No repentance nor apologies' for colonial abuses in Algeria, says Macron

French President Emmanuel Macron has ruled out issuing an official apology for abuses in Algeria, his office said Wednesday, ahead of a major report on how France is facing up to its colonial past in the country. There will be "no repentance nor apologies" for the occupation of Algeria or the bloody eight-year war that ended French rule, Macron's office said, adding that the French leader would instead take part in "symbolic acts" aimed at promoting reconciliation. 

The atrocities committed by both sides during the 1954-1962 Algerian war of independence continue to strain relations between the two countries six decades later. Macron, the first president born after the colonial period, has gone further than any of his predecessors in recognising French crimes in Algeria. Later Wednesday, a historian commissioned by the president with assessing "the progress made by France on the memory of the colonisation of Algeria and the Algerian war," will submit his findings.

Link.

Will France repatriate its collection of 19th century Algerian skulls?

The leader of resistance to occupation from Algeria: Lala Fatima N'Soumeur

The leader of resistance to occupation from Algeria: Lala Fatima N'Soumeur
1830 - 1863
She was an intelligent child whose father took care to educate her in religious sciences and left her in charge of his Quranic memorization school after his death. Her reputation for knowledge spread quickly throughout the Algerian tribes.
At the time, Algeria was under French occupation, and one day the French army launched a military assault on her village.
Fatima bravely fought alongside her brother and sparked fear in the hearts of the French, so much so that they started telling tales of the Algerian “Joan of Arc”.
After the day her village was attacked, she became active in the resistance and was part of many military campaigns. she achieved one victory after another, until the French army had to offer her a truce which she accepted. However, the French army soon broke that truce and attacked her village and captured Fatima and seized her library (which was rumored to have contained around 150 books) 

Fatima was placed in a prison under heavy French guard and there she stayed for several years until she suddenly passed away.
Some say of a sudden illness and some say poisoned by the French because they couldn't break her spirit, but her memory remained in the hearts and minds of the Algerian people as a symbol of resistance and strength.

from Muslim women in history FB page

Right-wing bloggers decry Nightrunner, DC’s Muslim ‘Batman of Paris’

A conservative blogger who earlier sounded the alarm about the perceived attack on the tea party movement in Captain America and warned of the “anti-American nihilism” of Watchmen has now turned his attention to Bruce Wayne’s recruitment of a Muslim to be the Batman of Paris.

But Nightrunner, the parkour-trained crimefighter introduced in this month’s Detective Comics Annual #12, isn’t just any Muslim — he’s a 22-year-old Algerian Muslim living in Clichy-sous-Bois, the poor commune east of Paris best known outside of France as the epicenter of the 2005 riots. And that doesn’t sit well with Warner Todd Huston.

“You see, DC Comics has decided that the ‘French savior,’ the French Batman is to be a Muslim immigrant,” Huston writes on his Publis’ Forum. “The character’s name is Bilal Asselah and he is an Algerian Sunni Muslim and an immigrant that is physically fit and adept at gymnastic sport Parkour. Apparently Batman couldn’t find any actual Frenchman to be the ‘French savior’.” What constitutes an “actual Frenchman” isn’t entirely clear, but presumably the writer is referring to one of the “Frenchmen of European stock” he mentions later.

Huston takes aim at David Hine’s story, which centers on a series of political assassinations that lead to riots by communist union members and neo-Nazis, describing it as “PCism at its worst”: “The whole situation is a misreading of what ails France. The truth is, neither communist Union members nor ‘Neo-Nazi’ Parties are causing riots in France. Muslims are. Yet DC Comics is absurdly making a Muslim immigrant the ‘French savior’?” He accuses the publisher of badly downplaying in Nightrunner’s origin “the seriousness of the actual racial tension in France” and oversimplifying the problems “as mere racism as if that is all there is to it ignoring the fact that Islam is the single most important factor in the strife.”

He isn’t alone in his criticism; he’s merely picking up the baton passed by far-right commentators like Avi Green who, writing last week at The Astute Bloggers — a site dedicated to “exposing leftist propaganda,” “highlighting under-reported news” and “promoting universal human rights” — said, “How about that, Bruce Wayne goes to France where he hires not a genuine French boy or girl with a real sense of justice, but rather, an ‘oppressed’ minority who adheres to the Religion of Peace. And this is a guy whose very parents were murdered at the hands of a common street thug!”

So while Huston isn’t the only defender of the, I don’t know, wounded honor of “actual Frenchmen” in this manufactured controversy, he may be among the most widely distributed. Commentary from his Publis’ Forum regularly appears at other conservative outlets, such as Andrew Breitbart’s network of websites and Canada Free Press. His Feb. 8 column about Captain America #602 was followed by FoxNews.com’s article about the comic’s “tea party jab” which, in turn, triggered more widespread coverage.

Huston characterizes DC’s decision to make “a Muslim in France a hero when French Muslims are at the center of some of the worst violence in the country’s recent memory” as “PCism run amuck.” It’s apparently part of the “PCing of the American comic book industry” that includes the Captain America-tea party incident, the introduction of gay character Kevin Keller in the pages of Veronica, and … Larfleeze? That’s right, Agent Orange.

Andrew Belonsky at Death and Taxes, who was among the first to pick up on the reaction to Nightrunner, views it in light of the recent calls for a boycott of Marvel’s Thor movie because black actor Idris Elba was cast as the Norse god Heimdall:

The Nightrunner controversy differs a bit from the Thor scandal seen earlier this week. In the Thor scenario, the Council [of Conservative Citizens] wasn’t saying black people can’t be heroes, period. They simply don’t want to see Idris Elba in a specific role.

“It’s not enough that Marvel attacks conservatives values, now mythological Gods must be re-invented with black skin,” they said. “It seems that Marvel Studios believes that white people should have nothing that is unique to themselves.”

It’s a discriminatory, myopic view, yes, but not nearly as narrow as the one The Astute Bloggers trumpet. Green and his colleagues assume Muslims can’t be heroic because they’re inherently villainous and out to spread “Islamic supremacism.”

Nightrunner’s introduction continues in Batman Annual #28, in stores this week

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Algeria ready for Ramadan

From Maghrebia:

Ramadan is coming to Algeria, and just like every year, special meals – and soaring costs – are on everyone's mind.

But before any meals can reach the table, Algerians must brave bustling markets. This year, they had the longest weekend in history for shopping: Thursday, Friday and Saturday, thanks to the transition to the new Friday-Saturday weekend last week. Prices are rocketing, despite efforts to rein in shopkeepers by the Ministry of Trade and the Algerian Traders' Union.

"It's like this every year; you have to stock up before Ramadan, no matter what the price," said Said, an elderly man shopping in the Bab El Oued market.

"What can you do? People buy without counting the cost, and they all come looking for the same items at the same time," said vegetable vendor Kamel, who sat behind a vegetable stall in an alley adjacent to the so-called "Three Clocks" market.

The lure of profits has casual vendors busy selling everything from parsley to dioul (fine dough for pastries). So great is the opportunity that many people switch from trades like hairdressing and fixing cars to selling Ramadan zalabiya for the month. Closed sheds are opened and young people erect tents made of reeds everywhere to serve as small mahchachates (places where people can play games while enjoying snacks until morning).

"Each Ramadan I club together with two neighbours to hire a shed and set up a mahchacha," said Samir, a civil servant who had just gone on annual leave. "It's a way of making a bit of money and is a time that young people in the area take advantage of. With nothing to do, the young people come round my place every evening to play dominoes, listen to chaabi music and sample my cakes and kebabs."

The pocketbook pinch of Ramadan shopping is balanced with the pleasure of delicious meals.

"It's the only month when women put their culinary skills on display," said Farida, who prepares her family's meals. "During the rest of the year, people eat snacks or pizzas in fast-food joints or whatever else is convenient."

The fast is usually broken with an iftar of dates and ben ou rayeb (curdled milk). Algeria is home to one of the finest dates in the world, the deglet nour, and mosques raise money to buy enough dates that worshippers can break their fast before the Maghreb (twilight) prayers.

In eastern and central Algeria, what follows is usually chorba frik (a soup of crushed wheat and tomato sauce), or in the west of the country, h’rira (a vegetable soup).

In Algiers, the next course is usually boureks, while a larger version called a brik is served in western Algeria. These leaves of dough are filled with boiled potatoes, eggs, minced meat and even prawns.

Then comes the pièce de résistance, usually ham lahlou. This dish of lamb with prunes and dried apricots is only eaten on a few days during Ramadan.

The last dish before the next day's fast begins is s’hour, which is usually couscous with raisins and curdled milk. Some people, however, prefer white coffee with cake or another hot dish.

Many people prefer to partake in the pre-dawn hours, but not everyone rises that early.

"I'm a civil servant and I can't afford to get up at four in the morning to eat," said Salim. "I might not make it in to work."

Besides the pleasures of traditional dishes, Ramadan traditions are seen in the way day and night-time activities break down along gender roles. Alongside cooking meals and spending evenings enjoying boukalate (a riddle game), women are customarily visited by neighbours or relatives and savour mint tea and pastries.

Men tend to meet friends at cafés or the mahchachates, where the nights are filled with tea and a range of sweets, as well as chats with friends and music. Those who perform taraouih prayers are the last to join in the nightlife.

But even with all the socialising with friends and neighbours, Ramadan is a family affair. "It's the only month when the whole family sits around the iftar (fast-breaking) table," said Farida, a teacher and mother.

"I eagerly wait for this month so I can see my grandmother play boukalate with her neighbours," said Razika. "It's an ancestral treasure that they keep alive."

See also Algeria…Ramadan Food Packages for the Poor