The Latest from Iran (11 September): Promoting the "Resistance Economy"

See also Iran Opinion: The "Left" and the Non-Aligned Movement --- A Guide for the Perplexed
The Latest from Iran (10 September): The Gathering Economic Storm

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1645 GMT: Currency Watch. Yesterday President Ahmadinejad held a three-hour meeting with Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani and head of judiciary Sadegh Larijani, with the currency crisis at the top of the agenda. So what insight did Ahmadinejad offer when questioned afterwards by journalists?

He asked them what they had for lunch:

Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi)

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Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Deaths and Executions on Both Sides

Claimed footage of an attack on a building of the security forces in Zabadani in Syria

See also Syria Video Feature: Does the Free Syrian Army Represent The People?
Monday's Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: Deaths and Executions on Both Sides

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2010 GMT: Syria. According to the Local Coordination Committees, 115 people have been killed by regime forces today:

40 martyrs were reported in Aleppo; 25 in Damascus and its suburbs; 23 Hama including martyrs from Kafarzeta and Halfaya; 11 in Deir Ezzor, among them 4 in the shelling of Shehail and 4 in Bokmal; 6 in Daraa; 5 in Idlib; 2 in Lattakia;2 in Banyas 1 in Homs.

See our note on the numbers release by the LCCs.

As you can see, the deaths in Aleppo today have been very high, with Damascus and Hama (particularly Kafer Zita, as we noted earlier) accounting for most of the rest of the fatalities today.

We saw a continuation of a pattern that has become familiar - the regime is using longer-range artillery, and air strikes, to inflict much of this damage, both to buildings and to lives. However, after several weeks of intensification, there are no signs that either the Free Syrian Army, nor the peaceful protesters, show any sign of giving up their resistance to President Bashar al Assad.

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Iran Opinion: The "Left" and the Non-Aligned Movement --- A Guide for the Perplexed (Postel)

How do we say we are against imposing the privations of sanctions, against subjecting the Iranian people to the violence of US/Israeli bombs, but are willing to take no position when those same people are subjected to violence by the Iranian government? This would make us an anti-war movement disconnected from social justice and life on the ground for ordinary Iranians; it would mean we have lost our moral compass.

We argue for the need to free all political prisoners, from Guantanamo to the Iranian prison Evin; to end the death penalty in the US and in Iran and everywhere; in other words, to build solidarity between our movements here and the movements there.

If we don't support Iranians struggling in Iran for the same things we fight for here, such as labor rights, abolition of the death penalty, and freedom for political prisoners, we risk a politically debilitating form of cultural relativism.

It is not only possible, but imperative, to simultaneously stand against all forms of outside intervention in Iran and against all forms of domestic oppression targeting ordinary Iranian people.

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Syria Video Feature: Does the Free Syrian Army Represent The People? (The Stream)

Al Jazeera English's The Stream asks if the Free Syrian Army is representative of the opposition, with the participation of Rafif Jouejati, spokeswoman for the Local Coordination Committees in Syria; analyst Fadi Salem, and opposition activist “The 47th” and the comments and questions of viewers.

Afghanistan Feature: How Will US "Withdraw" When It Has 550 Bases? (Turse)

Camp BagramAfghanistan may turn out to be one of the great misbegotten “stimulus packages” of the modern era, a construction boom in the middle of nowhere with materials largely shipped in at enormous expense to no lasting purpose whatsoever. With the U.S. military officially drawing down its troops there, the Pentagon is now evidently reversing the process and embarking on a major deconstruction program. It’s tearing up tarmacs, shutting down outposts, and packing up some of its smaller facilities. Next year, the number of International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) coalition bases in the southwest of the country alone is scheduled to plummet from 214 to 70, according to the New York Times.

But anyone who wanted to know just what the Pentagon built in Afghanistan and what it is now tearing down won’t have an easy time of it.

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Syria Feature: The Fight Within the Command of the Insurgency (Levinson)

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The Military Council announced its formation in early June. Promising fresh arms and supplies, it secured nominal pledges of loyalty from many of the rebel fighting groups.

But the Military Council came late to the game. The battle for the Aleppan countryside had been building since early spring. Village fighters had grown in numbers and combat know-how. Homegrown leaders emerged in their ranks.

By July, as the Military Council watched mostly from the sidelines, the battle for the north of Syria was nearing a climax.

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The Latest from Iran (10 September): The Gathering Economic Storm

See also Iran Snap Analysis: The Currency Crisis
The Latest from Iran (9 September): Sanctions, More Sanctions, No Talks

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Cartoon: Nikahang Kowsar1955 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. An interesting science lesson from the President today....

After commenting that drought in Iran has occurred because of industrial producton, he found another cause: the "purposeful destruction of clouds over Iran by enemies".

Ahmadinejad also had an annverisary message: while the media fusses about 3000 people killed on 9/11, there is silence on 1 million people killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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Syria (and Beyond) Live Coverage: The Renewed Battle in Aleppo

1919 GMT: Syria. According to Russian Vice Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, Syrian President Bashar al Assad would step down if he lost an election:

French newspaper Le Figaro quoted Bogdanov as saying in an interview after meeting Syrian dissidents in Paris that the "regime is still solid" and supported by an important part of the population who feared those who could take his place.

"Assad told us himself. But I don't know how sincere he is," Bogdanov said. "But he clearly told us that if the people didn't want him, and if they chose a different leader in an election, he would go."

1608 GMT: Syria. The LCC's death toll has now reached 102:

67 martyrs were reported in Damascus and its Suburbs (including 36 who were field-executed in Tadamun, 17 martyrs were found in Zamalka, and 3 who were field-executed in Mouadamiyeh), 16 in Aleppo, 6 in Hama, 4 in Daraa, 4 in Idlib, 2 in Homs, 2 in Lattakia, and 1 in Deir Ezzor.

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Egypt Opinion: Destroying the Books of Alexandria (Nervana)

Our clever pundits, who, thanks to books and literature, have earned various academic degrees and advise think tanks about the Arab world, did not devote even a tweet to the distraught owners of these bookstalls. Perhaps they are too busy dealing with far more pressing issues, such as redefining political terms, in which subtle theocracy is a civil state, backwardness is renaissance, and tyranny of the majority is the desired democracy.  Therefore, and in that context, the destroyed bookstalls are simply irrelevant.

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Syria Feature: Seeking Justice Against the "Banality of Evil" (Host Site: Walls)

"Memories at the Checkpoint" by Tamer al-Awam, killed on Saturday in Aleppo

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The battle with this regime is not about me, it is not about you, it is about humanity. My dear friends, I can now tell you why it has  been very hard to write. Over the past few months, my closeness to some of the young and brilliant people of Syria has enriched my life, but it has also made the tragedy, and the mess closer than ever.

I will not forget, nor will I forgive. I will not seek revenge, but rest assured, I will seek justice. And defending this regime, even covertly, makes one part and parcel in the murder of the friends I have lost. My cursing the regime  and its supporters is only an impotent response, but I, with the help of countless Syrians, lack no potency in following them through this planet and in making them pay by all legal means for their collusion with this abomination called Assad and for their disgustingly inhumane efforts to cover the stench with slogans of resistance and nationalism. They will pay for the murder of my city, and all other cities in my Syria, for killing my friends and for making my mother, brave as she is, cry.

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