JERUSALEM - "What kind of celebration is this," said Bat-El, 22, engulfed in a sea of blue- and-white Israeli flags in a huge procession marking Israel's self-celebrated Jerusalem Day, the anniversary by the Hebrew calendar of Israel's conquest of East...
Israel’s Red Line: Real Democracy
The recent arrest of two respected public figures from Israel's Palestinian Arab minority in night-time raids on their homes by the Shin Bet secret police – brought to light this week when a gag order was partially lifted – has sent shock waves through the community. ...
Is Israel Sliding Towards a Police State?
RAMALLAH -- Israeli nuclear whistle-blower Mordechai Vanunu has been sentenced to another three months imprisonment for allegedly refusing to perform community service in West Jerusalem. Vanunu, a former employee at Israel's secret Dimona nuclear facility in the Negev...
West Bankers Made Refugees in Their Own Country
RAMALLAH -- Several Palestinians have set up a protest tent in no-man's land in the northern Gaza Strip, near the Erez border crossing into Israel, as they protest their deportation from the Israeli occupied West Bank into Gaza where Hamas authorities have refused...
Blood or Treasure? Obama’s Crucial Choice in the Middle East
It does seem as if something may be changing, however slowly, in Washington when it comes to policy towards Israel and the Palestinians. Rumors, for instance, are spreading in the media that the Obama administration is threatening to take Middle East peace...
Hope Amidst Grim Prospects for Mideast Peace
RAMALLAH - Proximity peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians, due to begin shortly after months of delay due to Israel's continued settlement building on occupied Palestinian land, appear to have little chance of making a breakthrough. However, there appear to...
Egypt, Hamas Complicit in Israel’s Gaza Blockade
RAMALLAH -- A convoy of boats laden with humanitarian goods and accompanied by hundreds of journalists, human rights activists and European parliamentarians, is due to challenge Israel's naval blockade of Gaza at the end of May. The Free Gaza movement's "Freedom...
To Peace Plan or Not to Peace Plan, and When?
Reports earlier this month that President Barack Obama may present a comprehensive U.S. peace plan for resolving the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict have spurred a growing public debate over its wisdom and timing. While relatively few voices are calling for...
Settler Sewage Ruins Palestinian Crops, Drinking Water
BEIT UMMAR, West Bank -- Residents of this Palestinian village refuse to buy the idea that the flood of raw sewage from the adjacent Israeli settlement of Kfar Etzion, that destroyed vineyards and contaminated their drinking water, was an accident. The Israeli Civil...
Did Banned Media Report Foretell of Gaza War Crimes?
An Arab member of the Israeli parliament is demanding that a newspaper be allowed to publish an investigative report that was suppressed days before Israel attacked Gaza in winter 2008. The investigation by Uri Blau, who has been in hiding since December to avoid...


