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"It felt like a kind of resistance to celebrate"

IRIN Nahr al-Bared refugee camp 15 January 2008


Ahmed and Liliane Hassan, who are 25 and 17, were supposed to marry in August, but instead were driven from their homes in Nahr al-Bared camp, along with up to 40,000 other people, by 106 days of fighting between the Lebanese army and militant group Fatah al-Islam. They were among several thousand Palestinians allowed to return from 10 October, and soon after tied the knot. Ahmed explained: “When we celebrated our engagement during the 2006 July War, the Israelis bombed Abdeh, on the edge of Nahr al-Bared and we ended up in the shelters. Then the fighting delayed our wedding.” 

Israeli forces kill 17 Gazans in less than four hours

15 January 2008


On Tuesday morning, 15 January 2008, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) killed 17 Palestinians, including five civilians, and wounded at least 30 others, five of whom are in a serious condition, during an incursion into the al-Shojaeya and al-Zaytoun neighborhoods of east Gaza City. The incursion continued until noon. Preliminary investigations conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights indicate that most of the victims were killed by tank shells, and that IOF troops used excessive lethal force without regard for the lives of Palestinian civilians living in the affected areas. 

Gaza's fate left to the whim of an Israeli court

Rami Almeghari Gaza Strip 14 January 2008


It’s almost midnight. I rushed to my laptop when I saw the glow of the lamp after almost 12 hours darkness following one of the electricity cuts that hundreds of thousands of Gazans like myself have been subjected to over the past week or so. As a journalist in Gaza, I was keen to file to my editors a story on the electricity cuts. I did the job, I talked with the people, I collected the material but when I went to my office and sat down in front of my PC, there was no electricity. EI correspondent Rami Almeghari reports from Gaza. 

Meet the Lebanese Press: The Arabs to the rescue?

Hicham Safieddine 14 January 2008


Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa has been spending more time in Lebanon recently than any other Arab country outside his home base of Egypt. But the time he spends seems to be inversely proportional to number of issues he resolves. His latest trip this week was expected to bring the Lebanese factions to implement the latest Arab initiative launched in Cairo. Lip-service endorsements were all he got. 

US seen in policy retreat

Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani 13 January 2008


CAIRO, 10 January (IPS) - Recent months have witnessed several notable political reorientations in the Middle East, involving Iran, the Gulf states, Egypt and Lebanon. Several experts say the changes reflect a shift in Washington’s regional strategy following recent US policy setbacks. “US policies in the region are either in retreat or undergoing re-examination,” Ayman Abelaziz Salaama, international law professor at Cairo University told IPS. “Washington’s project for a new Middle East — launched in 2001 with the aim of redrawing the region to suit US interests — has failed.” 

Photostory: Volvo equipment used in house demolitions

Adri Nieuwhof 14 January 2008


The photographers of the group Activestills have documented Volvo equipment being used for the illegal construction of the wall and the settlements, and the demolition of Palestinian houses in Israel and occupied Palestine. Activestills gave special permission to publish some of the images on The Electronic Intifada to inform a wider audience about the systematic use of Volvo equipment in house demolitions in East Jerusalem. 

PA uses force to disperse peaceful Bush protest in Ramallah

12 January 2008


The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights condemns the use of excessive force by Palestinian security forces in order to disperse a peaceful demonstration held in Ramallah on 10 January 2008. The Centre calls on the government in Ramallah to investigate the attack on peaceful demonstrators, during which the crowd was attacked by tens of Palestinian policemen and security forces, who beat them with batons and threw tear gas grenades. 

The Grand Jury and the persecution of Dr. Abdelhaleem Ashqar

Michael E. Deutsch 13 January 2008


Ever since his sentencing on 21 November, I have been ruminating on the extreme injustice perpetrated on Dr. Abdelhaleem Ashqar by the US government and the federal court in Chicago culminating in a draconian sentence of 135 months for nonviolent acts of civil disobedience. Michael E. Deutsch, who was one of the counsel for Dr. Ashqar’s co-defendant Mohammad Salah, comments on the punishing of a man motivated by love for his people and their right to resist an illegal occupation of their land. 

In exclusion, Hamas counts

Mohammed Omer 10 January 2008


GAZA CITY, 10 January (IPS) - As US President George W. Bush began talks Thursday with Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas supporters in Gaza were determined to make their absence count. Leaders from the Palestinian party Hamas that won the elections in Gaza two years back have inevitably not been invited to meet Bush. The US considers Hamas a terrorist organization. Hamas took control of Gaza by force from the Fatah party headed by Abbas in June last year, about a year and a half after it swept the polls in January 2006. 

Ali Abunimah and Jonathan Cook discuss Israel's "generous offers" on Flashpoints

10 January 2008


EI co-founder Ali Abunimah and EI contributor and author Jonathan Cook were interviewed on Flashpoints radio out of Berkeley, California on Monday, 7 December 2007. The two were invited on just days before US President George W. Bush’s first ever presedential visit to the Middle East and discussed past Israeli “generous offers” including Camp David in 2000, and Ehud Olmert’s continued policy of ethnic cleansing.