Weekend Arab media roundup

Some tidbits from the Arab media over the weekend:

Al Khaleej (via Elaph) reports that the Jordanian government is cracking down on the salafis (Islamists) in Jordan, with a wide-ranging campaign of arrests, especially in the city of Salt.  The legal justification has been that Friday preachers have been violating new restrictions on content.   In other Jordanian news, King Abdullah gave a speech the other day which supposedly signaled that the government will begin divesting itself of control over the media (it currently owns not only the electronic media but also controlling shares over much of the press, including the English language Jordan Times).  That would be great - we'll see.   Meanwhile, a number of political parties are calling on the Jordanian government to break off ties with the temporary Iraqi government over Fallujah. 

And last, but not least, it is being widely reported that Jordan will no longer grant citizenship to the children of Jordanian women married to Palestinian men.  This is actually a pretty shocking development, given the widespread intermarriage between Jordanians and Palestinians.  It is evidently prompted by the fears expressed by Jordanian ethnic nationalists of the "large number" of such Palestinian-Jordanians (about half a million children in some 60,000 families, according to Interior Minister Samir Habashneh).   It seems a pretty ugly bit of ethnic disenfranchisement which is worth following up on, especially for democracy-promoting types who think that the United States should hold its allies in the region to a high standard.  For background on the rise of the ethnic Jordanian nationalists and their campaign against Palestinian political activism in the country, you might check out these articles in Middle East Report. 

Over in Bahrain, the human rights activist Abd al Hadi al Khawaja was sentenced to one year in prison, and then immediately granted a royal pardon.  For details on the protests over his trial, let me again direct you to the outstanding on the ground coverage provided by Chan'ad Bahraini.

On the question of whether or not the al Jazeera Baghdad bureau chief is the brother of Zarqawi's lieutenant, Al Jazeera today showed an interview with the brother in question, Omar Hadid, who denied any involvement with Zarqawi.  Hadid pointed out that at the time al Sharq al Awsat places him in Pakistan and Afghanistan working with al Qaeda, he was only 14 years old;  he also showed military service documents proving that he had been in Iraq during the time he was supposedly fighting in Afghanistan.   It's looking more and more likely that al Sharq al Awsat got the names wrong and jumped to conclusions;  meanwhile, Hadid says that his family is living in fear of the American occupation forces who might believe the SA story and see them as Zarqawi collaborators. UPDATE: Here's the English version if you want to gently point out this information to any overheated bloggers.

Oh, and the best story of all, which I've not seen reported in the US (which could just mean that it isn't true):  Al Hayat reports that the Near East section in the State Department is threatening to resign en masse if Danielle Pletka is appointed Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs.   State Department critics, who have little use for "Arabists" who have highly suspicious Arabic-language skills and actual expertise in the region, might see this threat as an unexpected bonus and make them all the more eager to see Pletka appointed.

Finally, a sneak preview.  Al Safir mentions that Open Dialogue, one of al Jazeera's leading talk shows, will be airing a debate between Yusuf al Qaradawi (leading moderate Islamist and the target of a concerted campaign accusing him of really being a radical "even more dangerous than Osama bin Laden" and trying to get him hauled off to the International Criminal Court) and Steven Emerson (the sensationalist "terrorism expert" and author of "Jihad in America").  Ghassan Bin Jadu, host of Open Dialogue, usually runs a serious and focused discussion, so this could be quite interesting.  Once al Jazeera posts the transcript, I'll let you know. 

Comments

[praktike]

AA, we have one rightwing idiot on the case of the two Hadids so far:

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/008681.php

[the aardvark]

Only one? Don't they usually travel in packs, like scary scary wolves?

By the way, above I added the English link to the latest al Jazeera story, if you know anyone who might helpfully be pointed to such a link:

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/1394A286-4A5A-4038-9FA7-777B51A10336.htm

[Jamal]

I haven't been watching Jazeera enough lately to see the commercials for the Qardawi-Emerson debate, do you know when it will be on? FYI, if you don't ever watch it, another great source for these types of "extreme debates" is LBC's show al-Hadath. I believe it airs on Sundays here in the US, at least that's when I've always seen it.

[the aardvark]

Jamal - the al Safir story said it was airing "tonight" (i.e. yesterday), but I haven't seen any commercials for it and it isn't (as of yesterday) blurbed on the website. Thanks for the tip on LBC - I never watch that, maybe I should. Who's the host of al Hadath?

[Jamal]

The host is a lady by the name of Shada Omar. A little blurb about the show can be found here:

http://www.lbcsat.com.lb/en/Programs/ProgramDetails.asp?PrgID=47

It is amazing how many of these types of shows have cropped up, just about every serious satellite channel has one now even if the quality varies a lot.