When life’s opportunities diminish, death is all that remains  Hamid Alkifaey 11 October 2023 Seventy five years have passed since the founding of the State of Israel, and this has been accompanied by acts of killing and destruction in Palestine. Hundreds of thousands have been killed so far, civilians and soldiers, children, women and the elderly. Millions of Palestinians have been displaced, while the solution remains far afield.   The... 

The Baghdad job: who was behind history’s biggest bank heist? Criminals stole $2.5bn from Iraq’s largest state bank in broad daylight. Nicolas Pelham follows their trail The Economist/ 1843 Magazine: July 27th 2023  On a scorching September day last year, Hussein Kanber Agha reached the front door of his house in central Baghdad. He had got in the habit of scanning the street for anything out of the ordinary before turning the key. In his free... 

Hamid Alkifaey is admonishing life for its treatment of his friend Saad Al-Jadir Treacherous Life He loved you, sang for you and sang your praises He composed his most beautiful melodies for you He travelled across all corners, singing and playing his lute for you He dedicated his soul for you He spread beauty and happiness in all your quarters He endured pain for your sake He regarded pain as a sign of life as the dead cannot feel the pain But you... 

Mythical Beliefs Threaten the Middle East Hamid Alkifaey* Creed is sacrosanct; no one has the right to interfere with people’s beliefs or impose their beliefs on others, it’s a basic human right guaranteed by laws, norms and religions themselves. The Qura’an, for example, has many verses to this effect such as verse 29 of the Cave Chapter “The truth is from your Lord. Whoever wills—let him believe. And whoever wills—let him disbelieve”... 

A Discussion with Hamid Alkifaey, Author of ‘Failure of Democracy in Iraq’ Foreign Policy Concepts4th June 2019 Interview with the author of ‘Failure of Democracy in Iraq’, Dr Hamid Alkifaey  1- What led you to write your book?  I explained in the introduction what led me to write the book. I opposed the dictatorship in Iraq since the mid-seventies and was engaged in exposing the regime’s dictatorial ways of ruling Iraq, wasting Iraqi... 

Inconclusive Elections Leave Iraqis Searching for Compromise by Hamid Alkifaey Although the May 12 Iraqi parliamentary election was the country’s fifth since 2005, it was remarkably different from the previous ones in many ways. For the first time since the beginning of the democratic process in Iraq following the removal of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship in 2003, Iraqi electoral lists, by and large, did not use sectarian, tribal, or regional... 

 The sun shines in Lisbon It emits light and heat on living creatures and other things; On trees and palms Yes, Palm trees in Lisbon! (Who smuggled this palm tree from my country?)*   Here, in the land of Portugal, the land of oranges** the land of Alberto the land of Alberta the land of Iberia the land of ab, as in the land of the Spanish and the Greeks, unlike the land of the English, the Americans, the Germans, the Italians, and the Iranians, and... 

Our suffering will continue unless Extremism is uprooted   Hamid Alkifaey Extremists, with their religious ranting, are accustomed to confrontation with whomever they disagree with. The nature and degree of this disagreement are of secondary importance to them. The confrontation with their foes has not come out of nowhere. They firmly believe that they are able to defeat their enemies because they think they are on the right side while their enemies... 

The Islamic State that isn’t OPenDemocracy 11/12/2015 ‘The Islamic State has taken the Iraqi city of Ramadi’. ‘The Islamic State beheaded British aid worker Alan Henning’. ‘The Islamic State beheaded American Journalist Steven Sotlof’. ‘The US discusses with its allies how to respond to the Islamic State’. ‘Russia is taking a tough stance against the Islamic State’. These are not made up phrases of any one’s imagination. They... 

Please briefly describe your book for us – what are the key points covered? The book deals with an issue that is becoming more and more important in Iraq and the wider Middle East – that is the issue of sectarianism. The sectarian problem in Iraq, which had largely lain dormant since the establishment of the modern Iraqi state following World War I, forced its way onto the political scene, with a vengeance, so to speak, after the US-led war...