Where does this dangerous and particularly unhealthy idea come from, that we can, for a single moment, discuss the real responsibilities in the massacre of Charlie? Wriggling in front of these twelve graves, wondering, with a penetrating air, if these dead people did not try a little bit to be murdered? You have to be really contaminated to think such a thing, that cartoons could be responsible for the execution of their authors. And then what? A text, an opinion, a thought, an attitude? Bullshit! We stagger about, it’s so stupid. So we would all be guilty, laymen that we are, of believing that freedom of expression and thought are not mortal sins?
Qatari students learn that the Jews, by “manipulating economic markets and accumulating immense wealth”, ruined Germany after World War I. It was therefore logical that the Führer made them pay dearly for their infamous betrayal. Or how to be brought up in antisemitism from childhood to adolescence.
While the French Ministry of the Interior has just renewed Hani Ramadan’s ban on staying in France (a ban which dates back to April 2017), the Director of the Islamic Center of Geneva (Tariq Ramadan’s brother) replies by questioning the official version of the 9/11 attacks!
Let’s say it outright, the only difference between the brotherhood of the Muslim Brotherhood and ISIS is the method. The end remains the same: to apply the Islamiya Sharia, the Islamic law, and to re-establish the caliphate, by appointing a caliph in the Islamic way, without a vote. Once this is done, they work on Islamising the existence and dominating the world. Thus, two fundamentalist entities do each other favours often consciously, sometimes unconsciously.
A new expression has recently appeared in the media and international diplomatic circles: ‘wolf warrior’ a term for the new and very assertive Chinese diplomats, who use Twitter and other social media platforms to prey on any person, legal or physical, which criticizes China or the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). This aggressive Chinese diplomacy has drawn particular attention in recent times due to China’s strenuous efforts to distance itself from any association with Covid-19 or accusations of responsibility for the spread of the virus. But the phenomenon is not entirely new. Because, for years, Chinese diplomats have tended to be more and more aggressive.
In a letter dated August 22, 2020, issued by its “Notices and Diffusions Task Force”, the General Secretariat of Interpol informed its National Central Bureaus (NCBs) in all member countries of the organization of its decision on the rejection of the Turkish request to issue an international arrest warrant (Interpol red notice) against the former head of Palestinian “Preventive Security”, Mohammed Dahlan.
China’s policy of corrupting the political class of a country, especially those that are economically fragile, is well known. Many countries in Africa, South & South East Asia and Latin America have fallen prey to these Chinese machinations and some are now neck deep in Chinese debt.
Tucked away in a small by-lane in Changklan Road in Thailand’s northern city of Chiang Mai is a nondescript restaurant called ‘Al Hussein’ that sells the typical Indian fare of naan bread and curry. The restaurant generally does brisk business, being located at the Anusarn Night Market with many hotels in its vicinity. The owner of the restaurant is one Baqar Shah, a Pakistani national. Married to a Thai woman for nearly 12 years, Shah is known to have good connections in the local government, immigration, customs and airlines. To an ordinary visitor, all looks normal when you visit the restaurant. However, not many, till recently, knew of Baqar Shah’s links with a fake passport racket, money laundering or the Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI).
Beylik: that’s the word we don’t want to hear anymore in Tunis. Beylik, domain of the bey, vassal of the sultan. Beylik, province or Ottoman “regency”. A word that comes from the well of the centuries, a return of the historical repressed. It was furiously written in the country’s media after the unexpected visit to Tunis of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who came to ask President Kais Saied to support a Turkish intervention in Libya in support of the ill-named “Government of National Accord” of Faiez Sarraj against General Khalifa Haftar. By opening Matmata airport to Turkish military aircraft. But yes, of course, it made sense: the tiny and strategic Tunisia could not but acquiesce to Ankara’s desires. In the spirit of the neo-Great Turk, it had to become again the vassal of the old days.
