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A defeated policy, not a defeated people

Ali Abunimah 7 March 2008


The fallacy that lies behind the differential concern for the lives of innocent Israelis and Palestinians is that the massacre yesterday in Jerusalem and the massacres in Gaza can be separated. Israeli deaths are “terrorism,” while Palestinian deaths are merely an unfortunate consequence of the fight against “terrorism.” But the two are intricately linked, and what happened in Jerusalem is a direct consequence of what Israel has been doing to the Palestinians for decades. Ali Abunimah comments. 

The Nakba generation

Ziad Abbas United States 9 March 2008


This year, it will sixty years since the Nakba, the catastrophe of expulsion of Palestinians from historic Palestine. Generations have been born, have grown up, and have died in refugee camps, but the international community still continues to ignore the political rights of the Palestinian refugees. What makes it sad for me as a refugee — one who was born and grew up in a refugee camp, and struggling not to die in a refugee camp — is that the Nakba generation is dying. Ziad Abbas writes. 

Salata Baladi or Afrangi?

Joseph Massad 12 March 2008


Cultural critic Joseph Massad finds a problematic political agenda is at the heart of Nadia Kamel’s first documentary Salata Baladi, in which she mourns the imagined loss of a cosmopolitan Cairo, told through the story of her mother Mary Rosenthal, a.k.a. Naila Kamel and her separation from family that left Egypt for Israel. 

Israeli sniper bullet takes 12-year-old girl's life

Sami Abu Salem Jabalya refugee camp 9 March 2008


“I put my hand on her chest to stop the streaming blood. She told me that she could not breathe, her body trembled and she closed her eyes,” said Ra’d Abu Saif of his 12-year-old daughter Safa’s last moments after she was shot by an Israeli sniper last Saturday. Safa was shot in the left side of her chest while she was inside her home in Jabaliya, northern Gaza. Sami Abu Salem reports from Gaza. 

Gaza man assassinated and run over, baby shot in the head

6 March 2008


Following its withdrawal from north Gaza on 4 March 2008, the IOF continued air strikes yesterday. Israeli occupation forces (IOF) penetrated the Wadi al-Salqa village in the central Gaza Strip, assassinated one man, and killed an infant less than one month old. The number of the people killed by the IOF since 28 February 2008 has reached 120, including 72 civilians. Among the civilians were six women and thirty children. 

Egyptian anger over Israel "approaching boiling point"

Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani 6 March 2008


CAIRO, 6 March (IPS) - Fury erupted on the streets and in parliament this week following violent Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip. But as protests were held nationwide in support of besieged Palestinians next door, Cairo continued to keep the volatile Rafah border crossing — the only means out of the strip not under direct Israeli control — tightly sealed. 

Crossing the Line interviews Israeli historian Ilan Pappe

6 March 2008


This week on Crossing The Line: The word “genocide” is one of the most powerful words used to describe criminal killing and destruction. It has been used to describe the Nazi holocaust, the killing fields of Cambodia, and Rwanda. More recently, Israeli author and historian Ilan Pappe has used this word to describe Israel’s actions in the Gaza Strip. Host Naji Ali speaks with Pappe about why he sees Israel’s ongoing occupation and killing of Palestinians in Gaza as genocide. 

Jabaliya buries its dead

4 March 2008


Sixteen-year-old Jacqueline Abu Shbak and her fourteen year old brother, Iyad, both lived on Jabaliya’s Abed Rabbo Street with their mother and three other young brothers and sisters. The children’s uncle, Hatem Hosni Abu Shbak, who lives next door, found the bodies of Jacqueline and Iyad in the early hours of Saturday 1 March, when he rushed upstairs after hearing intense shooting and then screaming. 

Medical negligence suspected in prisoner's death

4 March 2008


The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights is deeply concerned over the death of Fadel ‘Ouda ‘Atiya Shaheen, 47, from al-Jalaa’ neighborhood in Gaza City, who had been detained by Israeli Occupation Forces in Be’r al-Saba’ Prison, as there are indications that his health condition deteriorated and the administration of the prison failed to offer him appropriate medical treatment.