|
Xandu posted:This could have Arab Spring ramifications. Its kind of funny how they only target Syria and Iran yet they happily let Secure Computing peddle their software to other middle eastern countries.
|
#
¿
Apr 23, 2012 22:08
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 5, 2024 13:58 |
|
|
Brown Moses posted:Could any Arabic speakers do me a big favour and give me an idea of what's being said in this video? The guy says he was syrian army, republican guard (displayed in the ID), was given this uniform to wear, then images of him appeared claiming to be an alqaeda terrorist (the article says "Armed takfiris with UN inspectors"), he also says he doesn't know how many other people were given this uniform, and that he has defected.
|
|
#
¿
May 14, 2012 10:32
|
|
|
woops sorry, i mixed it all up. "UN inspectors with Armed men" the title says, the takfiris bit is unrelated apparently, the very top title is about "Takfiris take over of a church, evicting the community out of one of the villages", the other says "UN inspectors with armed men", the article goes on to say "The UN only blames one side, while ignoring elements of Al Qaeda "Jihad" entering Syria and murdering its people".
|
|
#
¿
May 14, 2012 11:37
|
|
|
they speak in standard arabic also known as Fus-ha, its a pretty good way to mask an accent, i'm no expert though, the first speaker may be a foreigner, since he prefaces the message "To the syrian people", the second one has that nasal voice common to levantine people, he also claims to have defected from the syrian army, so could be syrian. edit: Brown Moses posted:Does he mention any details of the region they are from or operating in? Nope, only that they have formed a unit part of the FSA, known as "Bara' Bin Malik" i'm unfamiliar to who they refer to though. Fizzil fucked around with this message at 13:18 on May 14, 2012 |
|
#
¿
May 14, 2012 13:10
|
|
|
Brown Moses posted:Here's a question for any tattoo experts, this video just came out of Syria supposedly show Hezbollah forcibly tattooing the heads of Syrian's in revenge for the kidnap of some Lebanese citizens. I think it's possibly bullshit, but I don't know enough about tattooing to know for sure. Can anyone shed any light on it? Well the problem is both sects in islam forbid tattoos, the guys hand is heavily tattoo'd, has tattoo equipment and such, it honestly looks dubious but i wouldn't really know, having committed a haram/sin in islam isn't eternal damnation to hell though, which is why people can drink, have tattoos and whatever in the middle east so your mileage may vary.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 2, 2012 16:30
|
|
|
Al-Saqr posted:Prince nayef bin abdel Aziz, heir to the Saudi throne and the extremely conservative head of both the intelligence services AND the religious police has died of illness, this is huge news and people feel both a huge shock since this is the second heir to die in the same year. shock? isn't he the most extreme of the saudi heirs. shouldn't the saudis be a little bit happy? 
|
|
#
¿
Jun 16, 2012 12:43
|
|
|
Al-Saqr posted:Shock could mean both ways, people didnt see him dying before taking the throne, and there is a very wide sense of relief amongst the populace that they dont have to deal with him being king anymore. which is good isn't it? i assume they are more open. Alot of the GCC populace view Abdullah [the current king] as the best of the lot, and i hold that opinion too. EDIT: Al-Saqr if you got the time, you probably should do a post on your expectations on the future generation of saudi heirs.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 16, 2012 12:50
|
|
|
The Arabic is very dodgy, the first word is literally "al situation" yeah its transliterated english, the next is Al Maidany which means on the ground, and Homs has an extra letter that shouldn't be there in Arabic (the letter that corresponds to Waw). حمص this is what it should like in Arabic and not حومص Edit: Also arabic dates aren't right to left, its left to right, same for numbers. Fizzil fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Jun 17, 2012 |
|
#
¿
Jun 17, 2012 00:39
|
|
|
Whats the story of Morsi and the spare tire? The Egyptians have the knack to maintain their light hearted humour even in the most dire times.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 18, 2012 20:25
|
|
|
Xandu posted:http://natashajsmith.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/please-god-please-make-it-stop/ Cairo is literally sexual harassment capital of the world, sexual repression there is even worse than other arab countries for some reason.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 26, 2012 21:15
|
|
|
az jan jananam posted:On the Syrian Revolution page on Facebook there is a posting of the obituary of a Christian woman mourning her as a martyr of the revolution. You would think that would be fairly uncontroversial, but no; there is a completely hysterical debate about how Christians can't be called "martyrs" because they are not Muslim, and how Christians are heretics to God because they believe in the polytheistic trinity and are destined for hell. It was kind of unbelievable to me when I read through it. That is very petty. I am reminded by the Iranian poster where they recognize people who have given their life for Iran (during the Iraq-Iran war) from the various minorities (ethnic or religious). Not to contrast obviously, Arab media also called non-muslims martyrs before, going back to the 70s, the fact that there is a growing minority of radicals right now pushing against that is troubling.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 1, 2012 11:24
|
|
|
My condolences to the families struck by this tragedy. I want to say something with regards to everything but i guess that article by khalid mutawwa and the facebook condemnation explains everything. Its especially touching my soul when i saw that image of ambassador sitting having an iftar with people, it reminds me of my time with European and American diplomats just last month 
|
|
#
¿
Sep 12, 2012 20:19
|
|
|
Tezzeract posted:Whoa, what the gently caress? Are you defending Osama Bin Laden and saying that his viewpoints are completely justified? Because what I'm reading is some random numbers that you've pulled out of thin air you're holding the US 100% accountable for the flaws of Middle Eastern leadership. how do you explain propping and supporting the GCC though? like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the others who were too happy killing their own people and crushing peaceful protesters?
|
|
#
¿
Sep 15, 2012 00:22
|
|
|
rudatron posted:Wrong. Osama bin laden and the phenomenon of modern islamic terrorism is a conflict rooted in the secularisation of the middle east, first and foremost. It's a conflict not of values being forced on them but of contemporary Jahiliyyah within muslim societies. This secular force is seen as having origin in the US, but it's very much a conflict over local power, between secular reformists and religious conservatives in arab countries. This is false, because Saudi Arabia is not a secular country, yet OBL still has grievances with them. I'd like to ask the question again, why do people look away from the GCC? why do they get a pass at oppressing their people?
|
|
#
¿
Sep 15, 2012 01:02
|
|
|
Mans posted:So are people in this thread really claiming Arabs had no access to the internet? I'm pretty sure Arabs could go to youtube before the revolution. Do you think they assume Youtube Poops are state released videos? Most of the middle east has internet, but not everyone speaks English, the video is on the same scale of misunderstanding as the danish cartoons debacle, alot of people think its state produced. The whole "financed by jews" got gobbled up instantly, much like a domino effect though terrorists needed a big bang and an iconic day promote the whole thing. Its not like people are unaware anti-islamic material exists, everyone knows that and was pretty much ignored. I'd fault the media (as nebulous as that sounds, excuse my vagueness but we do have multiple "Fox News" like channels in the arab world too) for misreporting the whole thing though.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 15, 2012 21:02
|
|
|
SpaceMost posted:What's Iran's current stance on the territories it lost through the 19th and 20th centuries? Parts of modern Aghanistan and territories in the Caucasus and such. There are still territorial disputes, but much like any modern states its centered around tiny islands in bodies of water. Right now Iran is poking at Bahrain (at one point it belonged to them) and occupying the Lesser and Greater Tunb Islands and Abu Musa (Islands that at one point belonged to the states of Sharjah and Ras Al Khaima, now part of the UAE, originally given by the Qajari Shah probably, then the Pahlavis took it back in the 70s, oh lord its a long story and i don't want to take sides).
|
|
#
¿
Sep 15, 2012 21:21
|
|
|
Mujahideen doesnt really mean holy warrior, its one of the old misconceptions that ties Jihad to holy war. It simply means "resistance" or literally "struggle". Its also used interchangeably with revolutionaries anyway, in the same sense the use of the word martyr, although martyr has holier connotations.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 17, 2012 11:38
|
|
|
Just a guess, but the smoothbore guns on these tanks are too powerful to protect the t-62s turret, plus the russians have the knack to downgrade export versions of their tanks, so my guess is that around 240mm steel won't really stop a kinetic round from penetrating it.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 18, 2012 23:59
|
|
|
Randandal posted:Lost in all of this is the fact that Muslims are prohibited from producing visual depictions of Mohammad lest the images lend themselves to the deification of a man their theology dictates is never to be worshipped as a deity, and yet here we have them responding to insults against Mohammad in a way that only someone defending their deity's honor would respond. I know yeah? apparently me and the other 99% worship Muhammed and not Allah, thanks for the fatwa Mullah Randandal!
|
|
#
¿
Sep 19, 2012 16:32
|
|
|
Randandal posted:drat, please use context clues. If you want to be indignant before you even read something, you'll find something to outrage you. As a Muslim, I'm interested in hearing about how you view the incredible overreactions from the Muslim world. Is it 99%? I was thinking it was a small minority, but either way I'd like to hear what you think about folks placing so much more emphasis on the Prophet Muhammed than they would on any other "just a man". Maybe you shouldn't paint a broad swath of people and instead used context yourself? Seriously now, how did you manage to read that as 99% protestors and not 99% who worship Allah, and don't give a gently caress about cartoons or videos insulting Muhammed. I'm no scholar but I was still in grade six yet we had no problem quoting Abu Bakr in religious classes: "O People! If anyone among you worshipped Muhammad, let him know that Muhammad is dead. But those who worshipped Allah, let them know that He lives and will never die. 'Muhammad is only a Messenger of Allah, there have been Messengers before him. What then, will you turn back from Islam if he dies or is killed?' " Tell me though, how did it become plainly obvious to you that people started worshipping muhammed, have you seen a billion people coming out in protests worldwide?
|
|
#
¿
Sep 19, 2012 17:26
|
|
|
Cuntpunch posted:You try to make it sound like I'm singling out Muslims for this sort of irrationality, and in doing so paint me as some sort of bigot - despite the fact that we're specifically talking about the threat of Muslim retaliation over things like publishing of cartoons portraying Mohammad. You specifically call out comedic, offensive, portrayal of Jesus and what that would do. The Onion as you likely well know published a picture of a hermaphroditic Ganeesha manually stimulating Jesus while, at the same time anally fisting the Buddha. That image should be upsetting to christian extremists(involving jesus in a mixture of sodomy, group sex, homosexuality, beastiality), hindu extremists(ditto), buddhist extremists(ditto). But to my knowledge there have been no death threats, no closing of embassies, no attempts to exact vengeance over this - all from a paper with almost three times the circulation of the French paper. The problem is statements like (i'm paraphrasing) "This is funded by a 100 jews + the israeli government" and the comment "this was made by america", unlike the Onion the video that made it to the egyptian media was effectively pinning this as "OFFICIALLY AMERICAN GOVERNMENT ENDORSED/PRODUCED THEY OFFICIALLY HATE US", this is what the people over in the middle east effectively heard whether lost in translation or a deliberate attempt is up in the air at this point but its effect is much greater. I don't think the french paper will register a blip on the radar, i mean there were like how many draw muhammed days? and thats on facebook which has even greater circulation than the Onion, but no one was up in arms about it since the danish cartoons riots.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 19, 2012 20:50
|
|
|
THE AWESOME GHOST posted:I love this. It's really not common to go up to random women on the street and tell them "cover up" though, that would be met with hostility in a lot of Muslim countries. Thats true, gender segregation is being (well slowly) shaken down, hopefully phased out in the future, but some men resort to this to truamatise women and shut them down, it turns alot of women away from working too. Its too bad that (to my experience around the GCC) there isn't much infrastructure or women organizations to help combat this.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 20, 2012 13:55
|
|
|
Deki posted:I'm a bit confused, why do the Saudi's want to arm the FSA? I could have sworn that when this started they were supporting Assad. They have had bad blood with Assad that predates the whole uprising. Edit: It mostly involves Lebanon, and Hezbollah who are in the way as well.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 7, 2012 21:17
|
|
|
Brown Moses posted:Could anyone do me a favour and translate this for me? Got it on Facebook "Hi i see you have collected alot of information on cluster bombs, i saw some videos of those used in deir al zor, i'll send to you." Or something like that.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 25, 2012 21:13
|
|
|
Tias posted:I know you guys mean well, and it is a working analogy, but it has irked me for a long time when people do these "x of x world" comparisons. I've heard palestinians called the irish of the arab world, and the tuareg the gypsies etc. and not only do the comparisons not fit so well, it also feels distasteful to me. Its a really long story with the Kurds, their language isn't comprehensible by any ethnic group, even though related to the Iranians, and they have had bad blood with every imaginable side involved. In recent memory their first kingdom was invaded and taken over by Iran, during the Abdul Karim Qasim era of Iraq, the iraqi government attempted to integrate the Kurds into the overall government structure, notably having a Kurdish general reform the Iraqi military around the 60s. During Saddams reign poo poo hit the fan when the Iranians and Iraqis were supporting separatist movements to undermine their respective governments, the Iraqis aided the Balouch ethnic group while the Iranians went with the Kurds, you can guess how that went down. W/R/T Syria, the Assad government were allied with the PKK, my guess is the FSA doing all this dumb poo poo is because of that, but i'm not too keen on kurdish-syrian relationships. Edit: I'm a quarter kurd, and i support an independent kurdistan, but not just partitioning Iraq though, all 4 countries gotta eat poo poo and let go of their respective regions. Fizzil fucked around with this message at 13:35 on Oct 28, 2012 |
|
#
¿
Oct 28, 2012 13:32
|
|
I'm sorry, I just have a massive curiosity about the arab world and the developments going on right now, and I know very little-
|
Brown Blitzkrieg posted:Just, you know, looking at myself and my Arab friends, then looking at my Kurdish friends. Every one of whom, when I met them, I had to ask "Are you an Arab?". Mind you, all of us speak English and most have Western culture. Yeah i can't tell either, and i been to both Iraqi and Iranian Kurdish regions (Mariwan, and Sulaimaniye). Besides the language barrier, the social order is very similiar to Bedouin society(modern bedouins not the nomads) clans are basically extended families centered around a sheikh, who basically tries and helps clan members get something they need, its a group effort mostly, if someone wanted a car, or to work they went to their leader and asked for it then the whole clan chips in or helps out etc.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 30, 2012 01:44
|
|
|
Brown Blitzkrieg posted:And what good would that do? UAE population: 5 million, Iran population: 125 million. UAE buys weapons from: USA - other side of the world, Iran buys weapons from: manufactures its own. The local population is around 1-2 million, the rest are expatriats. I was in the uae army formerly and i say this with experience, the whole gulf defense force with saudi, oman and qatar included wouldnt probably be able to deal with iran in a military action. Their only real experience was Kuwait in 1991 and it wasn't an easy offensive.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 5, 2012 15:45
|
|
|
Young Freud posted:I've been thinking, with them throwing all this cash around in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, why hasn't the United Arab Emirates just build a man-made canal to get around the whole Hormuz Strait thing? I'm guessing getting the Western militaries to do their fighting is probably cheaper. Most of the money went into Dubai to set it up as a port, they could pretty much set up port in Fujairah on the Arabian sea to avoid Hormuz but the rest of the exporters are mostly hosed and they probably don't want to pay royalties for a land route through Oman or the UAE, plus sea shipping is cheaper.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 5, 2012 22:14
|
|
|
Muscle Tracer posted:That terrible thing was "feeding Devil Child," so the solution there is pretty clear-cut. Besides the GCC and Saudi Arabia, you have Jordan and Morocco. All monarchies, and good old allies of the USA, pretty stable and quite because of economic stability, not quite up to the standards of first world countries though but its good enough. There is also Lebanon, they have somehow avoided the violence from spilling over from syria. Edit: even though protestors were murdered in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia its relatively stable, been in touch with Bahraini friends, its pretty divided there though. Edit2: I work as an airlines employee, Libya and Iraq are kind of doing ok, been seeing a lot more Libyans here where i live (The UAE) than before. Fizzil fucked around with this message at 07:15 on Jan 15, 2013 |
|
#
¿
Jan 15, 2013 07:05
|
|
|
Charliegrs posted:For all of the supposed "help" the Saudis and Qataris are giving to the rebels, it doesn't seem like they are giving them much beyond AKs and bullets. The things that the rebels really need (MANPADs and ATGMs) seem to be coming from looted regime stocks. If this is truly a proxy war between the Gulf states and the Iranian/Russian/Syrian alliance then the gulf states aren't really keeping up. Perhaps they are afraid of arming the rebels a little too well? I'm guessing its not worth going all the way for a swift end to the conflict. Instead they maintain the status quo until the Assad regime collapses, guerrilla wars are probably cost effective and more preferable to securing/transporting more advanced armament.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 2, 2013 22:45
|
|
|
Xandu posted:Egyptian prosecutors ordered the arrest of Bassem Youssef for insulting the president/Islam. His critique was against Islamist channels, i'm paraphrasing but its more or less "islamist channels do more bad to islam than good", this apparently riled up alot of people, particularly salafist currents probably. These channels are like fox news but for the middle east, nauseating and toxic, there is no real content besides dedicating 90% of their time to insult the Shia and other muslims because they're going to the wrong mosque.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 31, 2013 11:50
|
|
|
Mans posted:It always amazes me how Hezbollah and poo poo can have facebook pages yet Arab-feminist pages are closed in a matter months. The situation in the middle east for feminists is pretty dire, its gaining momentum but let me remind you that we had an MRA movement before the whole phenomenon happened on the internet 
|
|
#
¿
May 25, 2013 21:17
|
|
|
az jan jananam posted:It's actually kind of interesting the way that Arab Islamist types are describing Iran as the "Safavid Project." I guess its a step above calling them Magi dog-worshippers... Thats the surface, you check any of those crazy saudi funded channels? they do go down there, equating the shia with zoroastrians, and using the term Majus. Edit: VVV They recognise the zoroastrians though, i mean Iran is alot of bad things, but Islamists are loving nuts. Stealth edit: I'm a sunni arab, been accused as Iranian "Istitla'at" (i think it means intelligence) everytime i try to debunk popular myths about Iran. Fizzil fucked around with this message at 02:46 on Jun 14, 2013 |
|
#
¿
Jun 14, 2013 02:42
|
|
|
Ham posted:You're definitely not wrong, people are affected to a very large extent by TV media and whatever their friends post on Facebook. I think it's the worst result of the extremely lackluster Egyptian education institution which from 1st grade to college is centered around memorization rather than critical thinking or creativity. This extends to religious education where you're not allowed to question any part of religion, only accept it. To be honest, this is across the GCC as well (and the arab world to some extent i guess), many are deluded by garbage spewed by news channels or whoever is the approved popular talking head, without thought put into it. Also stay safe Ham.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 8, 2013 06:47
|
|
|
Last i heard the Aleppo highway was retaken by the SAA i figure the fighting there still fierce but they are advancing. Edit: this was yesterday watching the local news in the UAE which is a bit apathetic to the events not sure who the source was.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 8, 2013 11:40
|
|
|
THE AWESOME GHOST posted:You know the local GCC population is pretty well off? Based on a quick survey of the local game stores the most popular series are Call of Duty, GTA, and soccer games. With regards to this, I honestly thought these posts were some sort of joke or meta humor, i mean this is SA they really can't be that naive to make posts about bombing them with Pepsi and Xboxes in the lords year of 2013?
|
|
#
¿
Nov 13, 2013 11:22
|
|
|
the JJ posted:Didn't Ataturk ban it in favor of more 'modern' dress? Morrocan hat, it spread all the way to turkey and was sort of seen as a civilized mans hat later on (lot of north african arabs in western suits would put the fez on instead of any other hat usually, well back in the early 20th century anyway). Nothing to do with Islam, besides praying with hats on is pretty hard.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 28, 2013 03:07
|
|
|
enraged_camel posted:I mean, I ask again: are there any Muslim countries on Earth that are both secular and democratic? Yeah there is, historically at least. Back in the period of Mameluke Egypt stories were going around about how no one gave a poo poo if you said anything, they were still libertarian fucklords though. 
|
|
#
¿
Dec 29, 2013 10:04
|
|
|
Pieter posted:Let's add Indonesia to that list, the largest Muslim country in the world. To be fair though, he probably was talking about democracy and secularism in the middle east, i'd be hard pressed to find anything, maybe besides Tunisia, but this ignores a whole lot of history cause the countries didnt just appear in a vacuum.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 29, 2013 10:43
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 5, 2024 13:58 |
|
|
Fader Movitz posted:So does anyone know how Tunisia doing now? As far as I gathered they seem to be relatively stable whilst the rest of the middle east plunges deeper into despair, dictatorship and secreterian conflicts. Tunisia is fairly more homogeneous than states like Iraq or Syria, which is a cocktail of ethnic groups, cultures and religions. AFAIK Ben Ali enacted really anti-religious laws in the country which inflamed the more religious oriented groups, Al Nahda winning wasn't surprising once elections happened, but i'm surprised they actually backed out once people started noticing the poo poo they tried to pull, so its fairly civil. Plus their army aren't a bag of dicks like the rest of the middle east.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 6, 2014 14:15
|
|