Middle East Near You

Ascribing the euphemism of peace to the formal normalisation of the relationship between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Israel, and then the small island Kingdom of Bahrain with...

Much had been argued about the creation of Israel and the ensuing 1948 ethnic cleansing of non-Jewish Palestinians. Sadly however, most had become a desensitised academic debate. A lifeless...

Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom created a maelstrom in Israel by merely demanding a “credible investigation into deaths of Palestinians in order to clarify and bring about possible accountability.”...

In the last week’s column, I wrote on the banned love story from the Israeli high school reading list. The Israeli education ministry claimed that young Jewish students might...

How can a two-year-old novel become a best seller? Censorship is the short answer. The most important question is, however, why would the “Jewish democracy” censor a love fiction...

Palestinian civic organisations inside Israel have declared January 30 the Day of Solidarity with Palestinian Israeli citizens. Israel was established in 1948 on the ruins of more than 500...

Haftom Zarhum, a 29-year-old Eritrean, was lynched by Jewish Israelis simply because he looked different. After being shot in the legs, a mob circled him like hyenas over a...

Tension in Jerusalem has escalated to dangerous levels in response to deliberate Israeli provocation at Haram Al Sharif or the Noble Sanctuary. This fragile situation was further worsened by...

Many years ago I read Men in the Sun, a novel by late Palestinian writer Ghassan Kanafani. He, along with his young niece Lamis, were blown up by Israel...

If you are like me, I am sure you are tired of reading about the results of the last Israeli election. Or on Benjamin Netanyahu’s Hebrew pledge running up...

On January first, it will be 50 years since the start of the modern Palestinian revolution; and on the 15th it will be 10 years since Mahmoud Abbas was...

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and head of Yisrael Beitenu party published on November 28 a new manifesto outlining the party’s outlook for Israel. The updated platform entitled “Swimming...

Following the historical recognition by the Swedish government, British legislators voted overwhelmingly on a non-binding resolution urging their government to recognise the state of Palestine. Ireland’s Seanad and Spain’s...

It goes without saying that Gaza has taught the Israeli military a new lesson: the days of swift Israeli wars are over. While mostly one-sided, Israel has never before...

Animals: was my instinctual response to photos of Syrian soldiers being executed by members of the so-called Islamic State (IS). The same gut feelings two days earlier to the...

Scene one: Disappearance of three illegal Jewish settlers in Hebron. Israel closes the West Bank, demolishes homes of supposed kidnappers, nonstop air raids on Gaza, kills two dozen Palestinians...

Outgoing Israeli president Shimon Peres talked in a recent interview about a peace agreement he reached with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in 2011. According to Peres, the Israeli prime...

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon articulated publicly what Israeli leaders say privately: Give us your tax money, weapons and your veto power but “leave us alone.” He called the...

In America, the Jewish community’s Anti-Defamation League (ADL) promotes racial integration, equality and multiculturalism within American society. The ADL and other Jewish organisations work closely at local levels with...

It is ironic that Western nations seeking to halt Iran’s nuclear ambitions are the same countries which sold nuclear technology to Tehran in the first place. Iran has worked...

Last Tuesday was the 45th anniversary of the outbreak of a war between Egypt and Israel that reshaped the Middle East. At 7.30am, on 5 June, 1967, 200 Israeli...

What started as an extension of the Arab Spring is pushing Syria to the verge of civil war. Bashar Al-Assad must stop deluding himself by blaming the frustration of...

Pre-empting Mitt Romney’s campaign visit to Israel, President Barack Obama last Friday signed the United States-Israel Enhanced Security Co-operation Act of 2012. The bill was drafted by the American...

WESTERN and Israeli media are full of purported leaks giving details of the joint efforts by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Defence Minister Ehud Barak to enlist...

On the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, a new “sanitised” kind of war is reshaping the future of America’s military industrial complex. The use of unmanned drones –...

ZIONISTS and right-wing Christian evangelists appear to be exploiting America’s freedom of speech to fuel sedition and hate between the people of two great religions. In response, right-wing religious...

LAST August I predicted that as the US election drew closer, and as the President’s re-election became certain, a credible scenario would be for Israel to strike Iran, pre-empting...

On 15 November, 1988, the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) National Council, a body representing all Palestinians, declared an independent Palestinian state. The gesture did not change life for Palestinians...

Israel’s war on Gaza has not stopped since Palestinians exercised their democratic free will and voted for Hamas in the 2006 election. The relentless warfare has alternated between overt...

EGYPTIAN democracy is alive and well. That is about the only positive observation on the current pro-Morsi and counter-demonstrations in major cities across the country. President Mohamed Morsi’s pronouncement...

A DAY after the UN vote to upgrade Palestine’s status at the UN, the right-wing Israeli government responded by adding 3,500 illegal Jewish-only homes in the occupied West Bank...

I’m writing from Finland this week, where the omnipresence of snow and festive Christmas lights heralds another celebration of the birth of Jesus. In parallel, the descendants of the...