Over the past few years, Egypt’s relations with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates on one hand, and with Qatar and Turkey on the other, witnessed a complete reversal, twice over. Up until the 2011 uprising, Egypt maintained cool relations with Qatar and Turkey who had hosted Muslim Brotherhood leaders, while at the same time maintaining strong ties with the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Following the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood to power in 2012, the equation was completely reversed. Read more »
Articles
A UAE passport to the world
The benefits of a UAE citizenship are widely recognised and include medical, educational and housing benefits. With more nations expected to offer visa waivers in coming months, this country’s travel document is set to be the best Arab passport by far. Read more »
Can Mathaf Restore a Pan-Arab Artistic Identity?
In 2010, Mathaf (the Arab Museum of Modern Art) was opened in the Gulf state of Qatar. In his essay, I provide an overview of pan-Arabism in recent decades and looks at what this museum can do to restore a pan-Arab cultural identity that has been neglected and in some cases even vilified for decades. Read more »
In the UAE the only tribe is the Emirati
The UAE’s ethnic make-up includes natives whose ancestors can be traced back here for centuries as well as people who immigrated to the country from across the region. Today, the cultures of these immigrants and natives have amalgamated into what has become the Emirati identity. Over the past four decades being Emirati started to denote far more than a citizenship — it was also a way of life, a sense of common destiny. Read more »
Correcting misconceptions of the Gulf’s modern art movement
On Oct. 25, after a brief visit to the region, a Wall Street Journal writer declared, “The Arabic-speaking part of the Gulf has essentially no indigenous tradition of visual or plastic arts.” It isn’t the first time that the modern art movement in the Gulf was dismissed by those who don’t know better. In fact, modern art as defined in the West stretches back several decades across the Gulf with multiple generations of artists. Read more »
Thriving Gulf Cities Emerge as New Centers of Arab World
An old Arab saying goes, “Cairo writes, Beirut publishes and Baghdad reads.” These three capitals, along with Damascus, were long the hubs of culture and education in the Arab world. However, over the past few years, as these traditional Arab capitals became more embroiled in civil strife, a new set of cities started to emerge in the Gulf, establishing themselves as the new centers of the Arab world. Abu Dhabi, its sister emirates of Dubai and Sharjah and the Qatari capital, Doha, have developed as the nerve center of the contemporary Arab world. Read more »