There does not appear to be any end in sight to this latest Israeli attack. The Lebanese have reluctantly accepted that the international community - that increasingly cynical euphemism for the Great Powers - have abandoned them, though France, China and Russia at least have made reassuring gestures. George Bush and Condoleezza Rice have backed Israel’s right to ‘self-defence’ and blamed Hizbullah’s very existence for the current violence. Meanwhile, Tony Blair - in an ironic reversal of the Blair Doctrine, which calls for intervention for humanitarian reasons - has called for more UN peacekeepers to be deployed in southern Lebanon ‘to protect Israel’. Read more about How the War Will End
My siege notes are beginning to disperse. I write disjointed paragraphs but I cannot discipline myself to write everyday. Despair overwhelms me, along with a profoundly debilitating sense of uselessness and helplessness. Writing does not always help; communicating is not always easy, finding the words, deciding which stories should be included, and which should not. The experience of this siege is so emotionally and psychically draining, the situation is so politically tenuous. I miss the world. I miss life. I miss myself. People around me also go through these ups and downs, but I find them generally to be more resilient, more steadfast, more courageous than I. Read more about 1,500 souls in Bint Jbeil, Nasrallah, and the "New Middle East"
Nora Barrows-FriedmanDheisheh refugee camp, Palestine26 July 2006
I was in Ramallah over the past two days, visiting friends and documenting a fierce demonstration yesterday morning in the city center as Condoleezza Rice paid a truncated and pathetic quasi-visit to PA President Mahmoud Abbas. Palestinian and international journalists from all over the West Bank crossed humilating checkpoints, braved thick traffic and fought over press credentials only to find out, one hour before the scheduled press conference, that the important question and answer period was canceled by the US handlers. It was just handshakes and rhetoric for the PA president, then off to some other part of this tumultuous region to lie some more. Read more about On those "birth pangs"
The Israeli attack on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, which began on June 27, has provoked worldwide condemnation. Protest rallies and mass mobilizations were organized in Greece within hours of the attack. The protests were expected to continue until such time as the Israeli government ceases its bombing attacks on Gaza’s population and civilian infrastructure. In Greece, political parties, alongside trade unions, peace groups, women’s organizations and other movements, swung into action from the very first moment of the attack. Rallies were organized in Greece’s three largest cities — Athens, Thessaloniki and Patras — demanding the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces. The demonstrators condemned not only the Israeli government, but al Read more about Photostory: Greece swings into action against Israel's assault on Gaza and Lebanon
Seven-year-old Liyan opens her eyes in the middle of the night and calls for her mum who is sitting with the adults in the family on the sidewalk. She says, “Send my greetings to my brothers and sisters if any harm happens to me,” then she closes her eyes and falls asleep. Twenty-two children and six of their parents fled from Deir Amess in Tyre the day before yesterday under Israel’s heavy shelling and bombs and slept on the streets of Hazmieh (a northern suburb of Beirut) after roaming the streets for one whole day. Read more about Deir Amess To Beirut: 22 kids spend their night on the street
She was almost my age, my mother, back in the summer of 1982, that summer which holds my best-conserved memories. I look at myself in the mirror and I almost see her face staring back at me. The fine wrinkles on the forehead, a few grey hairs, and the new habit I am acquiring of pulling my hair up. How does one describe the changes in one’s features? Like looking at old pictures and knowing you don’t look as young anymore, though you also know you haven’t changed. Maybe more than anything, it is the eyes that betray us; - tired eyes through Kohol, our traditional black eyeliner, announcing to you and to the world that you are at war. Read more about Needing a miracle to hold my beliefs accountable
“We are struggling for justice and there is no place for murderers and war criminals among us!” Under this slogan, some 2,500 thousand Palestinians held a mass protest in Ramallah against Condoleeza Rice, US foreign policy in the region and the meeting that was scheduled that day between her and Abu Mazen. Popular anger and determination to resist all those that want the surrender of the Palestinian people’s struggle for justice was boiling in the streets as the presidential guards were attacking the protestors. Read more about Photostory: Ramallah to Rice: "Screw your 'New Middle East'!"
The tactics used by many Arab militants should be resoundingly condemned, both for targeting innocents and for bringing disaster on their own peoples. Even so, underneath America’s scorn for Hezbollah and Hamas lies an incredible racism that pretends to believe that no Arab could possibly have any legitimate grievance with Israel, even as Israel smashes their nations into oblivion. To deliver a solution to this crisis from out that racism is to birth a monster. For a short time this week I allowed myself to feel some hope. But America’s plan for “peace” amounts to throwing gasoline on an already raging fire and standing back while we all burn. Read more about Lebanon burns while the US feeds the flames
By superimposing the ‘War on Terror’ rhetoric, the US is continuing its bull-headed approach to foreign policy. Until Americans realize that their country is vehemently hated in this part of the world, and that only a fundamental shift in approach to the Middle East can alter this perception, its tainted role can only do more damage than good. Forget about imposing an outsider’s view of democracy - order, economic development and human rights would be sufficient in this region. The other changes must happen internally by the funding and development of civil society. Read more about What Are the Root Causes, Mr. Bush and Ms. Rice?
Rest assured: as long as there is injustice there will never be peace, and it is only a matter of time before the whole world is engulfed in a state of total chaos, we can see it anyway and only if the real justice prevails will there be real world peace. Today is not the time to throw accusations in all directions, to just sit back, talk and analyze. Today is time to open the mind, the eyes, the ears, and make the world understand that what the strong powers are doing today will one day turn against them. They are only increasing the desperation, the hate, the cruelty, the injustice, and there will only be desperate retaliations. Read more about Enough empty talk
