Geography Archives: Israel

  • About No Sex in the City

      Suad Amiry Presents No Sex in the City, 10 October 2007 Suad Amiry Speaks at the Casa Internazionale delle Donne, Roma. January 2009 Suad Amiry, Public Lecture, UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies, 8 April 2008 Play now: Excerpt from Ines Gramigna and Virginia Fiume, “Portrait of a Lady: Encounter with Suad Amiry” (Alternative […]

  • The Gay Electronic Intifada of Lebanon

    “Intifada” is Arabic for uprising.  People of the Lebanese gay community and their supporters are working very hard on their own intifada of supporting LGBTIQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersexual, and Queer) people and defeating homophobia.  A lot of this work is being done by Helem and Meem.  I personally work with Helem (“Dream” in […]

  • Abd el-Hadi Fights a Superpower

      In his life he neither wrote nor read. In his life he didn’t cut down a single tree, didn’t slit the throat of a single calf. In his life he did not speak of the New York Times behind its back, didn’t raise his voice to a soul except in his saying: “Come in, […]

  • Muslim in America: Identity and Isolation

    An early morning flight to D.C., day-long conference and empty cityscape drained me of energy. Exhausted, I stepped out of my nondescript hotel into the street and felt a heavy air pregnant with moisture.  Heading down the sidewalk to find dinner, I came across the shadow of a man who had the unmistakable gait of […]

  • The “Cosmopolitan Century”: European Re-Membering

      Natan Sznaider.  Gedächtnisraum Europa: Die Visionen des europäischen Kosmopolitismus; eine jüdische Perspektive.   Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2008.  153 pp.  EUR 16.90 (paper), ISBN 978-3-89942-692-2. As Europe moves into the twenty-first century, its search for a shared identity continues to occupy academic journals, the feuilleton pages, and Eurocrats eager to underwrite a by-and-large successful administrative […]

  • The Responsibility to Protect, the International Criminal Court, and Foreign Policy in Focus: Subverting the UN Charter in the Name of Human Rights

    It was just a matter of time before members of the collapsing left enlisted in the imperial attack on the most fundamental principles of the UN Charter, and added their voices to the growing chorus of support for Western power-projection under the Responsibility to Protect doctrine (R2P) and the International Criminal Court (ICC).  But this […]

  • Queers Respond to Tel-Aviv Homophobic Violence, Call for BDS against Israel

    If your own suffering does not serve to unite you with the suffering of others, if your own imprisonment does not join you with others in prison, if you in your smallness remain alone, then your pain will have been for naught. On the evening of August 1st in Tel Aviv, someone entered a youth […]

  • A Crucial Factor in Colonial Conflicts: Opposition from Within

    In a colonial conflict, the main protagonists are, on the one hand, the colonial power and, on the other, the colonized population, and, when it exists, the liberation movement of the latter.  This was the case in the Algerian liberation war, the struggle of the Vietnamese people, in Angola and in Mozambique.  The ability of […]

  • Choosing the Path of Critical Debate on Iran

    Tariq Ramadan just got purged from not only his position as “integration advisor” to the city of Rotterdam but also his visiting professorship at Erasmus University. — Ed. An Open Letter to My Detractors in the Netherlands Tuesday 18 August 2009 Once again I have come under attack in the Netherlands.  Last May and June, […]

  • Will Iran Get to Have Three Women Ministers?

    President Mahmud Ahmadinejad’s landmark decision to nominate three women for cabinet posts in his second administration bodes well for his post-election promise to usher in a “new era” in Iran. The choice of three females for top ministerial positions will be interpreted by critics as a ploy by Ahmadinejad to compensate for any perceived legitimacy […]

  • A Simple Question about Israel

      On 2 August 2009, after cordoning off part of the Arab neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah in east Jerusalem, Israeli police evicted two Palestinian families (more than 50 people) from their homes; Jewish settlers immediately moved into the emptied houses.  Although Israeli police cited a ruling by the country’s supreme court, the evicted Arab families […]

  • No American Money for Israeli Settlements

      For many years, various American governments have called on Israel to stop the expansion of settlements, but Israel has consistently ignored this demand.  The Obama administration has been the most vocal administration so far in articulation of this demand.  Yet unfortunately a number of American individuals and institutions have provided large quantities of material […]

  • I Did What My Heart Told Me to Do

      This is not the first time that I stand trial for my beliefs.  But it is the first time that they will probably be able to stop me. I always knew that many people silently supported me, and that if I ever got into trouble they would stand behind me.  This moment has come. […]

  • Mahmoud & Esfandiar’s Excellent Adventure

    Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, whose daughter is married to a son of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is the President’s Chief of Staff.  Mr. Mashaei is known for actions that have appalled certain conservative quarters of the Iranian political establishment, such as attending a ceremony in Turkey where women danced and hosting a ceremony in Tehran where women drumming […]

  • Open Letter to Iranian Authorities and World Community

      As members of the Board of Iranians For Peace (IFP), we are deeply concerned about the events following June 12 election in Iran particularly the street violence, loss of life, and widespread arrests.  One of the detainees, Dr Bijan Khajehpour Khoei, is a supporter of the IFP. We appeal to the Iranian authorities to […]

  • Higher Education Today: Theory and Practice

      In the Beginning I am a child of the cold war.  I was born in 1940, was an adolescent in the 1950s, and devoid of political consciousness when President Eisenhower warned of the “unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex” in 1960.   I was modestly inspired by the young President Kennedy’s […]

  • The Politics of the UNDP Arab Human Development Report

      On Tuesday, July 21st, the United Nations Development Program launched its 5th Arab Human Development Report (AHDR).  The independently prepared report was not presented to the public prior to its publication, but criticism began to surface even before it was released, both from researchers involved in the report and from observers. Wujohat Nazar (Perspectives) […]

  • Letter to the People of Israel

      August 8, 2009 When your government denied us our rights, many ordinary Israelis did not look away.  Instead they stood with us.  They showed us that Israelis are able to look past our differences and stand up for what is right. I call on the Israeli people once again to help. Early on Sunday, […]

  • Imperialism and Struggles for Democracy in West Asia

      The history of the West Asia for over a century is one long history of how colonial and imperialist powers, both old and new, have arrogantly plundered, looted, dismembered, manipulated and raped a region for their unbridled self interests.  It is a history of total disregard and callous disrespect for the peoples of this […]

  • Petroleum and Energy Policy in Iran

      Iran, a major oil producing and exporting country, also imports gasoline because of inadequate refining capacity and rising petrol consumption.  This article examines the problems faced by an economy dependent on the export of crude oil and gas that are compounded by the dilemmas of rising domestic consumption, a significant decline in productive capacity, […]