Lina Mounzer

cohosted a podcast with the great Leila Shami.

We spoke to Razan Rashidi from The Syria Campaign about a lot but particularly about how acts of justice build trust in the state and how without it a culture of impunity takes over that can spiral off into retaliatory violence and acts of vengeance.

International law governing conflict isn’t just “at a breaking point.” It was intentionally destroyed to protect Israel’s war on Gaza.

The War Within • EQUATOR The Islamic Republic, fearing for its own survival, presides over a bloodbath

“We all knew that a bloodbath had taken place, though as yet we didn’t know its true magnitude and perhaps never will.”

Salar Abdoh on what happened in Iran

www.equator.org/articles/the...

Sculptors, students and sportsmen: Who are the protesters killed in Iran? | The National Teenagers among hundreds of dead as unrest rages across the country

People killed protesting aren't numbers - they have names and stories. They had lives. Here are some of those killed in recent days in Iran

www.thenationalnews.com/news/mena/20...

I’m absolutely sick to read this. And I’m not interested in it as a statement of US hypocrisy — that’s old fucking news to us in this part of the world. Be its tongue red or blue, the US has only ever spoken the language of murder. It’s not help that’s on the way for Iran. It’s hell, pure & simple

This link should take you past the paywall. As a thanks for all the news and updates you’re posting 🙏🏽

archive.is/202601111134...

She never misses

Trump delivered an embarassing performance at the UN general assembly | Mohamad Bazzi This was Trump unfiltered and unleashed – as he has been since the start of his second term, with no restraint and no need for even the mildest niceties

“This was Trump unfiltered and unleashed – as he has been since the start of his second term, with no domestic or international restraint on his power and no need for even the mildest diplomatic niceties” — my latest for @theguardian.com on Trump's unhinged UN speech

Very proud of the new issue that’s up today. If you’ve been struggling with genocide-worklife balance, this one’s for you

Not pointless. The cruelty and destructiveness is the point. They see themselves as performing the divine mission of every colonizer: use any and all means to destroy the livelihood and will to live of the untermenschen to make way for the superior race to thrive

Got any questions for me? Please write in 👇🏽

This months’ q is from a man who wants to know why he’s still bothered that he can’t get through to his liberal Zionist friend

Sarah! I was thinking about you ❤️
I miss the whole community on twitter and don’t know where to find anyone anymore

Quote for the DAWN (Democracy in the Arab World Now) website: “The US is deeply complicit in the starvation and unspeakable suffering that Israel is imposing on the people of Gaza. Thanks to an unlimited supply of US weapons and diplomatic cover — starting with the Biden administration and continuing under Trump — Netanyahu has been able to continue Israel’s genocide with impunity.”

“The US is deeply complicit in the starvation and unspeakable suffering that Israel is inflicting on the people of Gaza. Thanks to an unlimited supply of US weapons and diplomatic cover, Netanyahu has been able to continue Israel’s genocide with impunity” — my comments to @dawnmenaorg.bsky.social

Agreed, but it’s the lack of diversity of users that frustrates me most

I keep forgetting BlueSky exists 🙄

Very proud to have been editor on this piece. Please read:

Sending you love and good wishes for your own tough journeys c.c. from back in Beirut, a place from which it’s impossible to stay away ❤️

Tell me this isn’t the earth fighting back

The entire western press was practically creaming their pants over the pager attacks in Lebanon. I bet some of them even think highly of using aid as bait to massacre starving Palestinians. Western media never met an Israeli depravity it didn’t admire or an Arab they didn’t think deserved death

Also: their drones have been buzzing over Beirut since Friday. The masters of stealth surveillance use drones so loud you hear them indoors with the windows closed. Masters of torture both physical & psychological

In three days of bombing, Israel has murdered nearly 1,000 Iranians. That is over 300 people per day. While continuing to carry out massacres in Gaza, dropping bombs & also directly gunning starving people down. Get this malignant cancer out of our region for the love of humanity

Afraid for Our Children’s Future, How Do We Talk About War? Souseh counsels hope and continued resistance to an anxious mother worried about her kids in dangerous times.

For this month’s Dear Souseh column, I answer a question from a Lebanese mother in France concerned about how and how much to tell her kids about the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Do you have a question for Souseh? Pls write to dearsouseh@themarkaz.org

themarkaz.org/afraid-for-o...

Badar’s fellowship is partially subsidized by the Scholars at Risk program, which works with U.S. universities to host international scholars facing threats in their countries. He never imagined that a country with a Scholars at Risk program would one day pose a risk to scholars.

A powerful essay ⤵️

I can’t imagine how it wouldn’t be! 😅

So the taxidermied head inside the car would definitely be a dealbreaker

On Brotherhood and Blindness - Longreads In this short personal essay, Salar Abdoh recounts the summer of 1972—during the Munich Summer Olympics—when he was sent to England for an eye operation. At the hospital, he meets an Arab boy, whom…

"In our special brotherhood of that summer of ’72 in London, the absence of words – in Arabic, in Persian, in distant English – did not require our names."

Salar Abdoh for @codastory.bsky.social and @strangersguide.bsky.social: