AMMAN, Jordan — By the time Umm Zeid caught the coronavirus in September, the Jordanian mother of three had spent 18 months losing a battle with what has become known as a shadow pandemic: domestic violence. Since the first wave of lockdowns, Umm Zeid has suffered in her small home in a city in northeast Jordan. In her 30s, she…
Iraqis opt for less religious strife
An election born of the 2019 protests reveals a distaste for religious-based parties and a preference for clean, secular rule. In the decade before the pandemic, social hostilities involving religion were on the decline around the world, according to the Pew Research Center. In the Middle East, a region long riven by religious strife, a 2019 poll by the Arab…
Kais Saied plans to transform Tunisia. It may go bust first
The president rules by decree as the economy seizes up Before he sent a tank to bar the doors of parliament, Kais Saied was a law professor who preached fealty to the constitution. It may seem a contradiction, but contradictions helped propel Mr Saied (pictured) to the Tunisian presidency in 2019. He was a populist with a patrician manner, a…
More violence, less income: Arab women bear the brunt of COVID-19, study finds
A new survey by Arab Barometer adds numbers to the narrative that COVID has led to a harsher reality for women in the Middle East and North Africa. The COVID-19 pandemic has turned Heba Mordaa’s life upside down. “Ever since the lockdowns started in March 2020, my work has been deteriorating,” the 29-year-old manicurist and mother of three in Beirut says. “At first,…
As Tunisia risks losing its democracy, the US takes a ‘wait and see’ approach
As Tunisia risks losing its democracy, the US is expressing concern about the country’s stability and political institutions but not taking any specific actions yet. It all depends on how things evolve in the coming days, writes Brooke Anderson. Over the weekend, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan spoke with Tunisian President Kais Saied to express his support for the…
Tunisia’s democracy in the balance after president’s power grab
Tunisia’s decade-old democracy hangs in the balance after President Kais Saied removed the prime minister and suspended Parliament on Sunday. Why it matters: Tunisia was the lone democracy to emerge from the Arab Spring. It remains the only democracy in the Arab world. But the country’s politics have been deadlocked amid an economic crisis and its worst COVID-19 wave, leading…