Posts Tagged ‘Roula Yaacoub’
“I am naked”: Lebanon campaign. The government too is totally naked…
I just got the no longer awaited news that Lebanon managed to form a government that lingered 11 months in “the making”.
And you know what? The new selected minister of Justice, and a candidate for the ministry the Interior and a former chief of the internal security, has been very vocal against the army that is protecting the citizens in the city of Tripoli (Lebanon) from the “terrorist” factions, which are supported or taking cover under the wings of Rifi, the minister.
Mind you that the parliament had last year extended its term for two years on the ground that the political climate is not amenable to election (advancing the same reason to the other confused “Arab States”, like Libya that extended the term of its assembly and a military General attempted a coup to dissolve the “Mou2tamar“)
The “I Am Not Naked” Campaign was posted on February 13, 2014 by champontop (selected as one of the top posts)
I tried a couple of days prior to the posting of this article to copy it, or part of this article or a similar one, from a link on FB in order to develop on it but it was locked. Until it was posted on wordpress.com.
I have posted 3 articles on that subject so far. You may read the first one Viva in the nude ski Lebanon https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2014/02/12/viva-sky-lebanon-jackie-chamoun-photos-before-heading-to-sochi-olympics/
Jackie Chamoun, 22 year old Lebanese Olympian skier, participated in a semi-nude photoshoot 3 years ago. The “making of” got out at the beginning of this week and caused a scandal among stone age media and minister Karami. Lebanon was outraged, they started stripping for Jackie!
At around 4pm on tuesday, I called up two friends of mine:
Carl Halal (photographer/animator/illustrator) and Mohamad Abdouni (art director/FIM2P editor) and told them I wanted to shoot naked people for Lebanon.
Carl called up photographer Tarek Moukaddem and he was instantly supportive and offered us his talent, time and studio! We were now the I’m Not Naked Team.
For all those who know me, know that it was never about the body and the nudity, it was about the message. I never got how so many people complain but few of them do.
As we saw that the #stripforjackie Cyrill Reaidy launched, was already spreading, we thought it was not logical to create a new one. And so we added that cause to our message!
This is not about the pictures we’re spreading.
It’s about Manal Assi & Roula Yaacoub beaten to death by their husbands (who now walk free).
It’s about a minister who’s worried about a beautiful model/athlete ruining Lebanon’s reputation, and that same minister who refused to sign that petition against domestic violence!
It’s about Jean Assi being arrested and thrown in jail for two months for tweeting about the president!
It’s about women being murdered and men getting away with it because they were crimes of honor.
It’s about the Lebanese Army not getting enough attention and recognition for arresting a suicide bomber (and many other terrorists) and getting him to disclose information about two cars that were about to go off!
(The last picture is of Jean Assi, not the other violent man who killed his wife)
We’re stripping to get your attention. And we did.
We could’ve done it in a completely other way, but so many have tried for a lot of years and things didn’t change.
We saw what Jackie’s body did to you, so we tried with our own.
Some of you didn’t understand, families cried or shouted.
Others were outraged that we were a disgrace. Some even told us, instead of stripping, go help these women.
We are, in our way. What are you doing?
Paris, London, Brussels, NYC, Boston, and other cities are joining our cause. It’s not about us. It’s about all of you.
We’re all Jackies.
It can be about Lebanon, but we are starting to think that it is now about the youth, since we’re getting international support.
They’re all shocked of how a 22 year old was attacked for being a model, and not praised for being an athlete.
I think enough was said about the matter. Mohamad has even said it better, I now urge you all “Jackie supporters” to support her by watching her perform on the 21st.
If we can gather around for the world cup, we can gather for her race and thank her for being the drop that mattered and woke us up about all the other issues that need to be addressed!
Before the campaign, I have seen 3 of my friends sharing the Manal Assi story.
After the campaign, my news feed is flooded with Manal Assi, Roula Yaacoub and Jean Assi’s pictures and articles. I think the point has been made!
A Teacher, a wife, a mother: Beaten to death in broad daylight in a crowded place…
Posted on: February 8, 2014
A Teacher, a wife, a mother: Beaten to death in broad daylight in a crowded place…
Family Violence is reaching the media, after centuries of being buried under carpets. These kinds of violence are not exclusive to under-developed societies, but are even more common in countries where opportunities to experience and witness violence are widespread.
Family violence is basically a community responsibility to monitor, re0educate, control, and expose.
BEIRUT: A woman died in a Beirut hospital early Wednesday due to injuries she suffered when her husband allegedly beat her repeatedly with a pressure cooker, a security source told The Daily Star.
Dahlia Nehme published in The Daily Star this Feb. 6, 2014
The husband, Mohammad al-Nhaily reportedly used the kitchen appliance to strike Manal al-Assi, his second wife, a mother of two, and a teacher, after a quarrel turned violent.
The incident took place in front of their two daughters, Tala and Sara, in their home in the Beirut neighborhood of Tariq al-Jadideh, the source said.
According to Assi’s brother, the neighbors heard the couple’s screams and called the local police station, only to be told by security personnel there that they couldn’t interfere in a family matter.
After beating Assi, Nhaily wrapped her in a carpet and tried to hide his crime, the brother told The Daily Star.
But neighbors and members of Assi’s family who live nearby broke into the house and rushed her to nearby Makassed Hospital.
Nhaily, a carpenter, managed to flee while the neighbors and family members were preoccupied with Assi, the brother said.
However, attempts to save Assi’s life failed, and she died 12 hours after being admitted to the hospital as a result of a deadly hemorrhage, the security source said.
Assi’s family held a funeral in Ali ben Abi Taleb mosque Wednesday and laid her to rest in Martyrs Cemetery, with shots fired into the air in tribute.
Assi and Nhaily’s daughters are staying at their grandparents’ house for the time being.
Assi’s family has filed a complaint against their son-in-law based on the medical report and the coroner’s examination of her body.
Neighbors told The Daily Star that the couple usually led a quiet life, with such violent quarrels rare. They said things had changed lately after Nhaily took a second wife.
This latest fatality related to domestic violence comes as the family of another victim, Roula Yaacoub, continues to demand justice for their daughter, who they say was also beaten to death by her husband.
Yaacoub was found comatose at her home in Halba, Akkar, last July, and died upon arrival at the hospital.
Yaacoub’s relatives and neighbors maintain that her husband beat her and their 5 daughters regularly.
However, the judiciary released a 13-page report last month that cleared Yaacoub’s husband, Karam al-Bazzi, of any role in her death.
| A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Daily Star on February 06, 2014, on page 4. |
Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Lebanon-News/2014/Feb-06/246514-teacher-beaten-to-death-by-her-husband.ashx#ixzz2sd5EGb3Q
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)
Can good events take place in Lebanon?
Alex Rowell posted this December 18, 2013 in NOW
Residents of the city might find it hard to believe (including me, especially that Paris came next), what with the multiple car bombs, rocket attacks, manic traffic, and perennial power and water shortages…
9. 4G Internet
Both of Lebanon’s service providers launched 4G Internet for the first time in 2013, ostensibly alleviating the country’s notoriously sluggish connection speeds.
However, at present the service is limited to specific areas in and around Beirut, and experts say Lebanon’s infrastructure is inadequate to make fully efficient use of the technology. (The funding are available and the necessary equipment also are ready for the remote districts, but Ogero is dragging its feet for political reasons to tarnish the great image of Sahnawe, the Communication minister))
8. Public sector workers win pay increase after weeks of strikes and demonstrations, public sector workers – whose wages have only seen two minor increases since 1997 – persuaded the cabinet to refer a bill that would increase their pay to parliament.
However, parliament has yet to actually approve the bill, and many economists argue incurring the additional expenditure during the present economic downturn could have dire repercussions. (We have no Parliament who extended its tenure for another 2 years, and we have no government for the last 7 months…)
7. General price levels unchanged
According to an October 2013 report from the Ministry of Economy, prices increased by just 0.5% in the 12 months since September 2012, compared to increases of 10% and 5% in the previous two years.
However, this is about the only good news for Lebanon’s economy, which has otherwise taken a dramatic hit from the neighboring Syrian crisis and the associated refugee influx. (Visit the supermarkets and you won’t be able to believe the government statistics)
6. Culture continues to flourish
While security fears did prompt the unprecedented relocation of the Baalbek International Festival, cultural events continued to thrive across the country, with several new street fairs, exhibition spaces, and literary publications, inter alia, being added to the annual itinerary.
A Syrian Contemporary Art Fair showcased the talents of those forced to leave the war at home. And even Tripoli, now the site of almost weekly gun battles, successfully launched its first film festival
5. Secularists win big at AUB student elections It is often said that elections at the country’s preeminent university indicate the political sentiments prevailing in the wider nation at large. If so, then Lebanon’s sectarian order may be facing growing resentment, given that secular students made unprecedented advances at the polls in November.
As an added bonus, the two secular candidates who went on to fill the powerful Vice President and Treasurer seats are both women, as is the Amal candidate who will assume the role of Secretary.
4. Oil and gas sector launches Lebanon’s nascent oil and gas sector began to take firm shape in 2013, with the new Petroleum Administration granting approval to 46 local and international companies to bid for exploration rights.
However, owing to the present lack of a government, two decrees necessary to get the bidding process underway have yet to be signed, and so progress to date has chiefly been symbolic.
3. Return of kidnapped pilgrims
Very rare indeed is it for something to go right in Syria these days. Yet 2013 did bring one silver lining to the nine Lebanese pilgrims held captive in Azaz, near Aleppo, whose 17-month-long ordeal was finally brought to an end in October.
Unfortunately, a number of other Lebanese are still being held in Syria, among them several nuns and the journalist Samir Kassab.
(And the swap deal was not fulfilled by the Lebanese government who is prosecuting those who kidnapped the Turkish pilots…)
2. Progress on domestic violence law
Following the harrowing murder of a 31-year-old mother, Roula Yaacoub, by her abusive husband in July, a long-awaited draft law criminalizing domestic violence was approved by a parliamentary committee.
Much like the public sector wage bill, however, parliament itself has not yet voted on the law, and feminist activists have further concerns that the draft doesn’t go far enough (it does not, for example, clearly recognize marital rape as a form of assault or the abuses done on foreign maids).
1. First civil marriage and birth
On April 25th, 2013, Nidal Darwish and Kholoud Succariyeh made Lebanese history when the interior ministry officially registered their civil marriage, the first ever carried out inside the country.
The couple exploited an obscure law dating back to 1936 that circumvented the traditional sect-based marital system. They then made further history when they left the “sect” field blank on their newborn son’s birth certificate, thus giving birth to Lebanon’s first “civil baby.”
Earlier this month, the Justice Ministry announced it would prepare a draft law to replace the 1936 article and formally recognize the legality of civil marriage in the Lebanese legal code.
Oxymoron, Liberty, Liberal, Liberalism, Libertine… And Is Liberalism in Lebanese a Myth?
Posted on: July 18, 2013
Oxymoron, Liberty, Liberal, Liberalism, Libertine… And Is Liberalism in Lebanese a Myth?
You think that the term Liberalism means some kind of liberty in choices, liberation from constraints, freedom from outside intervention, freedom of expression, rights to gather, “do as you please” in your decision and actions…
Nothing of the sort.
The terms liberal and Liberalism have various jargons in politics, economy, and finance that are not related to the social wishes and wants.
Liberalism is a political jargon used by the colonial powers to throw smokescreen on outright economic embezzlement and coercion on developing States.
Liberalism has been coined to express forms of economic activities, mainly in exploiting former colonial States by denying them import taxes on products that are subsidized by the developing States, by facilitating financial extortion schemes on the weaker people, by the rights to ruin entire economic bases for the benefit of the richest oligarchies inside and outside State boundaries, by allowing monopolistic enterprises, cancelling out any forms of competitions in the developed States… Dismantling well-run and profitable State institutions, and Privatizing them (read financed by Banks)…
Liberalism is a financial jargon expressing the will that all financial activities must be linked through Banks, directly linked to one of the 8 families related to the Rothschild House (hoarding $300 trillion). It fits the saying “Little cloud, you may wander any which way you want, where you rain your proceeds will return to me” (Harun Rashid, Abbasid caliph)
Liberalism is not Libertine life-style. Saudi Arabia is far more into Libertine way of life than Lebanon within enclosed palaces and special closed clubs of emirs and royal family members…
Life in Lebanon slowly but surely resets the dial on anyone’s “normality” barometer. You adjust to power cuts at home, at work, and in public places. You grow used to headlines constantly predicting impending war.
You even learn to laugh these off, once near-crises have passed you by. You stop thinking twice about buying $12 cocktails while a refugee child stands outside the bar, selling Chiclets for one hundredth the price of your shoes. I’m not proud of this, but all of these things have become my new normal.
Michelle Ghoussoub posted this July 12, 2013 on NOW: The Myth of Lebanese Liberalism
(with minor editing to match my style of writing)
Perhaps out of self-preservation, there is one thing I have never come to terms with: my inferior status as a woman.
In Lebanon, we don’t have it all that bad. (At least in the Christian dominated urban areas)
We can drive, dress as we like, study what we wish and have successful and fulfilling careers. But these norms should not be hailed as some kind of liberal victory. Rather as minimal requirements for a State that at least tries to manage itself “democratically”.
These so-called modern practices did nothing to help Roula Yaacoub when she was brutally murdered, allegedly by a husband who beat her regularly, and who remains a free man.
It frankly doesn’t mean much that women can dress provocatively and order a drink when their husbands can also legally rape them. Nor should we feel empowered by our right to date freely (within our religions, of course) when any woman who has lost her virginity is treated as damaged goods, or worse.
No society whose laws reflect the belief that a woman’s moral compass lies somewhere between her legs can logistically advance in any capacity.
If anything, Lebanon’s toxic mix of sexual objectification and repression enhances the extent to which women are seen as lesser beings.
Expected to remain simultaneously desirable and chaste, all sexual agency disappears when women are pressured to change their appearance to please men without being entitled to any fulfillment of their own. The narrative of Lebanon’s plastic surgeries – from breast enhancements to reconstructive hymen procedures – has been so well documented that it borders on cliché. If anything, it reflects the extremity of a country that marinates in superficiality, as half the population lacks basic rights.
This by no means implies that the situation is much better across the region, or in some of the world’s most developed countries.
While the horrific mass sexual assaults on women in Egypt have rightfully been vilified by international media, rape culture and restrictive laws in regards to women’s health continue to surface in the United States.
Hell, a video of Dustin Hoffman having an on-camera breakdown as he discusses his epiphany that society has “brainwashed” him against talking to ugly women has recently gone viral on the web.
But when pacifist feminists are threatened at gunpoint, and a mother of five is brutally murdered by a husband who then retains custody of her children, Lebanon may just take the cake in terms of ironic gender politics. And that should never pass as “normal” for any of us.
Adonis Diaries 