Word: jamal
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...Selamah arrived in the Philippines in or around 1992. Philippine intelligence sources believe him to have been a close associate of Mohammad Jamal Khalifa, brother-in-law and Philippines point man of Osama bin Laden. A veteran of the Afghan jihad, Khalifa is believed to have first visited the southern Philippines in 1988, setting up Islamic charities and a rattan business while recruiting Muslim youth to fight in Afghanistan. In Cotabato, his Islamic Relief Organization (IRO) opened offices in town opposite the bishop's residence. Embarrassingly for the MILF?which has angrily denied links with international terror?Khalifa's associate...
...Jamal persevered because he loves cooking and saw an opportunity to provide food for thought, so to speak, about Arab culture. This he does with engaging humor and scant respect for many Arab governments. He intersperses juicy recipes and equally juicy stories about growing up in Nablus and attending conferences around the world as an adult. He explains how to make falafel, tabbouleh, baba ghanoush and lesser-known dishes. At the same time, the reader picks up knowledge that is not strictly culinary. For example, that baba means coquettish and ghanoush is, roughly, dissolute - adjectives that seem unlikely...
...Jamal gives tips on dining with an Arab, the most important being to go to the table starving: the host will lay on a huge spread and keep heaping your plate. For most Palestinians, of course, having too much to eat is a dream. One of the dishes in the book is mjadarah, or rice with lentils. These ingredients keep well, which helps to explain the dish's popularity in a war zone - a fact, Jamal points out, recognized in United Nations food relief packages. Apart from rice and lentils, mjadarah requires only onions, salt, cumin, water and samneh...
This is not a political book, but Jamal can't resist describing a conference in Libya ostensibly to rally Arab nations to the Palestinian cause. It degenerated into a fierce debate about whether macaroni was the invention of the Italians, Libya's former colonial rulers, or was brought to Italy from China by Arabs. Writes Jamal: "Like many such conferences in Arab countries that are in principle to save Palestine, the only thing that was saved, finally, was the macaroni...
...this end, Jamal has just cooked up a new book - as yet only in Spanish and Catalan - called Palestine: Occupation and Resistance (Flor del Viento; 106 pages). In his role as historian rather than doctor or cook, he sets out to give a brief guide to the roots of the interminable conflict there. Israelis probably won't like it. But they should enjoy Arab Aroma, a book that could equally have been titled Make Food...