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Geopolitics

ARABICA Thursday, Feb 3, 2011

ARABICA  Thursday, Feb 3, 2011

A R A B I C A ارابيكا

your daily shot of what the Arab world is saying, hearing, sharing


by Kristen Gillespie


TWITTERING: Egyptian opposition leader Ayman Nour, head of the Al-Ghad party and who was imprisoned for four years after challenging Hosni Mubarak in the 2005 presidential election, fired off this tweet:

"I witnessed today, and my heart breaks over it, the most despicable crime that can be committed by any regime in the world. And yet, I also saw the greatest popular revolution in the world. God be with you, people of Egypt."

Other Egyptian twitterers are holding their breath as all live television feeds out of Tahrir Square have been cut…and predicting the move is in preparation for large-scale attacks on protesters Friday.

GRAPHICALLY SAID: A grassroots cartoon that would have been unheard of just two weeks ago.

It reads: "Support the revolution"

ALL NEWS IS LOCAL: An unprecedented meeting of the Islamist opposition and King Abdullah II of Jordan took place on Thursday, with the king for the first time in 10 years admitting that political reform had slowed down.

The Jordanian monarch regularly speaks in his mellifluous Oxford-refined English about reform, democracy and modernization while interviewed in the West, misleading at best considering the reform process ground to a halt years ago.

A statement released by the press office of the Muslim Brotherhood, the parent organization of the political party Islamic Action Front called the meeting "candid and positive." Apart from discussing the most pressing demand of political reform to allow for democratic parliamentary elections, the statement added that "emphasis was placed on public freedoms, and citizen security, and dignity, and to fight corruption in all its forms and to promote national unity."

The Islamic Action Front said it would continue to protest until its demands are met.

ALL NEWS IS GLOBAL: One day after Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh said he would step down at the end of his term in 2013, tens of thousands of Yemenis took part in a "day of rage" demanding that he step down immediately. They were met by a nearly equal number of Saleh supporters holding banners reading "No to sedition" and "no to sabotage," among others.

*Al Jazeera English's and Al Arabiya's websites were down for several hours on Thursday because of the traffic overwhelming the servers. The world continues to watch Egypt ahead of a high-stakes Friday prayer day for Muslims.

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Society

Do We Need Our Parents When We Grow Up? Doubts Of A Young Father

As his son grows older, Argentine journalist Ignacio Pereyra wonders when a father is no longer necessary.

Do We Need Our Parents When We Grow Up? Doubts Of A Young Father

"Is it true that when I am older I won’t need a papá?," asked the author's son.

Ignacio Pereyra

It’s 2am, on a Wednesday. I am trying to write about anything but Lorenzo (my eldest son), who at four years old is one of the exclusive protagonists of this newsletter.

You see, I have a whole folder full of drafts — all written and ready to go, but not yet published. There’s 30 of them, alternatively titled: “Women who take on tasks because they think they can do them better than men”; “As a father, you’ll always be doing something wrong”; “Friendship between men”; “Impressing everyone”; “Wanderlust, or the crisis of monogamy”, “We do it like this because daddy say so”.

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