The Zionist lobby strikes again: In a dramatic conclusion to a building political fight over his selection as the U.S. intelligence community’s top analyst, former U.S. Ambassador Charles “Chas” W. Freeman, Jr., asked that the appointment not proceed, the director of national intelligence, Dennis C. Blair, announced Tuesday. Freeman, 66, is a widely experienced former…
Showing all posts tagged West Bank
And the Islamists surge
Yet another own goal kicked by the Israelis: Hamas’s popularity among Palestinians has risen sharply since Israel’s three-week offensive against the Islamist group in Gaza last month, an opinion poll released on Monday showed. If an election were held today, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh would beat Mahmoud Abbas, the Western-backed Palestinian president and leader of…
Stay home Hillary, if that’s all you got
My latest New Matilda column is about the Obama administration’s first foray into the Middle East: On Palestine it’s hard to tell the difference between Obama and Bush. But while the US and Israel block progress, there are small signs of movement, writes Antony Loewenstein The number of people who believe in the two-state solution…
The opposite of peace now
A Likud “strategic thinker” opines. The message? The Palestinians aren’t “up to” statehood. Stall. Kill for time. Wait. Expand. The Israeli mainstream in 2009.
When peace is not desired
The two-state solution “dream” is fading by the day in the Middle East. Here’s why: A report by the Israeli left-wing NGO Peace Now released Monday says that the government is planning to build more than 73,300 new housing units in the West Bank. Peace Now estimates that if all of the units are built,…
What peace really means
While an ever-growing number of Israelis are embracing extremism: A small number of young men soon to be drafted into the IDF from Hesder yeshivot around the country gathered at the Jerusalem Theater on Monday evening to hear speakers from the national-religious camp espouse the virtues of fulfilling “the commandment of war.” The event, the…
Trying to mask the reality
Gideon Levy writes in Haaretz: As the war in Gaza raged, Israel Defense Forces reservists apparently thought anything was permissible: It was possible, maybe even necessary, to kill innocents, in the West Bank, too. Under cover of war, they thought, they could also kill a handcuffed Palestinian. It may not receive much international media coverage,…
Why nobody should accept this situation
Christopher Hitchens laments Israel’s political reliance on a Russian “thug”: A reliable friend and colleague swears that he saw the following incident in the Israeli-occupied territories a couple of years ago. A Palestinian physician, in urgent need of permission to travel, was trying to persuade a soldier at a roadblock to allow him to hurry…
The gift that Hamas gives
Tony Karon, Time.com, February 12: Fatah leaders see the Israeli election as confirming what they already knew: there’s nothing to be gained by continuing the charade of U.S.-sponsored talks about talks with the Israelis. Palestinians could not get what they needed from Olmert, and they know that his successors will take even more of a…
Blame the Jews for the attacks
The following report, published in Hebrew in Ma’ariv on February 23, has been translated by Melbourne-based Sol Salbe. The content speaks for itself and proves, yet again, that the Jewish state’s behaviour is causing anti-Semitism around the world: Olmert: Antisemitism on the rise – because of the Occupation During the weekly full ministry meeting Olmert…