A R A B I C A ارابيكا
12-MM TALKING
*A man in the northern Syrian city of Idlib found a creative way to describe recent protests in the city. “The city of Idlib, June 26th 2011,” he begins the narrative, while filming bullets placed on two pieces of white paper spelling out the word “freedom” in Arabic. Security forces fired tear gas on protesters and in crowded residential neighborhoods, the man says, and then used rubber bullets. As he is talking, he picks up a shell casing that forms part of the last letter of “freedom” and holds it close to the camera. “Twelve milliters – written on it ‘Made in Damascus,”” he said. Then he picks up a rubber bullet, neatly placed next to a second to form the dots under one of the Arabic letters. “Bashar and his thugs only understand the language of bullets,” the narrator says.
LANGUAGE OF REFORM
*Demonstrators both for and against reforms proposed by King Mohammed VI took place in cities across Morocco. The proposed changes require a referendum vote before being implemented. They include transforming Morocco into a constitutional monarchy and making Tamazight, the Berber language, one of the country’s official languages.
HEALTH BULLETIN
*Yemeni news website Maarib Press reports that “hundreds of thousands’ of Yemenis took to the streets demanding the departure of President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s regime and denouncing American and Saudi intervention in the country. Protesters also demanded that Saudi Arabia disclose details about the health of Saleh, who has been in a Saudi hospital since a rocket attack on his presidential palace in Sanaa earlier this month. Saleh’s health has been the subject of wildly varying rumors and speculation
RED SHIRT
*The Bahrain Revolution February 14 Facebook group posted a video said to be of a government “torturer named Yousef al-Manaee wearing a red shirt in the video and attacking a woman who tried to stop them from arresting the young man.” The man in question is Mohammed Reza al-Shaikh, and the administrator states that he was arrested in a-Daye village on Friday, June 25th. A small nighttime protest of men and women appears at the beginning of the clip, with shouts of “the people want the regime to fall.” At 4 minutes 30 seconds in, security forces arrive to the scene. At 7:12, the man in the red shirt pushes an older woman before getting into a police car.
June 27, 2011
photo credit: illustir