The Nakba, Intel, and Kiryat Gat

Israel established a "development town" on the site of the destroyed villages of al-Faluja and 'Iraq al-Manshiya in 1955. It was called Kiryat Gat (Gat City) in the mistaken belief that it was the site of the ancient Philistine town of Gath. Initially, Kiryat Gat's major industries were agriculture and textiles. But in the mid-1990s Intel chose Kiryat Gat as the site for a huge new plant it called Fab 18. Henry Norr comments for EI about the Intel corporation's complicity in the ongoing Nakba in Palestine. [MORE]

No Mediterranean Union shortcut around Arab-Israeli conflict

Escaping into ambitious political fantasy like that behind the Mediterranean Union is not the right approach to urgent political questions. It is no more than a waste of time. If Europe is truly concerned, there is a due need for a principled, bold, decisive and compatible with international law policy towards the resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. EI contributor Hasan Abu Nimah comments. [MORE]

Seeing the Dome of the Rock

Some might think that I am overreacting about the short trip out of Gaza to a place only two hours away. But I would say to them that for me and so many other Palestinians in Gaza, it is not just a short trip, but rather a once-in-a-lifetime experience. The trip was a window that opened suddenly to allow in the fresh air and joy of life, and one that I may never experience again. Najwa Sheikh writes from occupied Jerusalem. [MORE]

The Palestinian Bar Mitzvah

My son Arab is 14, just past the age that his Jewish Israeli peers are celebrating their Bar Mitzvahs. This ceremony in Jewish culture is a rite of passage that marks a boy's entrance into the realities and responsibilities of adulthood. And last week, my son experienced something akin to the Palestinian Bar Mitzvah. Bassam Aramin writes from occupied Jerusalem. [MORE]

Roadblocks cripple West Bank economy

HEBRON (IPS) - The Israeli military has erected three additional roadblocks, further blocking vehicular access on the road between the south Hebron village of al-Tuwani and the commercial hub of Yatta in the southern West Bank. The West Bank is the Palestinian area west of the Jordan river, much of it under Israeli control. [MORE]

Israeli soldier shoots restrained Palestinian at close range

Today, B'Tselem is publishing a video clip documenting a soldier firing a rubber coated steel bullet, from extremely close range, at a cuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainee. The shooting took place in the presence of a lieutenant colonel, who was holing the Palestinian's arm when the shot was fired. [MORE]

Boycott group: Israeli-British academic project politically motivated

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel deplores the unabashed pro-Israel bias of UK officialdom displayed during Prime Minister Gordon Brown's visit to occupied Jerusalem. Brown's pro-forma criticism of Israeli colonizing activities notwithstanding, the visit became an occasion to underline the UK government's prejudice in favor of Israeli policies of apartheid, dispossession and colonial expansionism. [MORE]

Taking you home: "Palestinian Walks"

Accounts by Western travelers coming to the "Holy Land," later used by Zionists to justify their colonization, also compelled Raja Shehadeh to provide a counter-narrative, in Palestinian Walks: Forays into a Vanishing Landscape. "The accounts I have read do not describe a land familiar to me," Shehadeh writes, "but rather a land of these travelers' imaginations. Palestine has been constantly reinvented, with devastating consequences to its original inhabitants." Lora Gordon reviews for The Electronic Intifada. [MORE]