SAKHR AL-MAKHADHI – With Egypt in the midst of a revolution and Tunisia coming to terms with life after dictatorship, Syria’s government has surprised the region by taking a potentially significant step to soften its grip on power: it has removed many of its internet restrictions. The web was widely used by protestors in Tunisia as [...]
A two-way for Sky News on the Palestine Papers.
SAKHR AL-MAKHADHI – Five years after the Cedar Revolution promised to change Lebanon forever, the country is back to its old ways. The political earthquake that followed the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri may have left Lebanon looking almost untouched, but in neighbouring Syria it has had profound, and unexpected, effects. One million people [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi SHAALAN It all started when Syrian students at the American School came out of class and wanted a New York-style coffee house in which to live out their Central Perk dreams. InHouse was born in ,2002a green and black Starbucks clone where staff spoke English and served Skinny Decaf Cinnamon Lattes. At the [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – A series of controversial Israeli films are provoking outrage and plaudits in equal measure at the London Film Festival. The best documentary award has gone to one of the year’s most controversial films. Defamation is a polemic by Israeli filmmaker Yoav Shamir. In his expose of America’s Anti-Defamation League (ADL), he claims anti-Semitism [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Miliband insists that efforts to strengthen Europe’s ties with Syria are not on hold, as Damascus calls for a delay in signing a long-awaited association agreement. The agreement will make Syria a member of the European Union’s Euro-Med partnership, which includes all 27 states of the European Union, along [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – A group of young Syrians have just released the country’s first rap album and walked straight into controversy. Sham MCs, a collective of nine rappers, and their debut album Crossword has provoked more than a few cross words in Damascus. This is the modern crashing head-on into the traditional. The album launch was [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, for years a regular presence on global and regional television, invariably wearing a black and white checkered scarf known as a kufiyeh, or keffiyah, helped turn the headgear into a symbol of Palestine. That meant good business for Yasser Hirbawi and his factory in Hebron, in the Occupied West [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – American officials are preparing to waive some of the sanctions against Syria imposed by the Bush administration, according to Imad Moustapha, the Syrian ambassador to Washington. First to go will be the ban on exports of spare parts and safety equipment for the Syrian civil aviation industry, followed by that on computer products. [...]
Sakhr Al-Makhadhi – It was a photography project meant to help Iraqis come to terms with their lives in and out of a war zone. But it ended in tragedy. Run by a British woman in Syria, the plan was to bring 12 Iraqi women from across the nation’s religious divides together so they could tell [...]
