Mustafa Khalifa’s largely autobiographical, newly-translated novel The Shell, set in Syria’s infamous Tadmor prison, vividly captures the absurdity and ultrasadism that are the Assad regime’s lifeblood, writes Robin Yassin-Kassab.

In Arabic, we differentiate between taghyeer (تغيير) and taghayur (تغيّر). Both words mean change. But taghyeer connotes planned action, executed unilaterally by a powerful elite, with a pre-known end result; whereas taghayur implies an open- ended, multitudinous process that could be influenced by organized social agents. Taghyeer is engineered according to a pre-determined ideal, already complete before its application, while it is this ideal which…

Mars the bringer of war A great deal of what is being written about the Syrian Revolution at this stage is descriptive and diagnostic. In fact the patient is on the verge of extinction because of too much meticulous attention to the sickness and the disease with few attempts at witting prescriptions and recommending treatments to start controlling the illness or healing the ailments. It…