The newly formed Green Party of Lebanon (GPL) is planning its debut with the May 2010 municipal elections. The Daily Star reports that the GPL is a secular, environmental, human-rights oriented party bent on slashing corruption and recovering burnt forests. GPL President Philippe Skaff (left) told the Star that focusing only on the immediate political crises […]
In every Middle Eastern country, people eat Majadra, the working man’s dish of lentils and rice topped with fried onions. The basic recipe is the same in Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, and Israel, with variations evolving from the local tradition or the taste of the cook. Some might cook the grains in stock instead of water. […]
Green Prophet had reported on Rawabi (for Hills), the first “planned” city for Palestinians back in 2007; We are not sure if the Israeli or American urban-style mortgage model is the one to follow for a sustainable community (as Daniella asks in her article about Palestinian malls). Now Felice Friedson editor of The Media Line, […]
Exercise in the United Arab Emirates: If more people did it, maybe the UAE wouldn’t be the 18th fattest country in the world. Photo by The National. With the United Arab Emirates boasting one of the world’s highest obesity rates, expatriates working there complain that their adopted country is packing on their pounds. Abu Dhabi-based […]
A Seambiotic algae farm grows biofuel Seambiotic’s been teaming up with NASA to to create a biofuel suitable for sending astronauts into space (?), and now this company is once again making news in a new venture with the China Goudian utility company to grow micro algae for use as a biodiesel fuel to power […]
Smog in Cairo is a year-round issue, but it is particularly bad during the autumn and winter months when weather patterns trap pollutants, creating a period known as the "black cloud". The air quality is often poor, with a high concentration of fine particulate matter (\(PM_{2.5}\)), and varies daily and seasonally due to industrial and domestic emissions, waste burning, and dust.
We reported earlier in the year that a Beirut-based property developer has designs to build a Dubai “World”-like set of islands in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Lebanon. Modelled after Dubai’s The World and Palm Islands, developers in Lebanon report that its $8 billion development project will not sink. This is all despite […]
Oil rich Saudi is not the only country getting slack for greenhouse gas emissions. This Canadian writer points the finger at Canada, where tar sands are yet to be an issue at climate change talks. Climate activist groups have been attacking Saudi Arabia, saying the Middle East country is playing an obstructionist role at climate […]
Green Prophet’s Daniella witnesses the Muslim holiday ritual slaughtering of a sheep, in Jaffa. Last Friday I was determined to find a sheep slaughter. It was Eid Al-Adha, the Muslim Feast of the Sacrifice. The story goes that Ibrahim was about to slaughter his son Ismail, when an angel came and redirected him to a […]
[youtube width=”560″ height=”480″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUEHgCSE9I0[/youtube] In a pretty radical move, Lebanon’s IndyACT organizes protest against what it calls Saudi obstructionism in climate change talks. Watch this vertigo-inducing video of their silent protest at Barcelona, a pre-Copenhagen climate meeting last month. In the last week of November activists from the Global League of Activists, IndyACT, carried out a […]
TAU’s nanosized “forest of peptides” can be used as the basis for self-cleaning windows and more efficient batteries. It’s cleaning up space junk, and is giving us lab-on-chip biofilters for detecting contamination. Now nanotechnology has produced a coating for windows or solar panels that repels grime and dirt. Expanded battery storage capacities for the next […]
[youtube width=”560″ height=”410″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkmDZpNKnms&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]Cairo is a city with 18 million people. Most do not have a way to remove their trash. Garbage Dreams, a new film (see above), explores Zabbaleen and how they recycle garbage in Cairo. A buy-out of two waste-management firms could make the waste management business run more effectively, but impact the trade […]
Dancing on water and the black water of “oil” Trout looks at a society’s transformation. Inbal Pinto and Avshalom Pollak’s latest dance piece, Trout, which will be performed at the Suzanne Dellal Centre in Tel Aviv for one week only (December 5 – 12) reveals yet another aspect of the creative pair’s ongoing relationship to […]
How much more exploitation can the Dead Sea take? Next up: drilling for oil. It’s hard to say what’s worse from an environmental standpoint; Jordan and Israel’s continued mining of potash and other minerals at the Dead Sea, or drilling for oil. The potash industry has been going on for years there, including a unique method […]
Israel’s been dragging its feet over the proposed drought tax. It’s been a pretty tumultuous month for water politics in Israel. After more than five years of abnormally low rainfall, as well as decades of unsustainable water consumption (at least according to Prof. Hillel Shuval) Israel faces an increasingly dire water crisis. Back in July, […]