Tovarisch Rafa posted:

Oh mysterious forces at work, do Russia next.

Ashmole posted:

ياللا بينا يا الشام

I'm waiting for Syria to go nuts.

quote:

Thousands of demonstrators have rallied in the East African nation of Djibouti to demand that president Ismail Omar Guelleh resign, the latest in a series of demonstrations spurred on by political protests across Africa and the Middle East.

Amid a tight police deployment, the demonstrators gathered at a stadium on Friday with the intention of staying there until their demands were met.

But the demonstration escalated into clashes after dusk, as authorities used batons and tear gas against stone-throwing protesters.

Guelleh has served two terms and faces an election in April, but critics are concerned by changes he made to the constitution last year that scrapped a two-term limit.

Officials from the Union for Democratic Change, an umbrella group of three opposition parties, gave speeches at Friday's demonstration calling for Guelleh to step down.

The group's leader, Ismael Guedi Hared, told the AFP news agency before the demonstration that Guelleh should leave power and called for a sustained protest movement.

"For the moment, our goal is to remove Ismael Omar Guelleh from power," he said.

Brown Moses posted:

They are also saying on AJE that a Libyan diplomat claimed on AJ Arabic that Gaddafi's sons ended up argueing, and one of them shot the other, and that there's reports that Gaddafi has fled to Venezula.

Galewolf posted:

Hey guys, i just entered home and trying to follow the news right now. It was a goddamn horror ride for me but i am safe and sound now, i literally feel like a movie protagonist jumping out from a window of building rigged with explosives before everything blew.

Jesus H. Christ man, what a week.

LITERALLY MAD IRL posted:

This is a pretty trivial point considering the significance of what we're witnessing, but I find it interesting that the protesters are flying the flag of the old Libyan monarchy. I didn't realize ordinary Libyans still identified with it.

Brown Moses posted:

It's the old "give a rambling speech and promise reforms even though it's way to late for that" that Mubarak pulled.

Tarnek posted:

With all the different people and organizations he blamed (foreign mercenaries, separatist tribes, islamists wanting to form emirates, thugs on drugs, young people from the internet, every other nation, al-jazeera etc.) it has to be the most complicated plot ever thought of.

QuentinCompson posted:

And here are the Arabs, rising up and taking control of their own destinies in a beautiful example of human spirit and all you racist clowns can do is bleat like lobotomized sheep about HONOR and LOVE OF CONSPIRACIES.

Brown Moses posted:

It's a loving bloodbath, I hope they hang every loving piece of poo poo responsible for this from Gaddafi, his sons, and inner circle, all the way down to the mercenaries doing the killing.

MJB posted:

You're right. And as for The Colonel himself, even he's been inconsistent in spelling it when he's occasionally signed things in English.

Patter Song posted:

"I went to talk to the young people in Green Square. I wanted to spend the night with them, but it started raining. I want you to know that I am in Tripoli, not in Venezuela. Do not believe the imperialist media."

-A soon-to-be-dead man

Xandu posted:

Giant hi-res panorama of Cairo with Midan Tahrir way in the back. Just click the original size. Pretty cool looking.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefangeens/5466797340/sizes/l/

Petey posted:

I know we were all transfixed by that trainwreck but did anyone ever find a bigger version of this pic?

Toplowtech posted:

That would work too. Isn't Ruby Moroccan?

Shageletic posted:

Might want to turn on PBS for frontline's report on Egypt. Saw clips of it earlier and they had some spectacular shots of the revolution.

davebo posted:

Didn't someone say Obama was going to speak like an hour ago? Did that happen yet?

Brown Moses posted:

#Libya map updated 24/2/11 morning; Nalut & Zwara now with the revolution; fighting in Azzawia
I don't suppose anyone can get this to load, it doesn't work on my PC, and I'd like it posted in the thread.

Narmi posted:

Anyone know what the different colours mean?

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-dark-humour-in-a-time-of-dictatorship-2219317.html posted:

It now emerges, thanks to a genuine old-fashioned scoop in Le Monde, that President Ben Ali didn't really intend to flee his country at all. He planned to fly his immediate family to safety in Riyadh and then return to Tunis next morning to continue his reign. Only when the Tunisair crew arrived in Saudi Arabia and saw al-Jazeera in the airport's VIP lounge, announcing Ben Ali's overthrow, did they call Tunis and receive a new flight plan to take off at 1.30am the following day. They discreetly flew away while the President slept, leaving the dictator planeless in Riyadh. Memo to all airline passengers: don't take your crew for granted. Especially if they've been watching al-Jazeera.

Xandu posted:

al-Jazeera Arabic is carrying a very large tribal meeting going on right now in east Libya. Kind of interesting to watch.

http://www.youtube.com/user/aljazeerachannel

It's not clear what's happening, but lots of yelling.

Sivias posted:

Yusuf Islam is the biggest hippie, but I do enjoy his classics

Dieting Hippo posted:

Any other sources on this? It's an Iranian site, which is why I'm a bit skeptical, but they they are reporting that Saif (Gaddafi's youngest son) has joined the protesters: http://www.presstv.ir/detail/166900.html

Ashmole posted:

That's the safest way. It's a "qaaf" not an Egyptian "jeem"...unless Libyans use the "g" sound for "qaaf".

Ham posted:

The curfew isn't enforced and emergency law won't be lifted until they hand over power to a civilian government in a few months.

Ham posted:

About yesterday's events: Egyptian Military is apologizing for an unintended use of force

Maels posted:

Some arabic dialects pronounce "Q" as "Gh", namely Egyptian.

MothraAttack posted:

Any Arabic speakers that can translate this more thoroughly? Video purports to show chemical weapons cache seized by revolutionaries:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jm6XF7l5iiQ&feature=player_detailpage

Xandu posted:

Not a terrible turnout in Lebanon today considering the rain.





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MR-NwNdA2BM

Radio! posted:

Is it a completely stupid idea to email the April 6 movement directly and ask if there's a way people can donate or something to help out? I know there was some talk of donations for Egypt awhile back, but I think that was going to be through the military and I don't remember hearing about it since.

It'd be nice to be able to help out, even a little.

Note: there might be information about this on their Arabic website, but I can't read Arabic and their English site is awful.

Radio! posted:

Thank you for looking this up. I probably won't end up donating to them at the moment since there seems to be a better option, but hopefully it will be useful for other people to know.

quote:

نعتمد على إشتراكات وتبرعات أعضاء الحركة كمصدر اساسى للتمويل، و نرفض التمويل المالى الخارجى

Xandu posted:

This parody is equally plausible

http://inanities.org/2011/03/this-is-just-the-start-and-it-never-loving-ends/

SauceNinja posted:

So I just want to be clear on this. They want help for this kind of thing but they don't want your help because you're a dirty foreigner? So you subvert their narrow mindedness by covertly giving to them. That's hilarious, not to mention, very big of you. I wish I could say I was as altruistic but I think I'd feel like I'd be promoting idiocy instead of helping hungry children.

SauceNinja posted:

Who would send him 740,000 pounds of sedatives?

Xandu posted:

Another amazing parody

Jack Napier posted:

Twitter saying Egyptians have sex tapes and poo poo flooding out of the Secret Service building.

Hashtag #amndawla

http://twitter.com/ShadyMokh
http://twitter.com/MahyAshmawy

Jack Napier posted:

Can you translate some of the stuff I posted after the edit?

Brown Moses posted:

Youtube video of people wandering around the former home office of the ex Interior Minister.

Patter Song posted:

Worth pointing out that the Lebanese division of seats for their parliament (which assigns each group a certain number of seats) is based on the 1932 census, and there's a general consensus among the elites of Lebanon to never hold another census out of fear that it would drastically alter Lebanon's shaky ethnic power balance. For example, Maronite Christians were ~40% of Lebanese in the 1930s and ~25% today, and a redistribution changing their proportional representation from one figure to the other would infuriate them.

Ham posted:

Right now it looks like the elections will be a battle between him and Amr Moussa who's already announced he also intends to run.

Ham posted:

EDIT: He also criticized some of the new constitutional amendments, which demands that a presidential candidate be of "pure Egyptian birth" and not to hold dual-citizenship or be married to a foreigner or a woman with dual-citizenship, even if he drops said citizenship. He said the focus on "pure Egyptian birth" reminded him of Hitler. He also said he'd vote No on the vote for the amendments taking place March 19th.

Lareous posted:

Al-Saqr posted:

“ Protestors are apostates” – The religious establishment.