Andrzej Wajda’s The Promised Land, screened on June 17 by the Toronto International Film Festival and part of its ongoing retrospective on contemporary Polish cinema, transports us back to early 20th century Lodz, a multi-ethnic city in central Poland that brings the uglier aspects of the industrial revolution up close and personal. Based on a novel by […]
Iraq is imploding. The Sunni jihadis of the group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria have moved to within sight of Baghdad, while the Shi’ite government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki becomes more dependent than ever on Iran. More and more, even Americans — who suffered tens of thousands of soldiers killed […]
Shortly after posting a stunning victory in last month’s European Parliament election, Marine Le Pen, the French politician who leads the National Front, said she hoped to form a far right-wing alliance of like-minded parties in Europe. Tellingly enough, she ruled out joining forces with an ultra nationalist Greek party that, she believes, has embraced […]
Across a wide swath of Maghreb North Africa and the Sahel countries, the United States has assumed an old European role: combating Islamist jihadists. The situation has become worse since the overthrow of Libya’s brutal dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Many of his former mercenaries, along with their large stockpile of weapons, are now active […]
The biggest misconception of the present-day Middle East is a distinction between “good guy” liberal democrats and “bad guy” Islamists. There is no such distinction because there are no such democrats, at least in the tumultuous fertile crescent of Syria and Iraq. What we’re seeing in these two countries is a death struggle between Islamists, mainly […]
I was raised on Polish food with a Jewish accent, but after my first trip to Israel in the summer of 1967, I became hopelessly hooked on Middle Eastern/Mediterranean cuisine, finding it fresh, flavourful and healthy. In Israel, I discovered the wonders of falafel, hummus, baba ghanoush, tabbouleh, lamb, beef and chicken skewers, roasted peppers, […]
Tel Aviv, Israel’s lively city set along the shores of the balmy Mediterranean Sea, tends to be architecturally drab. On closer inspection, it leaves a far more positive impression. Founded 105 years ago as a garden suburb of adjacent Jaffa, and now Israel’s cultural and commercial capital, Tel Aviv has the distinction of possessing one […]
Two Middle East powers upgraded their bilateral relations this week as Iran’s president visited Turkey. The president of Turkey, Abdullah Gul, declared that Hassan Rouhani’s visit marked a “new era” in Turkey’s sometimes fraught relationship with Iran. Rouhani, a self-styled reformer who has made it his mission to improve Iran’s foreign relations, was the first […]
Last weekend in Paris, Jean-Marie Le Pen insulted some celebrities who had criticized the National Front’s success in the recent elections to the European parliament. When he came to the French Jewish actor and pop singer Patrick Bruel, Le Pen said “We will organize an oven for him next time.” Le Pen used the […]
Since the outbreak of civil war in Syria three years ago, critics have claimed, not without reason, that the United States has done far too little to arm non-jihadist rebels seeking to topple President Bashar Assad’s Baathist regime. A few days ago, the former U.S. ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford, officially confirmed this accusation. In […]