“Suppose I were to leave my office here in Chicago and walk the short distance to the kidney dialysis unit down the road and pull out the tubes to which four elderly patients were attached, making them seriously ill or killing them.” EI co-founder Ali Abunimah argues that this, effectively, is what the so-called international community is doing to Palestinians by cutting off aid in an attempt to blackmail Hamas into changing its policies. Reports from hospitals in Gaza say that at least four people have died due to lack of medicine due to Israeli closures and the EU aid cut off. Read more about Helping Israel kill Palestinians
A young woman stands before a camera refusing to take the chair the director has set up. He asks why? “I have come to sing,” she says. Irritated, the director orders her, “You must act, didn’t they tell you we are looking for actors here?” With calm assertion she insists, “I do not know how to act. I have come to sing. Come on, you film and I will sing…” This scene illustrates a main theme running through Rashid Masharawi’s latest feature film Waiting: Palestinians forced to speak from someone else’s script, writes Electronic Intifada co-founder Ali Abunimah in this review of Masharawi’s latest feature which had its Chicago premiere at the Chicago Palestine Film Festival 2006. Read more about Film Review: Rashid Masharawi's "Waiting"
Michael Neumann’s “The Case Against Israel” is “the most comprehensive and devastating critique of Israel in print,” writes EI reviewer Raymond Deane. Yet it will make uncomfortable reading not only for Israel’s apologists but also pro-Palestinian activists. Neumann argues that although “Israel is the illegitimate child of ethnic nationalism,” its existence is “protected by the same useful international conventions that allow others” to retain “their ill-gotten gains.” Seeing that Palestinians have no true options to resist save violence, Neumann nevertheless advocates “the most extensive international sanctions possible”, undeterred “by the horrors of the Jewish past.” Read more about Book Review: The Case Against Israel
Coming only four weeks after the European declaration of sanctions against the Palestinian Authority, Ehud Olmert’s announcement of a new Israeli Government should raise profound questions in any Western country truly interested in a ‘balanced’ approach towards the Middle East. Olmert’s government does contain many politicians responsible for the last five years of terror and impoverishment on the West Bank, who fall foul of the conditions the Quartet (US, EU, UN and Russia) has seen fit to place on the Palestinians. Read more about Israel and the West: New Government, Old Policies
Listen to an interview with Ahmed Abdel Majeed, a stateless Palestinian born and raised in Ein el-Hilweh refugee camp in southern Lebanon, who was deported from Montreal Canada in November 2003. In Montreal Ahmed was an active member of the Coalition Against the Deportation of Palestinian Refugees, a group of Palestinians in Montreal organizing against deportation by Canadian immigration authorities. Read more about Audio Interview: From Montreal to Ein el-Hilweh
With Hamas in control of the Palestinian Authority (PA) government, and Western donors are halting all direct aid to it, an already precarious humanitarian situation in the West Bank and Gaza could potentially turn worse. Virtually bankrupt, the PA needs $120 million a month to pay its staff, and an additional $40 million for continued minimum basic services to its constituency. With Israel suspending the transfer of $60 million a month in Palestinian customs receipts, the $35 million the PA collects each month in domestic revenues are not enough to keep it afloat. Read more about Palestine: Making a Bad Situation Worse
Listen to a radio documentary on Burj el-Shemali refugee camp, located on the outskirts of the southern Lebanese city of Tyre & home to upwards of 20 000 Palestinian refugees. Recorded in Burj el-Shemali during the summer of 2005, this documentary focuses on the present day political, economic and social situation facing the Palestinian residents of the camp, within the context of ongoing major political changes taking place in Lebanon. Read more about Audio Documentary - Burj el-Shemali Refugee Camp
While the Palestinians are manoeuvring feverishly in reaction to the latest developments dropped in their fishbowl, Israel quietly but forcefully continues its sustained policy of seizing and maintaining control over the West Bank, its land and natural resources. In face of this onslaught and international apathy and complicity, writes EI contributor Rima Merriman, pleading for fulfilment of international obligations to the Palestinians is pointless. Palestinians should put all their energies, instead, into finding ways to contain and reverse Israeli military practices that target their land and natural resources. Read more about Flattening the conflict
In order to have a deeper understanding of the social suffering of the Palestinian people under occupation, a pilot Quality of Life study was undertaken by the World Health Organization - West Bank and Gaza and the Bir Zeit Institute of Community and Public Health in cooperation with the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. The investigation was completed one month before the Palestinian Legislative Council Elections on 25 January 2006. It can therefore be seen as a baseline study to measure the impact of the negative response of Israel and the West to the democratic victory of Hamas. Adri Nieuwhof looks at the survey. Read more about World Health Organization: Life Quality Dramatically Deteriorated for Palestinians
The sudden ascent of Hamas to power after the January 25 parliamentary elections in the Palestinian Authority (PA) areas has put at risk two vital sources of Palestinian finance: an aid package by Western donors of about $1 billion a year in humanitarian, developmental and budgetary support; and a monthly transfer by Israel of about $55 million in customs and tax revenues that it collects on behalf of the PA. Preserving the status quo, where international aid and customs revenues transfers are maintained at their 2005 levels, would not prevent Palestinian economic conditions from deteriorating. Read more about Aid and the Palestine Financial Crisis: A viewpoint on an ongoing debate
