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Egypt expedition 1842
A Prussian tour to the land of the Pharaohs
One hundred and eighty years ago, the Prussian king sent a team of scientists to the Nile. The items they brought back were ground-breaking for the development of Egyptology, a science very much in its infancy at the time. An exhibition on Berlin’s Museum Island tells the story
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India and Pakistan
The legacy of colonial rule
India's ruling political party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is inspired by the ideology of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Its core philosophy revolves around the idea of a predominantly Hindu India that seeks a global leadership role. By Suparna Banerjee
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The origins of the Maghreb
Was the Arab Maghreb a French invention?
The book "The Invention of the Maghreb: between Africa and the Middle East" prompts us to review basic terminology. This includes terms that we use almost every day as if they are definitive by virtue of geography, history and culture, such as "the Arab Maghreb", "North Africa", "the Middle East" and "sub-Saharan Africa". Shady Lewis Botros read the book
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Syrian conflict's impact on international law
The future cost of normalising Assad
Recent efforts to rehabilitate Assad are setting a damaging precedent for accountability, just as the international community is expressing the need to hold Russia to account for similar human rights violations in Ukraine. By Burcu Ozcelik
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Hieroglyphs exhibition at the British Museum
Museums with guilt complexes
To celebrate the bicentenary of the deciphering of the Rosetta Stone, the British Museum is running an exhibition entitled "Hieroglyphs: unlocking ancient Egypt" until February 2023. While Shady Lewis Botros welcomes the museum's effort to broaden the Eurocentric focus of the exhibition, he says that it "lays bare a critical approach and a potential for revisionism" and remains largely decorative
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Iran and global energy supplies
Covert conflict in the Gulf
Since Russia invaded Ukraine, Europe has been trying to find alternatives to Russian gas, inevitably zeroing in on the Arab Gulf states. In his commentary, Yemeni politician Muammar al-Iryani proposes a simple way for the West to secure international shipping routes
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Middle East literature
Al Saqi, Europe’s largest Middle Eastern bookseller, to close
London-based Al Saqi Books, Europe’s largest specialist bookseller for publications from the Middle East, has been forced to close because of the hike in prices of Arabic-language books and because Brexit has been "detrimental" to business
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Hasan al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood
Who was the architect of Islamism?
Renowned scholar of Islamic Studies Gudrun Kramer has just published the first well-founded biography of Hasan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. Joseph Croitoru read the book
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Faith united at Sisterhood FC!
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UN climate summit in Egypt
Abdul Fattah al-Sisi's greenwashing fail
COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh is turning into a PR disaster for Egypt’s military regime. Instead of praise for the host, the news is full of solidarity for imprisoned activist Alaa Abdel Fattah and criticism of the event’s grotesque surveillance measures. By Sofian Philip Naceur
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Faith united at Sisterhood FC!
Playing football in a hijab: founded in 2018, the London-based football club Sisterhood FC offers Muslim women the opportunity to combine their sporting passion and their religious beliefs. By Claudia Dehn and Ayse Tasci-Steinbach
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Hindu nationalism abroad
Fighting religious polarisation among India's diaspora
Indian Americans from diverse faith backgrounds have peacefully co-existed stateside for several decades. But events in the U.S. – and violent confrontations between some Hindus and Muslims last month in Leicester, England – have heightened concerns that stark political and religious polarisation in India is seeping into the diaspora