Quote of the Day

“I chose journalism to be close to people. It may not be easy to change the reality, but at least I was able to make their voice heard in the world.” -Shireen Abu Akleh, Palestinian American journalist

May she rest in God’s eternal peace, not found on earth, amen 🤲🏻🙏🏻

In Search of #Jan25 Missing & Detained

Below is a message from fellow tweeter Ruwaydah as we try to collect and search for those still missing/detained since January 25th in Egypt. If you have ANY information on ANY missing or detained persons, PLEASE post a comment, email me or send Ruwaydah or myself a tweet ASAP! We’ll assure the information is sent to the appropriate people and news sources to help assist in the search!

This link has a list of those missing. Please check it to see if you know the whereabouts of any of those.

Thank you kindly, in solidarity

Ms. Hala & Ruwaydah

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This is a sincere call to all activists in Egypt to collectively help our Brothers and Sisters. In the past few days we have been united, Christian, Muslim, Atheist and agnostic towards a common goal to bring democracy, freedom and liberty within our society.

In the process the Government has responded harshly, many dead, injured and dozens kidnapped. In order to help those kidnapped and in particular their families we are trying to get in touch with them. Unfortunately we don’t have their contact numbers, so we can’t get in touch with them.

If you know someone who is missing and is willing to talk about it to news channels, we urgently need you to get in contact with us. It is essential that those arrested/kidnapped are helped and not left alone.

Please leave a comment, or send an email. We are here to help those detained/kidnapped and we want to get them out.

—–

The following link below showcases an unidentified martyr from the Egyptian protests. If you or someone you know recognizes this person, please let us know so that we may try to assist.  http://bit.ly/g1iKc2

.الرابط التالي يعرض علينا شهيد مجهول الهوية من الاحتجاجات المصرية. إذا كنت أنت أو أي شخص تعرف هذا الشخص، واسمحوا لنا أن نعرفه حتى نتمكن من محاولة مساعدة

http://bit.ly/g1iKc2

Why This News Junkie is Boycotting CNN

I’ve been deemed a news junkie by family and friends for many years. In one seating, I’ll switch between CNN and Aljazeera while reading local news and news blogs online while getting alerts on my Blackberry for specific stories I’m following. Almost every day, another news media has showed its biased ways. This time around belonged to CNN.

Octavia Nasr has been with CNN for 20 years as the Middle Eastern Affairs Senior Editor. She was the reason behind CNN’s ability to report on Iran’s elections last year. She has always been the primary go to person for Rick Sanchez, Anderson Cooper and others on CNN whenever reporting on anything Middle East arose. The importance of her work and friendly demeanor has granted her a mass following on Twitter, Facebook and blogs.

Last weekend, Nasr tweeted:

Sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah… One of Hezbollah’s giants I respect a lot. #Lebanon

That tweet has since been removed and replaced with:

Regret tweet about Fadlallah death bc I didn’t explain specific respect for standing up for Muslim women. http://bit.ly/adrp95

The link takes you to her CNN blog where Nasr not only explains why she had some “respect” for Fadlallah but also apologizes for her “error in judgement” when it came to her former tweet. However, that blog came in response to the anti-anything-pro-Arab-and/or-Muslim-without-any-form-of-understanding right winged fanatics who immediately bashed CNN over her “biased” tweet. They seem to have forgotten her work and contributions to the American and international media on the issues involving the Middle East. They also seem to have either forgotten or cared less to remember that Fadlallah was not part of Hezbollah. He was pushed out by the group for his “moderate” views and disagreement on many of their ideologies. Nasr’s feelings was simply in relation to the things they did agree on, especially when it came to women’s rights.

Of course, that doesn’t matter. Just like it doesn’t matter that the Lebanese people voted for Hezbollah in their parliament; the Palestinian people voted for Hamas to govern Gaza and are now suffering the consequences of acting upon their right to vote.

Personally, I don’t agree with either group or most of their ideologies. However, who am I to tell a people how to vote, how to believe, what to speak or what to think? The line between speaking your mind (with respect of course) and being politically correct has some how vanished.

The fact is, if we don’t like them, we deem them as terrorists and forbid anyone to think of them as otherwise. Yet if we like them, we deem them as friends and forbid anyone to think of them as otherwise. Now that’s what I call, “freedom of speech!”

According to CNN’s internal memo posted by Mediaite yesterday, it was agreed that Nasr is “to leave the company”. For CNN to advertise that they are a network that showcases all points of views, firing Nasr contradicts just that. To basically do to Nasr what Hearst did to Helen Thomas is absurd and simply stupid. Just like the Hearst lost me as a reader, CNN has lost me as a long time viewer.

Other Sources:

Octavia Nasr’s Twitter Page

Salon – 8 July 2010

MEDIAite – 7 July 2010

NY Times – 7 July 2010

NY Times – 8 July 2010