Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Dr Ramzy Baroud
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Abbas’s la-la land and the evolution of the American love affair with Israel
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is ready to “go to the White House and continue what started with Donald Trump.” With this and other confusing statements, Abbas tried to articulate the new Palestinian political agenda to foreign reporters in Ramallah last month. According to Abbas, the PA...
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Palestinian mayor, arrested by PA, one of dying breed of revolutionaries
It would be unfair to claim that Palestine has not produced great leaders. It has, and Bassam Shakaa, the former Mayor of Nablus, who passed away on 22 July at the age of 89, was living proof of this. The supposed deficit in good Palestinian leadership can be attributed to...
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Killing Tariq: Why We Must Rethink the Roots of Jewish Settlers Violence
Seven-year-old Tariq Zabania from Al-Khalil (Hebron) was killed on the spot when an Israeli Jewish settler ran his car over him on July 15. Little Tariq’s photograph, lying face down on the road, was circulated on social media. His untimely death is heartbreaking. Tariq’s innocent blood must not go in...
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‘Clear and Decisive Win’: Why Netanyahu Needs a War on Gaza More Than Ever Before
Media reports of an impending Israeli war on the besieged Gaza Strip are now a regular occurrence. The frequency of these reports fluctuates based on Israel’s own political landscape. Empirical experience has taught us that when Israeli leaders are in trouble, they wage a war on Gaza. Now that Israeli...
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Who Killed Oscar and Valeria: The Inconvenient History of the Refugee Crisis
History never truly retires. Every event of the past, however inconsequential, reverberates throughout and, to an extent, shapes our present, and our future as well The haunting image of the bodies of Salvadoran father, Oscar Alberto Martinez Ramirez and his daughter, Valeria, who were washed ashore at a riverbank on...
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Israel’s Latest ‘Security Problem’: Who's to Blame for Gaza’s Environmental Crisis
Writing in The Jewish Journal under the title, “A Spillover Crisis: How Gaza’s Water Shortage Affects Israel”, Dominik Doehler explains the direct link between Gaza’s water problems and Israel. Doehler offered a scientific explanation behind the besieged Strip’s water crisis, but when it was time to assign responsibility, something went...
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The Book of Palestine: National liberation vs endless negotiations
Those who are still hoping that the new American agenda on Palestine and Israel is temporary, or reversible, should abandon this false hope. Washington’s complete adoption of Israel’s messianic, extremist policies regarding Occupied Palestine has been a long time in the making. And it is here to stay. Despite the...
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Africa and Palestine: A noble legacy that must never be betrayed
Europe’s “Scramble for Africa” began in earnest in 1881, but never ended. The attempt at dominating the continent using old and new strategies continues to define the western relationship with this rich continent. This reality was further validated when I arrived in Nairobi, Kenya on 23 June. Although my objective...
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Iran is not Iraq: American warmongers must be stopped
Along with American and British journalists and doctors, I visited Iraq a few years before its invasion and occupation by the United States and its ‘coalition of the willing.’ A decade-long siege before the war had left the country in ruin. It was as if not a single car in...
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Palestine and Kenya: Our historic fight against injustice is one and the same
In 1948 my grandfather, along with thousands of Badrasawis, was expelled by Israeli military forces from our ancestral village of Beit Daras in Palestine. Like hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from over 500 villages, my grandfather assumed he would be back home in a few weeks. “Why bother to haul...
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The day after: What if Israel annexes the West Bank?
Calls for the annexation of the Occupied West Bank are gaining momentum in both Tel Aviv and Washington. But Israel and its American allies should be careful what they wish for. Annexing the Occupied Palestinian Territories will only reinforce the current rethink of the Palestinian strategy, as opposed to...
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‘World Refugee Day’: Palestinians Keep Their Right of Return Alive Through Hope, Resistance
The United Nations’ World Refugee Day, observed annually on June 20, should not merely represent a reminder of “the courage, strength and determination of women, men and children who are forced to flee their homeland under threat of persecution, conflict and violence.” It should also be an opportunity for the...
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115 Court Appearances and Counting: Father of ‘Humanitarian Hero’, Mohammed El-Halabi Speaks Out
Mohammed Khalil El Halabi was born on April 2, 1978. He is the second of seven brothers. The El Halabi family was ethnically cleansed from the town of Al-Majdal in historic Palestine in 1948, to live in permanent exile ever since. Mohammed was born and raised in the Jabaliya...
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Kushner as a Colonial Administrator: Let’s Talk About the ‘Israeli Model’
In a TV interview on June 2, on the news docuseries “Axios” on the HBO channel, Jared Kushner opened up regarding many issues, in which his ‘Deal of the Century’ was a prime focus. The major revelation made by Kushner, President Donald Trump’s adviser and son-in-law, was least surprising. Kushner...
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Facing the Facts: Israel Cannot Escape ICC Jurisdiction
The Chief Military Advocate General of the Israeli army, Sharon Afek, and the US Department of Defense General Counsel, Paul Ney, shared a platform at the ‘International Conference on the Law of Armed Conflict’, which took place in Herzliya, Israel between May 28-30. Their panel witnessed some of the most...
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Arab-Israeli Normalisation: A desperate attempt at isolating Iran
Bahrain is gearing up to host the economic version of the so-called Deal of the Century. A two-day conference, co-hosted by the United States, is scheduled to be held in the capital, Manama June 25-26. The Palestinian leadership has rightly refused to take part in the latest US-Arab charade, which...
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Politics of Humiliation: Trump, Palestine, the Arab Peoples
The Deal of the Century has inspired much discussion about Washington’s latest political gambit in the Middle East. Largely excluded from the debate, however, is the emotional toll involving the Arab peoples everywhere. The ‘politics of humiliation’ is fairly a new discourse associated with the sense of collective defeat and...
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Resurrecting the PLO is Palestine’s Best Response to the ‘Deal of the Century’
Palestinian groups, Fatah, Hamas and others should not confine themselves to merely rejecting the Trump Administration’s so-called ‘Deal of the Century’. Instead, they should use their resistance to the new American-Israeli plot as an opportunity to unify their ranks. Leaked details of the ‘Deal of the Century’ confirm Palestinians’ worst...
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Madonna’s Fake Revolution: Eurovision, Cultural Hegemony and Resistance
Rim Banna, a famous Palestinian singer who translated Palestine’s most moving poetry to song, passed away on March 24, 2018, at the age of 51. Rim captured the struggle for Palestinian freedom in the most dignified and melodious ways. If we could imagine angels singing, they would sound like...
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A changing Middle East: Why the deal of the century will fail
Some are being misled to believe that the soon-to-be-announced deal of the century is a US-sponsored peace initiative aimed at resolving the so-called Palestinian-Israeli conflict. However, such a perception is erroneous, not only because the US is not interested in achieving a just peace in the region, but because the...
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Israel’s common denominator: Why Israel will continue to bomb Gaza
On May 4, Israel launched a series of deadly airstrikes on the besieged Gaza Strip, prompting a response from various resistance groups. At least 25 Palestinians were killed and nearly 200 people wounded in the Israeli attacks. Four Israelis were also killed by Palestinian rockets. The clashes were instigated by...
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The two narratives of Palestine: The people are united, the factions are not
The International Conference on Palestine held in Istanbul between April 27-29 brought together many speakers and hundreds of academics, journalists, activists and students from Turkey and all over the world. The Conference was a rare opportunity aimed at articulating a discourse of international solidarity that is both inclusive and forward...
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Why Palestinian prisoners choose hunger strike as a resistance strategy
One of the many ways in which Israel seeks to oppress and control the Palestinian population is by imprisoning those who lead the resistance to its occupation and settler colonialist project. In Palestine, a Palestinian prisoner in an Israeli jail is referred to as “aseer“, or captive, because he or she is...
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France and the EU, Recognising Yet Supporting Apartheid Reality in Palestine
A recent statement made by the outgoing French Ambassador to the US regarding the nature of Israeli apartheid accentuates a larger ailment that has afflicted the European Union foreign policy. The EU is simply gutless when it comes to confronting Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. Ambassador Gerard Araud was, of course,...