Ali Abunimah

Will Obama adopt a dangerously simplistic peace plan?


A new conventional wisdom is rapidly taking shape that the United States can resolve the 130-year-old conflict in Palestine by advancing its own peace plan. Former US National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and former US Congressman Stephen Solarz outlined such a plan in The Washington Post recently, and argued that President Obama could boost its prospects with a “bold gesture” — a trip, to Jerusalem and Ramallah in the company of Arab and other leaders to unveil it. Ali Abunimah comments. 

PLO paper reveals leadership bereft of strategy, legitimacy


As US-brokered “indirect” peace talks are set to resume, a paper authored by PLO chief negotiator Saeb Erekat reveals a Palestinian leadership ready to re-enter negotiations with Israel having already conceded fundamental Palestinian rights and demands. EI’s Ali Abunimah analyzes a document he says provides insight into the thought processes of a leadership bereft of strategy and legitimacy. 

NY Times' Jerusalem property makes it protagonist in Palestine conflict


The New York Times’ Jerusalem bureau chief lives on property Israel seized from Palestinian refugees forced to leave their homes during the Nakba in 1948. EI’s Ali Abunimah reveals for the first time details of The Times’ acquisition and use of this property and the story of the Palestinian family whose home it was. What are the implications for its reporting of a case that places the “newspaper of record” at the heart of the Palestine conflict? 

Israel's new strategy: "sabotage" and "attack" the global justice movement


Israel’s influential Reut Institute has identified the global movement for justice and peace as an “existential threat” and called on the Israeli government to “attack” and possibly engage in criminal “sabotage” of this movement in what Reut believes are its various international “hubs” in London, Madrid, Toronto, the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. Ali Abunimah comments for The Electronic Intifada. 

The United States, Israel and the retreat of freedom


A new report by Freedom House, a US-government funded think tank, suggests US interference around the world makes countries less free. Despite this, it calls for even more US intervention. The report’s approach also provides a stark example of the abyss liberal thinking has fallen into when it comes to ignoring Israel’s systematic abuses and presenting the country as an idealized democracy. EI’s Ali Abunimah comments. 

Gaza Freedom March: detained at the US embassy


On the afternoon of 28 December 2009, I was with several persons who accompanied CODEPINK cofounder Jodie Evans to the US Embassy in Cairo to present a letter from Massachusetts Senator John Kerry in which he expressed “strong support” for citizens of his state who were traveling to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and requesting they be given “every courtesy.” Ali Abunimah writes about being detained at the US embassy in Cairo. 

Israeli Jews and the one-state solution


One of the most commonly voiced objections to a one-state solution for Palestine/Israel stems from the accurate observation that the vast majority of Israeli Jews reject it, and fear being “swamped” by a Palestinian majority. Across the political spectrum, Israeli Jews insist on maintaining a separate Jewish-majority state. Does this mean that a peaceful one-state outcome is so unlikely that Palestinians should not pursue it, and should instead focus only “pragmatic” solutions that would be less fiercely resisted by Israelis? Ali Abunimah comments for The Electronic Intifada. 

Book review: How aid hurt Palestine


International relations specialist Anne Le More’s first monograph, International Assistance to the Palestinians after Oslo, the first in Routledge’s Studies on the Arab-Israeli Conflict series, provides an important critique of the belief that reconstruction, development and humanitarian aid form essential counterparts to political processes aimed at resolving longstanding violent conflicts. Ali Abunimah reviews.