Nader, the flag-bearer for Palestine in the opening ceremonies finished the 5km (3.1 miles for you Americans) qualifying round race in 14min 41sec close to his personal best time. In the midst of serious adversity, Nader hung with the best distance runners in the world. His time was within a minute of world class runners such as Canadien Kevin Sullivan (5th in Sydney Olympics) and rising American star Ian Dobson (3rd at US Olympic Trials).

Keep in mind Nader has logged hundreds of miles training alone on the potholed roads of Gaza since he couldn’t get permission from Israel to leave until just before the Olympics. Unlike every other runner in this race, Nader has no funding so doesn’t share the benefit of world class coaches and training partners, proper training shoes, nutritional supplements, or the ability to travel and train at temperate climates and high altitude. These are serious disadvantages for a runner in world class competition yet Nader truly hung in there.

Nader has been the face of the four-person Palestinian Olympic team. Time Magazine profiled Nader as #32 in their 100 “Olympic Athletes to Watch” (in between Kobe Bryant and women’s marathon record holder Paula Radcliffe of the UK).

Check out the stats: Track & Field: Men’s 5000 Meters

http://www.liveleak.com/e/606_1218731508

Will, you should recruit bloggers like this — cause I sure as hell wouldn’t take a bullet for KABOBfest.

Oxford issued a statement Wednesday denying it ever awarded Ali Kordan an honorary doctorate of law, as he claimed to parliament before it approved his appointment to the post earlier this month.

Though Kordan released a copy of the degree (with an Oxford seal and everything), it was instantly recognized as a fake.

How? Well, he spelled a bunch of shit wrong…

[I]n the certificate, “entitled” is misspelled “intitled,” and it says Kordan was granted the degree “to be benefitted from its scientific privileges.”

The clumsily worded document says Kordan “has shown a great effort in preparing educational materials and his research in the domain of comparative law,that has opened a new chapter,not only in our university,but, to our knowledge,in this country” — leaving out spaces after all but one of the commas. It was published in several Iranian papers this week.

Even worse, Oxford reps came out with a statement saying that he’s never been granted any kind of degree from their institution. In fact, the three signatures that appear on the forged degree don’t even belong to law professors!

Absurd, right? Well it gets even worse. Instead of apologizing to the Iranian people, the Interior Ministry decided to ban the news website where most of the criticisms of Kordan were being published.

Brace yourself. Here’s my favorite part of the story…

Ahmadinejad defended Kordan amid the debates, dismissing degrees in general as “torn paper” not necessary for serving the people.

Fayyad must be peeing his pants happy right now…

[Tarboush Tip: Not really sure. It was anonymously emailed to me.]

He set up a blog, KABOBfestWATCH to apparently attack and ridicule KABOBfest. Clearly, this is a laughable mockery that only demonstrates why we released him in the first place: he is a juvenile, pestering wackjob.

He invented some elaborate story, or rather, conspiracy theory, about why he got kicked out. It is pure fiction as I make clear in the comments section of his post. I want to clarify this without him dragging in the other KABOBers (so they can continue posting). His attacks have hurt a number of them.

While I am flattered that we deserve to be “watched” — an honor usually reserved for people with a vast readership — Programmer Buydatti is clearly off the deep-end and approaching, in my book, collaborator status. Already, he has proven to be just one more KABOB3rs — an oppositional rascal commenting away in our comments sections.

He is clearly not working for any cause other than pure vindication, and has only destructive, petty ends in sight.

He is clearly clever and very creative, which is why I originally invited him on, but those same positive traits are now being used to no good end. It is best you, our readers, ignore him. And we will continue grilling the absurd.

At this stage in the game, our professor adamantly believes that we should all be able to recognize every letter of the Arabic alphabet in initial, medial, and end position. Unfortunately, not everyone is doing their homework & so many are still saying “zaa” for “raa” and “yaa” for “taa.” This has left our professor very frustrated – so much so that he’s decided to move onto vocabulary words whether we’re ready for them or not.

Last night we were assigned our first set of vocabulary words – thirteen “household items” in all. After spending an hour sounding out every syllable out loud and in slow motion, our professor suddenly declared: “Stop saying ‘khaa’ for ‘jaa’ – if you cannot recognize the letters by now, then studying language is not for you!”

This was the most perturbed I’ve seen him in all six weeks of class. In fact, he was so annoyed that he decided: “Now I am going to tell you a word and you must spell it in super lightening speed. There is no excuse for being slow! For example, when I say tilfaz, you say ta – lam – fa – alif – zan.”

In a last-ditch effort to increase our spelling speed, he decided to tailor stories for each student that would encourage him or her to spit out the correct letters quickly. Below are the three most interesting stories:

Molly: the American soldier

Teacher: Listen to me Molly. Imagine that you are in Iraq and you are confronted by Iraqi children you want to shoot down with a machine gun because you are violent. POW! POW! POW! POW! This is is how fast I want you spell the word hatif.

Molly: Ha… um… eeh?… ta… if.

Teacher: Sorry, you were only able to kill a few.

Jeffrey: the Jewish kid

Teacher: Ok Jeffrey. You are my favorite. Imagine that you… let me think… ok, you are chasing after a Palestinian family. You want to destroy their lives fast, so you shoot the mother, kick the baby, and bulldoze the house. Really fast, like 1 – 2 – 3! Kill them! Spell kalam – Go!

Jeffrey: (laughing) ka – lam – meem

Teacher: Congratulations you are a murderer

Me: the lone Arab

Teacher: Ok we all know that you are Palestinian. I want you to imagine that an Israeli like Jeffrey is coming to steel your grandfather’s house…

Me: They already did.

Teacher: Oh. Ok, imagine that an Israeli like Jeffrey is coming to steel your grandfather’s orchard…

Me: They did that too.

Teacher: Ok then, imagine that Jeffrey is chasing you with a gun and you need to runaway with your life. Spell the following word very fast: Hasoob!

Me: ha – alif – seen – wow – ba

Teacher: Perfect! You are safe and alive… for now.

Jeffrey didn’t make eye contact with me for the rest of the class.

Don’t forget to read Awkwardness in Arabic Class I & II. Have interesting tales from Arabic class? E-mail them to KABOBfest.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeii225G-HM]

Actually, I don’t have a problem with the video’s overall message — given the context of the rabbit’s speech, there’s nothing inherently anti-Semitic about it. After all, we can’t hold Palestinian bunnies accountable for not delineating between Zionists and Jews when Israel describes itself as a Jewish state.

Still, I don’t think this is a suitable program for children to be watching. Kid’s shows should help develop their imaginations, knowledge, and aspirations — not reflect how grim life really is. Even if they are living in the OPT.

[Tarboush Tip: Muna]

A project of the Palestine Center for National Strategic Studies, Birthright Palestine “is meant to gather first generation, western‐born Palestinians (over the age of 18‐years old) in their ancestral homeland, so that they can reunite and witness firsthand how their brethren are living under illegal Israeli military occupation.”

The program is made‐up of four major components, education, tourism, hospitality, and volunteering, and was created to maintain Palestinian unity on an international level and to make foreign‐born Palestinians feel at home in their homeland.

As a Diaspora Palestinian myself, whose felt “out of place” (Oooh, did ya get the reference?) here and in my ancestral homeland, the program appeals.

According to their website, Birthright Palestine aims to assimilate Diaspora Palestinians into Palestinian society through cultural immersion. During the program’s duration (anywhere between 1 to 3 months), participants will live with a host family, learn Arabic (yes you can get college credit), and intern at a local NGO. Participants will also attend weekly trips throughout the West Bank and take part in numerous activities — including film screenings, cultural events, speeches, workshops, informative classes, special-issue debates, etc.

Though the program focuses on Diaspora Palestinians, anyone of Arab descent is welcome. Not including airfare, it’ll cost $2,900 to participate for three months (cheaper for those staying less).

Given that this year marks the 60th anniversary of al-Nakbeh, it’s quite fitting that the program launches this summer. At the risk of sounding like an infomercial (If I haven’t already), sign up today! TODAY! TODAY!

So I told you about my Arabic class and my crazy Egyptian teacher, right? Well get this…

At our last class he totally laughed at a girl who just found out she’s being deployed to Iraq. Then, as if that wasn’t enough, he followed it up with something to the effect of, “I bet they lured you into signing onto the Army with a free toaster, huh? Well good. It’s fitting. Because now the Iraqis will make you toast!”

Then, after some white girl’s inability to pronounce the “ghaaaaa” sound annoyed him, he instructed the class: “To practice ghaaaaaaaaaa by making pretend that you are being waterboarded by American occupation forces. It sounds exactly the same!”

THEN! During a class exercise in which we were repeating after him the names of Arab countries and their capitals, he totally bitched out this Jewish kid:

Teacher: Fa-la-steen

Class: Fa-la-steen

Teacher: Just joking. There’s obviously no such thing as Fa-la-steen, because that’s Arabic for Palestine.

Me: Actually, there is such thing as Palestine.

Teacher: No. Show it to me on a map? It doesn’t exist any more, right Jeffrey? (the Jewish kid)

Jeffrey: No it doesn’t.

Teacher: And why is that Jeffrey? Because you destroyed it for us, right Jeffrey?

Jeffrey: (laughing) Yeah, I guess we did.

Teacher: That’s what I thought. Now repeat after me Jeffrey – the capital of Fa-la-steen is Al-quds.

Jeffrey: Al-quds.

This class is fucking hilarious! I have no idea why no one’s complained yet. If I was a honkie, I’d totally rat his ass out… but for now, shit it’s all laughs for me.

Have interesting tales from Arabic class? E-mail them to KABOBfest.

Feel warm inside? Really, you don’t? Ok you heartless bastard, how about this…

Last Thursday, on Valentine’s Day, the SPCA International Baghdad Program (yes, there is such a thing) brought Charlie, a border collie mix, to the U.S after Watson, the active-duty soldier who found him in Iraq, couldn’t bare to give him up. According to Watson, “It’s probably going to be a real shock for him to see such beauty and great monuments after knowing nothing but the slums of Baghdad.” Charlie is currently on route from DC to Phoenix.

Isn’t that cute? I think so! Especially since this is what the doggies really want…

Just ask Nubbs. He currently lives in San Diego. An Iraqi by birth, he was transported to the U.S. after Major Brian Dennis rescued him in the Al Anbar province of Iraq. After finding Nubbs and nursing him back to health, Dennis was dispatched to a military outpost 70 miles away from where Nubbs resided. Nubbs, however, loved Dennis so much that he tracked him across the desert. Though Dennis couldn’t keep him, he was touched enough to arrange for the pup to be transported to the United States (via the “No Buddy Left Behind” initiative). A reunion is currently in the works for the Ellen Degeneres show.

And it doesn’t end there folks….

Eleven other dogs and two cats adopted by service members in Iraq or Afghanistan are in the pipeline for rescue, said Stephanie Scroggs, a spokeswoman for SPCA International. The SPCA will pay about $4,000 per rescue, Scroggs said. She acknowledged that the sum could aid many more stateside animals but said the program also supports the troops. [Washington Post]

In fact, Liberty and K-Pot are scheduled to arrive in the United States tomorrow. I can’t wait!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zIk2hih_ew]

[Tarboush Tip: Tarik]