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What's law got to do with it?

5 October 2003


Al-Bassaleh’s Loreh Al-Malekeh has just scooped Israel’s pop music story of the year! Here she reports on Israel’s exciting new entry into next year’s EuroVision music competition. Following in the gender-bending footsteps of Israel’s award-winning pop diva, Dana International, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will don a full Tina Turner wig, a black suede miniskirt, and fishnet stockings to perform a new twist on a 1980s hit song at next year’s contest. In the intro to a new rock video featuring Sharon in drag, the hardline PM gushes with gratitude. 

UN Special Rapporteur: "occupation continues to result in widespread violations of human rights"

30 September 2003

The Special Rapporteur on the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories, John Dugard, has finalized his latest report. Although the road map promoted by the Quartet offers some prospect of peace in the region, it is important to record that the past six months have seen continued violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. 

Defending Palestinian homes: Tears amid the rubble

Kathleen Christison and Bill Christison 30 September 2003


As we watched helplessly, the two Caterpillars, with pneumatic drills on their long dinosaur arms, systematically punched holes in the front of the house, then in the roof. Billows of dust began to rise as pieces fell off the house, then more as the roof began to fall in. The water tank on the roof was first dented, then punctured, sending out a large spray of water that was visible even from our distant perch. It all took only a few minutes. In fact, only an hour passed between the arrival and the departure of the Caterpillars, probably only 20 minutes from start to finish of the actual demolition. Kathy and Bill Christison write about just one day spent defending Palestinian homes. 

Edward Said: Campus hysteria in the face of truth

Naeem Mohaiemen 30 September 2003

Through a simple campus lecture, Edward Said precipitated a rupture at Ohio’s Oberlin College. But like many things in his life, the debate did not touch the substance of Said’s theory or politics. Instead, his enemies were obsessed by what he stood for — a Palestinian nationalism that scared them because it was not easily stereotyped or dismissed. Through this vignette, I also learnt about the limitations and myopia of liberal campus politics. Naeem Mohaiemen remembers Edward Said. 

Edward Said: A lesson that will not die, a vision that cannot fail

Laurie King 29 September 2003

“There is no excuse for us not to aspire to the courage and clarity that Dr. Edward Said embodied. There is no excuse for us not to envision a better future and to work together with diverse Others for its realization. There is no excuse for any of us to let despair, anger, jealousy or fear poison us or slow us down. And there is no time to waste in honoring and sustaining the legacy of Dr. Said. As an American poet, May Swenson, said about deep sorrow following a great loss: ‘Don’t mourn the beloved. Try to be like him’.” EI co-founder Laurie King-Irani reflects on the lessons to be learned from Dr. Edward Said’s life and vision. 

Professor Edward Said's Ninth Symphony plays on

Leila Diab 29 September 2003

On September 25, 2003, I received the somber news of the passing of Palestinian Professor Edward Said, at the age of 67. I like many others felt an unbearable loss of one Palestinian hero who had influenced and inspired my quest to ameliorate the long, unjust and unabated suffering of the Palestinian people. Professor Said was one of a kind. Educator and writer Leila Diab remembers Edward Said. 

Edward Said: The Loss of an Irreplaceable Mentor

Sarah Eltantawi 29 September 2003

Picking up a work by Edward Said is never intellectually or emotionally easy. Following Said through one of his thrusts into the meaning of the intellectual, of being an Arab or a Palestinian, or exploring with Said what it truly meant to be political is an experience so deep, at times, so painful, so unflinchingly honest that one emerges from it reborn, enlightened, and often on fire. I speak from experience as a young student set aflame by Said’s work in the mid-1990’s. I did not know Edward Said personally. I saw him lecture at Harvard and in Southern California, and I met him once at a conference in Boston. I talked to him about the challenges of being sympathetic to the Palestinians in academia. He responded, with real compassion and even a flash of anger in his eyes, “keep fighting.”  MPAC Communcations Director Sarah Eltantawi remembers Said.