12 December 2002
This summer, a little-known Manchester academic caused an international storm when she sacked two Israeli scholars from the editorial board of her journal. But was it an isolated freelance protest - or the first skirmish in a wider academic boycott? The Guardian’s Andy Beckett investigates. Read more about Is an academic boycott of Israel taking hold and spreading?
12 December 2002
NPR demonstrated a complete lack of skepticism about a report in the Washington Post citing shadowy and anonymous government sources claiming that Lebanon-based Al-Qaida-lined extremists obtained a deadly chemical weapon from Iraq. By failing to ask any hard questions, NPR served essentially as a transcription service for the government, rather than as an independent source of news and analysis. EI’s Ali Abunimah explains. Read more about NPR confuses irresponsible speculation for hard news
12 December 2002
Journalists and media organizations have abdicated their role of providing an independent alternative source of information and have too often slumped toward over-reliance on anonymous government sources. Almost every reporter uses anonymous sources. But it is a rare reporter or editor who will repeatedly use this device to convey information that might help start a war. Writing in The Buffalo News, Douglas Turner is alarmed by increasing examples of careless use of anonymous sources, with the result that the public is often grossly misled about fundamental issues of life and death. Read more about Anonymous sources fueling push for war
10 December 2002
The Geneva based Center on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) has identified the countries guilty of most consistently abusing and defying international housing rights law in 2002 for its new annual Housing Rights Violators Award. Israel is among the ten states chosen to receive the award, writes BADIL. Read more about Israel wins the world's worst housing rights violators award
10 December 2002
Above: Elia Suleiman in the director’s chair.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences operates a double standard that may have kept Elia Suleiman’s award-winning feature film “Divine Intervention” out of the competition for the Oscars, EI has learned. The film, a dark comedy about a love affair between two people on opposite sides of an Israeli military checkpoint, won a prestigious jury prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and the European Film Award. EI’s Ali Abunimah and Benjamin Doherty investigate. Read more about Oscars' double standard turns Palestinian film into refugee
10 December 2002
On this year’s Human Rights Day, over 6000 Palestinians languish in Israeli prisons, detained under arbitrary and unjust military regulations, interrogated through torture, and living in subhuman conditions of detention in the various military detention camps both in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, as well as those located illegally within Israel. Read more about Human Rights Day: Addameer on Palestinian detainees
6 December 2002
Following the killing in Gaza today of ten Palestinians, including two United Nations relief workers, the top UN human rights official, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Sergio Vieira de Mello, called for an Israeli probe into the recent pattern of serious incidents in the Middle East. Read more about UN's top human rights official urges probe into Israeli raid on Gaza
8 December 2002
In light of the recent attacks, the United Nations Staff Union and its Standing Committee on the Security and Independence of the International Civil Service once again call for a full investigation surrounding the events that led to the killings of three staff member of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Read more about UN Staff Union again calls for full investigation of recent killings of UNRWA staff
10 December 2002
When a Palestinian attack kills Israelis, the TV news networks are quick to cut to “breaking news” reports. Harrowing footage from the scene and interviews with outraged Israeli government officials are swiftly broadcast, and harsh statements are quickly issued by government and UN officials to appear in tomorrow’s front page newspaper stories. Meanwhile, the relentless killing of Palestinian civilians, many of them children, by the Israeli occupation army goes largely unnoticed and unreported. Read more about Invisible killings: Israel's daily toll of Palestinian children
6 December 2002
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has learned that two if its employees have been killed during the Israeli military assault on Bureij refugee camp in the Gaza Strip in the early hours of this morning. Read more about Ten killed in Gaza including two UNRWA staff