I don’t know

A few days ago I was watching this disturbing video on the bombing of Al Barra in Syria. There were too many civilian victims. I thought Bashar was a monster. But is he the only monster in the Syrian tragedy? What about the different opposition factions, Syria’s neighbours, “friend” and “foes”, Russia and the West, TV channels? It is said that Lakhdar Brahimi might resign soon, do we know the real reasons?
Obviously I don’t know.

3G deployment in Algeria is taking forever, the minister keeps setting dates and then postponing. Some people think it is because of purely technical reasons, others say it’s because the government is incompetent, others say it is because of Djezzy problem, and a few days ago somebody gave another explanation on TV.
I think it is all the above but, let’s be honest, I simply don’t know.

Algerians’ invisibility

In a previous post I spoke of some Algerians’ desire to be acknowledged by the world. But a more urgent wish for Algerians is to be seen and acknowledged by their rulers, representatives and their compatriots in their country and abroad.

Invisibility is not just not being seen by the other. It is also not being considered and respected; it is being ignored both in terms of rights and duties. Being invisible makes one feel useless and, as a consequence, irresponsible. I tend sometimes to blame our people for their wrong-doings, the fact they do not care of the cleanliness of their cities, etc. but I know that it is because most of them feel they are invisible that they do it. Invisibility also deprives the person from their morals, hopes and dreams, from their future.

Are Algerians self-confident?

Pfuel was one of those hopelessly and immutably self-confident men, self-confident to the point of martyrdom as only Germans are, because only Germans are self-confident on the basis of an abstract notion- science, that is, the supposed knowledge of absolute truth. A Frenchman is self-assured because he regards himself personally, both in mind and body, as irresistibly attractive to men and women. An Englishman is self-assured, as being a citizen of the best-organized state in the world, and therefore as an Englishman always knows what he should do and knows that all he does as an Englishman is undoubtedly correct. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and easily forgets himself and other people. A Russian is self-assured just because he knows nothing and does not want to know anything, since he does not believe that anything can be known. The German’s self-assurance is worst of all, stronger and more repulsive than any other, because he imagines that he knows the truth- science- which he himself has invented but which is for him the absolute truth.

This excerpt is from Leo Tolstoy‘s War and Peace, and I remember that when I read it I immediately thought Tolstoy didn’t know us Algerians for he would’ve mentioned us otherwise. While smiling at my own thought, I questioned it and wondered whether we are self-confident or not.

African animals in Paris

I have always considered French apology or repentance for what it did in Algeria as a strictly French affair. This is why I haven’t written about Francois Hollande’s visit to Algeria and his recognition of Algerian suffering during the colonial era. Also, the fact everyone I follow on Twitter kept mentioning it that day saturated me.

During that visit and besides the disgraceful walkabouts in Algiers and Tlemcen, Bouteflika offered the French president a painting by Baya Mahieddine and two Barb horses (Samy and Sedja). Hollande’s present included an old book written by Jean-Joseph Léandre Bargès and a Sevres Porcelain sculpture of an Arabian horse. I should add the new Renault plant and the shale gas exploration agreement (to be confirmed) to the list of presents Hollande had received but some of you may disagree.

Anyway, I am writing this today to share with you a new PoFLeak information which I just received.

Book Review: A world without Islam

Meeting with a book has sometimes to do with luck. Sometimes it is because you are at the airport with some foreign currency which you couldn’t spend even after you visited the restaurant, the café and the duty-free shops. And then you spot a book with a catchy title and the right price to empty your wallet. So you buy it and read it during the 12 hours-long flight. Then you decide to write a review because you have nothing more interesting to write about.
This is what happened to me and this book.

Well, not exactly. I decided to write this post because the book’s topic is essential in our present days where so many wars are said to be launched against Islam-ist groups and threat.

In “A world without Islam“, Graham Fueller tries to picture a world where Islam wouldn’t have existed and considers the current trends to find out whether they would have been different or not. Would there still be a war on terror, a clash of civilisations, hatred towards the US, etc.

Links: Algerian Female Bloggers

I have shared in a previous post a list of the Algerian English blogs I knew. Today I am going to share links to another category, blogs owned by Algerian women. And as this category is bigger than the blogs written in English, I will only give links to the blogs I follow.

So here they are with no particular order.

Salima Ghezali is an Algerian journalist and you can read her editorials here. She doesn’t really have a blog but I am mentioning her because I consider her weekly audio editorials on Medi1 Radio as blog posts.

Ghania Mouffok is also

Hna ymout Kaci

The title of this post could be added to the “Algerian wisdom” page as it is a widely known Algerian saying; but I feel many countries do have a similar saying (if they don’t then they should get one) as proven by Gbagbo in CIV, Ezzine who did his best to stay in charge in Tunisia or Mubarak who is still giving it his all to remain the undisputed Zaim.

The Algerian president is also a fan of this saying as it seems he intends to not leave before death comes. Someone should tell him the saying is only an image and that three mandates are already an eternity for most of us. It is by the way ironic that the candidate who declared in 1999 that his life was behind him, that he had no interest in Power, that if the people did not want him he’d be glad to leave them with their mediocrity; that man changed the constitution and cheated in the elections just to stay in charge of these mediocre people.

Poll: Disappointing WikiLeaks on Algeria

The title says it all; despite the many daily articles we read on the Algerian newspapers and those some specialist (or not) bloggers dedicated to the topic, I think the Algeria-related cables we got to know so far didn’t bring any additional information to what everyone already knew. I didn’t really follow the international news recently and I am therefore not aware of all the cables’ contents but even those related to the Middle-East and the probable war on Iran had little interest if at all.

I would like first to say that I didn’t feel comfortable with the idea of WikiLeaks sharing these cables first with some mainstream newspapers which “analyse” (and filter) them for us.

8 May 1945, the events which became an opportunity

Today the world celebrates the end of WWII. Algeria also commemorates 8 May 1945, but for us Algerians, this day was a bloody sad one. Like most of the old world’s populations, the Algerian people wanted to share their happiness after the end of WWII and remind the French colonizer and the other victors that they existed and wanted their freedom back, so they organized some peaceful demonstrations. But France didn’t intend it that way and massacres were perpetrated in many parts of Algeria, especially in Setif, Guelma and Kherrata.

So the commemoration of these events is a good way so nobody forgets the past and how dearly paid was our independence. The commemoration should also remind France and the world of the ugliness and inhumanity of the colonisation system. These last years’ talks between Algeria and France, and the more recent questions which arouse in France around the “Outside of the law” movie, show that we probably need more frequent and stronger reminders if we want to convince everybody.

Having said this, I would like to deal with another aspect of these events.

It runs in the family: why Arabs are incompatible with meritocracy

In ‘The Republic‘, Plato addresses a very interesting aspect: the relationship between the family, society and the ruling system. Although this was not the major aspect the oeuvre was concerned with (it was concerned with justice actually), it was nonetheless a very intriguing aspect where Plato reflected on how the influence of blood ties could be abolished in order to prevent them from interfering with politics and the rulers’ aptitude to act solely in the interest of the community. He went on to suggest a system based on commununism of women and children, arguing that this will destroy affection between husbands and wives on one hand and parents and their offspring on the other. Today, it would be tempting to call Plato a