Geography Archives: Israel

Being a part of the tremendous coalition effort to pass a divestment bill at Berkeley was quite simply an ecstatic experience.  As my colleague Sydney Levy said, “The movement grew by an enormous leap today.” First, the vote itself: after the UC Berkeley Student Senate originally voted on March 18, by a margin of 16-4, […]

  About one month after the beginning of the new Iranian calendar year (21 March 2010), and following the international recognition of Norouz by the United Nations General Assembly, Iran is facing new challenges.  Some of the challenges are domestic, while others emanate from Iran’s regional and international policies as well as international pressures put […]

  Norman G. Finkelstein: Israel would not be so up in arms about the Goldstone Report, would not be so upset by it, were it not for the fact that, yes, they are very vulnerable to the public opinion, and they know very well the limits beyond which it may not express itself against them, […]

  The president of Brazil brings a firm message to the summit on nuclear security. “I’m going to ask President Obama: what is the significance of your recent accord with Medvedev on the deactivation of nuclear warheads [of the United States and Russia]?  Deactivation of what?  If we are talking about deactivating the warheads that […]

  Address before the crowed of demonstrators protesting against the eviction of Palestinian families from their homes in Sheikh Jarrah, 9 April 2010 We came early, a group of people, and visited one of the homes here in Sheikh Jarrah . . . at 1 P.M.  The owner told us about the long history of […]

Background The West Bank has been occupied by Israel since 1967.  Israel maintains authoritative jurisdiction over the happenings in the West Bank via its military apparatus.  Decisions governing the simplest aspects of Palestinian life, from traveling from one area to another to building a home, ultimately lie under the jurisdiction of the Israeli Military’s High […]

Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. See, also, Amira Hass, “IDF Order Will Enable Mass Deportation from West Bank” (Haaretz, 11 April 2010). | | Print

  Shlomo Swirski, Economist, Adva Center: The government cut its yearly budget for four consecutive years.  The cuts were very severe.  They hit the school system, universities, the health system, and, more than anything else, the social security system.  So, within two years the level of the poverty rate for families jumped from 17 to […]

Comrade Khalida Jarrar, member of the Political Bureau of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, called for the development of a united Palestinian strategy that strengthens Palestinian resistance and rejects the failed and dangerous path of negotiations with the occupation. In an interview on April 8, 2010 with Jerusalem News Net, Comrade Jarrar […]

Dear Friends, This letter is being sent to you by citizens of the state of Israel who are active in various Left groups and on a variety of topics throughout Israel/Palestine, including human rights, ecology, peace, support for refugees, social justice, workers’ rights, feminism, and queer struggles.  We are struggling within our country and our […]

  A coalition of nearly 20 Jewish groups, ranging from the right-wing David Project and the Jewish National Fund to the liberal J Street, is distributing a misleading statement condemning a Student Senate bill at UC Berkeley.  The ground-breaking bill calls for divestment from companies that profit from the perpetuation of the Israeli military occupation […]

Obama Administration officials have been touting for some time that they have Russia “on board” for a new United Nations Security Council resolution imposing sanctions against Iran over the nuclear issue.  We, of course, have been arguing for months that, while Russia would probably end up supporting a new sanctions resolution, Moscow would not support […]

  Turkey has its own vision on the issues of international security.  On Iran, the Middle East, and nuclear proliferation, it has made itself the voice of the Muslim opinion which sees Israel as the chief troublemaker.  A member of the NATO and candidate for the European Union, led since 2002 by the “moderate Islamists” […]

In his column, the Washington Post‘s David Ignatius presents an important piece of reporting about the Obama Administration’s approach to Iran and the Palestinian issue.  David opens his column by citing “two top administration officials” as telling him that President Obama is seriously considering putting forward an American plan for a two-state solution to the […]

Why bother with moral persuasion when you can just threaten to take over government . . . everywhere? On March 18, UC Berkeley’s student senate voted 16 to 4 in favor of divesting from companies that profit from the Israeli occupation.  A week later, in a move oddly predicted by AIPAC’s Jonathan Kessler at AIPAC’s […]

  EXCERPT: Introduction This document was created by the community of Isha L’Isha—Haifa Feminist Center.  It began as a process of examination and re-conceptualization of the term “security” as we, feminist women in Israel, experience it.  Over the past five years, Isha L’Isha has been discussing and dealing with issues related to women, peace and […]

A group of Jews and Arabs are fighting in the Israeli courts to be recognized as “Israelis,” a nationality currently denied them, in a case that officials fear may threaten the country’s self-declared status as a Jewish state. Israel refused to recognize an Israeli nationality at the country’s establishment in 1948, making an unusual distinction […]

Carlos Latuff is a Brazilian cartoonist. | | Print

Author’s note: This is a response to Claudia Rosett’s “Turkey Tilts toward Iran,” published on 26 March 2010 by Forbes.com. Forbes columnist Claudia Rosett — who just so happens to be “a journalist-in-residence” with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a neo-conservative think tank — feigns her regret for having to report a “disturbing talk” […]

April 3, 2010 Istanbul, Turkey — Following months of preparation, a coalition bringing together a number of organizations and movements working to break Israel’s illegal blockade on Gaza was announced yesterday in Istanbul.  The coalition, composed of the Turkey-based IHH (Insani Yardim Vakfi) organization, the European Campaign to End the Siege on Gaza (ECESG), the […]