Dr Ramzy Baroud
Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of the Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is ‘These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons’ (Clarity Press). Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) and also at the Afro-Middle East Center (AMEC). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net
Items by Dr Ramzy Baroud
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- May 28, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Trump’s visit to Israel: How Palestine disappeared from US media coverage
As if he has, overnight, been transformed into a master politician, Donald Trump’s 27-hour trip to Israel has left many analysts mystified. Quoting former Israeli political adviser, Mitchell Barack, the New York Times referred to Trump as the “Liberace of world leaders”, in reference to flamboyant, piano player, Wladziu Valantino Liberace. The...
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- May 22, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Fear as an obstacle to peace: Why are Israelis afraid?
Bat-Hen Epstein Elias’ long article on Iranian Jews is interesting. Parts of it, in fact, are heartwarming. Yet, despite the lack of any serious evidence, the story is entirely framed in the language of fear. Entitled, “All the Jews there live in fear that their telephones are tapped”, the story...
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- May 15, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Jewish Nation-State Bill: Israel's precarious identity is Palestine's nightmare
The Israeli Knesset (parliament) has hurriedly passed a new bill that defines Israel as the “national home of the Jewish people.” Although the association between Jewishness and Israel goes back to the foundation of the state, the new law also carries clear discriminatory elements that target the country’s Arab...
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- May 15, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Recasting the Nakba: Palestinian struggle between victimhood and resistance
In mainstream Israeli politics, history books, literature and collective imagination, the Palestinian Nakba never happened. If the pain and suffering of a nation is acknowledged, then the people themselves would, naturally, have to be acknowledged as well. This, Israel could not do. In fact, the infamous declaration made by former...
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- May 8, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
New Charter: Should Hamas rewrite the past?
Now that the Palestinian Islamic Movement, Hamas, has officially changed its Charter, one should not immediately assume that the decision is, in itself, an act of political maturity. Undoubtedly, Hamas’ first Charter, which was released to the public in August 1988, reflected a degree of great intellectual dearth and political...
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- May 1, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The Prisoners’ Revolt: The real reasons behind the Palestinian hunger strike
Gaza is the world’s largest open air prison. The West Bank is a prison, too, segmented into various wards, known as areas A, B and C. In fact, all Palestinians are subjected to varied degrees of military restrictions. At some level, they are all prisoners. East Jerusalem is cut off from the West Bank,...
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- April 24, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Palestinian and Jewish voices must challenge Israel’s past together
Israel has resorted to three main strategies to suppress Palestinian calls for justice and human rights, including the Right of Return for refugees. One is dedicated to rewriting history; another attempts to distract from present realities altogether; and a third aims to reclaim the Palestinian narrative as essentially an...
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- April 17, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
When Daesh is defeated: Who will fill the intellectual vacuum in the Arab World?
Back in the Middle East for a few months, I find myself astounded by the absence of the strong voices of Arab intellectuals. The region that has given rise to the likes of Michel Aflaq, George Habash, Rached Al-Ghannouchi, Edward Said and numerous others has marginalised its intellectuals. Arab visionaries have either...
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- April 10, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Palestine retold: Palestine’s tragic anniversaries are not only about remembrance
For Palestinians, 2017 is a year of significant anniversaries. While historians mark May 15th as the anniversary of the date on which Palestinians were expelled from their historic homeland in 1948, the fact is the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians began in earnest in 1947. In strict historical terms 1947 and...
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- April 3, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Normalisation under occupation: How Israel understands the Arab Peace Initiative
Once more, the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002 is taking centre stage. Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas insisted during his speech before the recently-concluded Arab League Summit in Jordan that the initiative is the only solution on the table; asserting that it will not be changed or even...
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- March 28, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The next phase in the war on BDS: Why Israel detained Omar Barghouti
The Israeli state has violated international law more than any other country, yet has rarely, if ever, been held accountable for its crimes and misconduct. Israel’s successful public relations campaigns through its ever-willing western media partners, coupled with the relentless work and pressure carried out by its powerful backers in...
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- March 20, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
‘Decolonising the mind’: Using Hollywood celebrities to validate Islam
When Terry Holdbrooks Jr. converted to Islam in 2003 he was inundated with death threats and labelled a “race traitor”. If a religious conversion ever deserves to be admired, Holdbrooks’ conversion does, and not because Islam has “won” yet another convert, but because the new convert was assigned the very...
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- March 14, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
‘Web of Weirdness’: US and Israeli Codependent Relationship is Not Just about Money
“We must look back 25 years to realise how far Israel has fallen in world support,” wrote famed Jewish scholar, Harvard sociologist, Nathan Glazer in 1976. In the last 40 years since Glazer wrote his piece, which was uncovered and publicised by Philip Weiss, Israel’s global support has fallen much...
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- March 6, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Only the Israeli dead matter: Israel's failure at investigating its bloody wars
At a glance, Israel appears a true democracy. Take a closer look and that facade of democracy will soon dissipate, turning into something else entirely. Tuesday 28 February was one of those moments. The chain of events was as follows: An official Israeli State Comptroller issued another report on the Israeli...
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- February 27, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Descendants of slaves, forerunners of justice: American Muslims must stop apologising
I have recently been asked to give a talk about “Being an American Muslim in the United States”. Although wary of the uses and abuses of the term, I obliged. Islam is a religion propelled by values, not race nor, theoretically, by blind tribal allegiances, I explained. The “American Muslim” identity...
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- February 21, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The Trump-Netanyahu Circus: Now, no one can save Israel from itself
The President of the United States can hardly be taken seriously, saying much but doing little. His words, often offensive, carry no substance, and it is impossible to summarise his complex political outlook about important issues. This is precisely the type of American presidency that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu...
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- February 13, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Israel’s vision for the future is terrifying
Empirical historical evidence combined with little common-sense are enough to tell us the type of future options that Israel has in store for the Palestinian people: perpetual apartheid or ethnic cleansing, or a mix of both. The passing of the “Regularisation Bill” on 6 February is all we need to...
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- February 7, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The uncomfortable truth: Are we hating Donald Trump for the wrong reasons?
I fear that many of us are hating Donald Trump for the wrong reasons. Multitudes are being swayed by mainstream media-inspired demonization of the new US president, based on selective assumptions and half-truths. US mainstream media, which rarely deviates from supporting the American government’s conduct, however reckless, is now presenting Trump...
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- January 31, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Clamoring for Israeli Approval: Trump’s Election Promises Will Haunt Him
US President Donald Trump promises to be pro-Israel in every aspect. ‘I’m the best thing that could ever happen to Israel,’ he boasted at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s Presidential Forum in Washington DC, in December, 2015. For a brief moment, Trump appeared as if rethinking his unconditional support for Israel, when...
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- January 24, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The Paris Peace Conference: Signaling an end to a Western-dominated era?
No, it was not just ‘another Middle East peace conference,’ as a columnist in Israeli ‘Jerusalem Post’ attempted to depict the Paris Peace Conference held on January 15, with top official representations from 70 countries attending. If it was, indeed, just ‘another peace conference’, representatives from the Israeli government...
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- January 17, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
The Balancing Act is Over: What Elor Azaria Taught Us about Israel
For some, the ‘manslaughter’ conviction – following the murder by Israeli army medic, Elor Azaria, of already incapacitated Palestinian man, Fattah al-Sharif – is finally settling a protracted debate regarding where Israelis stand on Palestinian human rights. Nearly 70 percent of the Israeli public supports calls to pardon the convicted...
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- January 10, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Enough Fear-mongering: Only One Democratic State is Possible in Palestine and Israel
Long before 28 December, when Secretary of State, John Kerry took the podium at the Dean Acheson Auditorium in Washington DC to pontificate on the uncertain future of the two-state solution and the need to save Israel from itself, the subject of a Palestinian state has been paramount. In fact,...
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- January 3, 2017 Dr Ramzy Baroud
A blessing in disguise? The Trump presidency may be better for Palestine
Israel is dizzy. January 20th has been like another Christmas Day and Donald Trump is jolly old Santa Claus bearing gifts. The writing is already on the wall as President-elect Trump has appointed an extremist, David Friedman, as the next US Ambassador to Israel who intends to relocate the...
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- December 26, 2016 Dr Ramzy Baroud
Palestine 2017: Time to bid Farewell to Washington and embrace the globe
There is no doubt that the UN Security Council condemnation of Israel on Friday was an important and noteworthy event. True, the United Nations’ main chambers (the Security Council and the General Assembly) and its various institutions, ranging from the International Court of Justice to the UN cultural agency, UNESCO,...