Tunisia: 9 Convicted on Terror Charges (Eve)

Nine men were convicted on terrorism charges last week, after six of the suspects were arrested when the Tunisian government intercepted a letter from a Tunisian man in Iraq warning the other men to leave Tunisia and travel to Algeria, where they would meet up with a group from al-Qaida on a train.  The author [...]

Media Crisis leads to Identity Crisis for Arab Youths (Meredith)

The Arab Forum on Adolescents and the Media, organized by UNICEF, met recently in Dubai. Concerns have been raised about the amount of children in the Arab world who are illiterate, and have not received a proper education. The organization fears that, if nothing is done about these children, they will struggle to succeed in [...]

Ben Ali Receives the Award from Organization of the Islamic Conference (Meredith)

Recently, President Ben Ali of Tunisia received a prestigious award from the Organization of the Islamic Conference. This inter-governmental organization is comprised of 57 states and has a permanent delegation to the UN. Ben Ali was given this award at an international conference on terrorism in commemoration of the work he has done for his [...]

An interview with President Ben Ali

Yesterday, Le Temps published a fascinating interview with Tunisia’s President Ben Ali. November 7th, 2007 marked his 20 years as president, and in honor of this landmark event, the monthly magazine “Arabies,” which is published in Paris, decided to ask Ben Ali about his time in office and the progress Tunisia has made in the [...]

Lack of Milk Afflicts Tunisia (Meredith)

Tunisia is currently suffering from a lack of milk, also referred to in the article as “white gold.” For the past few weeks, no bottled or powdered milk has been available in stores nationwide. The milk shortage has resulted from the augmentation of the price of cow feed due to a lack of supply, combined [...]

Helping Tunisia’s Homeless Children

This article discusses poverty in Tunisia, especially as it relates to homeless children. Tunisia is allegedly moving backwards from where it was in the 1990s in terms of protection of the fundamental rights of its children. Though the article contends that “working children and children living on the streets is not a frequent phenomenon here,” [...]

What Should We Do Now? Coping with the Recent Tunisian Floods

BY MEREDITH RAHN-OAKES
This post discusses two articles on the same topic. They are both classified under national news, one on October 14th and the other on October 15th.
The big news out of Tunisia this weekend is that the country has been ravaged by floods. Torrential downpour over two days resulted in a crisis that caused [...]

Class Summary of 10/11/07–Another Look at North African States by Aly Singer

In today’s class, a main focus was Authoritarianism and its involvement in North African states. We defined this type of government as having one ruler with military support, one party with total political domination, modernization of its economy (by integrating itself in the world’s economy), having a strong industry, and being secular (not basing the [...]

Participants in the International Koran Memorization Contest in Tunis Pay Hommage to President Ben Ali

Hommage au Chef de l’Etat des participants au concours international de Tunis de mémorisation du Coran
Perhaps the rough equivalent of an American Spelling Bee, the Koran memorization contest took place in Tunis recently. What seems most interesting about this article, in light of what we discussed in class today, is the reverent tone with which [...]

U.S. Kills a Leader Of Al-Qaeda in Iraq: Tinisuan Directed Foreign Fighters -Eve (washington post)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/28/AR2007092800674.html
Abu Usama al-Tunisis, a native Tunisian and senior member of al-Qauda was killed in Iraq by the US military last week. During a press conference at the Pentagon, Josheph Anderson (chief of staff of Multi-National Corps-Irag) claimed that this is a big step that will continue the “increasingly fracture” group (al-Quada) down. [...]