Historic cities such as Old Najaf are challenged with balancing the preservation of their cultural and architectural heritage against the pressures of modern urban development. Being one of the major religious centers for Shia Islam, Old Najaf receives annual millions of pilgrims and tourists, pressuring its infrastructure and threatening its historic façade. The aim of this study was to explore the viability of integrated approaches that balance heritage conservation with sustainable urban development, and lessons learned from international best practices, as well as stakeholder perspectives on this issue in the face of these challenges. This prompted the study to identify the challenges and opportunities for the heritage preservation and sustainable development in Old Najaf. It aims to comprehend the way residents and experts understand the dynamics of these layers through a mixed methods approach as well as derive actionable lessons learned after comparative analyses with case studies in Fes, Morocco and Kyoto, Japan. The study also explores the role that emerging technologies, regulation, and citizen engagement can play in addressing this trade-off education about Artificial Intelligence. The study shows that the major impediments for Old Najaf heritage are unplanned urban growth, inadequate infrastructure and mass tourism. Survey responses show that both residents and experts prioritize stricter zoning laws at the city's level, improved infrastructure for those corridors and sustainable tourism practices. In Fes, a city already leveraging cutting-edge technologies such as digital twins in urban planning, and building on advances made by Kyoto in GIS, comparative insights from both cities show the need to embed advanced technologies within strong policy frameworks supported by community-led initiatives. The findings underscore the need for holistic and context-sensitive strategies to protect the cultural heritage of Old Najaf, in line with sustainable development. ©2025 The authors.
This study evaluated the knowledge and practice of breast self-examination (BSE), among a sample of educated Iraqi women. The study sample comprised 858 women aged 18–62 years affiliated to 6 major Iraqi universities, categorized according to occupation as teaching staff (11.5%), administrative staff (18.0%) and students (70.5%). Data were collected by a self-completed questionnaire. In all, 93.9% of the women had heard about BSE, the main source of information was television (39.9%), doctors (18.4%) and the awareness campaign of the Iraqi National Breast Cancer Research Programme (11.6%). Only 53.9% of the women practised BSE; the most common excuses by those that did not were lack of knowledge of the significance of BSE (42.0%) and lack
... Show MoreDam operation and management have become more complex recently because of the need for considering hydraulic structure sustainability and environmental protect on. An Earthfill dam that includes a powerhouse system is considered as a significant multipurpose hydraulic structure. Understanding the effects of running hydropower plant turbines on the dam body is one of the major safety concerns for earthfill dams. In this research, dynamic analysis of earthfill dam, integrated with a hydropower plant system containing six vertical Kaplan turbines (i.e., Haditha dam), is investigated. In the first stage of the study, ANSYS-CFX was used to represent one vertical Kaplan turbine unit by designing a three-dimensional (3-D) finite element (F
... Show MoreBackground: Vitamin D improves innate immunity by enhancing the expression of antimicrobial peptides. The antimicrobial action of cathelicidin is widespread and effective against cariogenic bacteria. This research aimed to investigate the effect of vitamin D deficiency on the level of salivary cathelicidin concerning dental caries experience.
Subjects and Methods: A case-control study was carried out, and the sample was composed of 80 females; the study group involved 40 females with a serum vitamin D concentration of less than 10 ng/ml. In addition to the control group involving 40 females wh
... Show MoreThis research aims to solve a problem in the field of accounting and financial knowledge in the world today, that is, the problem of creative accounting. Especially after the global financial crisis and the collapse of many large companies in the world, people find that they use creative accounting methods to distinguish them from reality, showing the results of their activities and their financial status. This research discusses the concept of creative accounting, the most important methods used in financial statements and its relationship with external auditing, and procedures to limit accounting creativity. This study uses descriptive analysis methods after confirming its theoretical aspects in practice. Using the statistical
... Show MoreThe study aims to identify the neurological perfectionism of talented girls with disabilities and do a case study for one of these girls. The sample of the study consisted of (11) female students at the university level, 5 females with disability and (6) normal female-students. The sample also included (19) secondary school female students in Tabuk region, including 10 students with visual disability and (9) normal students. The case study was limited to one case of mentally superior girls (talented) with kinetic disability. The researcher adopted the descriptive methodology (case study), he used neurological perfectionism scale, Salah Mekhemar interview, Stanford interfacial intelligence scale fifth picture, case study form. The re
... Show MoreThe concept of social graphic design is one of the most critical areas that highlight the designer's knowledge of social responsibility by employing design skills in community awareness. This study focused on defining social graphic design, the meaning, practices, and strategies for designing awareness posters. This study reviewed two examples of awareness posters that reflect the Saudi designer's practices. The results summarized that social graphic design is a concept not taught directly but gained from permanent practice in designing awareness posters that interact with community issues. The designer's understanding of his social events and their sensing in the visual form of a poster reflects the designer's social awareness. Social g
... Show MoreIn the early 1990s, as the beginning of the new unilateral leadership of global power by the United States, a new climate of rivalry emerged between revolutionary jihad and national jihad. Al-Qaeda has played on both sides to promote its agenda in support of global jihad. The veteran Afghan warriors returned to the Arab world after the play against the Soviet army "infidel" in Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and until the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1990. The Arab world is looking for roles to attract international forces seeking to implement specific projects that need a combat tool . Al-Qaeda has tried to exploit national conflicts and the emergence of sectarian political streams in the Middle Eas
... Show MoreResearch summary
Westernization is a term not familiar to our scholars at the beginning of the emergence of translation from Western literature, sciences and arts in its detailed form now.
Westernization was not an issue that those Greeks, Persians, Romans, Indians and others worked on translating those sciences and cultures. Rather, it was a process of transferring a new philosophy and logic that had not been previously seen by the Arabs, so they were affected by it in a strange way, to the point of fascination by some of them. For this reason, this research came to clarify these issues and address them within the scientific methodology.