The Pessoptimist

Jew in Arabia, goy in Israel

Saturday, October 28, 2023

Car accident on desertway Alexandria-Cairo: 32 dead

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                                                  Ahram online At least 32 people have been killed in a multi-car pileup on a highway in Egy...
Thursday, October 26, 2023

After 9.000 killed parties in Sudan resume negotiations

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Sudanese refugees in Chad S udan’s warring parties have resumed negotiations in Saudi Arabia aimed at ending the war that has killed more th...
Thursday, September 7, 2023

UN-experts seek justice for unfairly imprisoned Palestinian aidworker

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Mohamed Halabi GENEVA, Thursday, September 7, 2023 (WAFA) – UN experts today urged Israeli authorities to reverse the conviction of an impri...
Thursday, September 9, 2021

HRW: Egypt's national security killed unlawfully alleged ''terrorists''

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  (Beirut) –   Egypt’s   Interior Ministry police and National Security Agency officers have in recent years apparently killed dozens of all...
Friday, September 25, 2020

Chelsea owner Abramovich donated $100 million to ethnic cleansing of Jerusalem

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  Bank documents indicate that companies associated with or controlled by the Israeli-Russian billionaire businessman Roman Abramovich have ...

Fatah and Hamas agree on holding elections

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  Secretary-General of the Central Committee of Fatah Movement, Jibril Rajoub, said today that Fatah and Hamas, the two main factions in Pal...
Wednesday, September 23, 2020

After normalisation UAE and Bahrain with Israel Palestine turns down to preside over Arab League

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  Palestine has decided to relinquish its right to preside over the Council of the Arab League at its current session in reaction to the dec...
Saturday, May 2, 2020

Sudan makes female genital mutilation unlawful

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Khartoum (Wikipedia) The transitional government of Sudan has ecided to make female genital mutilation a criminal offense. The amendment...
Monday, October 14, 2019

Syrian Kurds shift alliance to Damascus, Assads troops on their way to the north

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 Qamishli (Photo Wikipedia) Syria's Kurds said Syrian government forces agreed Sunday to help them fend off Turkey's invasio...
Tuesday, October 8, 2019

At least 105 killed in nationwide protests in Iraq

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Updated October 8:  More than  hundred people have been killed so far in the protests in several Iraqi cities. The number of 105 was cited...

Trump gives Turkey green light to attack Kurds in Northern Syria

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 (Photo Wikipedia)  The White House has given the green light to a Turkish offensive into northern Syria, moving US forces out of the ar...
Friday, September 27, 2019

Attacks on two Saudi oil refineries: what followed

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Tensions in the Middle East have surged following attacks on two major oil facilities in Saudi Arabia. The pre-dawn attacks on September...
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Abu Pessoptimist
This blogname was derived from a satiric Arabic novel by the Palestinian Israeli Emile Habiby. In the ''The Secret Life of Saeed The Pessoptimist'' he uses absurdism as a weapon against the (ir)realities of daily life in Palestine/Israel. I consider it to be an example for how events in Israel/Palestine best can be approached. The subtitle is from a book by Dutch author Renate Rubinstein. In a way that is also still my motto. My real name is Martin (Maarten Jan) Hijmans. I've been covering the ME since 1977 and have been a correspondent in Cairo. In 2018, I concluded the study 'Arabic language and culture' at the University of Amsterdam. I started 'Abu Pessoptimist' in January 2009 out of anger about the onslaught of that month in Gaza. The other blog, The Pessoptimist, is meant to be a sister version in English. (En voor de Nederlandstaligen: ik wilde in november 2009 een tweede blog in het Engels beginnen en ontdekte te laat dat als je één account hebt, een profiel dan meteen ook voor allebei de blogs geldt. Vandaar dat het nu ineens in het Engels is... So sorry.)
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