Tafline Laylin

Owl Love Knows no Borders

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Travel & Nature »

wildlife, transboundary conservation, pest control, Israel, Jordan, LevantWe’re fond of saying that nature knows no borders but we could never have illustrated the point as well as a recent story from the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI).

The Barn Owls pictured above have recently parented seven little owlets in a nesting box situated on Kibbutz Ma’oz Hai’im just a skip from the border with Jordan, but here’s the rub: the male on the right is Israeli and the female on the left is Jordanian!

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Tafline Laylin

Nobel Winner Orhan Pamuk Devotes a Museum to Ordinary Things

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Lifestyle & Culture »

stuff, consumerism, Orhan Pamuk, Istanbul, TurkeyPaying homage to a slower time, Turkey’s first nobel prize winning author Orhan Pamuk has immortalized the importance of everyday objects in The Museum of Innocence. Among the world’s most unique collections, the museum that opened last month in Istanbul’s Beyoğlu district contains 83 cabinets full of bits and pieces collected in flea markets and antique shops.

Each cabinet represents a chapter in Pamuk’s book of the same name in which the main character, Kemal Basmaci, the son of a wealthy industrialist, collects artifacts that remind him of his cousin – a poor sales woman (who is also his cousin) with whom he is completely smitten. 

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Miriam Kresh

May’s Seasonal Produce: Sour Plums and Cherries

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Food & Health »

image-sour-green-plumsSour green plums the size of large marbles are in the shuk now, a seasonal favorite of the Iraqi community. Eat them out of hand as a snack, sprinkling each bite with a little salt. The classic Iraqi way to cook them is to pair them with meat in a flavorful stew. And if you want to ask for them in Persian, say, “Gojeh sabz!”

Fruit: The summer wave of colorful fruit has begun, to the rejoicing of cooks who love to put up preserves.  Apricots, peaches, and nectarines have entered the markets, and are already sweet enough to be worth buying. Strawberries are still with us, although getting seedy in preparation for disappearing till next year. If you haven’t made your jam yet, here’s our recipe. Kiwis are sweet and ripe.

Cherries have arrived, and farmers predict huge crops this year due to the prolonged winter this region enjoyed, which allowed the trees to “sleep” and blossom after the windiest weather. Last year’s crop almost didn’t exist, due to windstorms that blew most of the blossoms off the trees.

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Tafline Laylin

Israel Environment Minister Proposes Cuts to Gaza Electricity to Bridge Shortfalls

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Business & Politics »

renewable energy, Israel, Ministry of Environment, electricity cuts, energy shortages, Gaza StripWe should all keep an eye on the Levant this summer as it manages a severe energy crisis, because what is currently unfolding on a regional scale is likely to eventually take place internationally as well. Israel, Jordan, Egypt and the Palestinian Territories are all taxed by dwindling energy supplies and rising demand, and each country’s response to this dual challenge is worth noting.

Egypt cut off its supply of natural gas to Israel, Jordan is working furiously to get oil shale plants online, foreign aid organizations have been supplying renewables to the West Bank and Gaza and most recently, Israel’s Environmental Minister proposed a plan to cut off Israel’s electricity supply to Gaza in order to prevent shortfalls in their own energy supply.

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Laurie Balbo

Enforcing Smoke-free Workplaces in Jordan

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Food & Health »

smoking cigarette jordan cartoon

I just spit out my coffee. About to move house for the fifth time in as many years, I take a day to escape the cardboard box Himalayas towering in the living room.  Plus there’s heavy construction going on next door, and it sounds like all of Amman’s stray cats are in heat. I grab a laptop and head to the nearby Taj Mall Lifestyle Destination, to experience a 90s cliché: sit in a coffee shop and quietly write. I fire up the Internet. See a news alert from The Jordan Times: Jordan featured as regional pioneer in enforcing smoke-free business environments? (There goes that coffee.)

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Julia Harte

Archaeologists Discover Lost Language In Southeastern Turkey

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Travel & Nature »

A list of women’s names written in cuneiform is the only remnant of this unidentified language, which was spoken 2,500 years ago.

Found in the remains of an enormous palace that was destroyed by a fire around 700 BCE, the clay tablet pictured above holds the only remnants of a language previously unknown to modern scholars.

The language could contribute to our understanding of the ethnic groups who lived in the area thousands of years ago, and help map their interactions with the Assyrian Empire, according to Science Daily.

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Arwa Aburawa

Jordanian Bank Sanabel Buys One Quarter of a Congo Forest

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Food & Health »

congo-forest-jordan-sanabelAn Islamic bank in Jordan, Sanabel, has bought up over a quarter of a Congo forest for ‘sustainable projects’

When I first read about the acquisition of 500,000 hectares of high value forest in the Democratic Republic of Congo by an Islamic investment bank in Jordan, I thought one thing: land grab.

Over the last couple of years, countries across the MENA region have been buying tracts of land all over Africa. Worried about the rising cost of food as well as declining natural resources locally, they have been trying to make sure that their eggs (so to speak) aren’t all in one basket. Egypt has bought up land in Sudan, Saudi Arabia has staked a claim on land in Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates has farms in Sudan, Morocco and Algeria.

However, this latest land acquisition by Sanabel is a little more interesting as it claims to come with some green credentials. According to news reports, Sanabel which is Jordan’s first Islamic investment bank is considering a number of “Sharia’ compliant forestry activities” for the land it has purchased. These range from afforestation and reforestation projects, and protecting the land from deforestation and sustainable agro-forestry projects.

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Leigh Cuen

Israel’s Petroleum Council Adds Environment Reps

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Business & Politics »

meged oil field israelMeged oil field, in Israel.

Last week two environmental representatives were added to Israel’s Petroleum Council, according to the Jerusalem Post. The council has been restructured to include a total of 13 members, including seven members of the public. As Israel’s ongoing court dispute between government officials and national gas distributors proves, the industry has a local history of disregarding public interest for financial gain – look to our past story on polluting gas stations.

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Leigh Cuen

Is Urbanizing the Solution to Israel’s Housing Crisis?

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Architecture & Urban »

central israel forestsForest in central Israel, as seen from Ein Karem

Some architects and economists are proposing Israel solve its affordable housing crisis by turning central Israel into a “megacity,” similar to Hong Kong, and moving the nation’s lush nature reserves and agricultural lands to the Negev and the Galilee. Supporters of this solution insist it would not harm the environment if public transportation was improved and public parks increased.

According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the country produces around 93% of their domestic food requirements. As of 2002 central Israel held 39% of the country’s agricultural land. As we’ve seen in numerous nearby Arab nations, food security continues to be a divisive issue among Middle Eastern populations. It’s hard to imagine that paving so much of Israel’s fertile land would be beneficial in the long run.

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Maurice Picow

Lebanon Carpet Fire Causing More Atmospheric Pollution

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Architecture & Urban »

fire carpet beirut lebanonBlack plumes go airborne from burning Byblos Carpet Factory fire in Lebanon.

Lebanon has had more than its share of various air and surface pollution issues in recent years. Some of these issues have included dumping loads of garbage straight into the Mediterranean; as well as a giant garbage mound in Sidon that is so serious that boats at sea smell it before seeing it. Recent fires at tire dumping landfill sites have also been reported, including a recent tire dump fire outside Beirut  that was suspected as being intentionally set by people wanting to retrieve the steel reinforcing material from inside the tires themselves in order to resell it. Another prime contributor to air pollution near the country’s capital, occurred on Friday when a carpet factory fire broke out at a large carpet factory in the town of Safra, just north of Beirut.

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