The United Nations’ top human rights official said Friday that waterboarding — a tactic used by the U.S. in its battle against terror — qualifies as torture. The Bush administration acknowledged for the first time this week that it waterboarded al-Qaida detainees. Vice President Dick Cheney said it was “a good thing” that the prisoners […]

A blind 70 year old lady living by her own needs our help to renovate her house after it caught fire few days ago. The house consists of one room and one bathroom. The burnt room, which had everything she needed (fridge, heater, mattresses, closet and the stove), all got burnt. We need to fix […]

Sixty One: Age of Harry Truman when he decided to drop the atomic bomb in 1945.
Sixty One: The year (B.C.) Julius Caesar took command in Spain.
Sixty One: The number of days Saudi blogger Fouad Farhan has been stuck in jail as of today. He is yet to be charged.
- Forty
- Fifty
We Are All Fouads

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These thoughts have been wandering in my mind for some time, and have only recently, within the context of a conversation, found a way to congeal into something articulate. Actually, articulate is not the right word, but let’s go with that for now.
The other day, a fairly socially liberal colleague told me, out of the […]

The rain. The thunder. The cold. The crying. The quiet. And a whole population mourning. I think the day King Hussein died is a day that is ingrained in my memory. The storm outside was unforgettable and somehow seemed fitting for the moment. I remember that Jordan was so quiet that every drop of rain […]

Author’s Note: Last night Amin Matalqa’s Captain Abu Raed premiered for the first time in Jordan. I’ve reviewed many, many movies on the Black Iris, but this was by far one of the greatest films I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing. There will continue to be a great deal of buzz and reviews surrounding […]

The World Bank has said the quality of education in the Arab world is falling behind other regions and needs urgent reform if it is to tackle unemployment.
…The report concluded that Jordan and Kuwait were the top educational reformers in the region, while Djibouti, Yemen, Iraq and Morocco ranked lowest in terms of access, efficiency […]

Confession: I have been suffering from some of the worst writers’ block I have ever experienced for well over a year now. I’m not sure what triggered it, or what’s been feeding it, but all I know is that something up there is blurry. It comes at an odd time since my current living is […]

It’s a scary time to be a journalist in Jordan these days. Working in the media sector, my feeling is that semi-independent media is making an attempt of becoming more liberalized, and the state response to such efforts has not been kind. It seems we are now leaving the era of the standard verbal harassment, […]

The snow is on its way out so I thought I’d shift gears here on the Black Iris. Transitioning back to reality isn’t easy when snow is still the talk of the town, so here’s a selection of my delicious picks these past few days you might find interesting. Only the first two are about […]

Disclaimer: The following post contains scenes of nudity and language that might be disturbing to some. Viewer discretion is advised. This is absolutely, the final snow-related post of the season unless this thing drags on for another week. But I just found this to be too funny not to publish. A friend of mine, Tina, […]