What I’m Reading

If you want to know what I know about the world, read these:

http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/syrians-banned-hajj-over-differences-saudi-government

The “Hajj” is the Islamic pilgramige to Mecca. Millions of people go every year. It is only required of Muslims once in their lifetimes, but some go several times depending on means and other factors.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/09/201291812354473418.html

The “two state solution” talked about in this article is basically this: currently the Palestinians live under two militarily occupied territories, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The “one state solution” is basically a proposal to incorporate these territories into Israel and make the Palestinians citizens of Israel, which they don’t want to do because their theocratic democracy would be overthrown by the sheer number of Arabs being born (they have a statistically higher birth rate than Israelis). The two state solution is to create a separate Palestinian state.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/09/2012918155941524869.html

“Al-Nour” is, according to Wikipedia a very conservative party who wish to install Shari’a law.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2012/09/20129185557600905.html

China has had a long past of geographical tension. It still claims Thialand as part of itself and “invaded” Tibet after declaring that Tibet was also a part of China. The same can be said throughout much of China’s history, although that would go into much, much older times.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia/2012/09/201291831757273.html

Tidbit. The US has used (in the past, not sure about now) warlords to help route out and rule Afghanistan. Not a good idea in my opinion, but I’m also not a President or a general. In any case, this one is really strange because it was reportedly a female bomber from a group not known to use suicide bombers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19633062

This is about Burma. They’re crazy conservative. Just talked about this in my French class today. This is a really cool article viewed from that point of view. I’ll have to learn more about it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19637424

This never sounds good. Don’t here much about India in the U.S. That’s why this is here.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-19640182

Very short article. More on this later.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-19640175

Here’s a REALLY interesting one. Actually expected something like this. Calling for the arrests of the Coptic Egyptians who helped make and fund the recent inflammatory film. According to what I’ve heard, the man who made the film is currently being charged with breaking the conditions of his probation in which he wasn’t allowed to use internet or aliases. I don’t think it’s very likely the Egyptian judicial system will get much more than that. They will simply have to try and understand the concept of American Free-Speech, which is a much bigger hurdle than I think Americans realize.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-19635239

Really shocking news out of Britain. Two female police officers killed with a gun and a handgrenade. Not sure how the man even got a hold of all that when not even the police carry firearms (generally).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-19634076

News on Kenya. They’ve found two mass graves. Really freaky stuff. Apparently they’re in a kind of civil war. Didn’t know that. Thank you American news outlets (not).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-19634052

EVERYONE should read this. This is really, really important. Nuclear talks with Iran. It’s a really big, complicated problem with a lot of speculation, espionage, shadyness and a massive cost of failure.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19634700

This is so cool. I’ll leave you with this one. #geekingout