Summer 2006, Palestine — a crossover between film, video art, individual expression and a collective voice — is a unique experience in the Palestinian cultural scene. This collection of short films brings together 13 individual artists with different degrees of experience within the Palestinian film scene and other visual arts disciplines to convey the summer of 2006 in Palestine. The project is the result of an initiative led by several Palestinian filmmakers from the Palestinian Filmmakers’ Collective. Read more about Film review: "Summer 2006, Palestine"
There are many aspects of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians in urgent need of legal scrutiny as part of a much-needed critical dialogue. One such issue is Israel’s claim towards Hamas to acknowledge that it has a ‘right to exist’. This claim has not only been uncritically taken on board by the Quartet. It has become one of the top conditions to be fulfilled by Hamas for receiving aid by the Quartet and other international donors. At the risk of stating the obvious, we argue that this position lacks any basis under international law and will serve no constructive political purpose in seeking to resolve the conflict. Read more about 'Israel's right to exist': Is it a real issue?
MONTREAL: Over 100 people gathered at the Mile End Cultural Center on Tuesday, March 20th for a film-screening and public discussion entitled “Lebanon: Resistance & Hezbollah” organized by Tadamon! Montreal. In the shadow of the 2006 Israeli attack on Lebanon, widely opposed in Quebec and internationally, public discussion and debate on the Lebanese popular movement and political party Hezbollah has grown. The event featured a documentary film produced by Swiss Television, which focused on former Lebanese political prisoner Soha Bechara’s return to Lebanon after 2006 war. Read more about Montreal: Resistance and Hezbollah
On 4 April 1968, Martin Luther King was shot dead in Memphis, Tennessee, where he planned to lead a protest march. The powerful voice of King was silenced, but almost fifty years later, his ideas are still a source of inspiration for people who seek peace and justice. Israel claims to have a special relation with the legacy of King. Every year it marks Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a United States holiday, with a special session in parliament. Read more about The legacy of Martin Luther King: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere
WASHINGTON, D.C., 23 March 2007 (IPS) - How seriously and to what ends is the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush willing to engage the new Palestinian government of national unity? As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice makes her seventh visit to the Middle East in the last eight months, that is the question that foreign policy analysts and diplomats here are asking, and the answers are as yet far from clear.Is the administration committed to resuming a genuine peace process designed to fill out the “political horizon” of a final settlement to which both Israel and the Palestinians, including Hamas, will be willing to commit? Read more about Tentative moves toward new Palestine government
Gaza - Ma’an News Agency - The death toll due to the renewed clashes between Fatah and Hamas supporters in the Gaza Strip, which began on Wednesday, March 21, rose to three after a two-year-old infant died on Thursday evening. Security sources reported that the infant, Hassan Abu al-Nada, died from wounds sustained after being shot by armed men while in his house near the home of a leader of the Fatah-affiliated al-Aqsa Brigades, Samih al-Madhoun. Read more about Two-year-old killed in renewed factional violence
RAMALLAH, 22 March 2007 (IRIN) - One-third of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are food insecure, according to a report by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). About 34 percent of Palestinians cannot afford a balanced meal and another 12 percent are at risk of reaching this state, the organisations found in a Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Assessment published this month. Most affected is the Gaza Strip, where 51 percent of the population suffers from food insecurity. Read more about One-third of Palestinians 'food insecure'
Palestinian leaders heaved a sigh of relief over the weekend when the formation of the long- awaited Hamas-Fatah national unity government finally became a reality. But the Palestinians could quickly discover that while the formation of a unity government, after months of tortuous negotiations, may have averted the threat that growing internal strife would balloon into all-out civil war, it could fail to achieve its second and no less important goal — the lifting of crippling international sanctions. Read more about United But Still Isolated
The decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict lies at the heart of 21st century world affairs, with numerous nations, international organisations and NGOs involved on both sides. The United Nations has long played a role in the conflict, on both political and humanitarian levels. Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was established for the specific purpose of providing assistance to the Palestinian refugees the war created. Read more about Situation of Palestinian Refugees: "Worse than ever"
EASTJERUSALEM, 20 March 2007 (IRIN) - Two months ago, the 12 members of the Abdullah family awoke at 7.30am to find their home in East Jerusalem surrounded by 2,000 Israeli soldiers. They were hustled out as two bulldozers from the Jerusalem Municipality tore it down — leaving them to face the winter cold with just a canvas Red Cross tent for shelter. “We have no money to rent a flat here and no relatives who can take us in. Years of saving money and work disappeared in 30 minutes,” said Milouk Abdullah, a 55-year-old scrap-metal dealer. Read more about Evictions and demolitions continue in East Jerusalem
