All Content

Satisfaction, frustration and pride

Kaelen Wilson-Goldie Beirut 10 March 2007


BEIRUT: Nothing encourages artists to produce better work than competition. Last summer, for 34 days straight, two artists - one holed up in Achrafieh and the other holed up in Sin al-Fil - made drawing after drawing. When the power supply was on, they posted their pieces online, filling their respective blogs with diary-like accounts of living through the war in Lebanon. They each checked out the other’s work, as they each wondered how the other would respond to the day. Sometimes they felt the satisfaction of seeing a particularly trenchant piece of work. 

Report: Palestinian child prisoners in 2006

10 March 2007


In 2006, Israel continued its policy of arresting and imprisoning Palestinian children. Some 700 Palestinian children (under 18) were arrested by Israeli soldiers over the course of the year. Of these, around 25 children were held on administrative detention orders, imprisonment without charge or trial. The overwhelming majority of those arrested in 2006 were boys; there were eight girl child prisoners who served sentences at different points during the year. Of these, four had been arrested in 2006. At any given point during the year, there were between 340 and 420 Palestinian children held in Israeli prisons and detention centers in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory. 

Journalists hit by Israeli stun grenades, tear-gassed

10 March 2007


New York, March 8, 2007 - The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned that two journalists were bruised by Israeli stun grenades at an Israeli military checkpoint between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah today. Rami al-Faqih, a correspondent for the local Al-Quds Educational Television, and Iyad Hamad, a cameraman for The Associated Press, were each hit this morning as Israeli border police fired at journalists covering a peaceful protest marking International Women’s Day at the Qalandia checkpoint, the journalists told CPJ. 

BADIL: "Ongoing population transfer in OPT and Israel"

10 March 2007


Israel’s ongoing policies against the Palestinian people of land expropriation, house demolition, population transfer, colonial settlement expansion, denial of freedom of movement, and expropriation of water and other resources, present the Human Rights Council with one of the longest-standing, yet urgent cases of denial of internationally-recognized human rights. Under Israeli law and policy, only “Jewish nationals” exclusively enjoy a range of economic, social and cultural rights, including the “Law of Return” that allows free immigration for Jews, but denies the same to the Palestinian indigenous population tracing its ties to the land for thousands of years. 

“Future generations depend on our efforts”

Farid El Haffar 9 March 2007


“I want to be the first Palestinian woman to become president”, declares Suha, an ambitious 15 year-old Palestine refugee student from Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. “And what would you do for me?” asks her English teacher Mervat. “I would hire you as my personal advisor!” responds Suha, as the two burst into laughter. Mervat and Suha are two very dynamic and enthusiastic women. Sitting in their school’s playground, Mervat explains, “I used to study in an UNRWA school like this one and I had an English teacher I liked very much, who inspired me to become a teacher”. “When I look at Suha and at the other students I have, I realise relationships have changed. 

Obama and the Jews

Harold Brackman 9 March 2007


Those looking for Obama’s views on the Mideast won’t find a great deal. In 2004, he disappointed Ali Abunimah of the Electronic Intifada by giving a speech to Chicago’s Council on Foreign Relations endorsing the U.S. alliance with Israel. Speaking before Jewish audiences during his Senate campaign, he reassured them that his Swahili first name, Barack (“Blessed”), is a close relation of Baruch in Hebrew. His current bestseller, “The Audacity of Hope” — a carefully crafted manifesto positioning him for his 2008 run — has a page on a recent trip to the Mideast, where he talked to both Holocaust survivors and Palestinian villagers. 

Video: Interview with wounded son of man killed in Nablus Invasion

Research Journalism Initiative and a-films 9 March 2007


On 26 February 2007, the second day of the Israeli invasion, Anan Tibi was shot and wounded while on the rood of the the family’s home in the Old City of Nablus. Only seconds before, Tibi’s son Ashraf was also shot and wounded. From his hospital bed Tibi describes what happened: “When I went down the stairs that lead from the roof to our home I was shot in the arm. I told my father I was shot. … I sent my brother downstairs to get an ambulance. I reached our home and heard a second shot. When I looked up I saw my father lying on the stairs.” This video-interview was produced by the Research Journalism Initiative and the Anarchist Film Collective “A-Films”. 

Israeli soldiers use two Palestinian minors as human shields

9 March 2007


8 March 2007: Testimonies taken by B’Tselem reveal that during the army’s operation in Nablus in late February, soldiers used two Palestinian children, a fifteen-year-old boy and a eleven-year-old girl, and a twenty-four-year old man as human shields. The use of human shields constitutes a flagrant breach of international humanitarian law and is explicitly and clearly prohibited by Israeli military orders. B’Tselem wrote to the Judge Advocate General and demanded that he immediately order a Military Police investigation into the matter. 

Impunity for Violence Against Palestinian Women and Girls Must End

8 March 2007


Al-Haq takes the occasion of International Women’s Day, under the theme of ‘Ending Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls,’ to highlight the alarming situation of Palestinian women who not only live under the yoke of an oppressive military occupation that denies them the fundamental protections of international human rights and humanitarian law, but who, like women in countries across the globe, also suffer the denial of their basic rights within their own society. 

The Mecca Charity Show

Roni Ben Efrat 8 March 2007


At first glance, indeed, the Mecca Agreement may seem a great wonder, considering what we published here two months ago. We divided - and still divide - the Middle East into two axes. One included the US, Saudia Arabia and Fatah, and the other included Iran, Syria and Hamas. Under these circumstances, how was agreement possible? The answer lies in a temporary conjunction of interests between Saudi Arabia and Iran. When we unpeel a few layers, however, the dovish feathers fall away: the Mecca Agreement is a mere time-out - not the basis for a new beginning.