MENA Minorities

Interview with Basil Ghatas at Al Monitor , who represents the Arab-nationalist Balad-party and is one of two (the other being Hanna Swaid/Hadash) Christian MK's. Btw, I had no idea that he is related to Amzi Bishara, the controversal founder of Balad, who now lives in Qatar after he was investigated for spying on behalf of Hizballah .

A German Tv-team embedded with the chief the the Syriac Military Council (SMC) in Syria's Hasaka province, where the militia fights alongside the Kurdish YPG (in fact the SMC is part of the PYD) against the self proclaimed Islamic State. The militia-chief is a Swiss national of Assyrian heritage (from the Tessin, where many Assyrians live) by the name of Jacob Kosar. He is the former Swiss soldier in charge of the SMC's military training, who was mentioned before on this blog. Kosar estimates the manpower of the militia at 500 and you can also get an idea while watching of how antique the weapons of the SMC are. Edit: Here you can find the article in the German weekly Die Zeit which was produced during the same journey. 

Suwayda residents speak out against military service   by Syria Direct  ENOUGH IS ENOUGH : Pro-regime activists took to the streets of the Druze-majority city of Suwayda to distribute pamphlets condemning the mounting death toll among Suwayda's young men performing mandatory service in the regime army, reported pro-opposition Orient News Wednesday. Here, a pamphlet reads “Enough is enough...the sons of Suwayda are being murdered in A-Raqqa and elsewhere...for whose sake...until when...the chair [of power] is for you [Bashar al-Assad]...and the tomb is for our sons,” while women in the picture to the left mourn over their deceased relatives. The discontent with mandatory military service articulated in these pamphlets has surfaced in other pro-regime areas. Alawite activists—co-religionists of president Bashar al-Assad— distributed pamphlets in the Alawite-majority city of Tartus in August, reading “the chair for you [Assad], the coffins for our childre...

The prestigious Foreign Affairs has a rare report about Lebanon's Jewry and takes a look at the renovation of Beirut's oldest synagoge. The article features a lot of fascinating details and I strongly recommend reading. Lebanon's Jewish Revival by Adam Rasmi, Foreign Affairs

I found this very surprising table by Philip Connor and Conrad Hackett from the Pew Reasearch Center a few days ago on Twitter via Daniel Neep . According to their work, the Christian population in the Middle East (Iran and Turkey are not included) is in fact growing in numbers but much slower than the Muslim majority. Of course the post-2011 events are not included here but I expected a different trend still. Btw who would have assumed that the share of Protestants among Middle Eastern Christians is as high as 7%? Read the full piece here . 

After a period of relative calm in the overwhelming Druze province of Suwaida ʾ  the situation dramatically changed in the middle of last August. The villages of Dama (and Dair Dama) were attacked by a group of local Bedouin. Größere Kartenansicht Al Monitor reported that the attack came after local NDF members had responded with targeting Bedouin gatherings to the beheading of a Druze man . The Bedouin were allegedly joined by rebel elements, according to some reports from al-Qa ʿ ida affiliated Jabhat an-Nusra. The number of the casualties on the Druze side differs from 12 to 24 and reportedly includes a high number of religious sheikhs (according to opposition outlet Zaman alWasl even seven). Harming religious people ( ʿuqqal ) is generally a red line for the Druze. This was illustrated in April 2014, when the arrest of a sheikh led to rare public protests in Suwaida ʾ  and temporary a precarious situation for the regime. However, as Aymenn al-Tami...

An interesting feature about discrimination against Druze in Israel comes from Israeli international news channel i24news . It features two Druze personalities who had a successful career in the Israeli public: former diplomat and Shinui -MK Zaidan 'Atashi and former TV-journalist Rafiq Halabi, the current mayor of Daliat al-Karmal. Both are remarkably explicit in their criticism.