JERUSALEM — The intimate Mass to be celebrated by Pope Francis on Monday in the Cenacle, the hall on Jerusalem’s Mount Zion venerated by Christians as the room of the Last Supper, is intended to cap a Holy Land pilgrimage promoting peace and tolerance. But ancient rivalries lurk just beneath the flagstones here, and the pope’s visit has brought them to the surface. Also holy to Jews […]
BANHA, Egypt — His face smiles down from campaign banners everywhere, but splashes of red paint have bloodied a few. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the former army field marshal who led the military takeover last summer, is certain to win a landslide victory in the pro forma presidential election on Monday and Tuesday. But in this town about 30 miles north of Cairo, the mood is a discordant […]
DAMASCUS, Syria — For Younes al-Nasr, a lifelong train lover, the Hejaz railway station here in the heart of the Syrian capital is a repository of shelved ambitions. Every day, Mr. Nasr, 68, a Transportation Ministry employee, pads around his offices in the Ottoman-era building, where light filters through red, yellow and blue stained glass. He imagines the past — the few short years a century ago […]
JERUSALEM — Pope Francis inserted himself directly into the collapsed Middle East peace process on Sunday, issuing an invitation to host the Israeli and Palestinian presidents for a prayer summit at his apartment in the Vatican in an unexpected overture that has again underscored the broad ambitions of his papacy. Francis took the extraordinary step in Bethlehem, where he became the first pontiff ever to fly directly […]
Pope Francis at Israel’s separation barrier Associated Press BETHLEHEM, West Bank–Palestinians had been hoping that the papal visit to the West Bank would kick up international sympathy with their campaign for statehood and against Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank, and many were pleased with his actions. “It’s a great day for Palestine par excellence,” Palestinian Parliament Member Mustafa Barghouti said after after Pope Francis finished a […]
The Middle East’s oil boom was made in China HSBC As the world’s second-largest consumer of oil, China in the past decade has relied heavily on the Middle East to secure the resources required to fuel its ascendancy to become an economic superpower. In doing so, it overtook the U.S. as principal investor in the Middle East and played a pivotal role in transforming the region by […]
CAIRO — Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the former army officer soon to be Egypt’s president, promises to remedy Egypt’s crippling fuel shortage by installing energy-efficient bulbs in every home socket, even if he has to send a government employee to screw in each one. “I’m not leaving a chance for people to act on their own,” Mr. Sisi said in his first and most extensive television interview. “My […]
ON THE EAST BANK OF THE JORDAN RIVER — After visiting a site on Saturday where Jesus is believed to have been baptized, Pope Francis spoke about Jesus’s humility, “the fact that he bends down to wounded humanity in order to heal us.” So when some burly men prepared to carry a doctor in a wheelchair up four steps to the stage for a blessing, perhaps it […]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Waving to television cameras and assembled dignitaries, President Michel Suleiman departed the presidential palace on Saturday, the last day of his six-year term, leaving behind a political vacuum caused by the failure of the country’s political powers to agree on a successor. The vacancy in the president’s office is the most recent crisis in Lebanon’s fragile political system, which relies on agreements among the […]
The judicial authorities in Iran appeared to harden their clampdown on expression Friday, moving to block Instagram, imprisoning the director who made the now-famous Iranian version of the Pharrell Williams “Happy” video and warning women to comply with a police campaign on the proper wearing of mandatory headscarves. Taken together, the developments suggested that the country’s Islamic bureaucracy was alarmed over any perception of permissiveness that may […]
The surge in oil prices driven by Chinese demand has added $1 trillion to output in the Gulf Cooperation Council countries over 10 years, according to HSBC Holdings Plc. The six-member bloc’s gross domestic product increased to $1.7 trillion between 2003 and 2013, bringing per capital GDP to an average of $35,000, HSBC said in a report on the effect of a “globalizing China” on the Middle […]
Emaar Properties, owner of the world’s biggest mall, hired HSBC Holdings and Emirates NBD as bookrunners for the initial public offering of its retail arm, with Rothschild as financial adviser, five people familiar with the matter said. National Bank of Abu Dhabi and EFG Hermes Holding Co. will also be bookrunners on the sale of between 25 percent to 30 percent of the malls unit on the […]
Islamic finance has been one of the fastest-growing sectors in global finance but the industry has yet to shake off perceptions about high costs and complexity that are holding back some issuers. Sukuk, or Islamic bonds that follow religious principles such as a ban on interest and speculation, are now a major funding tool for companies in the Middle East and southeast Asia, and are becoming increasingly […]
The MIT Enterprise Forum Arab Startup Competition, one of the biggest startup events in the Middle East, will announce its winner on Thursday evening at an event in Cairo. Here’s the five startups that caught the Wall Street Journal’s eye from the shortlisted semi-finalists. Elwafeyat.com: The concept of Cairo-based Elwafeyat.com is dead easy to understand. The website is an online platform to honor deceased family members and […]
Uber San Francisco-based Uber — a smartphone app that connects passengers with cars for hire — officially launches in the Saudi capital Riyadh today after three months of beta testing, entering a new market with some unique opportunities. Saudi Arabia is a country with virtually no public transport and where half of the population — women — is not allowed to drive. Many of the regular cabs available […]
|By TAP Staff| Dubai outscores all US cities in terms of its healthcare system, the latest Cities of Opportunities report has revealed. Dubai is the only Middle Eastern city that features in the Price Waterhouse Cooper study takes the pulse of 30 cities at the heart of the world’s economy and culture. Dubai ranked 5th in global affordability, that measures cost of living, purchasing power and corporate […]
Tehran police have released most of the Iranians who had been arrested on Tuesday for posting a video in which they danced to the song “Happy” by Pharrell Williams, but kept the director in detention, according to the Facebook page created in support of the group. Reihane Taravati, who appears in the video, posted a photo and an expression of gratitude to her Instagram account: The arrest sparked global […]
What do you do if you are a cheerful 25-year-old college student in Iran tired of your country and its people being portrayed in the world as angry, provocative and depressed? Answer: You make a video of your friends being happy, singing and dancing in the streets of Tehran to Pharrell Williams’ smash hit song “Happy.” “People of Tehran are happy! Watch and share our happiness! … […]
FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, is no stranger to controversy. Allegations of bribery, corruption and vote-rigging have swirled around the organization for years, many of them recently centered on Qatar and its winning bid for the 2022 World Cup. Jerome Champagne, a French former diplomat and FIFA executive, wants the chance to right the ship. Jerome Champagne is running for FIFA president next year. Reuters […]
Some 10 days before the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt in 2011, a small startup accelerator was born with grand ambitions to serve the region’s entrepreneurs. Those ambitions had to be put on hold for six months with the ensuing political turmoil in the country. But now, in less than three years, Cairo’s Flat6Labs has established a platform, and most notably a brand, across the Middle […]
Coca-Cola’s Facebook page is supposed to have the biggest fan base for any brand. As per the latest tally, the page has over 82 million ‘likes’. A large part of this is obviously built up through paid promotion, but given that this is the highest number any single brand has managed to pull together on any social media platform, it is an achievement that the soft drink […]
|TAP Special| Sharjah might soon have its own Metro, which could be linked to Etihad Rai, as part of a massive plan to develop the emirate’s transport infrastructure, according to sources familiar with the plan. The newly-created Sharjah Roads and Transport Authority has been tasked with the responsibility of undertaking the feasibility studies in this regard. The plan also includes the development of new road networks and […]
|By TAP Staff| Ooredoo has announced a new collaboration with the world-renowned MIT Media Lab, in order to drive cutting-edge ICT innovation and research. Since 1985, the MIT Media Lab has pioneered unconventional research in the ICT sector to radically improve people’s daily lives. Ooredoo joins the MIT Media Lab as a Consortium Lab Member. Dr. Nasser Marafih, Group CEO, Ooredoo, said: “ICT is rapidly converging, and […]
GAZA — For 14-year-old Aseel Radi, the promised reconciliation between warring Palestinian political factions is viewed through a forlorn fountain in a crowded market on the eastern side of Gaza City. Aseel used to visit the fountain in what is known as Palestine Square with her father, Maher, a member of the Fatah faction’s armed wing who was killed by militants from its rival, Hamas, during the […]
