All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Woman journalist found with throat cut in southern Libya – Reporters Without Borders

Reporters Without Borders is shocked to learn that Naseeb Miloud Karfana, a TV journalist based in the southern city of Sabha, was murdered on Thursday 29 May. Her body was found together with her fiancé’s in the city’s northern Al-Hay Al-Jadida district. Her throat had been cut and she appeared to have been tortured.

Naseeb had worked for the state-owned TV station Libya Al-Wataniya as its programme coordinators in Sabha for the past eight months, the station’s director, Ali Shaniber, said.

Karfana left the TV station at about 7 p.m. with her fiancé, who came to collect her in his car, so that they could attend a friend’s wedding together. When she failed to arrive, her mother contacted the TV station, where an employee confirmed that Karfana had left.

The authorities have not as yet released any autopsy reports identifying the exact cause of death of the two victims.

Relatives said Karfana and her fiancé had recently received repeated threats from an unidentified person. Reporters Without Borders urges the competent authorities to carry out an impartial investigation without delay to identify the motive for this double murder, giving full consideration to the possibility of a link to Karfana’s work.

“It is imperative that those responsible for this shocking murder are quickly found and brought to account, in order to end impunity in Libya,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Christophe Deloire said.

via Woman journalist found with throat cut in southern Libya – Reporters Without Borders.

Samir Kassir on being Arab

Read this if you have not read before

Hummus For Thought

Samir Kassir

Today we remember Samir Kassir.

Nine years ago to this day, a car bomb exploded in Beirut. The usual confusion that followed was soon replaced with a nation-wide shock. The victim this time was none another than Samir Kassir.

Kassir cannot be described in a few words, so I won’t try and do so. The son of a Palestinian father and a Syrian mother, Kassir was one of the most well known intellectuals of the Arab left. He was a strong supporter of the Palestinian cause, and of Secular Democracy throughout the Middle East. His attempt to defend universal principles of equality and justice and adopt them to a Pan-Arab context made him deeply unpopular with some, leading to his death – it is usually believed that it was his opposition to the Syrian government’s presence in Lebanon and his criticism of the Baath party that killed him.

The following is an…

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Where Did I Lose My Name? #poetry #travel

penned in moon dust

new name

Somewhere between LAX, Charlotte  and Baltimore

I lost my identity

in the airplane engine’s intake

(or in the Starbuck’s line)

I was sucked in

spun about

spit out on a cup

what remains are three letters

that don’t belong to me

I finger them

striving for meaning

squinting for an answer

“L” always a sexy letter

that looks better curvy

saying “linger on my loops”

“I” is almost floating away

in a cloud of after thought

at 30,000 feet

“Z” a backwards s

the sound buzzes through your teeth

rather than hisses

and where am I?

Drowning in remembrance

attached to another name?

or talking in strange tones

after too much helium?

gather up your bags

whoever you are

there is  another leg to life’s journey

regardless of the name

wing

Ever had your name spelled wrong? Been called something else? How do you respond?

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The Newark Tory candidate’s mansion home he’s trying to keep secret:

Posh, very posh!

Pride's Purge

(not satire – it’s the Tories!)

The Tory candidate for the Newark by-election Robert Jenrick describes himself as “the son of a secretary and a small businessman”.

But for some strange reason, nowhere does he mention he’s also a Director of Christie’s auction house.

Perhaps he’s trying to present himself as a man of the people.

Which is probably why he also doesn’t mention his home.

Well, one of Jenrick’s homes to be exact – he also owns two houses in London – but the most impressive in his personal collection of expensive houses is his country home called Eye Manor which he bought in 2009.

Eye Manor is situated in Herefordshire (not in Nottinghamshire where Newark is situated) and was listed for sale at a reasonable £1.3 million.

Reasonable I say because it really is very, very nice indeed:

eye manor 1

eye manor 2

eye manor 3

eye manor 4

.

Not exactly a man of the people then?

.

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14 confirmed Ebola cases and 4 deaths revealed | Sierra Express Media

Freetown, May 30, 014 (SLENA) – The Ministry of Health and Sanitation has Confirmed 14 cases of Ebola and four deaths as of May 29, 2014.

Making the disclosure at the Inter-Ministerial committee on Ebola meeting held in the Health Ministry’s Conference hall in Freetown, Health and Sanitation Minister, Miatta Kargbo said out of the deaths, one died in the Kenema Hospital, one in the Kailahun community, and the two other deaths occurred in Liberia from patients who discharged themselves from hospital  to reside in Liberia.

via 14 confirmed Ebola cases and 4 deaths revealed | Sierra Express Media.

Israel bans Muslim call to prayer in Hebron 53 times in May | Maan News Agency

Israeli forces have forbidden mosque leaders from playing the call for prayer through loudspeakers at the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron 53 times in May under the pretext that it bothers nearby Jewish settlers, the Palestinian ministry of endowment said.

Hundreds of extremist Jewish settlers have taken over homes in Hebron’s Old City, and Israeli authorities use their presence in the southern West Bank city as an excuse to limit the ability of the mosque to play the call five times a day, according to Islamic custom.

The ministry of endowment’s Hebron office said in a statement that banning call for prayer “is a clear violation of freedom of worship which all international conventions maintain.”

In April, Israeli authorities prevented the mosque from playing the call to prayer 60 times.

More than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in settlements across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, in contravention of international law.

via Israel bans Muslim call to prayer in Hebron 53 times in May | Maan News Agency.