Middle East 4 ChangeStruggles in Iran – Another response
Tuesday, July 13, 2021
We published a letter we received from comrades Iman Ganji and Jose Rosales on the current strikes in Iran. We asked them how these strikes related to the…
Petrochemical workers in Iran strike over pay and conditions
Tuesday, July 6, 2021
Jean Shaoul Petrochemical workers across Iran have been waging strikes since June 19 to demand higher pay, the payment of back wages, the elimination of intermediary contractors and…
Two Poems of Palestine by Rafeef Ziadeh
Monday, May 17, 2021
Her poem ‘We Teach Life, Sir’ – an impassioned attack on media misrepresentation of the Palestinian cause – went viral within days of its release. We teach life,…
More than ever, the struggle for justice unites the Middle East and the world
Monday, November 16, 2020
Jade Saab “A spectre is haunting Europe…” This is how Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels opened their Communist Manifesto, written on the eve of several uprisings on the continent…
One year on, has Iraq’s anti-government protest movement changed the country?
Thursday, October 1, 2020
Alex MacDonald In the year since Iraqis took to the streets en masse to protest against unemployment, corruption, foreign interference and a creaking political system, the country has…
Death by Stoning: Poem by Ziba Karbassi
Sunday, September 13, 2020
translated by Stephen Watts and Ziba Karbassi little morning starare you here withyour star-gaze gone?little wrenare you staying in the busheswhen you go to the skies?little silver coinare…
Sweatshops and monopsony power – a review
Friday, July 17, 2020
Michael Roberts ME4Change has posted this article because the condition of garment workers in the UK city of Leicester is replicated throughout the Middle East and to underline…
The Syrian Revolution: A History from Below
Friday, July 10, 2020
12 Webinars, June 20-August 5, 2020 Syria has been the focus of much regional and global attention following the massive eruption of popular revolt in mid-March 2011. The…
Turkey’s Missing WPS Agenda and Implications for the COVID-19 Pandemic
Friday, July 3, 2020
Nisan Alıcı, Güley Bor, Güneş Daşlı By December 2012, when the peace process between the Turkish state and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to end the decades-long armed…
Iranian feminist political prisoner’s open letter defends Kurdish women political prisoners
Sunday, May 31, 2020
Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee Golrokh Iraee’s letter from inside the Varamin-Qarchak prison; the pressures on #Zeynab Jalalian continue. Zeinab Jalalian is one of the longest serving political prisoner in…
Engels was right, class society and women’s oppression aren’t inevitable or irreversible
Monday, May 25, 2020
Elaine Graham-Leigh 200th anniversary of his birth, Elaine Graham-Leigh looks at Engels’ The Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State All page references are to the…
جامعهی ایران مدیون مقاومتها و فعالیتهای پیگیرانهی زنان است
Saturday, March 14, 2020
هایده مغیثی در گفتوگو با مریم حسینخواه [این مصاحبه به مناسبت روز زن (۸ مارس) صورت گرفته است.] چهار دهه پس از استقرار حکومت اسلامی در ایران، حقوق…
Four poems by Kajal Ahmad, translated from the Kurdish
Tuesday, February 11, 2020
Were I a Martyr Trans. Darya Ali andAlana Marie Levinson-LaBrosse I want no flowers, no epoch of union, no dawn of disunion. I want no flowers for I…
Protests in Iran: interview with Ardeshir Mehrdad
Friday, January 31, 2020
Interviewer: Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen wild swings in protests in Iran: from the anti-regime protests before Soleimaini’s assassination, through the huge funeral mobilisations, to renewed…
We Are The Majority; We Must Turn That Into Power
Tuesday, December 31, 2019
Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flower Over the last decade, a national consensus has developed for a progressive left agenda on the economy, social services, the climate crisis and…
The popular assemblies at the heart of the Chilean uprising
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Bree Busk More than fifty days have passed since the Chilean uprising burst into existence. For those living it on the ground, it feels like much longer. The…
“A Free Country Needs Free Women”—Interview About Palestinian Women’s Protests
Tuesday, November 5, 2019
Last Thursday, in Jerusalem, Ramallah, Gaza, Haifa, and the Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut, more than 3,000 women took to the streets until late at night under the…
Defend the women’s revolution in northeastern Syria
Friday, October 11, 2019
ROAR collective Since 2012, with the leading role of women, the people in North and East Syria have been building a social system that enables a peaceful, radical-democratic,…
Feminists on the front lines of the Algerian uprising
Monday, September 9, 2019
Leïla Ouitis When in early February Algeria’s ailing octogenarian president Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced his intention to run for the presidency for a fifth term, millions of Algerians took…
Domestic Violence is Widespread in the Middle East
Sunday, July 28, 2019
Cesar Chelala. Gender violence, manifested essentially as violence against women, is one of the most significant epidemics in the Middle East today. This kind of violence occurs in…
Lights out: Tehran’s clampdown on Western habits
Tuesday, July 23, 2019
Kourosh Ziabari. Iran is a country in which many aspects of public life: governance, education, foreign relations and even people’s lifestyles are peculiarly determined by ideology. The authorities…
Suitcases & Theater: Two poems
Saturday, June 29, 2019
Solmaz Sharif. Suitcases Suitcases of dried limes, dried figs, pomegranate paste, parsley laid in the sun, burnt honey, sugar cubes hardened on a baking sheet. Suitcases of practical…
Social Media and the internet: a powerful organising tool
Thursday, June 20, 2019
Podcast by David Harvey. Social media has been a powerful took in organising mass movements. Their use in organising more durable structures such as trade unions, women’s organisation…
Tehran 2019: City On Edge, Iranians In Anticipation
Monday, June 17, 2019
Fariba Amini. May this year was a very pleasant time in Tehran when it comes to the weather. The abundant rain had cleared the pollution for a while,…
‘To sing is not a right in the Gaza Strip’
Thursday, June 13, 2019
Hind Khoudary. Abed Nasser, the owner of Cedar restaurant in Gaza City, broke the news to his customers in a Facebook post: the highly-anticipated music night scheduled for…
Welcome to the new Algerian revolution: an interview with Hamza Hamouchene
Thursday, May 9, 2019
Omar Hassan speaks to Algerian scholar and activist Hamza Hamouchene, coordinator of Environmental Justice North Africa and co-founder of the Algeria Solidarity Campaign, about the mass movement sweeping Algeria. In…
Three poems by Forugh Farrokhzad, a woman alone
Wednesday, May 8, 2019
English Translations of selected Poems and Poetry of the great Iranian Poet Forugh Farrokhzad فروغ فرخزاد Forugh, one of the most famous Persian Women poets died in a…
Women and the War in Yemen: Actors or Victims?
Sunday, May 5, 2019
In most conflicts, women are grouped with children; they are categorized among the most vulnerable groups. This designation erases, in many cases, women who are engaged in the…
Only People Make Their Own History: Writings on Capitalism, Imperialism, and Revolution: Book Review
Friday, March 29, 2019
Semir Amin. Radical political economist Samir Amin (1931–2018) left behind a cherished oeuvre of Marxist writings. Amin’s intellectual range—from economics to culture—was admirable, and his lessons remain essential….
Voices above the chaos: female war poets from the Middle East
Saturday, March 9, 2019
Ed Vulliamy. The Syrian city of Aleppo crumbles into rubble, assailed by Russian bombs, government artillery and chemical weapons. In the heat of battle, Turkish troops and Kurdish…