President Bush met for the first time with Palestinian Leader Mahmoud Abbas, promising $50 million to the Palestinian Authority. This promise of aid money has been called a vote of confidence for Abbas. Electronic Intifada’s Ali Abunimah offered his opinion on the offer on the 26 May 2005 edition of the Worldview program on Chicago Public Radio. Read more about EI's Ali Abunimah discusses the Bush-Abbas meeting on Chicago Public Radio
Electronic Intifada (EI) began in 2001, a year after Palestine’s Second Intifada. This site is packed with information that is organized, accessible, and thorough. It offers visitors historical, legal, cultural, and political information about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Laurie King-Irani, one of the site’s cofounders, says EI’s most popular aspect is its diaries — live reports from people on the ground in occupied Palestine. In 2002, the EI team decided that instead of critiquing the media, they would become the ideal. “Too often, we aren’t getting the whole story. What we do at EI is deliver the missing part,” cofounder Arjan El Fassed says. “We call it supplementary news, rather than alternative news.” Read more about Rabble, Straight Goods, Indymedia
Two scholars of the ongoing Israel-Palestine tension visited Ithaca College this week. Israeli educator and journalist Jeremy Maissel gave a public lecture Monday sponsored by Hillel titled. Maissel, who is associated with the Zionist educational organization Melitz, argued points of the conflict from an Israeli perspective. Ali Abunimah, a journalist and commentator on issues in the Middle East, gave a speech on Tuesday sponsored by Students For A Just Peace titled, “Israel and Palestine: Is Peace About to Break Out?” Abunimah, the founder of the Israel-Palestine news site ElectronicIntifada.net, discussed the conflict from a Palestinian perspective. Read more about Gauging conflict
Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian activist and co-founder of Electronic Intifada, a website that explores the Israeli/Palestinian conflict through a Palestinian perspective, spoke at Cornell yesterday evening and shed light on the fundamental debate: “Is Peace in Palestine a doomed fantasy?” Abunimah was brought to Cornell by a new Cornell club, Student Advocates of Palestine. “Our goal is to educate people in Cornell about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict from the Palestinian perspective,” president Chris Tozzi ‘08 said. Read more about Activist Speaks On Difficulty of Mid-East Peace
EI’s Ali Abunimah spoke to about 100 people at Pitt Thursday. Earlier in the day, Abunimah had spoken at Carnegie Mellon University, where about 40 students protested his appearance. Aaron Weil, executive director of the Edward and Rose Berman Jewish University Center, expressed disappointment that Abunimah was brought to speak. Abunimah questioned what he described as the “dominant narratives” about the region that he believes the U.S government and mainstream media promote. “We are hearing about a ‘window of opportunity’ for peace,” he said, referring to the proposed summit between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Read more about Founder of "Electronic Intifada" visits CMU, Pitt
A speaker whose planned appearance in a campus lecture series drew complaints from Jewish students at Carnegie Mellon University is being rescheduled so speakers with balancing viewpoints can be added. Carnegie Mellon yesterday confirmed the change involving a planned Feb. 21 speech by Norman Finkelstein. The school says it is discussing with him an appearance later in the spring semester, but no date has been set. On Thursday, about 40 Jewish students picketed a lecture series appearance by EI’s Ali Abunimah. Some students later asked why no opposing speakers were booked. Read more about CMU reschedules controversial speaker
In the first Israeli-Palestinian summit in four years, Israeli Prime Minister Gen. Ariel Sharon and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas verbally agreed today to end four years of fighting. Since the intifada began in September 2000, about 3,600 Palestinians and 1,050 Israelis have been killed in fighting. Israeli and Palestinian leaders are expected to announce a cease-fire deal today to end more than four years of bloodshed which has claimed over 4,000 lives. Hussein Ibish joins us in our DC studio. He is a Senior Fellow at the American Task Force on Palestine and on the line from Chicago we are joined by Ali Abunimah, founder of the Electronic Intifada. Read more about Sharon and Abbas Hold Summit, Call For End of Violence
Ali Abunimah, a writer and commentator on the Middle East and Arab-American affairs and co-founder of the Web site “Electronic Intifada,” laid out his opposition to a two-state solution to the Mideast peace process yesterday. The Middle East peace process is phony, Abunimah said, because what Israel wants to do — with U.S. complicity — is to set up independent homelands similar to the apartheid system under white-ruled South Africa. The apartheid system is so far advanced that a two-state solution to the conflict is no longer possible, he told about 100 students. What is needed is a unitary state in which Israelis and Palestinians would have equal rights, Abunimah said. Read more about Mideast commentator brings protest at CMU
The Somerville Divestment Project drafted a resolution to forbid Somerville investments in Israeli bonds and companies that supplied military and defense services to the country. “Like many other American cities…Somerville is directly, albeit unwittingly, contributing to the oppression, dispossession, humiliation and overall suffering of the Palestinian people,” Wallace wrote in his article, entitled “Somerville Divestment Failure is Bittersweet.” The article first appeared on Dec. 20, in The Electronic Intifada, an online publication dedicated to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Read more about Israeli divestment fails amid opposition from local groups, Mayor
Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz’s Clarity Media Group, which owns the San Francisco Examiner and plans to launch the Washington Examiner on Tuesday, has pulled an advertisement promoting the two papers following criticism that the ad demonized Palestinian children, The Denver Post reported Saturday. The Electronic Intifada asked its readers to contact Examiner vice president of advertising Mark Wurzer and San Francisco Examiner managing editor Jim Pimentel to request that they pull the ad, according to the Post. Read more about Anschutz Group Pulls Ad for 'Examiner' After Protest
