Ramzy Baroud, Middle East Monitor

For most people 8 December came and went like any other ordinary day. For Palestinian political groups, though, it was another anniversary to be commemorated, for it was on that day, thirty-three years ago, that the First Palestinian Intifada (uprising) broke out, and there was nothing ordinary about this historic event. Today, the uprising is viewed as history, another opportunity to reflect and, perhaps, learn from […]

No one seemed as excited about the election of Joe Biden being the next President of the United States as Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas. When all hope seemed lost, where Abbas found himself desperate for political validation and funds, Biden arrived like a conquering knight on a white horse and swept the Palestinian leader away to safety. Abbas was one of the first world leaders […]

Noam Chomsky is right when he says that, in the US, sports creates the necessary "fantasy world" required to shield people from understanding, organizing, and attempting to "influence the real world". Referring to sports commentary and phone-in shows, Chomsky, in an interview with AlterNet, marveled at the intellectual and analytical skills of people engaged in the sports culture. Ultimately, however, this culture "has no meaning and […]

Once again, Europe's top diplomats expressed their 'deep concern' regarding Israel's ongoing illegal settlement expansion, again evoking the maxim that Israeli actions "threaten the viability of the two-state solution". This position was communicated by EU Foreign Affairs Chief, Josep Borrell, on November 19, during a video-conference with Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister, Riyad al-Maliki. All Israeli settlements are illegal under international law and should be rejected in […]

In a few words, a close associate of Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, summed up the logic behind the ongoing frenzy to expand illegal Jewish settlements in Israel. "These days are an irreplaceable opportunity to establish our hold on the Land of Israel, and I'm sure that our friend, President (Donald) Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu will be able to take advantage," Miki Zohar, a member […]

In January 2017, the Economist Intelligence Unit's Democracy Index downgraded the state of democracy in the United States from "full" to "flawed". The demotion of a country that has constantly prided itself not only on being democratic, but also on championing democracy around the world, took many by surprise. US pundits duly challenged the findings. However, judging by events that have transpired since, the accuracy of […]

"If we are going to live another four years with President Trump, God help us, God help you and God help the whole world." These were the words of Palestinian Authority Prime Minister, Mohammed Shtayyeh, during a virtual meeting with European legislators on November 3. While some may agree with Shtayyeh's assessment, such utterances by a top Palestinian official are hardly reassuring. This was not the […]

The discussion on institutional Israeli racism against its own Palestinian Arab population has all but ceased following the final approval of the discriminatory Nation-State Law in July 2018. Indeed, the latest addition to Israel’s Basic Law is a mere start of a new government-espoused agenda that is designed to further marginalize over a fifth of Israel’s population. On Wednesday, October 28, eighteen members of the Israeli […]

There is no moral or ethical justification for the killing of innocent people, anywhere. Therefore, the murder of three people in the French city of Nice on October 29 must be wholly and unconditionally rejected as a hate crime, especially as it was carried out in a holy place, the Notre Dame Basilica. However, we would be remiss to ignore the political context that led a […]

Mohammad Ibrahim Ali al-Deirawi was born on January 30, 1978 in Nuseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. His family is originally from Bir Al-Saba’, an ethnically cleansed Palestinian town located in the southern Naqab desert. Mohammad was arrested by the Israeli army at a military checkpoint in central Gaza on March 1, 2001. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison for his role in […]

The outdated notion that China ‘just wants to do business’ should be completely erased from our understanding of the rising global power’s political outlook. Simply put, Beijing has long realized that, in order for it to sustain its economic growth unhindered, it has to develop the necessary tools to protect itself, its allies and their combined interests. The need for a strong China is not a […]

‘International law’ remains one of the most discussed terms in the context of the Israeli occupation of Palestine. It is almost always present, whether the discussion pertains to the Israeli wars and siege on Gaza, the expansion of illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank or the encroaching apartheid throughout Israel and the Occupied Territories. Despite the importance and relevance of the term, however, it rarely […]

It is abundantly clear that Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas, has underestimated the seriousness of the challenges facing Palestine and the Palestinians. The rushed agreement between his party, Fatah and Hamas in Istanbul on September 24, and the Palestinian leader’s speech at the 75th session of the UN General Assembly the following day, indicate that the Palestinian leadership insists on operating within the stifling confines of […]

Palestine can never be truly understood through numbers, because numbers are dehumanising, impersonal, and, when necessary, can also be contrived to mean something else entirely. Numbers are not meant to tell the story of the human condition, nor should they ever serve as a substitute for emotions. Indeed, the stories of life, death – and everything in-between – cannot be truly and fully appreciated through charts, […]

The polarized nature of American politics often makes it difficult to address fundamental differences between the country’s two main political rivals, Republicans and Democrats. As each side is intent on discrediting the other at every opportunity, unbiased information regarding the two parties’ actual stances on internal and external issues can be difficult to decipher. Regarding Palestine and Israel, however, both parties’ establishments are quite clear on […]

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is an alliance in name alone. Recent events notwithstanding, the brewing conflict over territorial waters in the Eastern Mediterranean indicates that the military union between mostly Western countries is faltering. The current Turkish-Greek tension is only one facet of a much larger conflict involving, aside from the two Mediterranean countries, Israel, Egypt, Cyprus, France, Libya, and other Mediterranean and European […]

On August 16, the Israeli navy declared the Gaza sea a closed military zone. A few days later, a group of Gaza fishermen decided to take their chances by fishing within a mere two or three nautical miles off the Gaza shore. No sooner had they cast their nets, Israeli navy bullets began whizzing all around them. Soon after the incident, I spoke with one of […]

Only recently, the Palestinian group, Hamas, and Israel seemed close to reaching a prisoner exchange agreement, where Hamas would release several Israeli soldiers held in Gaza while Israel would set free an unspecified number of Palestinian detainees held in Israeli prisons. Instead of the much-anticipated announcement of some kind of a deal, on August 10, Israeli bombs began falling on the besieged Strip and incendiary balloons, […]

French President, Emmanuel Macron, is in no position to pontificate to Lebanon about the need for political and economic reforms. Just as thousands of Lebanese took to the streets of Beirut demanding “revenge” against the ruling classes, the French people have relentlessly been doing the same; both peoples have been met with police violence and arrests. Following the August 4 blast which killed over 200 people […]

On August 4, hours before a massive explosion rocked the Lebanese capital, Beirut, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, issued an ominous warning to Lebanon. “We hit a cell and now we hit the dispatchers. I suggest to all of them, including Hezbollah, to consider this,” Netanyahu said during an official tour of a military facility in central Israel. Netanyahu’s warning did not bode well for Israel […]

Protests against Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, have raged on for weeks, turning violent sometimes. Israelis are furious at their government’s mediocre response to the coronavirus pandemic, especially as COVID-19 disease is experiencing a massive surge throughout the country. Netanyahu warned protesters, thousands of whom have been rallying outside his residence in Jerusalem, against “anarchy (and) violence”. Scenes of utter chaos and violent arrests have been […]

As illegal settlers increase their attacks on Palestinian civilians in the occupied city of Al-Khalil (Hebron), the people of the Palestinian city continue to mount a campaign of popular resistance. One of the channels of resistance is Human Rights Defenders (HRD), “a grassroots, non-partisan Palestinian organisation, working to support nonviolent popular resistance through popular direct action and documentation of human rights violations committed by the occupation.” […]

On July 11, a video footage which showed a popular Israeli TV celebrity demeaning Palestinian children from the Bedouin community in the Naqab area went viral on social media. “Let’s feed a Bedouin. Don’t you want to feed a Bedouin?” Israeli Children TV host, Roy Oz, repeatedly asks his children, who were seated in the back seat of his car. Outside the vehicle, two Palestinian children […]

In a recent TV discussion, a respected pro-Palestine journalist declared that if any positive change or transformation ever occurs in the tragic Palestinian saga, it would not happen now, but that it would take a whole new generation to bring about such a paradigm shift. As innocuous as the declaration may have seemed, it troubled me greatly. I have heard this line over and over again, […]

The visit by newly-elected Tunisian President Kais Saied to France on June 22 was intended to discuss bilateral relations, trade, etc. But it was also a missed opportunity, where Tunisia could have formally demanded an apology from France for the decades of French colonialism, which has shattered the social and political fabric of this North African Arab nation since the late 19th century. A heated debate […]

A 32-year-old man with the mental age of an 8-year-old child was executed by Israeli soldiers on May 30, while crouching behind his teacher near his special seeds school in the Old City of Jerusalem. The cold-blooded murder of Eyad Hallaq might not have received much attention if it were not for the fact that it took place five days following the similarly heartbreaking murder of […]

Wafaa Aludaini is a witness to many of Gaza’s recent tragedies and also never-ending resistance. She experienced the violent Israeli occupation, the subsequent blockade on the impoverished Strip, and several wars that resulted in the death and wounding of tens of thousands of Palestinians. But none of Israel’s wars impacted Aludaini’s life as much as the 2014 onslaught which Israel dubbed ‘Operation Protective Edge.’ Of the […]

On May 15, thousands of Palestinians in Occupied Palestine and throughout the ‘shatat’, or diaspora, participated in the commemoration of Nakba Day, the one event that unites all Palestinians, regardless of their political differences or backgrounds. For years, social media has added a whole new stratum to this process of commemoration. #Nakba72, along with #NakbaDay and #Nakba, have all trended on Twitter for days. Facebook was […]

Starting on March 27, 1948, a beautiful, small Palestinian village called Beit Daras, came under Zionist militias attacks. With little means – a few old rifles and kitchen knives – the Badrasawis fought back, repelling the first raid and the second. The final attack on the peaceful village followed a scorched-earth military strategy, leaving in its wake scores of dead and wounded, and the entirety of […]

Mats Svensson is a former Swedish diplomat, author, and photographer. His books include “Crimes, Victims, and Witnesses – Apartheid in Palestine.” His latest volume,  “Apartheid is a Crime – Portraits of Israeli Occupation,” was just released by Cunepress in Seattle. Svensson joined me and my co-host Romana Rubeo on “Palestine Chronicle TV”, on May 6, to discuss his fascinating experiences in Palestine and the balancing act […]