Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Yvonne Ridley
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Desperate scare tactics suggest that the Zionist dream has become a nightmare
The future of Israel is hanging in the balance as the number of immigrants has dropped by more than a third, according to the latest statistics. While the coronavirus pandemic is being blamed for this, stories of a broken economy and general decline in living standards are thought to be…
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Qatar’s solidarity with Palestine shows that not all members of the Arab League are worthless
The Arab League has a reputation for being full of men overburdened by their own sense of importance. This, though, could be about to change because of one small gesture by the tiny but influential state of Qatar. In terms of decisive action, Qatar’s gesture will barely register on the…
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Scotland is being targeted by an anti-Palestine dirty tricks campaign
When Al Jazeera’s hard-hitting documentary “The Lobby” exposed how the pro-Israel lobby had faked allegations of anti-Semitism and sought to influence British politics, it led to an apology from the Israeli Ambassador in London. Mark Regev, notorious for his spin doctoring during Israel’s military offensives against the Palestinians in the…
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The ‘ban’ on Emiratis praying in Al-Aqsa highlights the fact that treaties with Israel are worthless
Israel’s plans to wipe Palestine off the map are very real, especially Benjamin Netanyahu’s intention to annex a huge section of the occupied West Bank. Such expansionism by the Zionist state has been the intention from the day it was created in Palestine in 1948. Alone among all UN member…
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This shocking video exposes the truth about HTS torture in Syria
Seven years ago this month, a military defector codenamed Caesar smuggled 53,275 photographs out of Syria showing some of the victims of the regime of Bashar Al-Assad. The chilling montage of human misery charted a story of pain, torture and abuse. Twenty years ago last month, Assad basically inherited the…
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Don’t shoot the messenger
The controversial American journalist who sued the US government for putting him on a “kill list” in war-torn Syria, was arrested yesterday by a Sunni Islamist militant group in rebel-held Syria, sparking outrage both in the Middle East and across the West. Yesterday’s arrest came hours after Bilal spoke to Middle East…
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British-born aid worker rearrested in Syria
The ordeal of a British-born aid worker in Syria who was taken by members of a Sunni Islamist militant group in rebel-held Idlib took another twist on Tuesday when he confronted the man who he says had interrogated and tortured him in prison. During the dramatic encounter in a courtroom,…
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Pointless presidents, corrupt kings and playboy princes
When Americans tell me that they are envious of Britain because of our Royal Family, I can sort of understand what they mean, especially when I look across the Atlantic and see who they have for a president. The man who snatched Jerusalem from the Palestinians and also gave Syria’s…
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British complicity in Israeli war crimes is being highlighted by pro-Palestine activism
A direct action group in support of Palestine burst onto the scene in London this week by storming an Israeli arms company in the heart of the English capital to highlight Britain’s complicity in war crimes against the Palestinians. Four members of Palestine Action took part in the audacious daylight…
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A tale of two cities twinned by treachery
This is a tale of two cities twinned by treachery. Syria’s Jabal Al-Zawiya might be 1,800 miles away from Sirte in Libya, but their fates are very much intertwined as military forces threaten to put the regional powers of Turkey and Russia on a collision course. In Sirte, trenches are…
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Step into Palestinian shoes by watching this film and help Make Apartheid History
The Palestinian people have drawn support from many legendary figures over the years. The universally admired Afro-American civil rights activist, writer and poet Maya Angelou was one of them. She stood in solidarity with the Palestinian struggle when she honoured the late Rachel Corrie, another heroic woman who put her…
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Hagia Sophia: Religious and political leaders are missing their own chances to right historical wrongs
Apparently Pope Francis, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, is “very distressed” by the decision to revert the Byzantine-era Hagia Sophia into a mosque; it has been a museum since 1934. He made his views known in the latest edition of the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano. Quite why he…
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Palestinians must not rely on back-stabbing Britain
Vocal human rights activist Malcolm X once said: “You don’t stick a knife in a man’s back nine inches and then pull it out six inches and say you’re making progress” and I was reminded of his comment when I heard that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson today begged Israel not to push ahead with plans to…
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Labour leader’s knee jerk reaction to knee-on-the-neck tweet is spineless
Britain’s Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer sacked his shadow education secretary, Rebecca Long-Bailey, today after she tweeted praise for an interview in which the actor Maxine Peake described the US police tactic of kneeling on a suspect’s neck as being a method taught by the Israeli secret service. Frankly,…
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British aid worker kidnapped in Syria
A British aid worker has been kidnapped in Syria by members of a Sunni Islamist militant group in rebel-held Idlib, it emerged on Monday night. Tauqir Sharif, 31, from Walthamstow in East London lives and works in the north-west Syrian city, which has a large number of other British humanitarian…
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The Black Lives Matter movement can help to deliver justice for Palestinians and others
I have deliberately avoided watching the video of the murder of George Floyd simply because I’ve seen so many similar images before on the streets of Palestine under Israel’s brutal military occupation. The similarities do not end with such brutality. It has often been said that if Palestinians were black,…
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The Scottish politician who blames the Palestinians for the Nakba must be held to account
Long before Sir Winston Churchill said that history is written by the victors there were variations on the theme; the winners of any conflict get to write the definitive version of what happened. Those on the losing side are more often than not silenced simply because the winners have the…
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Elections, a new leadership and BDS are pivotal for Palestine
Ever since President Donald Trump blundered blindly into the Middle East with his woefully inexperienced team of advisors, US foreign policy has swung wildly out of control. Predictably, it has destroyed the already fragile two-state solution as defined by the Oslo Accords. It’s no use pretending that such a solution…
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Kidnapping family members is Bin Salman’s tactic to intimidate Saudi dissidents
Details are emerging about the kidnapping of two young people within Saudi Arabia which appears to be the latest desperate move by Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman to exert pressure on one of the Kingdom’s highest profile dissidents. Dr Saad Al-Jabri, once the gatekeeper of Saudi intelligence and security, has…
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Football must not provide cover for human rights abuses and war crimes
Sportswashing and the billions of dollars it involves might mean very little to most Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip as they go about their daily struggle to exist. It is, though, a term which is being used increasingly to describe the means by which brutal regimes…
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Greater Israel is the objective as Netanyahu plans to wipe Palestine off the map
When it comes to Palestinians and peace in the Middle East, world leaders and Western journalists have taken their eye off the ball due to the coronavirus pandemic. The increasingly bizarre views of US President Donald Trump and his disastrous handling of Covid-19 have gripped everyone’s attention. As has happened…
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Assad is in the dock as his henchmen go on trial for torture
Syrians Anwar Raslan and Eyad Al-Gharib are not very nice men, apparently, and we are about to find out, in horrifying detail, exactly why. Every torturer who has ever carried out his nauseating job on behalf of tyrannical regimes around the world should be focusing on the historic trial in…
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Israel ignores the Biblical command to ‘love thy neighbour’ at its peril
The mantra “we are all in this together” has been said numerous times every day recently by politicians of various stripes around the world as the Covid-19 pandemic rips through our communities. And it does feel as though we are all under attack, regardless of our status and position in…
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We must never forget Israel’s massacre in Jenin
Lockdowns come in many shapes and sizes, and the one that millions of us around the world are enduring today is in place for our own protection from the coronavirus Covid-19. However, there are other forms of isolation which are also imposed upon communities by force, and which serve to…