Mind Soup

Can you put borders on social media interactions? In January 2012, Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri unknowingly responded to a “Good Morning” tweet by Israel Defense Forces Spokesman Avichay Adraee and Hezbollah affiliated media such as Al-Manar Television and Al-Akhbar newspaper had a field day with it, dubbing it as “tweeting with the enemy.” Soon after, Hariri publicized a formal apology that reads: "When I answered today's good morning greetings, I answered one some of you say belongs to an Israeli official's Twitter account. If that's true I would like to clarify that I did not know it when I answered him, since I consider Israel to be an enemy state.” In January 2013, blogger Elie Fares from Separate State of Mind received a supportive email from an Israeli and wrote about his dilemma of answering him back. “I recently received an email from an Israeli […] and the email was touching. People advised me not to reply. So I didn’t. But I really, really wan...

Below is a guest post by my favorite politician in Lebanon, HMA Tom Fletcher , the British Ambassador to Lebanon. In Lebanon's Hands Lebanon tends to be high on our August watchlist. This year there was no major single crisis, but five developments raised anxiety. Israel accused Hizballah of involvement in the Bourgas terrorist attack. A pro-Assad former Minister was arrested. Kidnappings returned in a dangerous 48 hours. Some Gulf countries told their nationals to leave. The Tripoli powder keg re-ignited. Throughout, the media were quick to accentuate the negative. Lebanon has learnt to live with a certain level of instability. Periodically, for millennia, it has gone through phases of fragility, as regional tectonic plates and delicate demographics shift. The result is often conflict and political realignment. Are we in such a phase? Not yet. But I think there is an increasing realisation among Lebanese that Assad’s ability to directly influence political life in Lebanon is...

When you hear “Lebanon” and “government” in the same sentence, what comes to mind first? Sectarianism, money wasting, no electricity, no water, no jobs, bad internet, expensive living, taxes, wasta? The list goes on and on… Lebanon does not only have a beautiful landscape, it’s not only a touristic destination, it’s not only a clubbing hub, but it is also rich in resources that can help the Lebanese stand on their own feet. Lebanese are proud of that and are ready to fight for Lebanon, that’s the only thing they all agree on. But are we fighting for the right reasons? Do we participate in protests and political gatherings to improve our current state of living or just because our leaders tell us to? A couple of years back, Israel tried to claim the traditional Lebanese Hommos (Chickpeas) dish with tahini as their own. The whole Lebanese community from different sects and religions stood together and defended the Lebanese-born dish by breaking the Guinness Book of records for th...

This is a repost guest post by a good friend Hala Hassan which was originally posted at A Seperate State of Mind , a recommended blog by another great friend Elie Fares . Hear it from those who were there. A neighboring country at war, you sympathize. Innocent civilians torn into pieces under the wreckage of their houses, you shed a couple of tears. Frightened children and sick elderly begging for international intervention, you pray deaf ears listen somehow. But what if you were that citizen in that country, held up in your house, scared like you’ve never been, reciting every single prayer that ever crossed your mind for those bombshells to stop and those warplanes hovering in the sky to go away… Yes, it’s been 5 years since “July war”, “the 33 days war”, “the 6th Lebanese/Israeli war” or whatever they want to call it. But for that traumatized girl, it still feels like yesterday… To survive a war is one supposedly satisfying ending. Not to have lost a family member is considered a bl...

James Wolfensohn [Communicated via e-mail to the AUB community] Dear AUB faculty, students, staff, and friends, You will have heard that Sir James Wolfensohn has decided not to attend the Commencement ceremonies on June 25, during which the university had intended to award him an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters and had anticipated hearing him give the keynote speech at graduation. His decision was taken in the aftermath of a petition that was organized by several faculty members at AUB, then circulated to the faculty and student community, as well as to our alumni, who were specifically encouraged not just to sign the petition but to write letters of protest. In the wake of predictable coverage by the media, the press in Lebanon have given wide notoriety to the issue as well, apparently based primarily on the wording of the petition, which is highly selective in the information it provides. The coverage has been mostly, and unfairly, critical of James Wolfensohn...

Dear Minister Nahhas, I had the unfortunate displeasure of attending your so-called "open discussion" last week at AUB.which was hosted by the Youth Shadow Government  I have to begin that the whole lecture (which cannot even be considered an "open" discussion because there was nothing open about it) was very pointless and was not informative at all about the telecom situation in Lebanon. What it was though is extremely depressing. Your excellency explained that decreasing the costs of telecommunications will not solve any problems. You also said that equalizing chances between countries will not be achieved if telecommunications became better. I am sorry to tell you that this is a pathetic excuse not to improve the communications sector in Lebanon. Your speculations that such improvements are not necessarily advantageous to the Lebanese society are invalid. I don't know if you realize how important the internet and fast communication is for the Lebanese yo...

Photo of Masri in South Lebanon via NOW Lebanon (from facebook) Last Sunday, during the demonstrations in the South near the Lebanese-Israeli borders to commemorate Nakba , Munib Masri, a petroleum studies student at the American University of Beirut got severely injured after being shot by an Israeli bullet. Masri is Palestinian in origin, but also holds both the Jordanian and American citizenships. Masri has underwent a couple of operations this week; "he is undergoing surgery today. He has already lost his left kidney and spleen in an earlier operation. His spine is also fractured, and he’s sustained injuries to his diaphragm, along with pieces of shrapnel lodged in his back."  ( NOW Lebanon ) In an e-mail addressed to the AUB community, Dr. Peter Dorman, President of AUB, writes: "We are all shocked and saddened by this development, and our thoughts and hearts are with Munib and his family.We are appalled by the unrestrained use of deadly force against un...

Cadbury Schweppes – announced on Dec. 17, 2002 plans to invest $4.5 m in Israeli confectionary maker and distributor Carmit after a year’s trial association with Carmit whereby the latter distributed Cadbury’s goods in Israel. The money, Cadbury specified, will paid in the first three months of 2003 and will be used for the advertising to promote its products in Israel. Carmit will become Carmit-Cadbury Coca-Cola – bought 43% of Neviot Water in 2001 for c. $20 million, a company which has 40% of the Israeli bottled water market  in January 2002 Coca-Cola reported it was beginning negotiations to acquire Golan Wineries, located in the Golan Heights  in Dec. 2000 bought 33.3%of StoreAlliance, Israeli computer technology supplier, for $5 million through its Israeli subsidiary until July 2000 Coca-Cola owned Mayanot Eden which is a water-company based in the Golan announced in July 2002 that, in return for millions of dollars in tax breaks from the Israeli ...

MIND SOUP : For weeks now, a minute church by the name of "Dove World Outreach Center" in Gainesville, Florida, has been advertising for an event it calls "International Burn a Qur'an Day". Pastor Terry Jones is insisting to hold this "event" on September the 11th "to honor those killed in the 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington." He says the burning of the Qur'an will "send a message to violent Islamic extremists like al-Qaida, which carried out the attacks against the United States." The second day of Eid el-Fitr falls this year on the same day. As many world leaders and institutions, including the Vatican, US President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and  others , have denounced this act, this pastor is insisting on carrying out this event. This is as much facts as I am willing to give about this issue. Below in ten points is my opinionated response. First of all, as a Muslim, I don...

Rami Chemali and his mother BLOGBALADI : A [couple of months] ago, Rami Chemali , a Lebanese national and Star Academy participant, was killed in a car accident in Egypt. Mahmoud Shukri, Rami’s friend and also part of Star Academy was severely injured. Rumors spread that Rami was the one driving and a week ago, Rami’s mother pledged to sue Shukri’s family for falsely accusing her son of being the one responsible of the accident. Now the question is why don’t the Lebanese authorities bother to investigate the issue further? And how come no updates on the accident were heard since then? Is someone trying to hide the truth? On a final note, I found more pictures of Rami Chemali on an Israeli site than on all other Arab websites. Now why would Israeli websites be interested that much in a Lebanese star? And how did they get “Copyright” pictures of his funeral? "You will remain in our hearts" Related post: Rami Chemali from Star Academy 7 dead at 23 (moudz.blogsp...

Egyption President Hosni Mubarak MIND SOUP : An Egyption lawyer has filed a lawsuit again the Egyptian Minister of Justice Mamdouh Merhi and others accusing them of misleading the Egyptian people by hiding the truth. The lawyer, Hamed Sayed Makki, claimed in the case memo that the minister has been hiding the death of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak. What's more interesting, or maybe unbelievable, is that he believe that Mubarak has been dead since 2004 while winning the past elections in 2005 (a year after his alleged death). According to Horiyatna radio station, the lawsuit said that this is a "local and international scam to fool us about Mubarak's life." The source revealed more detail about his alleged death. It said that Mubarak has passed away in Germany on the 16th of June, 2004 while undergoing an operation to remove a cancerous tumor from his ear. The lawsuit adds that Mubarak underwent this operation secretly, and after the surgery, the doct...

NAHARNET/AP: Gaza's Hamas rulers have banned women from smoking water pipes in cafes, calling it a practice that destroys marriages and sullies the image of the Palestinian people. The ban marks the Islamist militant group's latest effort to impose their Islamic lifestyle in the seaside strip on an often resistant public. While Islamic law does not technically ban women from smoking the traditional tobacco-infused pipes, tradition frowns upon the habit. Hamas frequently mixes its strict interpretation of Islamic law with conservative Gaza tradition, and over the weekend, the two dovetailed to produce the smoking ban. "It is inappropriate for a woman to sit cross-legged and smoke in public. It harms the image of our people," Ihab Ghussein, Hamas interior ministry spokesman, said in a statement released Sunday. "Many women who smoke in public were divorced when their husbands saw them, or found out about them," said Hamas police spokesman, Ayman Batn...

MIND SOUP : A couple of days ago, the news of Octavia Nasr being fired from CNN envaded the Lebanese and Middle Eastern media. It may has come as a shock to the society, yet this denial of free speech has been demonstrated very widely across various prestigious institutions in the region and world-wide. To re-cap, Nasr who held the position of senior Middle East editor at CNN was laid off earlier this week after 20 years of work because she praised the late Hezbollah Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah on twitter. "Sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah. One of Hezbollah's giants I respect a lot," she posted Sunday morning. This tweet was immediately picked up by Israeli supporters and Nasr was criticized and attacked for sympathizing with Fadlallah. The Simon Wiesenthal Center in the US demanded that Nasr "apologize to all victims of Hezbollah terrorism whose loved ones don't share her sadness over the passing of one of Hezbol...

I have, of course, been outraged at armed men boarding ships in international waters, killing passengers on board who attempt to resist and then forcing their ship to the hijackers' home port. I am, of course, talking about the Somali pirates who are preying on Western ships in the Indian Ocean. How dare those terrorists dare to touch our unarmed vessels on the high seas? And how right we are to have our warships there to prevent such terrorist acts. But whoops! At least the Israelis have not demanded ransom. They just want to get journalists to win the propaganda war for them. Scarcely had the week begun when Israel's warrior "commandos" stormed a Turkish boat bringing aid to Gaza and shot nine of the passengers dead. Yet by week's end, the protesters had become "armed peace activists", vicious anti-Semites "professing pacifism, seething with hate, pounding away at another human being with a metal pole". I liked the last bit. The fact that ...

The following article is extracted from Debbe Schlussel's blog and is only presented to you here for humor purposes. [ via ] May 16, 2010, - 11:38 pm Donald Trump, Dhimmi: Miss Hezbollah Rima Fakih Wins Miss USA; Rigged for Muslima? Miss Oklahoma’s Arizona Immigration Answer By  Debbie Schlussel It’s a sad day in America but a very predictable one, given the politically correct, Islamo-pandering climate in which we’re mired.  The  Hezbollah-supporting Shi’ite Muslim, Miss Michigan Rima Fakih – whose bid for the pageant was financed by an Islamic terrorist and immigration fraud perpetrator –won the Miss USA contest. I was on top of this story before anyone,  telling you about who Fakih is  and  her extremist and deadly ties . Rima Fakih: Miss Hezbollah is Now Miss USA No, it’s not “just another beauty pageant.”  Donald Trump, Muslims (who mostly support Islamic terrorist groups, like Hezbollah, which features many of Fakih’s close relatives as t...