PRESENT-DAY AMMAN

In a few blog postings past, l mentioned that the Kingdom of Jordan was an Arab-occupied country, and I believe in another post, I referred to it as an artificial country created by the British. I think this deserves some clarification since it’s actually a bit more complex than that. While it is a simple fact that Jordan really is an artificial country with no historical basis, as far as it being Arab-occupied, well, that's only half true. In other words, half of it is true and half of it is not. The western part, especially the northwestern quarter, is indeed Arab-occupied since it historically belongs to Israel. The rest of the country has historically belonged to Arabia, so in that sense, Jordan is not as occupied as most countries in the region. The reason why I bring this up is because I decided to do a posting on the capital city of this artificial country, Amman, originally the ancient town of Ammon, capital of the Ammonites, located in the western Central part, just outside the borders of historic Israel, in Arabia. Today of course, it serves as “Jordan” ‘s political and financial hub.

For many years, anti-American sentiment has been rife in this city as in the rest of the country. America’s crime? Being allies of Israel. See this article written in Weave News in February.

I wonder if the present-day Ammonites ever thought about fixing their own problems at home instead of blaming everything on America and Israel. See this article in RoyaNews in March.

FOLLOW-UP FROM PREVIOUS POSTING

Algiers is a major city in Arab-occupied Algeria. Indigenous sites in the city include:

The Casbah, located on the ruins of Icosium, the Roman settlement, located along the city's bay. Roman ruins can still be seen there today. Located in the Casbah are several Moorish-influence palaces such as the Palace of the Dey, built by the Dey Hussein in the 16th century; along the bay, the so-called Palace of Riyadh fortress which was begun by the Dey Ramdhan Pasha in 1576; and the Dar Moustapha Pacha Moorish Palace built in 1798. 

The El Kebir, or Great, Mosque, the oldest in Algiers, is located on the Rue de la Marine. It was built by the Berber Almoravid Caliph Yousef ibn Tashfin; 

The Bardo National Museum of Prehistory and Ethnography was originally a Moorish villa; it opened as a museum in 1927.

The Villa Abd el Tiff, built in the Moorish style in 1907.

The Museum of Modern Art was originally a French department store, completed in 1909 in the Moorish style. It opened as a museum in 2007.

THE INDIGENOUS ALGERIANS

The Pact of Omar in the 7^th century defined the relationship between Muslims and non-Muslims. Usually, this meant that non-Muslims would have to content themselves with being second class citizens. It was institutionalized racism, but did this racism only pertain to non-Muslims. The answer is actually “no”. The indigenous people of North Africa, the Berber (Amazigh) tribes, who adopted Islam early in Islamic history – some tribes, involuntarily – in the wake of the Arab invasion, occupation, and colonization of their ancestral homeland, North Africa, many times, throughout their history, have often been relegated to second class citizenship in relation to the Arab occupiers.  

Since North Africa is such a huge area, this blog has covered various locations separately. So for right now, I will cover the indigenous people of Algeria. For a brief historical overview of the indigenous Algerians, see this posting.  

Discrimination against the Amazigh continues to this day. For articles on such discrimination, combined with their culture, see these articles from France24, Xinhua, and PressZA.

INDIGENOUS ALEXANDRIA

The status of the indigenous Egyptians, the Copts, in Alexandria, as with the rest of Egypt, is pretty precarious at best. For instance, in December 2020, a Coptic shopowner was stabbed to death by an Arab settler simply for being a Copt. For a history of the indigenous Egyptians in Alexandria, see this posting. For two of the most recent events in the indigenous Egyptian community, both written in Wataninet.com, see here and here.

COMPARING TO CURRENT EVENTS

From a Jewish perspective, the present conflict in Ukraine is very awkward. Both the leaders of Russia and the leaders of Ukraine are very friendly to Jews and have close relations with Israel. The question then arises: how do Jews relate to a leader, in this case, Putin of Russia, who may be a friend to Jews but a tyrant to other people, in this case, Ukrainians. This blog does not attempt to answer that but I have written on the subject in a roundabout way (nothing to do with Eastern Europe). See this posting written in October.