All Content

Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia on the rise in Europe, decline in US

Jim Lobe 21 September 2008


WASHINGTON (IPS) - Both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia have risen in Europe over the last four years, according to a survey conducted earlier this year by the Pew Research Center. While attitudes towards Muslims are substantially more negative than those against Jews across Europe, anti-Jewish sentiment as grown steadily in five of the six countries surveyed on the question. 

Poll shows Arab Americans favor Obama by wide margin

Zainab Mineeia and Jim Lobe 21 September 2008


WASHINGTON (IPS) - With less than two months before the November elections, Arab American voters in the United States are poised to vote heavily Democratic, according to a poll released here today by the Arab American Institute. The poll, which was conducted by Zogby International for AAI, a Washington-based lobby and public education group, found that the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama, currently leads his Republican rival, Sen. John McCain, by some 20 percentage points among Arab American voters — 54 percent to 33 percent — in a two-man race. 

A refugee's open letter to Mahmoud Abbas

Abdelfattah Abusrour 19 September 2008


Where are you taking us, Mr. President? To what desert are you leading us? To what catastrophe? How dare you decide how many refugees can or cannot return? Who gave you permission to speak in my name, and in my children’s name? Who asked you to barter our rights? What is the price for the sale of an entire people’s rights and their sacrifices for 60 years? Abdelfattah Abusrour decries the Palestinian Authority president’s recent statements undermining the Palestinian refugees’ right of return and compensation. 

World Bank: Growth weak, aid dependency rising

19 September 2008


JERUSALEM (IRIN) - Economic progress ha s been insufficient to stimulate growth in the Occupied Palestinian Territories because of the restrictions on movement, while dependency on aid was increasing, the World Bank said on 17 September. In a report released ahead of a donors’ meeting on 22 September, the bank praised the reform efforts of the Palestinian Authority, saying appointed Prime Minister Salam Fayyad had managed to significantly reduce expenditure, cut down on government employment and begin reforming the security forces. 

Dutch bank must disinvest from rights abuses

Jeff Handmaker 18 September 2008


On 26 August 2008, a group of human rights advocates attended a meeting at the offices of SNS Asset Management in Utrecht, the Netherlands. We were there to urge the bank — a full subsidiary of SNS Bank, one of the top five banks in the Netherlands — to withdraw its investments in the French Veolia Corporation because of Veolia’s direct and indirect involvement in Israel’s violations of international law in occupied East Jerusalem. Jeff Handmaker comments for The Electronic Intifada. 

And so it continues: 26 years after the massacre

Laurie King 17 September 2008


This week marks the 26th anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacre, one of the bloodiest events of the second half of the twentieth century. A Google search for recent news reports on this year’s commemoration of the atrocity, however, brought up very little. The Electronic Intifada co-founder Laurie King comments that the failure to hold massacre perpetrators accountable has let the atrocities continue. 

Forgotten at the Gaza-Egypt border

Eva Bartlett al-Arish, Egypt 17 September 2008


Silenced and out of the international spotlight, the hundreds of Palestinians waiting in al-Arish said that their plight at the closed crossing is either ignored or politicized. Many were running out of money, while others had completely run out, having waited for the opening of Rafah for weeks without earning an income. Eva Bartlett writes from al-Arish.