride and a pinch of Islam

one of the most important ancient sites for Assad was Ugarit, near the Mediterranean city of Latakia. With five layers of cultures going back to the Neolithic period, not only is it famous for its clay tablets with an alphabet in cuneiform script, but Ugarit is also just north of Qardaha, where Assad was born and is buried.

Unlike in Saddam’s Iraq or Assad’s Syria, in Gadhafi’s Libya, the Department of Antiquities suffered from constant underfunding. “Our budget was next to nothing,” recalled Fakroun. “Once they forgot about the Department of Antiquities when they were drawing up the country’s budget. We had no salary for six months. We’re talking about a country with tons of money from petrol, and they gave us pennies. And we have five World Heritage sites.

outstanding archaeological sites in all three countries suffered looting, vandalism, neglect, or at the hands of the Islamic State or, in the case of Ancient Babylon, from U.S. and Polish troops building their military base on top of the ruins in 2003

Garabli grew up in the Ajami neighborhood of Jaffa. The city made headlines this year after residents organized mass demonstrations to protest increasing gentrification, which has taken on an ethnic dimension as Jewish buyers displace Palestinian families who can no longer afford the rent on the homes they’ve been living in for generations.

In Jaffa, dance lessons were a privilege that not everyone could afford, she noted. There was also a social imbalance to the classes: the teachers were Jewish Israelis who did not speak Arabic or understand local norms, whereas most of the students were Palestinian citizens.

According to Garabli, who comes from a traditional Muslim family that prays and fasts during the holy month of Ramadan, many among the Palestinian community in Jaffa do not approve of dancing as a profession. Dance is considered a temptation, and women moving their bodies in such a free way can “damage” their reputations. Moreover, given that the community is heavily focused on its survival, advocating for affordable housing, and mobilizing against gun violence and police brutality, many Palestinian residents view artistic activities as an indulgence, Garabli explained. This, she added, is why relatively few Palestinians attend cultural events like hers.

The private surveillance business has flourished in the last decade in the Persian Gulf as the region saw the rise of an information war using state-sponsored hacking operations that have coincided with the run-up to the World Cup.

The AP took several steps to verify the documents’ authenticity. That includes confirming details of various documents with different sources, including former Chalker associates and soccer officials; cross-checking contents of documents with contemporaneous news accounts and publicly available business records; and examining electronic documents’ metadata, or digital history, where available, to confirm who made the documents and when. Chalker did not provide to the AP any evidence to support his position that some of the documents in question had been forged.

Two Tunisian television stations critical of the president, Nessma and Al-Quran al-Kareem, were taken off the air on October 11, over alleged licensing issues.

By curating and translating the work of contemporary Arab poets, writers, visual artists and journalists based around a specific theme, Arabpop aims to fill a gap in accessibility to Arab stories specifically catering to people who are interested in what goes on in the Arab world beyond the daily headlines.

While it’s merely a coincidence that Arabpop came out almost exactly 20 years after 9/11, Comito does refer to the extreme rise in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment that manifested itself since then, both in politics and society. “I say this at every presentation: a large part of the problem is the media, which in the last 20 years since the attack on the Twin Towers have unleashed a terrifying anti-Islam and anti-Arab country propaganda.”

Other highlights include an excerpt from the 2016 book Paolo by celebrated Egyptian writer Youssef Rakha, which is so thoughtfully translated that you wish everyone could read Arabic translated into Italian – the cadence, the poetry of the mundane, the flow of the story shows how perfectly the two languages sway together when approached with a passion for language and culture and attention for detail.

With all this rich, Maghrebi and Middle Eastern culture, aesthetic and historical references on display, once again I must ask: where are the significant MENA actors?

What an opportunity it would have been to cast the likes of Egyptian actor Amr Waked or French-Algerian actress Lyna Khoudri in these roles. Instead, we get Javier Bardem doing whatever the Arab version of Blackface is.

The rest of the Fremen - those whose faces aren't masked and have speaking roles - are made up of actors of Guyanese, West or East African heritage. This wouldn’t be a problem at all if there were at least some MENA actors to reflect the diversity of that region which Villeunueve claims to care so much about and admitted to using as inspiration: “I feel true that I’m right in doing it this way. It feels authentic, it feels honest and true to the book.”

We’re used to being vilified, maligned or erased on screen. We’re used to having most of our representation in Hollywood limited to plane hijacking or suicide bombing or perverted sheikhs or refugees or having non-MENA actors replacing us in our own stories. Like Dwayne Johnson who is playing Black Adam, the first MENA superhero character to get his own solo movie. Can you imagine the outrage if The Rock was cast as Black Panther? Or Shang-Chi? People wouldn’t stand for it.

But in a post-9/11 world where Arabs and Islam are still considered too dangerous and foreign to pass the racial profiling in studio boardrooms and casting call discrimination, too taboo to be given the same equal opportunities for positive or nuanced representation as other ethnic minorities are now slowly beginning to benefit from, must we continue to wait and bittersweetly watch films like Dune that take but do not give back?

PodFest Cairo is Egypt and Africa’s first podcasting conference, bringing podcasters and podcast listeners together to share experiences. Africa Podfest is a Kenyan, woman-led company which founded Africa Podcast Day (February 12) and whose primary objective is to cultivate the African podcasting community through networking and sharing resources. 

in Africa, podcasts are produced in many of the native languages, including Arabic, and thus reach audiences that are otherwise ignored by podcasters who reside outside of the Global South

globally, including in Africa, traditional radio is tethered to governments in terms of regulation and licensing and thus subject to various levels of censorship. On the other hand, podcasting is more rogue, with niche non-standard formats and topics. As a result, there is an exciting variety of podcasts, including emerging podcasts in true crime, wellness, history, and identity and culture. There is also a reciprocal relationship between the content podcasters are creating and what podcast listeners are interested in; meaning there is a focus on audience engagement. Buoyed by the growth in African podcasts that speak to the African experience, African podcast listenership has expanded.

Weak mobile and internet penetration, though increasing, stifles the ability of the industry to flourish

in Africa, where it’s estimated that there are at least 1500 languages, podcasts are produced in many languages

Aaisha Dadi Patel, a writer and journalist at the Wall Street Journal Africa bureau, says audiences are more likely to listen to the radio as opposed to undertaking the added burden of trying to find, download, and then listen to a podcast, not to mention the exorbitant cost for data

Just as the podcast medium’s presence is increasing in Africa, so too is research in the field. South African podcasters have seen their community grow and firms, like Edison Research, have taken notice by collecting data on the region, releasing their first report on South Africa in 2019. Scholarly research has also increased

Africa is the continent with the youngest population worldwide, with around 40 percent of the population aged 15 and under compared to the global average of 26 percent

Africa Podfest reports dating back to 2018 indicate that the types of podcasts released in Africa are consistently hyperlocal