Creating new perspectives since 2009
Items by Ramona Wadi
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Israeli settler-colonialism protects US interests, hence the unconditional support
The US will not get involved in the current government turbulence in Israel, but remains committed to the security of the settler-colonial state, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has declared. Her words are a far cry from the impositions which Palestinians faced from the US and the international...
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Israel is more important than the lives of those forced to live in it
Two weeks ago, while the international community was busying itself with statements condemning Hamas rockets in an attempt to steer the narrative away from Israel’s colonial expansionism, Palestinians were also protesting the forthcoming construction of 350 settlement dwellings in Beit El, which were approved by the Israeli government late...
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The PA seeks international assurances while continuing to fail the Palestinians
During each major Israeli offensive against Gaza, the Palestinian Authority is careful not to antagonise the settler-colonial state with its rhetoric. Its sights are perpetually set on the aftermath, particularly rebuilding Gaza and how much of a prominent role — and aid money — it can take in the...
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Ireland shows the way over Israel’s de-facto annexation of Palestine
When it comes to Palestine, the Republic of Ireland continues to lead the way over Israel’s violations of international law. A recent motion by Sinn Fein calling out Israel’s de-facto annexation of Palestinian territory won unanimous approval in the Oireachtas, the Irish parliament. This made Ireland the first European...
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One Israeli minister’s option for Gaza is an entity that compromises Palestinians
As happened in the aftermath of Israeli’s military offensive labelled with huge irony as Operation Protective Edge in 2014, the Palestinian Authority’s dithering over protecting Palestinians and actually doing nothing is approved of by Israel and the international community. When Israel agrees to a ceasefire and the question of...
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Decolonising Palestine: Hamas between the anticolonial and the postcolonial
Somdeep Sen’s introductory observation in his book Decolonising Palestine: Hamas Between the Anticolonial and the Postcolonial (Cornell University Press, 2020) is a telling statement that also reflects on the realities that Palestinians have faced in the aftermath of the Oslo Accords when the illusion of state-building within a colonised...
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PA exploitation of Jerusalem does not help the people’s resistance
At a time when Israel is escalating its attacks against the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Authority would do better to address its failures rather than pontificate about Jerusalem. Any defence of Jerusalem will come from the Palestinian people, for the simple reason that the PA has surrendered all Palestinian...
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Biden’s funding for Israel’s massacre of Palestinians can never be justified
So adamant is the US assertion about Israel’s “right to defend itself” that President Joe Biden has approved a $735 million arms deal for the settler-colonial state, at the height of its latest military offensive against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. The sale is related to precision bombs,...
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Israel’s colonial violence gives Palestinians the right to defend themselves
The Biden administration has been presented with an opportunity to sound its rocket rhetoric after Hamas retaliated against the Israeli colonial violence unleashed upon Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. As Israel bombed the Gaza Strip, creating yet another wave of internally displaced Palestinians, US Secretary of State Antony...
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Rhetoric about international intervention is an excuse for risking nothing, while Palestinians risk their lives
The international community is quite happy to keep up the narrative of the “barren land” until Israel’s colonial violence escalates to attract global attraction and condemnation. When this happens, the UN rediscovers the existence of the colonised Palestinian population, albeit while feigning ignorance about its own role in maintaining...
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The ‘strategic importance’ of the Abraham Accords is to protect Israeli colonialism
US President Joe Biden has given yet another shard of proof that his policies will follow the legacy of his predecessor Donald Trump. In his first call with the UAE’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, Biden stressed the importance of normalising relations with Israel within the context of...
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What has the PA done to halt Israeli apartheid?
The Palestinian Authority couldn’t have hoped for better timing for the release of the Human Rights Watch report detailing Israel’s apartheid system and violations. It’s just a pity for the PA that Palestinians are not fooled by a leadership that calls for the international community to act upon the...
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My First and Only Love
“Occupation is akin to an earthquake, and so are immigration and desolation and everything people leave behind.” This rumination by Nidal, the protagonist in Sahar Khalifeh’s literary novel, My First and Only Love (Hoopoe Fiction, 2021), is a tempestuous introduction to a love story that spans decades, in much...
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The US is shielding Israel from apartheid claims and itself from complicity charges
The Palestinians mentioned apartheid in connection with Israel long before B’Tselem used the description. Now it is the turn of Human Rights Watch (HRW) to — rightfully, if belatedly — accuse Israel of apartheid in its latest report titled A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid...
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There’s a new twist in Israeli state-settler complicity against the indigenous Palestinians
In another example of collaboration between the government of Israel and its illegal settlers, the Israeli Settlements’ Council has started to issue eviction orders to Palestinians setting up vegetable stalls in the occupied Jordan Valley, an action that was previously only associated with the Israeli occupation security forces. Seven...
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US funding for UNRWA buys silence while Palestinians are deprived of their rights
A brief but revealing press statement marked the meeting of US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield with the Commissioner-General of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini. Neutrality, a politicised status that underscores the agency’s approach to political events, is one of the...
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Abbas statements are complicit with Israeli settler-colonialism
Known for belatedly spouting known truths, Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas was true to form in his address to the J Street conference recently, which revealed the extent of his collaboration with the international community over Palestine’s loss, and his complicity with Israeli settler-colonialism. Mentioning “apartheid” as he did...
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Israel’s impunity is endorsed by the international community
Unsurprisingly, attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinian civilians have increased during the first three months of 2021. UN human rights experts and rapporteurs have documented more than 210 settler attacks in the first three months of this year, indicating a possible increase when compared with the 771 instances of...
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Israel’s rejection of the ICC war crimes investigation is about politics, not justice
Israel has opted to reject, rather than defer, the International Criminal Court’s investigation into war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories. The decision comes after months of the settler-colonial state lobbying world leaders to oppose the ICC decision, even as the Israeli government took its own measures and precautions...
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UNRWA is supposed to be ‘neutral’ even as humanitarian aid is politicised
The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has issued yet another warning about the perilous living conditions of Palestinians in Lebanon’s refugee camps. Covid-19 is seen to have exacerbated the refugees’ plight, but having this immediate and more pressing concern is, for diplomatic reasons, a premise...
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US calls for ‘equal treatment’ for Palestinians and Israelis, within the unequal two-state compromise
US President Joe Biden may be returning the country to the two-state paradigm, but the inequalities between Israelis and Palestinians are becoming more prominent with each statement uttered by officials. When the US speaks of the two-state compromise, it is doing so with complete recognition of the fact that it...
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The US’ designation is glossing over colonialism in Palestine
In another move that shows US President Joe Biden is navigating between the Trump administration’s era and the return to the two-state politics, the US State Department’s 2020 Country Reports on Human Rights presented two facets of the current administration’s policy. The title reads, as it did during former US President Donald Trump’s tenure,...
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US aid is tied to Palestinian acquiescence to the two-state illusion
The US has reversed one aspect of the Trump administration’s foreign policy in Palestine; humanitarian aid will be resumed with a $15 million grant for vulnerable Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. “Our engagements all have the same aim: to build support for a peaceful solution...
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Quartet rhetoric normalises Israel’s unilateral decisions
The Trump era is over, or so the Middle East Quartet would have us believe. Now that the Zionist colonisation project is back to contending diplomatically with the two-state compromise, the main international actors are keen to publicise Washington’s return to decades of negotiations which have actually led to...