Egypt’s decision to officially re-open its border to the Gaza Strip may be officially tut-tutted over by Israel, which in Hosni Mubarak had a willing partner for besieging the Palestinian enclave controlled by Hamas. But as a practical matter, the siege effectively ended a year ago Tuesday when Israeli commandos killed nine civilians on …
Humanitarian aid
The Dear Leader Does Beijing. But Why Is He in China Again?
What leader of a hungry, isolated regime wouldn’t want to enjoy a little vacation in China? On Wednesday, an armored train carrying North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and his 70-person entourage is believed to have arrived in Beijing, where the man known as the Dear Leader is presumably in town to meet with Chinese President Hu …
A Devil Dog Finds His Best Angels
After several interruptions, I’ve finally finished the best book to land on my desk this year: “It Happened On The Way To War,” by Rye Barcott, a former Marine who has devoted his life to bringing development to one of the world’s worst slums. The book (published by Bloomsbury) chronicles the creation of Carolina for Kibera (CFK), a …
The Other Shoe? Egypt Moves to Ease Gaza Siege
Egypt’s announcement that it will open its border crossing with the Gaza Strip — loosening the siege of the Palestinian enclave Egypt has helped Israel carry out — has the sound of the other shoe dropping. Coming one day after word that the post-Mubarak government had brokered a tentative unity accord between rival Palestinian …
More Whoa! in Haiti: Did the Ruling Party Manipulate Election Results?
If you’re wondering why only about a tenth of the more than $10 billion that international donors pledged to Haiti’s reconstruction has actually been disbursed so far, we likely got another reminder on Monday, April 25. Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) announced that it was delaying certification of results from 19 …
World Bank to East Timor: We Messed Up
East Timor was supposed to be the poster child for nation-building. In 2002, after two centuries of Portuguese rule and two decades of Indonesian occupation, this tiny half-island became the century’s first country. Its path to nationhood was paved by a host of international organizations keen to make the fledgling state a model of …
U.K. and France Try to Boost Libyan Rebels, But Risk Rupturing NATO
As troops loyal to Col. Muammar Gaddafi continue to pound the rebel-held city of Misratah — leading to hundreds of civilian casualties — British Foreign Secretary William Hague announced April 19 that the U.K. and France were dispatching a joint squad of military advisers to Benghazi, stronghold of the Libyan rebels in the …
Why Three Cups of Tea are Not Enough
I will be the first to admit that I was an early adopter of Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea. When it first came out I reviewed it for TIME, and named it one of the 10 best books of 2006. I gave it out as Christmas presents, and encouraged my mother to read it in her book club. By no stretch of the imagination was it a work of great …
After the Earthquake, Not All Quiet on China’s Western Front
One year ago today, an earthquake hit the northeastern edge of the Tibetan plateau, leveling a small, majority-Tibetan town. The magnitude-6.9 temblor shook buildings from the hills and pulled monasteries and mud-brick homes to the ground. The first images from the scene showed crimson-robed monks digging though the rubble by hand. They …
The U.S. Civil War in Global Context — Not that Big of a Deal?
April 12 marked the 150th anniversary of the shelling of Fort Sumter, the island battery in Charleston harbor whose surrender to South Carolinian secessionists signaled the start of the Civil War. And while our attention rightly falls on the war’s dramatic — and traumatic — legacy, one which is still being grappled over to this day, …
After Disaster, Sorrow in a Few Short Words
When an earthquake hit the Japanese town of Niigata in October 2004, Yo Yasuhara, an elderly monk, wrote these words:
It’s cold and wet/camping outdoors/aftershocks multiplying the misery
The poem, originally written in Japanese, so stirred survivors that it was carved in a memorial stone. Today, one month after the Great Tohoku …
How to Understand the Responsibility to Protect
Since the international community found itself stepping in to try to stem burgeoning humanitarian disasters in Libya and the Ivory Coast, much has been made of the principles behind the interventions. A cadre of liberal internationalists (in Europe, often lapsed socialists) saw in the two countries — particularly in Libya — a mandate …
In Gaddafi’s Tripoli, Visions of Doomsday and an Endgame
Such is the hothouse atmosphere of the Rixos Hotel, where the Tripoli press corps remains imprisoned by the Gaddafi regime, that any new source of information, be it a shopkeeper in a bazaar who manages to slip out a disparaging word about Libya’s leader or a rumor of the man himself out in the streets, sends reporters into a frenzied …