Weapons to wasabi: Russian jihadist runs Syria sushi outlet

Weapons to wasabi: Russian jihadist runs Syria sushi outlet
1 / 2
Islam Shakhbanov (R), a 37-year-old fighter from Russia's Muslim-majority Dagestan republic, observes as his chef prepares rolls at his sushi restaurant in Syria's rebel-held northwestern city of Idlib. (AFP)
Weapons to wasabi: Russian jihadist runs Syria sushi outlet
2 / 2
Islam Shakhbanov, a 37-year-old fighter from Russia's Muslim-majority Dagestan republic, sits at his sushi restaurant in Syria's rebel-held northwestern city of Idlib. (AFP)
Short Url
Updated 30 March 2023

Weapons to wasabi: Russian jihadist runs Syria sushi outlet

Weapons to wasabi: Russian jihadist runs Syria sushi outlet
  • Islam Shakhbanov headed to Syria in 2015 “to take part in jihad.”
  • Shakhbanov was inspired to open “Sushi Idlib” after sampling Japanese cuisine during his travels

IDLIB: A Russian jihadist has traded his weapons for wasabi by opening a small sushi restaurant in war-torn Syria’s rebel-held northwest, as the conflict wanes and fighters look for other income.
Islam Shakhbanov, 37, from Russia’s Muslim-majority Dagestan republic, said he headed to Syria in 2015 “to take part in jihad.”
But after years of war, the Damascus government has regained control of most of the country and Syria’s main frontlines have largely frozen, putting many foreign fighters out of a job.
“In the end I opened this sushi restaurant,” the goateed man told AFP, standing near a banner displaying a fish, with slogans in Arabic, English and Russian.
Wearing a warm vest, and with a dark winter cap on his head, Shakhbanov said he fought alongside jihadist factions and the Faylaq Al-Sham rebel group until about five years ago.
Faylaq Al-Sham is a Sunni Islamist group that has acted as Turkiye’s proxy during several Turkish military campaigns on Syrian soil. It has also been the source of pro-Ankara mercenaries sent to battle in Libya on the side of the UN-recognized government.
The group fought fierce battles against the Russian-backed Syrian regime in Aleppo, Idlib and Latakia provinces, and is considered close to the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Shakhbanov said he had lived in countries including Pakistan, Afghanistan, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, and was inspired to open “Sushi Idlib” after sampling Japanese cuisine during his travels.
He boasted it was the first sushi restaurant in the conservative enclave, Syria’s last main rebel bastion where many people depend on humanitarian aid.
Rebel-held Idlib is home to about three million people, around half of them displaced by 12 years of war.
The enclave is controlled by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda, and other rebel groups — some of whom count fighters from central Asia and the Caucasus among their ranks.
Landlocked Idlib is surrounded by regime troops to the south but borders Turkiye to the north, with the coast less than 25 kilometers (16 miles) away in some places.
Shakhbanov said he imports many of his ingredients from Turkiye — pickled ginger, soy sauce, prawns and even crab.


Idlib was among the areas struck by a February 6 earthquake that collapsed buildings and killed tens of thousands, mostly in Turkiye.
The sushi restaurant survived unscathed.
Behind the counter, two chefs, also former fighters from Russia, chopped fresh salmon and cucumber, spreading the ingredients onto a bed of rice and seaweed before pressing everything into a roll.
The restaurant at first struggled to attract customers in the impoverished enclave where Japanese food is an oddity, but Shakhbanov bills his seaweed rolls as “affordable.”
A California roll sells for 60 Turkish lira ($3), double the price of a large shawarma sandwich more familiar to local residents.
He said he now has about a dozen regulars and hopes to attract more customers by adding fried dishes to the menu.
But Shakhbanov, married to a Syrian woman and with two young daughters, said he is ready to leave the sushi behind and taste combat again should divided rebel factions agree on a military strategy.
“I opened a restaurant,” he said, “but I did not abandon jihad.”


Riders in Lebanon must haggle with drivers to take an Uber

Riders in Lebanon must haggle with drivers to take an Uber
Updated 27 May 2023

Riders in Lebanon must haggle with drivers to take an Uber

Riders in Lebanon must haggle with drivers to take an Uber

Once known for quick and affordable on-demand rides, Uber is now struggling with pricing rides in Lebanon, leading the company to launch a “flex” option.

The new and seemingly only way to book an Uber in the country requires riders to “bid” for their ride. The rider suggests a price and the driver then accepts, rejects or counteroffers, and so on.

Lebanon adopted a new official exchange rate on Feb. 1, marking a massive 90 percent devaluation from its current official rate, which had remained unchanged for 25 years.

The currency fluctuation is so drastic — changing every day or even every hour — that Uber was unable to price a ride fair to the market, said Uptin Saiidi, journalist and content creator, in an Instagram video.

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Uptin (@uptin)

 

Drivers were calling riders once they booked a ride and then negotiating over the phone before agreeing to pick them up, so Uber launched the “flex” ride so both parties could haggle within the app.

Uber has been criticized in the past for increasing fares in Lebanon, with users calling for its boycott. The ride-sharing app displayed fares in US dollars from its launch in Lebanon until 2021 when it switched to the local currency — but the fares were much more expensive.

“With the economic collapse in Lebanon, and the extinction of USD bank notes and the rendering of bank cards useless, pricing in USD is no longer possible,” Lebanese blogger Gino Raidy wrote in a blog post.

It seemed that Uber chose the 3,900 LL/USD exchange rate “that the governor of Lebanon’s central bank pulled out of somewhere,” which led to fares “increasing significantly, given they were being paid on the ‘official’ exchange rate of around 1,500 LL/USD,” Raidy said.

An Uber spokesperson told Al Arabiya at the time that it had only increased its recommended fares, which had nothing to do with the exchange rate.

Currently, it seems that riders must negotiate or bid to book an Uber. Meanwhile, many are switching to other services such as Bolt, which are cheaper and more efficient.


Turkish embassy celebrates manti dish during cuisine week

Turkish embassy celebrates manti dish during cuisine week
Updated 26 May 2023

Turkish embassy celebrates manti dish during cuisine week

Turkish embassy celebrates manti dish during cuisine week

RIYADH: The best of Turkish food was on display this week in Riyadh as the country’s embassy held a cooking contest as part of Turkish Cuisine Week.

The week is held every year from May 21-27 to celebrate the country’s food. This year, the ministry chose manti, traditional dumplings stuffed with lamb mince that are topped with three sauces: brown butter, caramelized tomato and garlic-yogurt.

Shaimaa Nur, the spouse of Turkish envoy Fatih Ulusoy, said the week was themed on the cuisine of Hatay, which was struck earlier this year by devastating earthquakes.

Manti are made from flour, eggs, salt, and water. The mixture is kneaded into dough, rolled thin, cut into small squares, filled with lamb, onion, parsley and salt and then folded and steamed.

Four teams went head-to-head in the embassy’s competition on Wednesday. Judges included Ambassador Ulusoy and his wife, Mayada Bader, the CEO of Culinary Arts Commission, and chefs Khulood Olagi, Diyab Tut and Gökhan Tufan, the executive chef at Radisson Blu Hotel Riyadh Diplomatic Quarter.

The event was accompanied by a buffet with more examples of the nation’s cuisine.


Children in quake-hit Syria learn in buses turned classrooms

Children in quake-hit Syria learn in buses turned classrooms
Updated 25 May 2023

Children in quake-hit Syria learn in buses turned classrooms

Children in quake-hit Syria learn in buses turned classrooms
  • Traveling classrooms service more than 3,000 children at some 27 camps

JINDAYRIS, Syria: In a dusty Syrian camp for earthquake survivors, school pupils line up and wait for a colorful bus to pull up. Since the disaster hit, they go to a classroom on wheels.
School bags on their backs and notebooks in hand, the children took off their shoes before entering the bus, then sat down along rows of desks fitted inside.
A teacher greeted them in the mobile classroom, decorated with curtains bearing children’s designs, before they broke into a song for their English class.
The February 6 quake killed nearly 6,000 people in Syria, many of them in the war-torn country’s rebel-held northwest, and also left tens of thousands dead in Turkiye.
The Syrian town of Jindayris, in Aleppo province near the Turkish border, was among the worst hit, with homes destroyed and school buildings either levelled or turned into shelters.
“We were living in Jindayris and the earthquake happened... and then we didn’t have homes anymore,” said 10-year-old Jawaher Hilal, a light pink headscarf covering her hair.
“We came to live here and the school was very far away,” said the fifth-grader now staying with her family at the displacement camp on the outskirts of town.
As relief services were set up, she told AFP, “the buses came here and we started to study and learn. The buses are really nice, they teach us a lot.”
The traveling classrooms are a project of the non-profit Orange Organization and service more than 3,000 children at some 27 camps, said education officer Raad Al-Abd.
“The mobile classrooms offer educational services as well as psychological support to children who were affected by the quake,” he said.
More than three months after the quake, 3.7 million children in Syria “continue to face desperate conditions and need humanitarian assistance,” says the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF.
“Almost 1.9 million children have had their education disrupted, with many schools still being used as shelters,” it added in a statement this month.
In northwest Syria alone, “a minimum of 452 primary and secondary schools” were reportedly damaged to varying degrees, the UN humanitarian agency OCHA said weeks ago.
“More than 1 million school-aged children need education support and are at risk of being out of school,” it said, adding that at least 25,000 teachers are also in need of help, including “mental health and psychosocial support.”
On another bus, boys and girls enthusiastically interacted with the teacher, balloons hanging from the ceiling, for lessons that included Arabic, math and science.
Outside in the bare dirt, children sang in a circle and clapped along with the educators.
As the buses left, pulling out through the road running between the camps’ tents, adjacent structures and trees, the children yelled out and waved goodbye.
Jawaher’s father Ramadan Hilal expressed relief and gratitude for the initiative.
“After the earthquake there were no more schools or anything else,” he said. “Even though they wanted to establish schools, they are far away.”


Documentary photography workshop in Riyadh tackles gender equality

Documentary photography workshop in Riyadh tackles gender equality
Updated 26 May 2023

Documentary photography workshop in Riyadh tackles gender equality

Documentary photography workshop in Riyadh tackles gender equality

RIYADH: The embassies of Germany and France in Riyadh hosted documentary photography exhibitions in May.

The Goethe Institute, the French Embassy, and the Alliance Francaise in Saudi Arabia, in collaboration with Gharem Studio, set up a project in October 2022 called “Lens for Equality,” dedicated exclusively to documentary photography.

The genre refers to a form of photography which is used to show specific situations or environments, and also everyday events.

These photographs tend to be taken by professional photojournalists or reporters, but sometimes by amateurs.

Authorship of the genre is generally attributed to American historian Beaumont Newhall who, in March 1938, published the article “Documentary Approach to Photography.”

Artists participating took part in a 10-day workshop in which they had the opportunity to discuss and explore the theme of gender equality through their work by analyzing it from an artistic point of view.

The project was led by three mentors — Scarlett Coten from France, Susanne Kriemann from Germany and Tasneem Al-Sultan from Saudi Arabia.

The German, French and Saudi artists have had very different journeys in the world of photography.

Kriemann, a professor at Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design, said that photography is a “recording system” — a privileged means to study the human species.

Saudi American Al-Sultan is an award-winning photographer. She uses images to capture the spirit of the Middle East and its people, as well as recent changes that have transformed the region.

Coten explores the themes of gender, identity and intimacy mainly through the form of portraits.

The varied backgrounds of the three photographers added richness to the innovative workshop. The session aimed to mobilize artists and the public on a subject still new to Saudi Arabia, and promote the art of documentary photography.

Students’ photographs were exhibited in December 2022 at the Ahlam Gallery in the Al-Moussa Mall in Riyadh.


Simply the Best: Rock queen Tina Turner has died at 83

Simply the Best: Rock queen Tina Turner has died at 83
Updated 25 May 2023

Simply the Best: Rock queen Tina Turner has died at 83

Simply the Best: Rock queen Tina Turner has died at 83
  • ‘We Don’t Need Another Hero’ featured on the soundtrack to ‘Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome,’ the 1985 post-apocalyptic thriller starring Mel Gibson
  • A decade later she oozed her way through ‘Goldeneye,’ joining the select ranks of artists who have sung on the James Bond franchise

NEW YORK: Rock legend Tina Turner, the growling songstress who electrified audiences for decades, has died at the age of 83, a statement said Wednesday.
“It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Tina Turner,” read the statement on the official Instagram page of the eight-time Grammy winner.
“With her music and her boundless passion for life, she enchanted millions of fans around the world and inspired the stars of tomorrow.
“Today we say goodbye to a dear friend who leaves us all her greatest work: her music. All our heartfelt compassion goes out to her family.
“Tina, we will miss you dearly.”
Turner, who had been living in Switzerland in her final years, first encountered fame with husband Ike Turner.
The pair recorded a number of hits together throughout the 1960s and 1970s, in a musical partnership in which she was clearly the more talented.
After their troubled and violent marriage collapsed — she fled in 1976 mid-tour — Tina Turner forged a wildly successful solo career.
The following decades gifted the world instantly recognizable hits like “What’s Love Got to Do With It?,” “Private Dancer” and the anthemic “The Best.”
Her “We Don’t Need Another Hero” featured on the soundtrack to “Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome,” the 1985 post-apocalyptic thriller starring Mel Gibson.
A decade later she oozed her way through “Goldeneye,” joining the select ranks of artists who have sung on the James Bond franchise.