1 December 2008
JERUSALEM (IRIN) - Food aid accounts for over two thirds of the 2009 $462 million requested by United Nations agencies and non-governmental organizations to fund humanitarian aid programs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Food accounts for $209.4 million; next comes cash assistance ($133.3 million), followed by protection, emergency jobs, water and sanitation. Read more about Humanitarian appeal focuses on food
29 November 2008
The following is a speech delivered by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire at the seventh International Sabeel Conference in Jerusalem on 19 November 2008: I am very happy to be here with you and to be invited to speak to you. I am deeply grateful to have the freedom to come here to East Jerusalem and the freedom to speak and meet with you. Read more about Nobel Laureate: There is a way toward peace for Palestine
27 November 2008
The slow death that is being visited on the Palestinians in Gaza is finding its first victims in more than 400 critically ill patients who are being prevented from leaving Gaza for urgent medical attention in Israeli or Arab hospitals. Thousands of other patients are being turned away from hospitals suffering from a severe shortage of 300 different kinds of medicines. Sonja Karkar comments. Read more about Gaza's death throes, and no one's listening
25 November 2008
The Electronic Intifada’s correspondent in Gaza, Rami Almeghari, sat down with UNRWA Chief of Operations in the Gaza Strip, John Ging, to discuss how the siege, and the latest closures are affecting UNRWA and the civilian population in Gaza. UNRWA is the UN agency responsible for providing aid to millions of Palestinian refugees. On 4 November, Israel sent tanks into the Gaza Strip and carried out attacks which killed six Palestinians, breaking a ceasefire that had generally held since June. Read more about UN aid chief to EI: Gaza people "stripped of their dignity"
24 November 2008
The Batsheva Dance Company of Tel Aviv is touring the US and Canada in January, February, and March, 2009. A recipient of public financing since the 1990s, the dance troupe is clearly an Israeli apartheid cultural institution. Writing October 26, 2008, in The Independent of London, Jenny Gilbert reports that the dance company is “funded by Israel’s government, its performers include none of Arab extraction, and it is ‘proud to be considered Israel’s leading ambassador.’” Read more about Organize to stop apartheid dance troupe's North America tour
23 November 2008
In October 2008 the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions National Committee (BNC) published a strategic position paper for the upcoming Durban Review Conference, which will be held from 20-24 April 2009 in Geneva, Switzerland. At the Conference, attending nations will assess the progress made toward the Program of Action adopted at the 2001 World Conference against Racism, which called for end racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. However, Western governments have repeatedly sidelined efforts to bring the case of the systematic violation of the rights the Palestinian people forward in the Durban review process. Read more about A Palestinian action plan to combat Israeli racism
21 November 2008
On the evening of Tuesday 18 November Khalid al-Habeel sat surrounded by his wife, family, and other concerned fishermen. Until the early hours of the following day, they had no idea what charges were being laid against 15 fishermen, including two of al-Habeel’s sons, Adham (21) and Mohammed (20), after they were nabbed from Gaza’s territorial waters earlier that morning and taken to an Israeli interrogation center at Ashdod port. Nor did they know when or if their boats — their livelihoods — would be returned. Eva Bartlett reports. Read more about Israeli gunboats kidnap Gaza fisherman, peaceworkers
20 November 2008
Text messages came from student protestors who had managed to get inside the lecture hall. They let the their fellow demonstrators outside know that their chanting could be heard inside over the voice of Israeli President Shimon Peres. There was clapping and stamping of feet and placards banged on the railings to make as much noise as possible, along with the constant “Free, free Palestine” which did not stop for a moment of the hour-long lecture. Abigail Humphries reports from Oxford. Read more about "Shimon Peres, you're a war criminal!" say Oxford students
30 November 2008
From the very beginning, students have played an active role in the Palestinian national movement. Their enthusiasm, motivation, and hard work help them to overcome even the most daunting tasks. Organizing rallies, academic events, political debates, fundraising, cultural programs, students demonstrate the great influence they are able to assert on societies divided by war, engrossed by political strife, and weakened by economic turmoil. The Electronic Intifada contributor Raja Abdulhaq argues that the General Union of Palestinian Students must be rebuilt. Read more about Rebuilding a General Union of Palestinian Students
20 November 2008
The middle-of-the-night eviction last week of an elderly Palestinian couple from their home in East Jerusalem to make way for Jewish settlers is a demonstration of Israeli intent towards a future peace deal with the Palestinians. Mohammed and Fawziya Khurd are now on the street, living in a tent, after Israeli police enforced a court order issued in July to expel them. Jonathan Cook analyzes. Read more about Only feeble protest over family's eviction