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Greece Wants a West-Leaning and Democratic Türkiye, mid-May 2023
AKP Leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the left; CHP Leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu on the right The Turkish newspaper, Cumhuriyet, known for its independent reporting and anti-Islamist stance, on 14 May 2023, as Presidential and Parliamentary elections voting was coming to a close, claimed that Türkiye’s incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had lost the election to…
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“We Have Faith, They Have Religion”
Thus Russtrat director, Elena Panina, begins her May 5, 2023 opinion piece in which she reasons that Russia will prevail in Ukraine because the former is united under the rubric of ‘faith,’ i.e., that ‘God is on our side’ because of the justness of the cause under the banner of which the SMO [Special Military…
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Turkey: The Abandoned Iraqi and Syrian Christian Asylum Seekers, Late April 2023
Turkish journalist, Uzay Bulut, who writes for the Gatestone Institute, International Policy Council, recently submitted the following report which details the difficulties Iraqi and Syrian Christian asylum seekers are experiencing, including persecution for their faith, while living as refugees in Turkey. The author also addresses the dangers facing Christians who have not left Iraq or…
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“Street People” – A Graphic Reporting Initiative Depicting the Plight of the Homeless in Russia, late April 2023
The Russian newspaper, Novaya Gazeta (New Gazette), on its 25 April 2023 internet site edition featured an article in which free-lance journalist, Irina Kravtsova, explained how she came to create the graphic reporting endeavor Street People. As an example of her work, Novaya Gazeta included a snippet from the Street People project. [Kravtsova’s article as…
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‘Dead Souls’ To Be Revived in Turkish Presidential Elections? Possibly, According to Turkish Political Analysts, mid-April 2023
The Greek newspaper, Kathemerini, in its internet edition for April 16, 2023, featured an article by Manolis Kostidis based on the opinion of Turkish political analysts that Turkiye’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), at the helm of which is Islamist conservative Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, may use the identities of the victims of the earthquake…
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The Arrest of WSJ Reporter Evan Gershkovich in Russia and Reaction to It. Chronology
Voice of America’s Russian language service correspondent Masha Morton has filed a detailed report documenting the chronology of the arrest of The Wall Street Journal reporter in Russia, Evan Gershkovich. Morton’s April 3 account will probably be the most factually-based version of the incident that Russian-only speakers will receive, given the anti-free speech climate in…
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The Nechayev Affair: The Murder of the Student Ivanov in November 1869
This post is supplemental to my post, Dostoevsky and the [Russian Orthodox] Church, in order to add context and a partial raison d’etre for Dostoevsky’s writing the novel Demons. It is a translation of an article published by A.I. Rakitin in 2014 at ©”Загадочные преступления прошлого” (Mysterious Crimes of the Past). The translation by LOC…
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Dostoevsky and the [Russian Orthodox] Church
This is a translation, from the Russian, of a 3-part article by Vladimir Malyagin, an author and dramatist who serves on the publishing council of the Russian Orthodox Church. The reader is invited to engage in a critical review of the author’s commentary, remembering that it is the viewpoint of an apologist of Russian Orthodoxy,…
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Book Review: Russia in Search of Itself by James Billington
An American scholar with a deep interest in Russian culture, particularly as it relates to the country’s Christian heritage as expressed through Russian Orthodoxy, James Billington was perhaps the foremost chronicler of Russia and its history for over 40 years. Billington first appeared on my radar in the mid-1970s while I was studying Russian Language…
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When is ‘Dog’ not ‘Dog’?
In 2 Samuel, chapters 7 & 9, there are two Hebrew words that appear to be from the same root with the meaning ‘dog’ (כלב/keleb). In the second passage, Mephibosheth, upon being showered with King David’s mercy, asks, “What is your servant, that you have turned [your attention] to the dead dog that I am?”…