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Turkey is Typing…

Deborah Ann Dilley · 11:26

…about soccer this week, or rather there are 2 Turkish blogs to add to our list this week that focus on that subject: Gulay, Galatasaray, and the Dogs and The Round Ball in Ankara. Like in many countries Soccer is a national sport in Turkey and it is nice to see blogs devoted to sport come up like these who are insightful and entertaining. The top two teams, fan base-wise for sure–in talent that is another issue (but hey, I root for Diyarbakirspor so most would discount my futbol opinion), are Galatasaray (who might be facing bankruptcy soon) and Fenerbahce (to see the debate as to whether the refs are more lenient on this team see here.) We will be definitely be looking at these blogs in the future.

Let's see how everyone else is doing, beginning with the girls first:
Phanja from The Need to Know reveals her crush on American actor Alan Alda in her youth. She also mentions the irony of the Anti-American movie Valley of the Wolves spreading anti-American sentiment in a traditionally American way, by making a lot of money in the process.

Idil from Ignore me if You Can writes about the latest Metblogs meeting in Istanbul and a comparsion to the OC in the US to a suburb of Istanbul.

Moving onto Metroblogging: Istanbul, Metecem wonders if Istanbul really needs more tunnels to help avelate its traffic problem. Sven laments the absence of the umlauted o's in English.
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This Week in Palestinian Blogs: After the Last Sky

Shaden Abdul Rahman · 06:03

News of the blogosphere…

In sad breaking news from A STAND FOR JUSTICE, an Israeli sniper killed a 15-year-old Palestinian during a raid on West Bank:

Amer Bassyouni, 15, was shot in the neck and died from his wounds as Israeli forces searched for militants in the Alamin refugee camp in the West Bank city of Nablus.

Palestinian security srouces said:

the youth had been seen next to his house as Israeli forces raided the area.

The Black Iris of Jordan, reports that three Israelis attacked Basilica of Annunciation, one of the holiest Christian places located in Al-Nasserah (Nazareth) wounding several congregants. Naseem condemns the attack saying:

Attack on holy sites, be they Islamic or Christian, are nothing new really. But I wonder if the world will pay more attention now after a major church is attacked?
I wonder if all the Israeli attackers are mentally ill?

More on the horrific incident and the Main Stream Media bias in coverage, Haitham Sabbah says:

I went digging for more details in the MSM, unfortunately I could not find much worth mentioning. However, I noticed what we call biased story coverage.

From Raising Yousuf, the final part of the separating Israeli wall will be finished in few days declaring the holy Christian city of Bethlehem officially a closed ghetto:

The wall…will not only sever the connection between the region’s most holy Christian sites ,but will also herald the creation of a new ‘fact on the ground’ - an illegal Jewish settlement which will be home to some of Israel’s most extremist religious groups.

Paradise Now under fire-still according to al-falasteenyia. By means of Sugar Cubes, Ari Lives in Israel provides a Jewish perspective on the film and the petition created by supporters of Israel in which they ask to get it off the Oscars. On the other hand, another petition was created in solidarity with the Palestinians.

In KABOBfest, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas prays for divine intervention to stop the US from sending its advocates around the World in an attempt to spread the Israeli's stance about the PA (Palestinian Authority) and Palestinians. Abbas is, in parallel, seeking to secure financial backing for the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority.

What we talk about…

Bethlehem Bloggers says they are starting a Jewish settlement in Bethlehem and that in the last three weeks the Main Stream Media failed to report the arrest of sixty three Palestinians of which twenty one are children.

From Raising Yousuf, the ongoing closure of al-Mintar (Karni) crossing has resutled with $10.5 million loss and the depletion of Gaza's main food staples according to a report by the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humantarian Affairs (OCHA).

In a counting game, Laila el-Haddad of Raising Yousuf, kept track of the shelling on Gaza where she lives. From 6:14 PM to 6:18 PM thirteen shells, and she lost count after that. Yousuf, her little son succeeded in distracting her. Laila says:

He'll only get as scared as you do, sometimes. And sometimes no amount of re-assurance can convince him that this loud and recurrent thud he hears every day is innocuous (so far).

She adds:

I sometimes think of Rafah's children, and how their lives must have been during those night under constant Israeli seige; how their lives will continue now

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Latin American Voices

David Sasaki · 04:59

Time to take a trip through Latin America to see what Spanish-language bloggers are talking about. By far, the most linked-to post comes from Eduardo Arcos, a native of Ecuador who now lives in Mexico City and blogs at ALT1040. Taking into consideration his six years of blogging experience, he offers readers what he sees as the “five most common errors on blogs.” They are:

Not linking
Echoing someone else's post or thoughts is ok. A single weblog making a point doesn't do much, but a hundred weblogs making the same point does.
A blog isn't a newspaper and a blogger isn't a journalist. Bloggers must find their own path without emulating mainstream media.
There is no formula as to what a blog should be and shouldn't be.
We have to spend more time improving our own work and pay less attention to what it is that we don't like.

Claudio Ruiz, from Santiago, Chile, who blogs about law, internet, and technology at Quemar Las Naves (Burning Bridges) has a stinging critique of Senator Fernando Flores' responses in an interview by our own Rosario Lizana. Quoting a passage by Flores about not putting forth opinions on his own blog, Ruiz inquires:

If it's not to offer your opinion, then what is the value of a weblog? Why are they so important then? You can have a blog with comments or without them, with or without trackbacks, with or without advertising, but you can't have a blog without opinions. A blog without opinions is the equivalent of a geocities webpage. Or a photolog.

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Kenyan bloggers condemn attack on press freedom.

Sokari Ekine · 03:33

Last Thursday the Standard media Group of Kenya was raided by Government forces and shut down. Kenya Television Network (KTN) was taken off the air, the printing plants closed down and newspapers burned. Kenyan bloggers have been united in their condemnation of the attack on Kenya's media and freedom of press.

MentalAcrobatics published a CCTV video footage of the raid and comments.

These pictures are very disturbing. In some of them they have an employee spread eagled on the floor with a gun pressed against his/her head and a boot in his/her face. Remember these are NOT criminals being man handled like this. These are Kenyan men and women who went to work only to be pistol whipped and roughed up by an elite police squad.

For a broader picture of reactions he publishes an extensive roundup of Kenyan blogger's comments on the raid.

The raid stirred Kenyans to raise their voices in protest in the streets of Nairobi. The same reaction was seen from Kenyans online as Kenyan bloggers decided to speak out. A large part of the online protest was based around Keguro‘s appeal that we all post a letter to the president on our blogs.

Gukira writes a letter to President Kibaki and asks other Kenyan bloggers to publish the letter on their blogs.

This latest attack follows the jailing of three journalists from Standard Newspaper, attacks on Citizen Weekly, and ongoing harassment of journalists by government-sponsored forces.

Kenyan Pundit asks

I mean what the hell is this all about? I’m totally perplexed. Doesn’t this “crack sqaud” have better things to do, for instance like solve real crimes? Wasn’t the Kalonzo story among one of the more innocuous one’s published by the Standard? It would have totally gone under the radar if the government hadn’t reacted to it…I really fail to see what is causing this reaction

Feminist African Sister, is left with a “chill which gets chillier the more she reads” and comments

This Government ceased representing many of my interests a while back.
When they had Ministers making derogatory analogies of women!
They lost me even more when allegations of corruption at the highest levels was met with open arrogance on the part of Kiraitu, Mwiraria and Moody Awori.
They lost me when they put Maina Kamanda (a well documented misogynist) as Minister for Gender!
When they made tokenist offers of a Gender Commission, a Gender Ministry with a close to zero budget, while they gorge on Merceedes Benzes, mansions, trips abroad etc. etc.
They lost me when images of their thuggish ways were juxtaposed in my mind, with those of a little emaciated Kenyan boy in Wajir whose last dying breathes were captured on ITV news sometime this week in Wajir!

For Thinkers Room the raids are “Enough!

Kenyans are still trying in vain to come to grips on the blatant assault on their right to expression, and therefore blatant assault on them. The response from the government exemplifies the Kibaki regime — disjointed and confused. Some members of the cabinet express ignorance while others express scorn and disdain.

What an African Women Thinks wonders if the government meets regularly to discuss “how to stoop to new lows and how best to incur the wrath of the people.”

You Missed This comments that even under “Moi's and Kenyatta's darkest hours this never happened” and asks who ordered the raid? which he answers

The whole operation to invade the Standard group was hatched by Internal Security Minister John Michuki (of the now famous rattle snake comment), CID Director Joseph Kamau and President Kibaki’s special advisor (on political strategy) Stanley Murage

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