Bottom lines

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Despite overwhelming odds, there was victory at the Iraqi ballot box, according to Habib Haddad in the London-based Al-Hayat; "I found the book expensive so I bought just five pages." Farag Hassan, in Egypt's Al-Ahram, on the Cairo Book Fair.

"This is the first election in human history where neither the names of candidates nor the venues of the balloting stations were publicly announced." -- Youssef El-Qaeid, Al-Osbou

"A state that is based on the dominance of the followers of a particular religion or ethnic sect has no right to complain about foreign conspiracies against its unity." -- Mohamed El-Sayed Said, Al-Ahram

"What democracy are international observers monitoring in the Jordanian capital Amman which is 2,000 kilometres away from Baghdad?" -- Abdel-Bari Atwan , Al-Quds Al-Arabi

"Where does this talk about a shining future originate from when the process of counting the votes in Baghdad and Basra was conducted under candlelight because of a power blackout." -- Al-Sharq

"Perhaps... when there are some incidents in which soldiers abuse living Palestinians, we shouldn't be too upset by the few cases in which they have a little fun with the bodies of dead Palestinians." -- Eyal Gonen, Yediot Aharonot