Word: morocco
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...diaries will be published as a sort of a blog, with entries added daily, exactly 70 years after Orwell wrote them. Running from 1938 through 1942, the diaries cover the early days of World War II as well as Orwell's travels in Morocco, where he recuperated from injuries he received in the Spanish Civil War. There's also a lot about chicken farming...
...conservative Morocco, these female preachers could never have gained acceptance without a nod from King Mohammed VI, a progressive when it comes to women's rights. One of the monarch's first decrees on ascending the throne in 1999 was to throw open the doors of his father's harem in Rabat, pensioning off dozens of concubines who had rarely been allowed outside the palace walls. He later pushed for a reform in family law, giving women more rights than in most Muslim countries in matters of divorce, property and her husband's choice of subsequent wives. (Islam permits...
...wake-up call arrived in May 2003, when al-Qaeda suicide bombers killed 45 people and wounded dozens of others in Casablanca in explosions outside a luxury hotel, a Jewish center, a Spanish restaurant, a social club and the Belgian consulate. Since then, Morocco has been rocked by scattered acts of terrorism, and in February police arrested 38 people who were allegedly members of an extremist gang suspected of pulling off robberies in Europe in the mid-1990s to bankroll a plot to assassinate Moroccan ministers and police chiefs. "We also know that Moroccans are feeding into the pipeline...
...many more sympathizers. She scoffs at the government's efforts to combat religious radicalism by standardizing Koranic teaching and sending female guides into the slums: "This is Islam Lite. It's like throwing powder in our eyes to distract us." She argues that "real changes" are impossible without improving Morocco's level of education...
...improved under Mohammed VI. Nadia Yassine also welcomes the fact that women are now allowed to conduct religious activities. "We need to restore a version of Islam that has less machismo," she says. After all, such efforts to bolster a gentler, more moderate form of Islam may stop Morocco turning into Iraq once Hollywood's cameras stop rolling...