#landing in kuwait

[pcgamer]

Watch This Amazing Landing At Kuwait International Airport - Kuwait Airw...

[alex99achapterthree]

SEPECAT Jaguar Anglo-French supersonic jet attack aircraft originally used by the British Royal Air Force and the French Air Force carried IR missiles on TOP of the wings, when all the under-wing hardpoints were full.

Looks awkward, but it worked. You do what you gotta do I suppose.

Of course, the RAF did something similar with ferry tanks on the English Electric Lightning...

... and that looks even MORE awkward.

The Lightning in Royal Air Force service had no under-wing hard points at all. With control surfaces and the long landing gear there was little space under the narrow wings. Missiles were mounted on the fuselage and the guns were internal.

The Mk.53 export version of the F.6 Lightning (used Saudi Arabia and Kuwait) did manage to squeeze one pylon under each wing, used to carry one 1000-pound bomb or rocket pods for ground attack missions.

The over-wing fuel tanks could also have rocket tubes in the front of the tank. High-explosive solid-fuel rockets fired from the front of a fuel tank! What could possibly go wrong?

[gaysails]

"When the first contingents of U.S. troops were being sent to Saudi Arabia, in August of 1990, Corporal Jeff Paterson, a twenty-two-year-old Marine stationed in Hawaii, sat down on the runway of the airfield and refused to board a plane bound for Saudi Arabia. He asked to be discharged from the Marine Corps:

'I have come to believe that there are no justified wars. . . . I began to question exactly what I was doing in the Marine Corps about the time I began to read about history. I began to read up on America's support for the murderous regimes of Guatemala, Iran under the Shah, and El Salvador. . . . I object to the use of military force against any people, anywhere, any time.'

Fourteen Marine Corps reservists at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, filed for conscientious objector status, despite the prospect of a court-martial for desertion. A lance corporal in the Marines, Erik Larsen, issued a statement:

'I declare myself a conscientious objector. Here is my sea bag full of personal gear. Here is my gas mask. I no longer need them. I am no longer a Marine. . . . It, to me, is embarrassing to fight for a way of life in which basic human needs, like a place to sleep, one hot meal a day and some medical attention, cannot even be met in our nation's capital.'

. . . When President Bush attacked Iraq in 1991, claiming that he was acting to end the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, a group of Native Americans in Oregon distributed a biting and ironic 'open letter':

'Dear President Bush. Please send your assistance in freeing our small nation from occupation. This foreign force occupied our lands to steal our rich resources. They used biological warfare and deceit, killing thousands of elders, children and women in the process. As they overwhelmed our land, they deposed our leaders and people of our own government, and in its place, they installed their own government systems that yet today control our daily lives in many ways. As in your own words, the occupation and overthrow of one small nation . . . is one too many. Sincerely, An American Indian.'"

-Howard Zinn, A People's History of the United States

[haveyoureadthispoll]

A sweeping and lyrical novel that follows a young Palestinian refugee as she slowly becomes radicalized while searching for a better life for her family throughout the Middle East, for readers of international literary bestsellers including Washington Black, My Sister, The Serial Killer, and Her Body and Other Parties. As Nahr sits, locked away in solitary confinement, she spends her days reflecting on the dramatic events that landed her in prison in a country she barely knows. Born in Kuwait in the 70s to Palestinian refugees, she dreamed of falling in love with the perfect man, raising children, and possibly opening her own beauty salon. Instead, the man she thinks she loves jilts her after a brief marriage, her family teeters on the brink of poverty, she’s forced to prostitute herself, and the US invasion of Iraq makes her a refugee, as her parents had been. After trekking through another temporary home in Jordan, she lands in Palestine, where she finally makes a home, falls in love, and her destiny unfolds under Israeli occupation.

[raplinesmoon]

hi everyone, i just wanted to come on here and make this post. like a lot of you, i’ve been deeply affected by what’s been going on in Gaza the past few weeks. It has quite literally altered my brain and the way i’ve been able to live my life day-to-day. even though i’m not Palestinian, i’ve grown up learning about the fight for Palestinian liberation. my real name (bless my parents), literally references the land of Palestine.

i know there’s a lot of grief in our hearts, watching genocide happen live on our screens in front of our very eyes. It’s heavy and it’s traumatic and the human body isn’t built to withstand this much grief and trauma without it fundamentally altering us. I’ve been struggling a lot with my grief recently, and how to make sense of it, and in doing so, i’ve tried to challenge myself that whenever i need a “break” from the news, or i just need to do something that makes me fundamentally human (like watching a movie, listening to music, making food), i’m going to try and engage with content from Palestinian creatives as a way to stay dialed in and to never stop speaking up. i thought i’d share some of what i’ve been engaging with in order to keep learning about Palestine and its people, and to make sure their voices are always heard.

disclaimer: this list is not meant to be comprehensive or exhaustive, as I still have a lot to look through, but feel free to reblog with your own additions!

Read:

A Woman Is No Man by Etaf Rum - In Brooklyn, eighteen-year-old Deya is starting to meet with suitors. Though she doesn’t want to get married, her grandparents give her no choice. History is repeating itself: Deya’s mother, Isra, also had no choice when she left Palestine as a teenager to marry Adam. Though Deya was raised to believe her parents died in a car accident, a secret note from a mysterious, yet familiar-looking woman makes Deya question everything she was told about her past. As the narrative alternates between the lives of Deya and Isra, she begins to understand the dark, complex secrets behind her community.

The author just released a new novel, Evil Eye, which is also on my to-read list.

Against The Loveless World by Susan Abulhawa - As Nahr sits, locked away in solitary confinement, she spends her days reflecting on the dramatic events that landed her in prison in a country she barely knows. Born in Kuwait in the 70s to Palestinian refugees, she dreamed of falling in love with the perfect man, raising children, and possibly opening her own beauty salon. Instead, the man she thinks she loves jilts her after a brief marriage, her family teeters on the brink of poverty, she’s forced to prostitute herself, and the US invasion of Iraq makes her a refugee, as her parents had been. After trekking through another temporary home in Jordan, she lands in Palestine, where she finally makes a home, falls in love, and her destiny unfolds under Israeli occupation.

Susan Abulhawa is also the author of Mornings in Jenin, a fantastic novel that describes the Nakba (Catastrophe) of 1948, in which 750,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes by the Occupation Forces, and The Blue Between Sky and Water, a story about four generations of a Palestinian family in a refugee camp in Gaza.

Salt Houses by Hala Aylan - On the eve of her daughter Alia’s wedding, Salma reads the girl’s future in a cup of coffee dregs. She sees an unsettled life for Alia and her children; she also sees travel, and luck. While she chooses to keep her predictions to herself that day, they will all soon come to pass when the family is uprooted in the wake of the Six-Day War of 1967.  Salma is forced to leave her home in Nablus; Alia’s brother gets pulled into a politically militarized world he can’t escape; and Alia and her gentle-spirited husband move to Kuwait City, where they reluctantly build a life with their three children. When Saddam Hussein invades Kuwait in 1990, Alia and her family once again lose their home, their land, and their story as they know it, scattering to Beirut, Paris, Boston, and beyond. Soon Alia’s children begin families of their own, once again navigating the burdens (and blessings) of assimilation in foreign cities.

The Beauty of Your Face by Sahar Mustahfah - Afaf Rahman, the daughter of Palestinian immigrants, is the principal of a Muslim school in the Chicago suburbs. One morning, a shooter—radicalized by the online alt-right—attacks the school. As Afaf listens to his terrifying progress, we are swept back through her memories, and into a profound and “moving” (Bustle) exploration of one woman’s life in a nation at odds with its ideals.

Light In Gaza (anthology) - Light in Gaza is a seminal, moving and wide-ranging anthology of Palestinian writers and artists. It constitutes a collective effort to organize and center Palestinian voices in the ongoing struggle. As political discourse shifts toward futurism as a means of reimagining a better way of living, beyond the violence and limitations of colonialism, Light in Gaza is an urgent and powerful intervention into an important political moment.

E-Book is available for free on Haymarket Books’ website!

The Butterfly’s Burden by Mahmoud Darwish - The Butterfly's Burden combines the complete text of Darwish's two most recent full-length volumes, linked by the stunning memoir-witness poem “A State of Siege.” Love poems, sonnets, journal-like distillations, and interlaced lyrics balance old literary traditions with new forms, highlighting loving reflections alongside bitter longing.

Orientalism by Edward Saïd - In this wide-ranging, intellectually vigorous study, Said traces the origins of "orientalism" to the centuries-long period during which Europe dominated the Middle and Near East and, from its position of power, defined "the orient" simply as "other than" the occident. This entrenched view continues to dominate western ideas and, because it does not allow the East to represent itself, prevents true understanding.

THIS IS LITERALLY ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT THINGS I’VE EVER READ

Watch:

Farha (2021) - After persuading her father to continue her education in the city, a Palestinian girl's dream is shattered by the harrowing developments of the Nakba.

Born In Gaza (2014) - The documentary follows the story of about ten children who tell what their daily life is like after the horror of the war on Gaza in the summer of 2014.

Omar (2013) - Arrested after the death of an Israeli soldier, a Palestinian baker agrees to work as an informant, but his true motives and alliances remain hidden.

Mo (2022) - Mo Najjar straddles the line between two cultures, three languages and a ton of foolishness as a Palestinian refugee constantly living one step away from asylum on the path to U.S. citizenship.

Listen: 

Saint Levant - born Marwan Abdelhamid, is a Palestinian/French/Algerian/Serbian artist based in California. He was born in Jerusalem during the second Intifada due to complications in the city where he would eventually spend his childhood years – the Gaza Strip.

Check out: From Gaza, With Love

Nehmasis - Nemahsis is the stage name of Nemah Hasan, a Palestinian Canadian pop singer from Toronto, Ontario

Check out: i wanna be your right hand

Zeyne - Zeyne is a Jordanian/Palestinian singer, songwriter and musician. A voice passed down from her grandmother down to her mother and then to her, 'songbird' zeyne seeks to create music that shares her truths and perspectives in the hopes of connecting with others worldwide.

Check out: Balak

Belly -Ahmad Balshe, known professionally as Belly, is a Palestinian-Canadian rapper, singer, songwriter, and record producer. Born in Jenin, Balshe was raised in Ottawa.

Check out: Xion

Eat:

Mxriyum - Mariam is a Palestinian home cook behind the ever popular account TikTok and Instagram, Mxriyum. 

Heifa (fufuinthekitchen) - I’m a first-generation Palestinian American raised in NJ but now calls Chicago home. I am the founder, recipe developer, and food photographer behind Fufu’s Kitchen. And if you are wondering, Fufu is my nickname-it just stuck!

Hanan Saeed (palestinianfoodie)

Joudie Kalla - Joudie Kalla is a Palestinian-British chef and food writer. She is the author of two prizewinning cookbooks, Palestine on a Plate: Memories from My Mother’s Kitchen, and Baladi: A Celebration of Food from Land and Sea, and has featured in venues like The New York Times, The Guardian, and Al Jazeera

Shop:

Nominal - co-founded by Lena Sarsour, a Palestinian, Nominal creates Arabic-inspired jewelry. They are currently donating 100% of proceeds to Pious Projects, an on-the-ground aid organization working in Gaza, until October 31, 2023. 

PaliRoots - Founded in 2016, the PaliRoots mission is to bring awareness to the world about the Palestinian culture by crafting specialty products inspired by its people and identity. They work with Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA), to donate a meal to children in Gaza for every order.

West Bank Apparel - West Bank Apparel was established in 2014, guided by a singular mission: to offer our customers products that resonate with a sense of purpose and contribution to a greater cause. They work with Islamic Relief USA to donate a portion of each sale to various charities providing meals and aid in Palestine.

[ahmednser]

We live in a border area that was considered dangerous in gaza strip. At the beginning of the war, we stayed in the house until the situation became more dangerous, so we moved to another, safer area, leaving behind everything we owned. The duration of our first displacement was two months. During that time, the Jews entered our neighborhood, our house, and our land, and burned it completely, with all of its possessions, furniture, and clothing. Nothing was spared from him. Even the earth has been destroyed and ruined After they left the neighborhood, we returned to our damaged house and repaired a small apartment that was not enough for the whole family, but it was of no use because there was basically no other option. Meanwhile, the famine intensified in our sector, as there was neither flour nor anything to feed the young, the old, or the newborn. Despite this, we remained steadfast. However, aid began to enter and another kind of torment began because it was another war that almost killed Anas,He went that day to get something to satisfy our stomachs or calm our hunger, but the occupation betrayed him and at the Kuwait roundabout, Israeli soldiers and a tank came out to him and opened fire on him, so he escaped from them, but he did not succeed. The Quadcopter hit him and opened fire and directly hit his hand. He was injured in January or at the present time. His hand did not improve for a number of reasons: no treatment, no tonics, no food.

Zakaria was also injured by a bullet in his ear due to the aid One day we were all in the house and were surprised by the sounds of aircraft approaching and bombing everywhere. We stayed until the situation calmed down a little and we went out. For the second time, the quadcopter shot at the child Tala, but this time it was worse. It hit her in a critical place and it might have been fatal had it not been for God’s will, as it betrayed her back and the bullet came out. From her chest

And another bullet in her hand. She stayed in the hospital for several days, then God bless her and she came out in good health. We returned to our house, as it was the only shelter for us and our large family. Day after day, week after week, the Jews invaded us again *the invasion of Olives*, but we could not get out, as we were literally surrounded, and there was no one around us except us.

Tanks on four sides and planes above us. You can imagine hearing the sounds of houses being bombed and thinking that your turn will inevitably come. And you hear the sound of confrontations around you. Even the sound of the helicopter coming to rescue its dead. We did not think that we would get out of there alive, but God is with us. The Jews bombed us with a tank shell, but thank God nothing happened to us and we remained in this state for 12 days without any breath or food, of course. When the siege ended, we left it and were no longer there for those reasons, but the Jews invaded again a third time and targeted the entire house.

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

We got tragic news yesterday. Three hostages were killed in Gaza. It's not clear yet whether they managed to escape Hamas, or their captors bandoned them, but they were walking around in what was a fighting scene. An IDF force realized three people were coming at them, the soldiers saw the hostages from a distance. In this area, there were, in addition to lots of battles, including yesterday, a lot of attempts to carry out suicide attacks, Hamas terrorists who tried to get as close to the IDF as possible, in order to take out with them as many soldiers as they can. The terrorists have been using deception, too. An officer said the IDF wasn't prepared for the scenario that hostages will be talking in the war zones in northern Gaza (where all civilians were warned to evacuate weeks ago), and that initials lessions from this incident had already been passed on to the forces on the ground. It's a tragic, understandable mistake, and I heard the father of an 18 year old hostage (still in captivity) say as much, that the families understand the mistake, and that they are with the soldiers. The killed hostages are (left to right in the pic): 26 years old Alon Shimriez, 28 years old Yotam Chaim and 25 years old Samer Talalkah. I've heard Yotam's mother and Samer's dad talking about their sons. My heart is breaking for the loss of these young men, for the grief of their families, and the pain of the soldiers.

Yesterday, Hamas fired a barrage of rockets at Jerusalem. This is what the interception of some of the rockets looked like:

On a personal note, you might have seen that I have housing issues due to the war, and I'm staying at a temporary place. The rocket attacks on Israel are a part of why it's a bit difficult for me to find a place to stay in. Since 1992 (a year after the First Gulf War, during which Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi tyrant responsible for the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Kurds and for the invasion of Kuwait, fired rockets at Israeli cities), houses in Israel must include a built in bomb shelter per apartment, but some homes are older. What do people living there do? It depends. Some of the older homes still have a communal bomb shelter for the whole building. Some don't, but if the building has an internal staircase with no items made of glass, it can be used to take shelter. But if that's not true either, these residents have to run out of their home and to the nearest public bomb shelter. In Jerusalem, we have a minute and a half to do this (which is better than anywhere else in Israel). But I'm disabled. I don't have a very good chance to grab my bunny and make it into a bomb shelter outside my apartment in less than a minute and a half. So yeah, I'm a bit limited in my housing options.

Yesterday's rocket attack was my first time hearing and responding to the siren after moving into this temporary place, which was the only one with a built in bomb shelter, that I could find in my price range and at short notice. I grabbed my bunny, ran in, meant to shut the door, when I realized that the metal covers for the windows of the bomb shelter aren't closed, and that they can only be closed from the outside. I didn't have enough time to go out, close them, and get back inside. So I just had to hope this time, the rockets or their debris wouldn't land close enough to hit us, or cause a blast that would shatter the glass window.

And these rockets were fired at more than one area of Jerusalem, which means that the sites holy to Judaism, Christianity and Islam in the Old City all came under threat yesterday. Let this sink in: Hamas, which had initiated rocket attacks at Israel on more than one occasion, under the claim that it was defending the al-aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, fired rockets at the al-aqsa mosque in Jerusalem yesterday. This is what it looked like at the Western Wall, right next to the mosque, as Jews who came there to pray had to run for shelter:

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A post shared by Rami Even-Esh (@koshadillz)

This is what it looked like at the same time on the Temple Mount, by the Dome of the Rock:

The debris of one of the rockets fired by Hamas fell by a hospital in the Palestinian city of Ramallah, which is not too far from Jerusalem. I haven't checked, but I'm willing to bet the supposed pro-Palestinian blogs are NOT ragingly posting about this.

The debris of another rocket fell on a main power line in the city of Beit Shemesh, also in the vicinity of Jerusalem, causing a blackout that lasted for hours.

Meanwhile, in an Arab neighborhood of East Jerusalem (an area where Hamas is pretty popular), when the Israeli Iron Dome intercepted rockets that could have killed the local population, they were recording themselves shouting "Allahu Akbar" and seemingly cheering for Hamas:

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A post shared by חמ״ל - חדשות מתפרצות בזמן אמת (@hamal_news)

It kind of reminds me that when Saddam Hussein was occupying the Arab country of Kuwait, starting in Aug 1990, making himself a pariah in most of the Arab world (which then chose to join the western coalition against Iraq in solidarity with Kuwait), the Palestinians were celebrating his rocket attacks on Israel.

After regaining its independence, Kuwait expelled its entire Palestinian population for this disloyalty. Funny how I've never come across a "pro-Palestinian account" that talked about the expulsion of 357,000 Palestinians from Kuwait, even though that's no less than roughly half the number that had to flee the war they started against Israel in 1947.

Two Hezbollah drones invaded Israel's north today. One crashed, the other one was shot down by the IDF.

In the pic below, on the right, you can see Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza, in a defiant pic he took after the end of Operation Guardian of the Walls, in May 2021. For 11 days, Israel responded to rocket attacks from Hamas, supposedly in the name of defending the al-aqsa mosque, while Sinwar hid down in the tunnels. When a ceasefire was achieved, he took this pic, sitting on an arm chair, not too far from one of his homes. That's right, one of his homes. He's not as rich as some of the other Hamas leaders, but he is wealthy enough to have more than one home. Yesterday, the IDF took over Sinwar's home, and "recreated" his pic:

This is the Almog Goldstein family during this past Hanukkah:

The father and the eldest daughter were murdered. The mother Chen, and two of her children, were kidnapped to Gaza, and released by Hamas during the hostage deal. Yesterday, she revealed that, as they were being let go, a Hamas terrorist told her to "go north" because they will be back.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[perfectlyripeclementine]

queer novel masterlist: Palestine edition

Found this list via @evereadssapphic on Instagram.

You Exist Too Much, Zaina Arafat

On a hot day in Bethlehem, a 12-year-old Palestinian-American girl is yelled at by a group of men outside the Church of the Nativity. She has exposed her legs in a biblical city, an act they deem forbidden, and their judgement will echo on through her adolescence. When our narrator finally admits to her mother that she is queer, her mother's response only intensifies a sense of shame: "You exist too much," she tells her daughter.

Told in vignettes that flash between the U.S. and the Middle East--from New York to Jordan, Lebanon, and Palestine--Zaina Arafat's debut novel traces her protagonist's progress from blushing teen to sought-after DJ and aspiring writer. In Brooklyn, she moves into an apartment with her first serious girlfriend and tries to content herself with their comfortable relationship. But soon her longings, so closely hidden during her teenage years, explode out into reckless romantic encounters and obsessions with other people. Her desire to thwart her own destructive impulses will eventually lead her to The Ledge, an unconventional treatment center that identifies her affliction as "love addiction." In this strange, enclosed society she will start to consider the unnerving similarities between her own internal traumas and divisions and those of the places that have formed her.

Opening up the fantasies and desires of one young woman caught between cultural, religious, and sexual identities, You Exist Too Much is a captivating story charting two of our most intense longings--for love, and a place to call home.

Haifa Fragments, Khulud Khamis

As a designer of jewelry, Maisoon wants an ordinary extraordinary life, which isn't easy for a tradition-defying activist and Palestinian citizen of Israel who refuses to be crushed by the feeling that she is an unwelcome guest in the land of her ancestors. She volunteers for the Machsom Watch, an organization that helps children in the Occupied Territories cross the border to receive medical care. Frustrated by her boyfriend Ziyad and her father, who both want her to get on with life and forget those in the Occupied Territories, she lashes out only to discover her father isn't the man she thought he was. Raised a Christian, in a relationship with a Muslim man and enamored with a Palestinian woman from the Occupied Territories, Maisoon must decide her own path.

A Map Of Home, Randa Jarrar

In this fresh, funny, and fearless debut novel, Randa Jarrar chronicles the coming-of-age of Nidali, one of the most unique and irrepressible narrators in contemporary fiction. Born in 1970s Boston to an Egyptian-Greek mother and a Palestinian father, the rebellious Nidali--whose name is a feminization of the word "struggle"--soon moves to a very different life in Kuwait. There the family leads a mildly eccentric middle-class existence until the Iraqi invasion drives them first to Egypt and then to Texas. This critically acclaimed debut novel is set to capture the hearts of everyone who has ever wondered what their own map of home might look like.

The Skin And Its Girl, Sarah Cypher

In a Pacific Northwest hospital far from the Rummani family's ancestral home in Palestine, the heart of a stillborn baby begins to beat and her skin turns vibrantly, permanently cobalt blue. On the same day, the Rummanis' centuries-old soap factory in Nablus is destroyed in an air strike. The family matriarch and keeper of their lore, Aunt Nuha, believes that the blue girl embodies their sacred history, harkening back to a time when the Rummanis were among the wealthiest soap-makers and their blue soap was a symbol of a legendary love.

Decades later, Betty returns to Aunt Nuha's gravestone, faced with a difficult decision: Should she stay in the only country she's ever known, or should she follow her heart and the woman she loves, perpetuating her family's cycle of exile? Betty finds her answer in partially translated notebooks that reveal her aunt's complex life and struggle with her own sexuality, which Nuha hid to help the family immigrate to the United States. But, as Betty soon discovers, her aunt hid much more than that.The Skin and Its Girl is a searing, poetic tale about desire and identity, and a provocative exploration of how we let stories divide, unite, and define us--and wield even the power to restore a broken family. Sarah Cypher is that rare debut novelist who writes with the mastery and flair of a seasoned storyteller.

The Philistine, Leila Marshy

Nadia Eid doesn't know it yet, but she's about to change her life. It's the end of the ‘80s and she hasn’t seen her Palestinian father since he left Montreal years ago to take a job in Egypt, promising to bring her with him. But now she’s twenty-five and he’s missing in action, so she takes matters into her own hands. Booking a short vacation from her boring job and Québecois boyfriend, she calls her father from the Nile Hilton in downtown Cairo. But nothing goes as planned and, stumbling around, Nadia wanders into an art gallery where she meets Manal, a young Egyptian artist who becomes first her guide and then her lover. 

Through this unexpected relationship, Nadia rediscovers her roots, her language, and her ambitions, as her father demonstrates the unavoidable destiny of becoming a Philistine – the Arabic word for Palestinian. With Manal’s career poised to take off and her father’s secret life revealed, the First Intifada erupts across the border.

The Twenty-Ninth Year, Hala Alyan

For Hala Alyan, twenty-nine is a year of transformation and upheaval, a year in which the past--memories of family members, old friends and past lovers, the heat of another land, another language, a different faith--winds itself around the present.

Hala's ever-shifting, subversive verse sifts together and through different forms of forced displacement and the tolls they take on mind and body. Poems leap from war-torn cities in the Middle East, to an Oklahoma Olive Garden, a Brooklyn brownstone; from alcoholism to recovery; from a single woman to a wife. This collection summons breathtaking chaos, one that seeps into the bones of these odes, the shape of these elegies.

A vivid catalog of heartache, loneliness, love and joy, The Twenty-Ninth Year is an education in looking for home and self in the space between disparate identities.

Between Banat, Mejdulene Bernard Shomali

In Between Banat Mejdulene Bernard Shomali examines homoeroticism and nonnormative sexualities between Arab women in transnational Arab literature, art, and film. Moving from The Thousand and One Nights and the Golden Era of Egyptian cinema to contemporary novels, autobiographical writing, and prints and graphic novels that imagine queer Arab futures, Shomali uses what she calls queer Arab critique to locate queer desire amid heteronormative imperatives. Showing how systems of heteropatriarchy and Arab nationalisms foreclose queer Arab women's futures, she draws on the transliterated term "banat"--the Arabic word for girls--to refer to women, femmes, and nonbinary people who disrupt stereotypical and Orientalist representations of the "Arab woman." By attending to Arab women's narration of desire and identity, queer Arab critique substantiates queer Arab histories while challenging Orientalist and Arab national paradigms that erase queer subjects. In this way, Shomali frames queerness and Arabness as relational and transnational subject formations and contends that prioritizing transnational collectivity over politics of authenticity, respectability, and inclusion can help lead toward queer freedom.

Belladonna, Anbara Salam

Isabella is beautiful, inscrutable, and popular. Her best friend, Bridget, keeps quietly to the fringes of their Connecticut Catholic school, watching everything and everyone, but most especially Isabella.

In 1957, when the girls graduate, they land coveted spots at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Pentila in northern Italy, a prestigious art history school on the grounds of a silent convent. There, free of her claustrophobic home and the town that will always see her and her Egyptian mother as outsiders, Bridget discovers she can reinvent herself as anyone she desires... perhaps even someone Isabella could desire in return.

But as that glittering year goes on, Bridget begins to suspect Isabella is keeping a secret from her, one that will change the course of their lives forever. (I believe this book is by a Palestinian author but not actually set in or about Palestine.)

[taviamoth]

🚨 Government Media Office in Gaza:

—

The "israeli" occupation has committed 5 massacres against aid distribution centers within 48 hours, resulting in 56 martyrs and more than 300 injured.

Within 48 hours, and in a flagrant and appalling violation of the sanctity of the blessed month of Ramadan, the "israeli" occupation army committed 5 massacres and crimes against aid distribution centers for civilian citizens and individuals working there, with the martyrdom toll reaching 56 martyrs, in addition to causing injuries to more than 300 individuals during these barbaric crimes.

The occupation army committed these massacres by bombing an aid distribution center affiliated with UNRWA in the Rafah governorate, resulting in 5 martyrs. Additionally, two civilian citizens working in aid delivery were killed by bombing their vehicle in the Rafah governorate.

Another aid distribution center in the Al-Nusseirat camp in the central governorate was also bombed, resulting in 8 martyrs.

On the nights of Tuesday and Wednesday last week, the occupation killed 11 martyrs, and more than 30 civilians last night who were waiting for the arrival of aid at the Kuwait roundabout in the Gaza governorate, 23 of whom reached the hospitals.

Over 10 martyrs' bodies were left on the ground, with the occupation preventing anyone from reaching them and firing at anyone who approaches.

We hold the American administration and the international community, in addition to the "israeli" occupation, fully responsible for the crime of genocide and for the war of starvation and famine that is deepening further in the Gaza Strip. We also hold them responsible for the massacres and crimes committed against civilians, children, and women on a daily basis.

We call upon all countries of the free world to pressure the occupation to stop the genocide and ethnic cleansing it is waging against our Palestinian people, which has so far resulted in more than 110,000 victims, including martyrs, injured, missing, and detained.

We also demand an immediate halt to the famine before it is too late, and call for the opening of land crossings and the immediate entry of hundreds of thousands of tons of aid piled up at the land crossings to our noble Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip through the land crossings, in conjunction with the blessed month of Ramadan and in response to the famine.

Government Media Office

Friday, March 15, 2024

[decolonize-the-everything]

Here are the day's main developments. At least 82 Palestinians have been killed and 98 injured in Israeli strikes in the past 24 hours, according to the latest figures from the Gaza health ministry. At least 32,705 Palestinians have been killed and 75,190 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October. Truce talks between Israel and Hamas will resume on Sunday in Cairo, Egypt's Al Qahera News TV reported on Saturday, citing a security source. To mark the 48th anniversary of Land Day on Saturday afternoon, thousands of Palestinians marched through the town of Deir Hanna. On 30 March 1976, six Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces as thousands of Palestinians in Israel's northern Galilee region rose up against the Israeli expropriation and occupation of Palestinian lands. The event became known as Land Day and a symbol of the national struggle that unites Palestinians around the world. According to a statement issued by the Colonisation and Wall Resistance Commission (CWRC), Israel has seized 27 sq km of land in the occupied West Bank since 7 October. World Health Organisation director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said around 9,000 patients urgently needed to be evacuated from Gaza for lifesaving treatment abroad. These patients had suffered wounds in Israeli bombing, or needed cancer treatment, kidney dialysis or treatment for other chronic conditions, Tedros wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter. Other key developments included: The British government has received advice from its own lawyers stating that Israel has breached international humanitarian law in Gaza but has failed to make it public, according to advice received from its own lawyers, according to a leaked recording obtained by the UK's Observer newspaper. At least five people were killed and dozens injured by gunfire during an aid delivery in Gaza. The incident happened after thousands of people gathered in the Kuwait roundabout in northern Gaza, awaiting the arrival of 15 food aid trucks. Al Jazeera Arabic reported that Israel had intensified its shelling on the eastern parts of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis. The air strikes targeted al-Mughraqa in the north of Khan Younis. UN peacekeeping mission Unifil confirmed that four of its personnel were injured in an explosion in the southern Lebanese border town of Rmeish. A group of around 20 relatives of Israeli captives held in the Gaza Strip on Saturday called for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's resignation, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported. Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Saturday that the "famine" in Gaza could be dealt with in a short time if Israel opened the land crossings for aid to enter.

[newsfrom-theworld]

27/05/24

Today's breaking news:

An IOF drone strike directly targeted the emergency entrance of Martyr Salah Ghandour Hospital in the city of Bint Jbeil with a missile in southern Lebanon.

Settlers have set fire to lands in Ain Qadis in the town of Husan, west of Bethlehem, this morning.

Palestinian Ministry for Health: The "isr@eli" occupation committed 7 massacres against families in the Gaza Strip, resulting in 66 martyrs and 383 injuries arriving at hospitals in the past 24 hours.

At least 3 Egyptian soldiers were reportedly killed in a gunfire exchange at the Rafah border crossing that took place between the Isr@eli army and Egyptian soldiers.

Two medical staff working at Kuwait Specialized Hospital were martyred as a result of being targeted by “isr@eli” reconnaissance aircraft while they were on duty in front of the hospital gate in the center of Rafah.

An Isr@eli air strike targeted a group of civilians at the entrance of the Kuwaiti hospital in Rafah.

The Isr@eli occupation army detonates a residential complex in the Sabra neighborhood in the center of the Gaza Strip.

Zionist forces assaulted and arrested 8 Palestinians in Haifa in northern occupied Palestine in a protest calling for the end of the war on Gaza.

An Isr@eli drone footage optioned by Al Jazeera shows Israeli forces blowing up residential blocks in Al Zaytoun neighborhood in Gaza city.

A number of Palestinians were injured by an Isr@eli air strike in Rafah.

[pcgamer]

Watch This Amazing Landing At Kuwait Int. Airport - Emirates B777-300ER

[cognitivejustice]

From crab monitoring and bear patrols to rescue operations, the watchmen are the official eyes and ears of indigenous communities

It was started more than 15 years ago in response to heavy commercial crab fishing in an area where the federal government had done little independent monitoring to determine if a fishery was sustainable.

It is the quintessential guardian assignment: remote monitoring work of immediate importance to a small community, far beyond the gaze of administrators at understaffed government agencies.

The watchmen are the eyes and ears of their First Nation community on the lands and water of their territory, which spans about 18,000 sq km (7,000 sq miles, roughly the size of Kuwait) on the central coast of British Columbia around the town of Bella Coola, 430 mountainous kilometres northwest of Vancouver.

For Mack, being chosen to join the guardians was a godsend. “I had no idea what I was going to do with my life,” she says.

[flipshitz]

Refuting common blood libel about Jews and israel:

gen·o·cide

noun

the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.

"a campaign of genocide"

From 1990 to 2022 the population of Palestine increased from 1.98 million to 5.04 million people. This is a growth of 155.0 percent in 32 years. The highest increase in Palestine was recorded in 1991 with 4.58 percent.

Israel is estimated to possess somewhere between 75 and 400 nuclear warheads (one can be used to wipe out all Palestinians if wanted but Israel will not)

What percent of Gaza's population has been killed?

1%

7, 2023. With 23,357 killed in Israel's military operation in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health, the Gaza Strip population has now lost 1% of its 2.3 million residents. (There is no reason to believe these numbers are true as hamas is a terrorist organization with no intention of reporting accurate numbers therefore we can estimate less.)

Jews originally trace their ancestry to a confederation of Iron Age Semitic-speaking tribes known as the Israelites that inhabited a part of Canaan during the tribal and monarchic periods. Modern Jews are named after and also descended from the southern Israelite Kingdom of Judah.

With this we know that Jews come from Judea and Arabs come from Arabia.

49 Muslim countries 2 billion Muslims

To 15 million Jews in their one Jewish state the size of New Jersey. 100 to 1 odds.

Zion: the hill in Jerusalem where king David built his kingdom -David (flourished c. 1000 bce) was the second ruler of the united kingdom of ancient Israel and Judah

Israel predates Islam by 1500 years.

ZionISM: the believe that Jews have the right to self determination in their homeland.

Muhammad Amin al-Husayni (189?-1974) was the Mufti (chief Muslim Islamic legal religious authority) of Jerusalem under the political authority of the British Mandate in Palestine from 1921 to 1937. His primary political causes were: -exiling and further blocking from Jews in diaspora from immigration.

-Organizing pogroms against Jews

-meeting with Hitler

-launching a war that would they would again lose & effectively displace thousands of Palestinians back into their neighboring Arab countries where they came from and blaming it all on the Jews.

After three defensive wars in 1949, 1956, and 1967, Israel had expanded its territory, leading to heightened tensions with the Arab states. On October 6, 1973, an Arab coalition of Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a surprise attack on Israel on Yom Kippur—the Jewish holy day of atonement.

After these victories and acquiring of more land, the Israelis chose to give back their ancestral soil as a land for peace deal which the Palestinians would violate year after year by electing genocidal governments that seek to finish hitlers bidding.

To date; The bilateral agreements between Israel and the Palestinians contain no prohibition against the building or expansion of settlements.

Despite contrary allegations repeated ad nauseam.

2001 Israelis uprooted its citizens who had settled in Gaza already in order to make way for the Arabs to settle in an effort for peace but almost immediately they elect Hamas which is a proxy of Iran much like Hezbollah who’s only political agenda is to kill all Jews.

Oct 7th is a direct result of what happens when you invite terrorists to your front door.

For more copy and paste link:

SATURDAY-OCTOBER-SEVEN.COM

For the “UN” excuse;

Islamic Countries in the UN (46): Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Egypt, Turkey, Iran, Sudan, Algeria, Afghanistan, Morocco, Iraq, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, Yemen, Syria, Kazakhstan, Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal, Tunisia, Guinea, Azerbaijan, Somalia, Tajikistan, Sierra Leone, Libya, Jordan, UAE, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Chad, Lebanon, Kuwait, Albania, Mauritania, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar, Gambia, Comoros, Djibouti, Maldives, Brunei, Lebanon. All of which are under the influence of IRAN which guess what? Owns Hezbollah and Hamas as its proxies. All of these nations have genocided or exiled all of its Jews. It’s no wonder they all take a majority vote over israel while simultaneously burying their crimes against humanity - but no mention of that from the peanut gallery on ur end right? Doesn’t fit your shill narrative. And to make matters worse; Iran's appointment to chair UN yes that’s right IRAN was appointed as chair for human rights - which drew rightful criticism at least thank god. Oh and 450 terror operatives in Gaza, mostly Hamas members, are also employed by UNRWA

Attacks on Israel: (still on going)

Shlomo Zalman Zoref 1851

Battle of Tel Hai 1920

Jaffa riots 1921

Meora’ot Tarpat 1929

Hebron Massacre 1929

The great revolt 1936-1939

*in the years 1937-1939 was funded by nazi germany*

War of independence 1948

Scorpions pass massacre 1954

Palestinian fedayeen

Jerusalem bombings 1969

Lord Airport massacre 1972

Munich massacre 1972

Yom Kippur Surprise attack 1973

Ma’alot Massacre 1974

Coastal road massacre 1978

Lanarca yacht killings 1985

1st intifada 1987-1993

Tel Aviv Jerusalem bus 405 attack 1989

Night of the pitchforks 1992

Western wall tunnel riots 1996

2nd intifada 2000-2008

Dolphinarium Discoteque massacre 2001

Sbarro restaurant suicide bombing 2001

Haifa bus bombing (16 suicide bombs) 2001

Passover massacre 2002

Yeshiva beit Yisrael bombing 2002

Cafe moment moment bombing 2002

Matza restaurant suicide bombing 2002

Yagur junction bombing 2002

Rishon lezion bombing 2002

Meggido junction bus bombing 2002

Patt junction bus bombing 2002

Karkur junction bombing 2002

Kiryat Menachem bus bombing 2002

Tel Aviv central bus station massacre 2003

Beersheba bus bombing 2004

2nd rosh ha’ir Restaraunt bombing 2006

Kedumim bombing 2006

Eilat bombing 2007

Jerusalem bus stop bombing 20011

Itamar massacre 2011

Tel Aviv truck attack 2011

Shaar ha negev school bus attack 2011

Tel Aviv bus bombing 2012

Gush Etzion kidnapping and murder 2014

Jerusalem synagogue attack 2014

Stabbing intifada 2015-2016

Tel Aviv shooting 2016

Temple Mount shooting 2017

Ariel stabbing 2018

Samaria combined attack 2019

Wave of terror 2022

Jerusalem bombings 2022

Bizengoff shooting 2023

Ramot junction attack 2023

October 7th massacre 2023

[flowersofjannah]

I am a married sister from USA and I recently want to make Hijra to gulf Arab countries. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait. Do you think it’s a good decision. I am not Arab and don’t speak Arabic but am willing to learn of course. As a English speaker and wanting to live in a majority Muslim land and also able to earn good money for a family, where do you think is a good fit? No country is perfect but I know I hate the states and don’t want to raise children here. I don’t want my tax dollars going into pockets of terrorists and murderers. Please help!

Assalamu 'alaykum!

I can't speak for Arab countries as I haven't been there, but I have been to Malaysia and I think it's a great place for hijrah! They donate all of their 10% tourism tax to palestine alhumdulilah and I found everyone there to be very kind and respectful, lots of beautiful masjids. I hope to live there one day myself in sha Allah ^.^

[eretzyisrael]

BY ROBERT SATLOFF

The 1973 Arab-Israeli war may be known to Jews as the Yom Kippur War, but it is widely known in the Arab world as “Harb Ramadan” — the Ramadan War — given that Anwar Sadat dispatched Egyptian forces to cross the Suez Canal during the holy month. But it is only a relatively recent example of Arab or Muslim armies waging war during this month. 

The Saudi newspaper Arab News provided a helpful primer on the topic in 2014: “While much literature has been written on Islamic conquests focusing on strategy, many victories occurred during Ramadan due to the focus of the Ummah on Allah Almighty and this removed fear from the hearts of the Muslims. This is why some of the greatest victories in Islam occurred during Ramadan …”

Starting with the seminal battle of Badr in Year 2 on the Islamic hijri calendar, corresponding to the year 624 A.D., the list of historic victories in Ramadan cited in this article includes “the conquest of Makkah (8 Hijri), the conquest of Rhodes (53 Hijri), the successful landing of Muslims on the coast of Spain (91 Hijri), the victory by Tarik Ibn Zayed against the King of Spain (92 Hijri), the victory of Salahuddin against invading crusaders (584 Hijri), and Mamluk’s victory versus invading Tatars in the battle of Ain Jiloot (650 Hijri).”

More recently, take a look at the bloodthirsty Ramadan record of the Islamic State. As a Washington Post reporter noted, a spokesman for the terrorist group exhorted followers in 2016 “to make it a month of calamity everywhere for nonbelievers” — and indeed they did, with gruesome Ramadan attacks against civilians from Kuwait to Syria to France to a nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

And, as my Washington Institute colleague Patrick Clawson pointed out in 2004, naive non-Muslim governments have been disappointed when they appealed to their Muslim foes for ceasefires during Ramadan: “Modern proposals for Ramadan ceasefires by secular governments — the Soviets in Afghanistan, Saddam Hussein when fighting the Islamic Republic of Iran — were uniformly rejected by the Islamist side, which usually intensified fighting during Ramadan.”