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Abu Dhabi, UAE
CNN
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A weeping Iranian lady is seen kneeling by her useless brother’s coffin as she slashes through her hair with a pair of scissors. Her kin wail for justice as she tosses strands onto the coffin.
They have been grieving for 36-year-old Javad Heydari, who was fatally shot final week at one of many anti-government protests which have gripped Iran.
Images like these have galvanized women internationally to hitch Iranian women protesting the dying of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini. She died in hospital on September 16, three days after being pulled off the streets of Tehran by morality police and brought to a “re-education center” for classes in modesty.
From the Middle East, Europe and across the United States, women across the globe have proven solidarity with Iranian women’s plight in rallies and demonstrations. Some have additionally minimize or shaved their hair in public or whereas being filmed.
Now in their twelfth day, protests have swept through greater than 40 Iranian cities, together with the capital Tehran. Iranian safety forces have been cracking down on protesters, with a whole lot arrested and not less than 41 killed, in keeping with state media. Some human rights organizations say the dying toll is as excessive as 76. CNN can’t independently confirm these figures.
So, why are women cutting their hair?
For many Iranian women, cutting off hair – an indication of magnificence that’s decreed to be hidden within the Islamic Republic – is a poignant type of protest.
“We want to show them that we don’t care about their standards, their definition of beauty or what they think that we should look like,” stated 36-year-old Faezeh Afshan, an Iranian chemical engineer dwelling in Bologna, Italy, who was filmed shaving off her hair. “It is to show that we are angry.”
Afshan attributes the apply of cutting off hair to historic cultural practices. “In our literature, cutting the hair is a symbol of mourning, and sometimes a symbol of protesting,” she advised CNN. “If we can cut our hair to show that we are angry… we will do it.”
The apply is cited in Shahnameh, a 1,000-year-old Persian epic and a cultural mainstay in Iran written by Ferdowsi. Made of practically 60,000 verses, the poem tells the tales of the kings of Persia and is without doubt one of the most vital works of literature within the Persian language. In a couple of occasion via the epic work, hair is plucked in an act of mourning.
“Women cutting their hair is an ancient Persian tradition… when the fury is stronger than the power of the oppressor,” tweeted Wales-based author and translator Shara Atashi. “The moment we have been waiting for has come. Politics fueled by poetry.”
In the Shahnameh, after the hero Siyavash is killed, his spouse Farangis and the women accompanying her minimize their hair to protest injustice, Atashi advised CNN.
The characters portrayed within the poem “are in everyday use as symbols and archetypes,” she stated, including that the poem has helped form the identities of Iranians, Afghans and Tajiks for 1,000 years.
“But there is haircutting in the poetry of Hafez and Khaqani too, always about mourning and protests against injustice,” she stated, referring to different Persian poets.
The apply can also be widespread in different historic cultures. The Epic of Gilgamesh, a 3,500-year-old poem from historic Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) covers themes of grief and despair, the place cutting or pulling out one’s hair is used to specific anguish. The poem is taken into account to be one of many world’s oldest works of literature and is claimed to have influenced neighboring cultures.
Shima Babaei, an Iranian activist residing in Belgium who stated she was arrested by Iran’s infamous morality police in 2018 for publicly eradicating her hijab as an indication of protest, advised CNN that hair cutting had “historical meaning” for Iranians. Women who lose a direct relative would generally minimize their hair as an indication of mourning and anger, she stated.
“For us, Mahsa was our sister,” she stated. “And so, in this way, we are protesting.”
Cutting hair, stated Atashi, “is itself a ceremony of mourning to better expose the depth of suffering at the loss of a loved one.” And in in the present day’s context, she provides, it’s a signal of “protest against the killing of our people.”
Saudi king names MBS as prime minister
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz has named his son Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (often known as MBS) as the dominion’s prime minister and one other son Prince Khalid as protection minister, in keeping with Saudi state media.
- Background: The crown prince was promoted from protection minister and has been the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia for a number of years. Khalid beforehand served as deputy protection minister. MBS stated the dominion has elevated its self-sufficiency in navy industries to fifteen% from 2% and plans to achieve 50% beneath the newly appointed protection minister, state-run Saudi Press Agency reported. King Salman will nonetheless preside over the cupboard conferences he attends, the decree confirmed.
- Why it issues: MBS has modified Saudi Arabia radically since rising to energy in 2017, main efforts to diversify the economic system from its dependence on oil, permitting women to drive and curbing clerics’ powers. His reforms, nonetheless, have include a crackdown on dissent, with activists, royals, women rights’ activists and businessmen jailed.
Turkey summons German envoy after politician likens Erdogan to ‘sewer rat’
Turkey’s overseas ministry summoned the German ambassador to Ankara on Tuesday to protest feedback made by a senior German politician who likened President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to a “little sewer rat,” Reuters reported. “We condemn in the strongest terms the insulting statements made by Wolfgang Kubicki, the vice-speaker of the German Federal Parliament, about our president in a speech during the Lower Saxony state election campaign,” Turkish overseas ministry spokesman Tanju Bilgic stated in a press release.
- Background: Kubicki confirmed to Reuters that he made the remark throughout an election marketing campaign rally whereas attempting to attract consideration to an increase within the variety of unlawful migrants shifting from Turkey alongside the so-called Balkan route in the direction of Germany. “A sewer rat is a small, cute, but at the same time clever and crafty creature that also appears in children’s stories,” Kubicki stated, citing the favored animated film “Ratatouille” for instance.
- Why it issues: Turkey is a candidate for EU membership however negotiations have lengthy been stalled amid disagreements on quite a lot of points together with Ankara’s human rights document, migration and geopolitics. Insulting the president is a felony offense in Turkey, the place Erdogan and his ruling AK Party have held energy for 20 years.
At least 4 Palestinians killed, dozens wounded in considered one of this yr’s deadliest Israeli West Bank raids
At least four Palestinian men have been killed and 50 wounded throughout an Israeli navy raid in Jenin Wednesday morning, Palestinian officers stated, making it one of many deadliest Israeli raids within the occupied West Bank this yr, which has already seen over 100 Palestinians killed by Israeli troopers. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) stated the raid was associated to an assault in Tel Aviv in April which left three individuals useless, and that the suspects Wednesday fought again with explosives and gunfire.
- Background: For months, Israel has been recurrently raiding cities within the West Bank, focusing particularly on Jenin and Nablus, saying it’s concentrating on militants and their weapons caches earlier than they’ve the possibility to cross into Israel and perform assaults. The operation, dubbed “Breaking the Wave” by the IDF, was launched after a sequence of assaults on Israelis. At least 20 Israelis and foreigners have been killed in assaults concentrating on civilians and troopers in Israel and the West Bank up to now this yr.
- Why it issues: This is already the deadliest yr for Palestinians within the West Bank since 2015, in keeping with the Palestinian Ministry of Health. More than 35 of these killed have been in Jenin. Israel says most killed have been partaking violently with troopers throughout navy operations, however dozens of unarmed civilians have been killed as properly, human rights teams together with B’Tselem have stated.
Henna, a reddish-brown dye famously used for physique artwork in lots of components of the Middle East, could also be making its approach to becoming a member of the UNESCO checklist of intangible cultural heritage.
In the method of being nominated by the UAE and the Arab League, henna has lengthy been a part of Middle Eastern, North African and South Asian heritage and identification.
Dating again 1000’s of years, the non permanent dye is used to create elaborate designs primarily on one’s fingers, typically for non secular festivals and celebrations.
Representatives from 16 Arab nations met this month to debate the nomination, in keeping with the Abu Dhabi authorities media workplace, stressing that henna performs an vital position in Arab and Gulf tradition and identification.
UNESCO’s checklist of intangible cultural heritage contains each inherited in addition to fashionable traditions, and is supposed to advertise practices that contribute to “social cohesion” and encourage a shared sense of identification.
The checklist contains practices equivalent to falconry, yoga, and Arabic calligraphy.
By Nadeen Ebrahim
