Palestine Think Tank

Free Minds for a Free Palestine

Archives for the ‘Opinions and Letters’ Category

The Mass Psychology of Anti-Fascism

By Mary Rizzo • May 22nd, 2008 • Category: Analysis, Hasbara Deconstruction Site, Israel, Opinions and Letters, War, Zionism

(at the left, one of the cartoons circulating in the civilised US on Zionist and Conservative sites)
WRITTEN BY JAY KNOTT
Who could fail to be against fascism, the movement which drove Germany and Italy in World War II, which culminated in the murder of millions of civilians in concentration camps? But anti-fascism implies a lot more [...]



Hebron is a ghost town where joggers carry automatic rifles

By Mary Rizzo • May 17th, 2008 • Category: Culture and Heritage, Human Rights, Israel, Music, Poetry, Events, Opinions and Letters, Palestine

WRITTEN BY IAN JACK
For the settlers, subsidies and tax breaks have become as important a motive as Deuteronomy
At Birzeit University in Ramallah last week a young woman student in a headscarf asked how it was that Nadine Gordimer, the South African novelist and Nobel laureate, could agree to visit and speak in Israel. Hadn’t Gordimer [...]



The Nakba is our Holocaust

By Khalid Amayreh • May 16th, 2008 • Category: Israel, Khalid Amayreh, Nakba and Right of Return, Opinions and Letters, Our Authors, Palestine, Zionism

“This morning we saw pictures of the Warsaw ghetto at Yad Vashem and this evening we are going to the Ramallah ghetto.”
German Bishop Gregor Maria Franz Hanke during a visit to Ramallah in March 2007.
Basking in their usual insolence and self-absorbedness, Israeli leaders have been visibly irate over the highlighted commemoration of the 60th anniversary [...]



The Hypocrisy of the British Government: why not Gaza?

By Mary Rizzo • May 15th, 2008 • Category: Analysis, Human Rights, Israel, Opinions and Letters, Palestine

WRITTEN BY IBRAHIM TURNER*
Today in the Parliamentary Question Time Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister answered questions about the Myanmar crisis caused by the cyclone that hit the country over a week ago. Among the measures he called for was an emergency meeting of the United Nations to call on the Military Junta of Myanmar [...]



Jimmy Carter’s Mid East Lesson

By Mary Rizzo • May 13th, 2008 • Category: Analysis, Israel, Middle East Issues, Opinions and Letters, Palestine, Zionism

By Tommaso Di Francesco, translated by Diego Traversa
The diverging international reactions to former American President Jimmy Carter’s initiative in the Palestinian Occupied Territories and the attention it is receiving from the Arab and Muslim world underscores a fact that has been ignored in Italy and Europe.
Indeed, what we’re facing is the arrival at an original [...]



Iqbal Tamimi - “Get-the-BLOG outta here.” Obstacles facing women journalists

By Iqbal Tamimi • May 13th, 2008 • Category: Internet and Communication, Opinions and Letters, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance

I have been asked many times why I switched to blogging after slaving for many years in journalism in the Middle East.
Many obstacles face women journalists in the Middle East, but on top of the list comes dedicated male efforts to exclude females from acquiring serious decision-making positions like that of Editor-in-Chief. Some still can’t [...]



Young people, be fairies. Only a weak Israel can put us back on the right track

By Mary Rizzo • May 11th, 2008 • Category: Israel, Nakba and Right of Return, Opinions and Letters, War, Zionism

WRITTEN BY BENNY ZIFFER for Haaretz Hebrew Edition
On Sunday, one of my students (I am a lecturer in a course from four to six at Tel Aviv University) approached me after the class and told me that she was the producer of an alternative Memorial evening, which also takes into account cruelty to Palestinians, that [...]



The historic wronging of Palestine

By Mary Rizzo • May 10th, 2008 • Category: Analysis, Documents, Israel, Mary's Choice, Opinions and Letters, Palestine, Zionism

WRITTEN BY DAVID MORRISON (art by Carlos Latuff)
The state of Israel came into existence 60 years ago on 14 May 1948. In the months before and after this declaration, Jewish forces drove around 750,000 Palestinians from their homes. Over 500 villages were emptied of their Palestinian population and most of them were destroyed [...]



Annual Arab Public Opinion Poll

By Mary Rizzo • May 10th, 2008 • Category: Analysis, Documents, Israel, Middle East Issues, Newswire, Opinions and Letters, Palestine

The Anwar Sadat Chair for Peace and Development has released its poll results.  The poll was conducted under strict sampling methodology (margin of error +/- 1.6%) amongst a representative population in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Lebanon and Jordan.  The full survey can be viewed here: 2008 Arab Public Opinion Survey (power point).
Key [...]



Wael Al Saad - Justice Lost in the Age of Power

By Wael Al-Saad • May 8th, 2008 • Category: Education, Features, Ideas and Projects, Opinions and Letters, Palestine, Resistance, Somoud: Arab Voices of Resistance

The Dimensions of Occupation, the Occupational Lobby and the Age After
I am not a politician or a journalist or writer but I am thinking day and night, experiencing new dimensions of consciousness and seeking answers. How can we move forward strategically in our struggle for justice and peace?
An Insight
Looking into the current analyses that are [...]