القفص نظيف.

The cage is clean.

Breakdown of القفص نظيف.

• نظيف: clean
• قفص: the cage

Questions & Answers about القفص نظيف.

How would I pronounce القفص in Levantine Arabic?

A common Levantine pronunciation is il-ʔafas or el-ʔafas, because ق is often pronounced like a glottal stop in many urban Levantine accents.

A few notes:

• الـ is the definite article the
• ق is a moon letter, so the l in الـ is pronounced
• In some Levantine varieties, you may hear q kept, so il-qafas is also possible

So in everyday speech, many learners will hear something like il-ʔafas.

Why is there no word for is in this sentence?

Because Arabic often leaves out the verb to be in the present tense.

So Arabic says something like:

• the cage clean

but it means:

• the cage is clean

This is normal in both Standard Arabic and Levantine.

If you want another tense, then a verb appears:

• القفص كان نظيف = the cage was clean
• القفص رح يكون نظيف = the cage will be clean

Why doesn’t نظيف have الـ?