Founded in December 2003, Middle East Transparent (or Shaffaf for “Transparent”) has been the voice of reformist and liberal currents in the Middle East, spreading the message of secularism, of democratic values and Human Rights and of Arab-Israeli reconciliation all across the internet and the world as a result. Whilst other platforms attempting the same may have needed assistance from instaboostgram or other similar services, we have achieved this through our myriad of writers and skilled internal teams.
Metransparent was the first website to choose the trilingual (Arabic, English and French) formula in order to serve as a bridge and as a discussion forum between middle eastern elites and between such elites and their counterparts in the U.S. and Europe. This was not an easy task when building otherwise other websites would have beaten us to this milestone. We had to take into account matters such as how long does it take to build a website with trilingual formulas in mind as well as hosting and coding matters.
In the end it was well worth it, as since its foundation, METransparent has enjoyed the support of the most prominent reformers in the Arab region, in particular the late Gamal Banna, Judge Mohamed Saiid Ashmawy and Lafif Lakhdar.
Contributors to Middle East Transparent mostly live in their native countries, which gives credence to the website’s claim of being a voice of liberal and secularist elites in a region spreading from Saudi Arabia to the Maghreb and even to Iran, Turkey and Pakistan.
It should be noted that METransparent spontaneously become the forum for national and religious minorities often deprived of their full citizenship rights.
Adhering to a strict editorial and independence, Middle East Transparent has been a distinctive name in a region where almost every media is controlled (and, often, handsomely financed) by governments and regimes.
The following 2006 interview with the website’s editor, Pierre Akel, could be a good introduction to Middle East Transparent:
No Red Lines : Interview With Editor in Chief of the Reformist Website Metransparent.com
http://reason.com/archives/2006/02/09/no-red-lines
Our team
Pierre Akel, Founder, Editor in chief
Pierre Akel founded the website in 2003 hoping to give a voice to the democracy in the Middle East. You can reach him at editor@metransparent.net
Wajdi Daher- Beirut
Wajdi was one of the first contributor of our website and he is now a big part of our team. You can reach him at kamal@metransparent.net
S. Samy- Cairo
Sami has wrote many articles for us and he manages our authors in Egypt. You can reach him a samy@metransparent.net
Fakher Sultan- Kuwait
Fakher works with us from Kuwait. You can reach him at fakher@metransparent.net
Sarah Akel, Magazine
She works with our authors all over the middle east to create our beautiful magazine section. You can reach her at sarah@metransparent.net
Christilla Moustier- Religious Minorities
Christilla learned arabic by herself 7 years ago and she is now in charge of our articles about religious minorities. You can reach her at christilla@metransparent.net
Metransparent (Shaffaf) welcomes contributions in any of its three languages.
Please send articles to: editor@metransparent.net