Palestine Think Tank

WRITTEN BY ANTOINE RAFFOUL
BACKGROUND:
In April 2002, Israel launched Operation Defensive Shield by invading the Palestinian
refugee camp of Jenin, south of Nazareth. In this operation which lasted about 8 days and followed a suicide bomb attack on the Israeli town of Netanya. Israel deployed 30,000 reserve soldiers against a camp population of 33,000 refugees. It sealed [...]

“We don't have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in the process of change or resistance. Small acts, when multiplied by many people, can transform the world”
“If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the [...]

UPDATE: UNHCR has accepted to take Yousra to her own shelters after she refused, according to her lawyer, to go back to Caritas shelters, pending a permanent solution. Caritas is held a conference on Tuesday and issued a press release to voice its view point. The main question on the ‘legal status’ of Yousra, when [...]

The Lebanese General Security Office (GSO), the official state body in charge of entry, stay and exit of foreigners, is coming under heavy fire following its decision to maintain the arbitrary detention of Iraqi refugee Yousra El-Amiri.
On 11 December 2009, a Lebanese judge in Zahle, Cynthia Kasarji, order the immediate release of Yousra who has [...]

After spending months being detained without charge in an Israeli prison, human rights defenders Mohammad Othman and Jamal Juma' have been set free.
Their release is a massive victory. Thank you to everyone who took action to help secure their freedom.
Mohammad and Jamal work for Stop the Wall, a War on Want partner organisation which has [...]

PEOPLE WITH MEDIA CONTACTS THERE, PLEASE ENCOURAGE THEM TO AIR THIS FILM!
Marco Pasquini’s Gaza Hospital 
If every building has a story to tell, then Gaza Hospital, a medical center-turned-refugee-shelter in the Sabra and Shatila camp, can recount a saga.
It is this saga that director Marco Pasquini sets out to capture using archival footage and testimonies [...]

The question remains: did the organizers know all [the conditions] beforehand – especially the El-Arish stipulation – or was it suddenly sprung on them? Was clearance given for the southern route via Aqaba, then rescinded, or was it left to chance?

The convoy’s organizers are not answering basic questions and the full picture has still not emerged.
God speed you to the Gates of Hell then, George. But next time you should maybe consider going by sea, sailing 200 boats though international waters and demanding that the Western powers guarantee the freedom of the high seas. That way you don’t need to bow to the likes of Mubarak.

This week marks one year since Israel began its attack on the Gaza Strip: a year since phosphorus bombs, DIME bombs and other weapons of death and destruction were unleashed on a defenseless civilian population. A year since the people of the world demanded that Israel end its attack on Gaza. 
In this Israeli war of aggression [...]

Bethlehem is one of the most historically significant towns in  Palestine.  It is known as the birthplace of King David and of Jesus.  And, for generations, it was a lively and bustling town.  But, today, Bethlehem resembles an open-air prison, occupied by Israel's military and encircled by Israel's wall.  These circumstances have caused Bethlehem's population, [...]

Lifta, a most picturesque Palestinian village, lies on the slopes of West Jerusalem below the highway linking it to Tel-Aviv. It has been abandoned since the invading Hagana underground forces backed by the Stern Gang drove the last of its Palestinian inhabitants in 1948 during the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
It was the one single event [...]