Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Feras Abu-Helal
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Are the extremists Ben-Gvir and Smotrich executing a new Nakba against the Palestinians?
At the end of last month, Benjamin Netanyahu formed the most extreme Israeli government since the Occupation of Palestine in 1948. The government includes two of the most racist and extremist politicians, namely Itamar Ben-Gvir, head of the Otzma Yehudit Party, and Bezael Smotrich, head of the Religious Zionism...
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Shireen Abu Akleh: There is greater presence in some absences
One of the family Why do the living cry over their dead? Not only because of kinship, friendship, or blood relations. People cry over their dead because they are part of their daily life, a flash of their memory, their personal history as they grow, change, and become less young...
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The war in Ukraine has taught us the truth about the West’s ‘universal values’
It is probably true to say that most Arabs sympathise with the people of Ukraine in the face of Russia’s invasion of their country. This is due in large part to Russian support for Bashar Al-Assad’s brutal regime in Syria, and the innate sympathy with nations invaded by major...
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Rayan's story between politics, economics and the news industry
Rayan is the name of the Moroccan child that entered every house in the Arab world and became a symbol of the humanity of all people in the region, and all the villages in our afflicted region became called Ighran, the name of his village. His story spread fast on...
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Pegasus investigation and the forbidden love between the occupation and Arab regimes
A lengthy investigation published by the New York Times, after working for a year, reveals interesting details about the occupation state’s use of Pegasus spyware to gain political influence in the region and the world. The Arabs certainly have the lion’s share of involvement in these details. The investigation confirms...
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Kais Saied and the importance of the people's return to the street
Since 25 July, Tunisian President Kais Saied has been unable to achieve anything, neither for the state nor for the Tunisian people. He only succeeded in freezing parliamentary life and completing the mission he had begun since his election: to disrupt the government which was established following the elections...
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Britain's 'hunger' and the dangers of populism to the world
Britain, of course, has not reached the stage of starvation yet but, for the first time since the October/Ramadan War of 1973, it is witnessing a great rush for gas stations. This prompted the government to ask the army to send several thousands of its soldiers to drive large...
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The assassination of Nizar Banat means there’s only one solution for the Palestinians
The assassination of political activist Nizar Banat during his arrest by Palestinian Authority security services is a turning point in occupied Palestine. It is no less important and dangerous than the shift represented by the recent Jerusalem uprising, which covered Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza and the territory occupied...
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Gaza has slain the phoenix and taken its place in local legend
According to Greek mythology, the phoenix is a bird which can renew itself over and over again. Legend says that it bursts into flames every thousand years or so and is reborn from the ashes. Many people likened Gaza to the phoenix when it persevered following Israel’s military offensive in...
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The Western response to the coup in Myanmar exposes its fickle support for democracy
The situation in Myanmar is fluid, and all scenarios are possible following the military coup. It is worth looking, therefore, at generalisations about coups rather than specifics, from an Arab and Egyptian perspective in particular. It is clear that making concessions towards the military is no guarantee of protection against...
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Can the Arab Spring really be an Israeli conspiracy?
Ever since the launch of the Tunisian revolution ten years ago, some have accused the Arab popular revolutions of being an “Israeli or American conspiracy”. The intention has been to condemn the uprisings and accuse those who took part and paid a high price for doing so of working...
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Macron, Sisi and the human rights struggle in the Arab world
When the leader of the coup government in Egypt, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, began his recent visit to France, a wave of human rights reports and appeals reached his French counterpart, President Emmanuel Macron. He was being asked to put pressure on Sisi to end his regime’s human rights violations. This...
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Bandar Bin Sultan blamed the Palestinians, not Israel’s brutal occupation
Much has been written about the “spontaneous” intervention by the former Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the US, Bandar Bin Sultan. It is now known that the most important message that he was sent to convey was contained in the last sentence of his lengthy interview on Al-Arabiya: Saudi Arabia,...
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The popular protests in Egypt against Sisi have broken through the wall of fear
The popular protests in many Egyptian cities over the past two weeks cannot be considered as normal events, regardless of their size and spread. This is because merely participating in demonstrations means facing possible imprisonment or death under an oppressive and authoritarian regime that does not give any weight...
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Tunisia is torn between a reading of the constitution and the death of politics
The crisis in Tunisia has taken a new turn with President Kais Saied tasking his former legal adviser and Interior Minister in the caretaker government, Hisham El-Mechishi, to form a new government following the resignation of Elyes Fakhfakh. The president used his constitutional right to choose the figure whom...
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Will foreign counter-revolutionaries succeed in sabotaging Tunisia?
Observers can’t miss the campaign against the Tunisian revolution by both domestic and foreign parties as they try to derail this beautiful country’s democratic transition. Tunisia is writing its own experience, slowly, but with a clear path ahead. I am referring to the intensified attacks on the Speaker of the...
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Turkey’s operation in northern Syria signals the end of Sykes-Picot
The conflict in Syria has entered a critical, completely different stage. This is the first time that Turkey has put such military weight into the war with the Assad regime. There is also a heavy Russian presence and an important role, albeit blurred at this stage, for Iran in...
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The importance of Sheikh Raed Salah and the Palestinians in Israel
The latest unjust sentence imposed on Sheikh Raed Salah does not intend to punish the man personally. It is actually part of a series of successive measures taken against the Sheikh and the Islamic Movement in the Palestinian territories occupied in 1948, as well as against all of the Palestinians...
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When Regev cried in Abu Dhabi and Netanyahu in Muscat
In life, there are funny ironies and there are sad ones. What we are experiencing today with the accelerated normalisation between some Gulf countries and Israel – despite their lack of formal relations – is definitely a dark, comedic irony. Such comedy brings with it a flow of tears...
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Erdogan's speech: Has Turkey ‘sold out’ Khashoggi?
Many Arabs seemed to wish that Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan would come out and directly accuse the Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammad bin Salman (MBS) of murdering journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Yet they were disappointed by the speech, with some even accusing Turkey and its president of “selling out” the...
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Weak Obama and popular Trump: support for tyranny and hostility to the Brotherhood
Did we really need new evidence of American support for tyranny in the Middle East? Were we waiting for a new revelation to affirm Washington’s pragmatic policy and its lack of any moral dimension? In fact, the answer to this question by the majority of Arabs is a big...
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Nothing costs the occupation more than peaceful resistance
The occupation has escalated its ongoing attack on the Gaza Strip, after months of tension and cautious calm, to the extent that observers expect that this escalation is the beginning of a fully-fledged war similar to the Israeli wars in 2008, 2012 and 2014. Is it really the beginning...
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Mahmoud Abbas may well be shooting himself in the foot, but where is Fatah?
It is no secret that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is experiencing an unprecedented political crisis, in light of the measures that the Trump administration is taking to impose a “peace” deal tailored to the Israeli occupation. These include the approach adopted by the US President’s son-in-law and Middle East...
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On the political and cultural lessons of the Jordanian popular movement
The Jordanian popular movement ended a few days after it began, with many gains and very few losses. It recorded many lessons that the Arab governments and people can learn from. Without casualties or material damage, and only a few minor injuries, some of which happened by accident or as...
