Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Ramona Wadi
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The UN’s divisive tactics will not alienate Palestinians from their right of return
Nobody takes the UN seriously anymore. It has bred an array of detractors from across the entire political spectrum while continuing to function as an organisation that facilitates the continuation of violence. For oppressors, the UN serves as a base from where aggression can be justified and later secured...
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An Oral History of the Palestinian Nakba
The erasure of Palestinian memory is often wrongly associated with the past. When combined with narratives that exclude Palestinians from their ongoing displacement, it is imperative to challenge both the sources and the parameters of how, and from where, knowledge is gained. “An Oral History of the Palestinian Nakba”...
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Palestine and Palestinians should not be defined by Mahmoud Abbas
The brief encounter in Moscow between Argentina’s legendary footballer Diego Maradona and the Palestinian Authority President generated international headlines. “My heart is Palestinian,” Maradona told Mahmoud Abbas. Even so, a heart aligned with Palestine slipped into an overlooked omission. “President Abbas has a country and has a right,” Maradona said....
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One state or two states, Israel has the upper hand in manipulating Palestinian compromise
Following the Middle East Quartet’s statement in 2016 which effectively rendered the two-state compromise obsolete, the international community, including representatives of the Quartet, have failed to come up with other strategies. International diplomacy has been based on extending the farce of allegedly working towards the impossible. There are other narratives...
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A sporting event should be an opportunity to highlight illusionary ‘unity’
Sporting events are imbued with illusions of unity. The FIFA World Cup is no exception. In the context of Palestine, however, unity becomes a departure point for questioning the colonial trajectories that have fragmented, rather than united, the Palestinians. Coinciding with the finale of the football tournament in Russia, European...
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Purported neutrality at the UN is harmful to Palestinians
On Monday, Israeli lawyer Yuval Shany was appointed to chair the UN Human Rights Committee – a body of experts that monitors the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 1(1) of the covenant states: “All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they...
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What use is UNHRC agenda item 7 if it is manipulated to serve Israeli interests?
Yesterday’s debate at the UN Human Rights Council exposed how options for Palestinians are being depleted. Other than recurring statements from countries and non-governmental organisations about Israeli violence and the importance of keeping standing agenda item 7 — “Human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories” —...
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Descending to a new low – Fatah’s manipulation of starvation and resistance
For Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the visit to Israel by US envoys Jason Greenblatt and Jared Kushner provided additional bolstering of the sniper massacre against the Palestinians involved in the Great Return March on the Gaza borders. During a weekly cabinet meeting Netanyahu declared that “there was complete...
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Pay No Heed to the Rockets: Palestine in the Present Tense
If this book had to be described succinctly, it is a perfect example of the different components that construct an implosion. Marcello Di Cintio’s “Pay No Heed to the Rockets – Palestine in the Present Tense” combines travel writing with creating the space for Palestinian narratives within a literary...
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Statements by Kushner and Erekat highlight how dispensable the PA really is
Between recent statements by Jared Kushner and Saeb Erekat there is a truth which is overlooked to the point of oblivion; the same power which has made it possible for the Palestinian Authority to assume an authoritarian stance can also dictate its fragility. Following an interview with Al-Quds in which...
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The US departure from UNHRC is reflection of widespread impunity
There is a major flaw which is overlooked when discussing the US withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC). On one hand it shows the collaborative efforts of Israel and the US to marginalise their human rights violations away from scrutiny. However, analysing the departure within the limited...
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Palestinians are united for Gaza and against Abbas
The Great March of Return protests have catapulted the legitimacy of the Palestinian right of return to their land back into public prominence. They have also been instrumental in harnessing international scrutiny as Gaza’s humanitarian catastrophe is exposed, alongside the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority’s premeditated actions to inflict as much...
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Purported protection for Palestine does not cover the elimination of colonialism
The latest Human Rights Watch (HRW) report titled “Israel: Apparent War Crimes in Gaza” commences with a sentence that mars the rest of its investigation and analysis. “Israeli forces’ repeated use of lethal force in the Gaza Strip since March 30 2018, against Palestinian demonstrators who posed no imminent...
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There is no humanity in giving humanitarian aid to the oppressors
The entire international community and institutions are treating Gaza as an experimentation ground. To compensate for the concordance in human rights violations against Palestinians in the enclave, there is no shortage of meagre donations, ostensibly to provide humanitarian assistance, even as Israel profits from lucrative ventures with the same...
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BRICS contributes to Palestine’s oppression through the two-state compromise
Israel’s colonisation of Palestine has altered the dynamics of politics and expectation to one of permanent exploitation and compromise. The two-state compromise, in particular, has ensnared governments, as well as many prominent institutions and groups to the point that opportunities for Palestinians to define their aims from within their...
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In the absence of favourable media coverage, US and Israel seek distortion of facts
While Israel’s snipers continue to extract Palestinian lives from the Great Return March protests, it has also failed to sell its usual narrative to media outlets, causing US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman to lash out at journalists, accusing them of bias against the settler-colonial state: “Just keep your...
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PLO references to Latin America highlight what the Palestinian leadership can’t emulate
Yet more Palestinians have been killed in the wake of US President Donald Trump’s announcement of his “deal of the century”. Gaza has again been bombed by Israel over the past couple of days, and now suffers further incarceration with the construction of more land and sea barriers. To...
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Exposing the dynamics of UNSC draft resolutions on Palestine
Last week, the UN Security Council discussed a draft resolution on providing international protection for Palestinians, upon request by Kuwait’s permanent representative to the UN, Mansour Al-Otaibi. By the end of this week, the UNSC will be voting on the resolution, with Wafa news agency reporting that if the...
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The Wrong Story: Palestine, Israel and the media
“The stories told about Palestine-Israel are as notable for what they exclude as they are for what they include.” This is an apt introduction to the three main narratives discussed in Greg Shupak’s book, “The Wrong Story. Palestine, Israel and the Media” (OR Books, 2018). It is imbued with...
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US considers further financial cuts to international bodies to silence Palestinians
Under US President Donald Trump, international organisations have become targets for repression and vehicles by which Israeli oppression is maintained. Following the financial restrictions it imposed upon the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) last year, Washington has now set its sights on cuts in funding to another...
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PA overtures to the ICC divest diplomacy of accountability
Last month, the International Criminal Court (ICC) Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda employed rhetoric that questioned, rather than affirmed, Israel’s violence against Palestinians participating in the Great Return March as constituting a war crime. True to form, the Palestinian Authority’s Foreign Minister, Riad Al-Maliki, is approaching the ICC with a...
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Bullets first and aid later is a perverse Israeli tactic
Predictably, Israel has attempted to play the humanitarian card after inflicting severe injuries upon thousands of Palestinians, many of whom will remain scarred for life; at least 111 men, women and children have also been killed by Israeli troops over the past few weeks. On Wednesday, during a lull...
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B’Tselem report highlights Israel’s plan for forced displacement
Settler violence in the occupied West Bank is an ongoing violation that has been normalised by the Israeli colonial state. A culture of impunity pervades the dynamics of collaboration between settlers and soldiers, which has resulted in a situation whereby law enforcement is an ineffective charade which provides no...
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The Other Side of the Wall. An Eyewitness Account of the Occupation in Palestine
What we are accustomed to reading as structured news items or analysis about Palestine quickly dissipate in Richard Hardigan’s book “The Other Side of the Wall: an eyewitness account of the occupation in Palestine” (Cune Press, 2018). Volunteering with the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) in 2014, Hardigan imparts his...
