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Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

@HusseinAboubak

12 Mar

With all the good things coming out of the Gulf, its important to understand there are still a crucial problem for thr Gulf to solve, the indigenouization of skills. The Gulf has impressive infrastructure, made, maintained, and managed by foreign skill and Indian programmers

The native skills are mostly concentrated in finance and real estate. The educational efforts of importing American campuses is yet to show results. The reasons this issue is so difficult to overcome are very complex and don't give in to quick solutions. However, if there is a

country that shows the potential for the kind of human capital needed for information based economies, it is actually, no kidding, Saudi Arabia. Most of my life, I, like many, resented the Kingdom for reasons that are well known and no need to restate them. But things have

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Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

@HusseinAboubak

8 Mar

One of the things that is hard for me to explain, even to many Zionists, is that the Palestinian cause was never about Palestine at all, it was always about other major struggles for power in the regions. The words that can describe Arab politics best for the 20th cent

is "crisis of legitimacy," questions of who is to have power, why, and to what end WERE THE QUESTIONS. Nothing else existed. Coups, civil wars, assassinations, militias, and a metaphorical jungle of prime chimp power competition. Palestine was the only tool in the Arab

political toolbox to circumvent those questions. If you wanted power, the only legitimacy you could find was Palestine. It was the only thing that let you carry arms, come in over tanks, and grab all the power your tormented soul is lusting for. Nasser, the Baath, PLO, PLFP, Amal

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Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

@HusseinAboubak

7 Mar

There is a major process going on in the Middle East right now to which most western observers are completely blind. There is a major multi dimensional process of identity and social structure reconfiguration. All over the region, people are starting to play with most intimate

things, faith, identity, and sex. Individuation on multiple levels, national identities are breaking off of pan identities, Individual identities breaking off of collective ones, and new think breaking off of group think. Its happening at home, on the street, in institutions,

and on national levels. 15 years ago I prefered to read and listen to western conversations because Arabs had nothing interesting to talk about. Today, without exaggeration, its the complete opposite for me. Even SAUDI podcasts are far more interesting than American ones

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Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

@HusseinAboubak

5 Mar

Rant: Identity is not property. You don't own a history, a tradition, a faith, a historical memory, a human experience. Identity is a democratic tradition, it includes you and countless others, dead, alive, and yet to be born. It interacts with you, it gives you meanings and

wait for you to add to it. The utterly pathological way that people deal with identity as if it is a claim to be put onto others or property is just man's tyranny finding another precious thing to hide behind. Our sickness to which we have no cure. The insistence on being the

definitive and determinate voice mostly comes from whom I call "the walking as's," people who live "as a such and such," without ever giving their identity the respect and the attention. They don't study the culture nor the tradition, the way cultural traditions subject us to

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More from @HusseinAboubak

Hussein Aboubakr Mansour

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