MER Article "We Invite People to Think the Unthinkable" What prompted you to found Hurriyyat Khassa, and what are its goals? Sara Scalenghe • 10 min read
MER Article Disavowed Homosexualities in Beirut Beirut can be perceived as a social body, with all the complexities of such an organism. Lebanon's capital provides, in fact, the stage for a panoply of moods and dispositions which are a dynamic result of particular histories and larger socio-cultural circumstances. As a body, Beirut is, of Sofian Merabet • 11 min read
MER Article Transgender Bolero I remember seeing her. What I can’t remember is not seeing her. For the moment I saw her she was everywhere. Perhaps, unlike the rest of us, she was made of fluid and did not fit into any corporeal frame meant for the solidified. Or perhaps it was her Elif Shafak • 11 min read
MER Article Egypt's Virtual Protection of Morality Action by states to impose excessive regulations on the use of...the Internet, on the grounds that control, regulation and denial of access are necessary to preserve the moral fabric and cultural identity of societies, is paternalistic. These regulations presume to protect people from themselves and Hossam Bahgat • 11 min read
MER Article The Trials of Culture Session after session, the men stood packed against the cage bars, their eyes furtive behind masks made from torn handkerchiefs or underwear. That and their white jail uniforms gave them a ghostlike look: disincarnate in the sweaty chaos of the courtroom, incarcerated wraiths. Scott Long • 15 min read
MER Article Letters (Spring 2004) MARTYR’S MONUMENT I was partly responsible for the US Marine battalion that secured the portion of Baghdad containing the Martyr’s Monument. Sinan Antoon (“Monumental Disrespect,” MER 228) portrays the US occupation of the monument as an episode of unthinking American disregard for the sanctity of (Author not identified) • 8 min read
MER Article Aida Dabbas MERIP mourns the passing of Aida Hashim al-Dabbas, who died of cancer on November 1, 2003. A dedicated grassroots activist, Aida gave the last seven years of her life to advocacy for peace and justice in Palestine, the welfare of the Iraqi people, and political and civil freedoms in her home country Jillian Schwedler • 3 min read
MER Article From the Editors (Spring 2004) "An educated wife and mother is a better wife and mother. No husband is better off because she is chained by ignorance. No son is better off because his mother cannot read." Students of Middle East history might guess that these are the words of Qasim Amin, the Egyptian lawyer whose writings at the The Editors • 7 min read
MER Article Editor's Picks (Winter 2003) Buck-Morss, Susan. Thinking Past Terror: Islamism and Critical Theory on the Left (London: Verso, 2003). Center for Public Integrity. Windfalls of War: US Contractors Reap the Windfalls of Post-War Reconstruction (Washington, DC, October 2003). Dodge, Toby. Inventing Iraq: The Failure of Nation-Bu (Author not identified) • 1 min read
MER Article Football and Film in the Islamic Republic of Iran Maziar Bahari opens his documentary, Football Iranian Style (2001), at Tehran’s Azadi Stadium, where a large mural of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic until his death in 1989, peers down on the 110,000 soccer fans filling the bleachers. Like 75 percent of Iran’ Shiva Balaghi • 9 min read
MER Article "Let Us Be Moors" “Seamos moros!” wrote the Cuban poet and nationalist José Martí in 1893, in support of the Berber uprising against Spanish rule in northern Morocco. “Let us be Moors...the revolt in the Rif...is not an isolated incident, but an outbreak of the change and realignment that have entered the world. Let Hisham Aïdi • 33 min read
MER Article "Honor Crimes" and the International Spotlight on Jordan With the runaway success of Norma Khouri’s Honor Lost: Love and Death in Modern-Day Jordan, “honor crimes” -- killings of girls or women accused of sexual transgressions, in order to cleanse family honor -- are firmly equated in the eyes of the West with Jordan. Khouri’s book sold Janine A. Clark • 12 min read
