The Koran is for sale at nearly every tram stop in the port city of Alexandria, stacked neatly beside soft drinks and mobile-phone cards. Picking one out, however, can be difficult for a non-Muslim foreigner. Buyers can choose pocket-sized Korans, versions meant as decoration, or study volumes tripled in length with interpretations.

My new color-coded Koran was my best friend while I learned the rules of tajweed, the science of recitation. At first, I was hesitant to concentrate on recitation, preferring to focus more on subject matter, but my professor and tutor insisted that the Koran was meant to be spoken. 

The Koran is arguably the world’s most famous oral poem and certainly the most memorized. What better way to know your own religion than to be able to recite it the same way people sing along to a tune on the radio?

It’s no surprise, then, that a drive in an Alexandrian taxi usually involves listening to tajweed on FM 90.1. Drivers make their rounds throughout the city while reciting along with Sheik Hosary or Sheik Abd Samad. If Egyptian soccer teams aren’t playing, televisions in restaurants air recitations of the Koran with accompanying text. The Koran’s ubiquitous presence is wonderful for those who love to hear it, but sometimes after reciting the story of the Virgin Mary in Arabic for an hour or so, I preferred to listen to something different.

Nine ships sailing from various destinations, including Ireland, Turkey and Greece, are headed toward a Mediterranean meeting point from which they will set sail for the Gaza Strip. Carrying 700-800 passengers, including members of parliament from Europe, the so-called Freedom Flotilla intends to break through the Israeli naval blockade of Gaza and deliver 10,000 tons of aid.

Huwaida Arraf of Free Gaza says the campaign will challenge Israel's blockade, which she called illegal. Israel's policies vis-a-vis Gaza are criminal and immoral, she said at a port in Crete on Wednesday, "and it's about time the international community broke its silence."  

Israeli Foreign Ministry officials had met with the relevant European ambassadors to ask them to stop the ships. They said they'd do their best. The ships sailed anyway.

A PR battle on the high seas was born.

Israel denies accusations from humanitarian groups about conditions in Gaza. The army has compiled a summary of the blockade measures, detailing the routine transfer of goods and emphasizing that its operations, including the maritime closure, are designed to thwart terrorism and prevent weapons smuggling.

The Foreign Ministry issued a similar report. "The Israeli humanitarian lifeline to Gaza" describes the transfer of more than a million tons of humanitarian supplies to Gaza in the last year and a half. The ministry website also posted an interview with one of its legal experts on the subjects of the naval blockade and aid.

Israel calls the campaign a provocation, designed only to embarrass the country.

"Israel has invited the flotilla organizers to use the land crossings ... however, they're less interested in bringing in aid than promoting their radical agenda and playing into the hands of Hamas provocations," Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said in a video on YouTube and the ministry's website. The organizers have "wrapped themselves in a humanitarian cloak but engage in political propaganda," he said.

Times reporter Borzou Daragahi, who is based in Beirut and has led the paper's coverage of Iran, will be chatting with readers at noon Thursday.

Daragahi was in Tehran after last summer's disputed presidential election and covered the violent protests that followed. He attended the family wake for Neda Agha-Soltan, the young woman shot dead during street protests and whose last breaths were captured on video that became viral on the Internet. Daragahi's article told the story of a joyous woman, who loved music and travel, and whose life and dreams were cut short by a bullet.

Daragahi was honored this week with The Times' Editor's Prize for his work in 2009.

More recently, Daragahi reported from Iraq last week on Baghdad's middle class, whose members are losing faith in their nation's ongoing political crisis. 

Go to latimes.com/readers Thursday at noon to ask him your questions about Iran, Iraq and the life of a foreign correspondent.

Photo: Borzou Daragahi in Baghdad.

Tuesday marked the 10-year anniversary of Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon, and Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah took the opportunity to reiterate his promise to exact equal damage from Israel in any future conflict, this time threatening Israel's naval capabilities.

"If you launch a new war on Lebanon, if you blockade our coastline, all military, civilian or commercial ships heading through the Mediterranean to occupied Palestine will be targeted by the Islamic Resistance," Nasrallah said in a speech broadcast Tuesday night.

During the 2006 July War between Israel and Hezbollah, Israel imposed a siege on Lebanon's coast and shelled its ports.

"When the world sees how these ships are destroyed, no one will dare go" to Israel, he added. "And I am only speaking about the Mediterranean; I haven't reached the Red Sea yet."

Iran's puritanical guardians of morality have stepped up their cultural war against those who dress too modern for their tastes, sharpening class and social tensions just two weeks before the anniversary of the nation's disputed presidential elections.

Days after Friday prayer leaders delivered fiery sermons in which they called for a clampdown on women dressing immodestly, morality police squads began cracking down on youngsters sporting figure-hugging outfits or hairdos deemed un-Islamic.

On Saturday, police stopped and checked 30 cars in east Tehran. Some of the vehicles were seized, and owners had to retrieve them from a police parking lot after paying fines, the Iranian Labor News Agency reported.

The news agency also published a series of photos from the first days of this year's annual anti-vice campaign, which  usually falls in the beginning of the summer when people start wearing lighter clothes in hot weather.

Images show young women with tight, colorful short coats and locks of hair showing from beneath their head scarves being stopped by police officers.

It would be difficult to weave as intricate a web as the international spy thriller that first unraveled in Dubai in January. Yet another sinew has been threaded out of the ongoing, worldwide investigation on the killing of Hamas arms procurer Mahmoud Mabhouh. 

In recent days, the Australian foreign minister informed the Israeli Embassy that its Mossad station chief, whose identity remains secret, would be leaving the island continent within a week.

Stephen Smith spoke to the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, claiming that the officer in question was "involved in state intelligence." He argued that Australian passports "were deliberately counterfeited and cloned for use" and investigations had proved "beyond doubt" that Israel was involved, reported the Australian publication International Business Times.

Israeli authorities had a warrant out for Mabhouh's arrest, as did the Egyptians and Jordanians. In 1989, Israeli authorities had failed to arrest Mabhouh for his recently confessed participation in the murder of two Israeli soldiers.

Smith concluded that Australia "remains a firm friend of Israel." 

However, he lamented, "this is not what we expect from a nation with whom we have had such a close, friendly, and supportive relationship."

A famed Iranian filmmaker jailed in Tehran for allegedly making an illegal movie was released from prison on bail Tuesday, the semiofficial Mehr News Agency reported (in Persian). 

Jafar Panahi, 49, was jailed more than two months ago after police raided a gathering at his north Tehran home. His arrest and jailing launched an intense campaign by fellow filmmakers worldwide to get him released.

[Updated, 9 a.m. PST: Jafar Panahi's son, Panah, has posted fresh pictures of his dad, appearing emaciated but in good spirits, to his Facebook page.]

Actress Juliette Binoche, after winning the best actress award at Cannes over the weekend, made a public appeal for the release of Panahi, who had been slated to serve as a judge at this year's festival. 

A report by the semiofficial Iranian Labor News Agency (in Persian) said Panahi's family had put up $200,000  bail to have him released.

The Mehr report, citing the judiciary, said prosecutors continue to pursue their case against the filmmaker, who is a vocal supporter of the green-themed opposition movement born of Iran's disputed 2009 presidential elections.

-- Los Angeles Times 

Photo: A 2006 picture shows Iranian director Jafar Panahi at the 56th Berlin International Film Festival. Credit: Wolfgang Kumm  / EPA

The Zulfiqar Mosque's minaret rises over Sadr City, curving at the top into the shape of the double-tipped sword from which it takes its name, the sword of Imam Ali.

But its unusual minaret is not all that distinguishes the mosque in this Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad. Inside, worshipers gaze up at something that was illegal under Saddam Hussein's rule and even now could put the mosque at risk: paintings.

On the walls hang two huge canvases depicting the battle of Karbala in the 7th century in which Imam Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, was killed, eventually leading to the split between Shiites and Sunnis. Shiites mourn the death of Imam Hussein in a yearly commemoration called Ashoura.

On one canvas, Imam Hussein clutches the body of his son against a red sky. In the second, Hussein's half-brother, Abbas, looks out serenely from atop his steed as the battle rages behind him.

"To place the drawing in a mosque is a genetic mutation,” said the artist Baqer Sheik, who painted both pieces. “There is some kind of evolving in the Shiite religious culture and understanding.”

Most mosques throughout Islamic history have been decorated with geometrical designs and arabesques, often using mosiacs of faience. Painting living creatures, and especially humans, is extremely controversial in Islam and banned completely by some sects.

Shiite clerics have generally been more tolerant of depicting human figures, and images of Imam Hussein are ubiquitous during Ashura in places such as Iran and Lebanon. Since the fall of Saddam Hussein, these illustrations have become more common in Iraq, but Abu Yaser, one of the financiers of the mosque, said most of these icons are cheap and poorly done.

Hamas announced Monday its decision to boycott the municipal elections slated for the West Bank on July 17, citing the fact that holding elections at this time will only increase the Palestinian division. The Palestinian faction, which controls the Gaza Strip, also said that arrests and harassment of its West Bank members does not make it possible for it to participate in the elections.
 
“While security forces of the Oslo team [the Palestinian Authority] in coordination with the Zionist enemy are waging a fierce battle against the resistance groups in the West Bank, particularly Hamas, through political arrests, dismissal from work, banning union and student activities, closure of dozens of social and welfare organizations… the illegal government of the Oslo team calls for municipal election on July 17 neglecting Palestinian national harmony and the importance that elections should be a result of national reconciliation,” Hamas said in a statement.
 
“As a result, we in Hamas and after studying the matter of municipal elections in the West Bank, announce our decision to boycott and not take any part in the municipal elections,” the group said.
 
Hamas said it holds Fatah and the Palestinian Authority “fully responsible for the grave consequences that will have negative impact on the national Palestinian arena and will increase political division.”
 
The Islamic Jihad has also decided to boycott the elections and said in a separate statement Monday that holding elections and “announcing them unilaterally without national accord will only increase and worsen internal division.”

The group condemned what it called “the oppression of the Palestinian Authority security forces of members of the Jihad and other resistance movements.”

-- Maher Abukhater

Abu Abdullah spent years fighting a guerrilla war against the Israeli army in southern Lebanon with the militant group Hezbollah, but when asked to share a good war story, he just shrugs and continues with the official tour.

No one is surprised. The movement that began as a militia, grew to an army and now boasts an administration, security apparatus and infrastructure that rival the Lebanese state's releases information only through official channels and carefully orchestrated events, like the inauguration of Hezbollah's new museum and heritage trail in Mleeta, a former mountain stronghold with a tunnel system and a clear view all the way to the Israeli border.

 When asked this weekend about Egypt's 2011 presidential elections, Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif was quick to express his wish to see President Hosni Mubarak run for a sixth term, an answer that again raised concerns over who might eventually replace the man who has ruled the nation for nearly 30 years.

"The [political] system has not put forth an alternative [to Mubarak], who can be comfortably placed in this field," Nazif said.

The last few years have raised concerns among many Egyptians that Mubarak would forgo his candidacy in favor of his younger son, Gamal, who has headed the ruling National Democratic Party's politburo since 2002. By suggesting there is no replacement for the elder Mubarak, Nazif, a party member, appeared to cast doubt about the willingness of top NDP officials to nominate Gamal Mubarak in the presidential elections.

Opposition figures have warned against a possible Mubarak dynasty, arguing that Gamal Mubarak lacks the experience and charisma to run the country. Even longtime NDP officials, including former minister Safwat Sherif, one of the party founders, have objected to some of Gamal Mubarak's "radical" policies and ideas.

President Mubarak, 82, who recently overcame a health scare after being hospitalized for several weeks following gallbladder removal surgery in Germany in March, is yet to reveal an answer to the question on many Egyptians' minds. Will he be the National Democratic Party's candidate in 2011?

-- Amro Hassan in Cairo

Photo: Gamal Mubarak. Credit: Associated Press

Tighten your hijab, ladies, and pull on your manteau. The months-long siesta for religious hard-liners in the Islamic Republic of Iran appears to have drawn to a close as two Friday prayer leaders called for a crackdown on the immodest dress of women, potentially laying the groundwork for more harassment of women in public.

The government coordinates on Tuesdays with religious leaders to determine the content of sermons for Friday prayers, ensuring that the same message is spread throughout the country. 

In Tehran, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati called for a crackdown on all Iranian woman, beginning with "government employees and students." 

Referring to female students, Jannati said that they may face disciplinary committees if they refuse to abide by the state's interpretation of a uniform Islamic dress code and that the success of their exams may be contingent on their conformity to the moral order.

Jannati said that hospitals and other public centers should also not avoid scrutiny. He praised the Supreme Council for Cultural Revolution, one of the institutions that drove the 1979 Islamic Revolution, for adopting a plan two years ago to enforce chastity and the wearing of the hijab, though it was blocked.

"Those who obstructed this law should be held accountable.... Why haven't you implemented this law yet?"

Jannati's sermon was broadcast on state radio.

Jannati is a force to be reckoned with in Iranian politics. He has been a member of the Guardian Council since 1980 and its chairman since 1988. He also holds seats in the Assembly of Experts and the Expediency Discernment Council, significant government organs.

 

In an unprecedented outburst toward Saudi Arabia's religious police, a married woman shot at several officers in a patrol car after she was caught in an "illegal seclusion" with another man in the province of Ha'il on Tuesday.

"She shot at the officers to distract them and allow the man to escape instant detention," said Sheik Mutlak al Nabet, a spokesman for the religious police in Ha'il. He added that the unnamed woman's husband has filed an official report, asking for his wife to be punished and stripped of her Saudi nationality.

Saudi law forbids women to socialize with unrelated men or walk in public without a male guardian, other than her husband, father or brother. Members of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, known as the religious police, are tasked with segregating the sexes.

A Lebanese prosecutor has reportedly charged 12 people in connection with the mob lynching of a quadruple-murder suspect in the Mount Lebanon village of Ketermaya last month.

Eight of those charged are already in custody, and the remaining four suspects are fugitives, Agence France-Presse reported. The prosecutor in Mount Lebanon has charged them with "beating, stabbing and lynching" Egyptian national Mohammad Mssalem, 38, in the village on April 29.

All of the defendants are from Ketermaya, but few details about them were provided in the indictments. It is not known when the trial will start.

Nadim Houry, senior researcher at the rights watchdog Human Rights Watch in Beirut, told Babylon & Beyond that the indictments are "an important sign" and a step in the right direction in the case. But he also emphasized that more transparency is needed in the investigation.

What's so funny about peace, love and understanding? Nothing for Israeli fans of Elvis Costello who will not see the legend perform in Tel Aviv this summer after he canceled all scheduled shows there, citing concerns over the treatment of Palestinians.

"There are occasions when merely having your name added to a concert schedule may be interpreted as a political act ... and it may be assumed that one has no mind for the suffering of the innocent," Costello wrote on his website.

"I must believe that the audience for the coming concerts would have contained many people who question the policies of their government on settlement and deplore conditions that visit intimidation, humiliation or much worse on Palestinian civilians in the name of national security," the statement continued. "I hope it is possible to understand that I am not taking this decision lightly. ... It is a matter of instinct and conscience."

Reactions in Israel have ranged from disappointment to outrage.

Israeli Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat lashed out at Costello, saying: "An artist boycotting his fans in Israel is unworthy of performing here," according to Ynetnews, the website of the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.

Ariana Melamed, also writing for Ynet, said that although she understood and even respected artists who chose to boycott Israel over the occupation, to pull out after the contracts had been signed and tickets had gone on sale was hypocritical.

While newspapers in the U.S. and other countries are facing dwindling pages and Internet pressures, Sudan is taking a different approach: The government has ordered the nation’s dailies to print more pages.

The strategy seems odd in a country where about half the population can’t read, but the government of President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir says it wants to promote the print media. Naturally, journalists are suspicious, and it appears that the intentions by the Sudanese Press and Publication Council are less about press freedom than making money.

Is she Miss USA or "Miss Hezbollah USA"?

Some right-wing American bloggers are convinced Rima Fakih is the latter.

When the sparkling tiara was placed atop the Lebanese-born Shiite Muslim's long, dark tresses on Sunday night, making the 24-year-old marketing executive from Dearborn, Mich., the first Muslim woman to win the Miss USA contest, it was just much for some conservative commentators. 

Fakih happens to have the same last name as some officials in the militant Lebanese Shiite political party Hezbollah, causing right-wing blogger Debbie Schlussel to dub the beauty queen "Miss Hezbollah USA" and accuse Fakih of being a radical Muslim financed by "Islamic terrorists."

In the latest twist to the Persian Gulf spy thriller, Dubai police have identified yet another suspect, a British national, in the assassination of Hamas military commander Mahmoud Mabhouh, the British consulate confirmed to the Palestinian Ma'an Agency on Monday.

Unlike the other 32 suspects, including two alleged members of the Palestinian Authority, the latest alleged agent to enter the United Arab Emirates actually did so with his real passport. Though Interpol and Dubai authorities maintain they have the biographical information of the suspect, all that is known publicly is that the 62-year-old Brit’s father was a Jew who fled Palestine after the onset of World War II and immigrated to the United Kingdom.

Noam Chomsky, 81, a world-renowned linguistics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said Monday that Israel banned him from entry into the West Bank, where he was scheduled to give a lecture at Birzeit University, because of his critical views of Israel and because “they did not like the fact that I was going to speak at BZU.”

Chomsky, a Jewish American known for his strong critical views of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, was invited to give a lecture on Monday at the Palestinian university near Ramallah.

Speaking by phone from Amman, Jordan, to a news conference in Ramallah, Chomsky, who was traveling with his daughter, said they were held up for five hours on Sunday at the Israeli-controlled Allenby Crossing between Jordan and the West Bank, only to be told that they would not be allowed to enter.

“This very unusual behavior only happens in totalitarian states,” Chomsky said.

He said interrogators at Allenby Crossing received their questions from the Israeli Interior Ministry.

Anthony Bourdain, author, television host and the original bad boy of celebrity chefs, is not one to leave business unfinished.

And so four years after he and his crew evacuated Lebanon by boat in the midst of the 2006 war between Israel and the militant group Hezbollah, they have returned to film a new episode, and to confront some painful memories in the process.

"The most urgent reason I’m here is because I have lived with a deep sense of dissatisfaction that I never got to show people how amazing this place is," Bourdain told Babylon & Beyond during a break from shooting his Travel Channel show 'No Reservations' in Beirut.

In person, Bourdain is definitely more chef than celebrity: He is frank, quick and talks about his crew with as much affection as chefs talk about anything. In fact, Bourdain said the only reason it has taken four years to return to Beirut is that he wanted as many of the original crew as possible with him.