September 22nd, 20170By Nabil Mohamad
On September 16, 1982, following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the right-wing Christian Phalange militia stormed the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in West Beirut and began a massacre which ended in the deaths of hundreds, maybe thousands, of mostly Palestinian civilians. I was 19-years-old at the time. By chance...
September 14th, 20170BEIRUT ― Lebanon will file a complaint to the United Nations against Israel for violating the country’s airspace and causing damage by breaking the sound barrier in the south of the country, its foreign minister said on Monday.
Israeli jets flew low over the southern city of Saida on Sunday, causing sonic booms that broke windows...
August 20th, 20170By James J. Zogby
It is fascinating to watch some U.S. senators tripping over themselves as they attempt to defend their support for or opposition to proposed legislation that would make it a federal crime to support the international campaign to Boycott, Divest or Sanction (BDS) Israel for its continued occupation of Palestinian...
August 16th, 20170BEIRUT — On Sunday, the leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah dismissed the prospect of tougher U.S. sanctions against his group, which is backed by Iran, and said the U.S. administration had no way to harm it.
"The American administration, with all available and possible means, will not be able to damage the strength of the resistance,"...
August 4th, 20170Neither Fatah nor Hamas have been of much relevance to the mass protests staged around the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem. Neither have American pressure, half-hearted European "concern about the situation" or cliché Arab declarations made one iota of difference. United Nations officials warned of the grim scenarios of escalation,...
July 28th, 20170
DEARBORN HEIGHTS— In November 2012, a 12-year-old cancer survivor from Gaza arrived in Michigan to the open arms of Yasmeen Hamed and her family, who had hosted his three-month stay through the Palestinian Children Relief Fund (PCRF) — a non-profit organization devoted to “healing the wounds of war and...
July 28th, 20170Israel, which has played a precarious role in the Syrian war since 2011, is furious to learn that the future of the conflict is not to its liking.
The six-year-old Syria war is moving to a new stage, perhaps its final. The Syrian regime is consolidating its control over most of the populated centers, while ISIS is losing ground fast...
July 27th, 20170DEARBORN — The outcries of thousands of Arab and Muslim American men, women and children from outside Dearborn’s City Hall could once be heard throughout the nation.
While demonstrating in a mosaic of green, red and white, Dearborn’s Arab Americans were branding a newfangled Arab unity, amid divisions in their...
July 27th, 20170JERUSALEM - Thousands of Muslim worshippers surged into Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque on Thursday and at least 113 were hurt in scuffles with police after Israel lifted security measures imposed at the sacred site in the face of days of violent protests.
Chaotic scenes unfolded as Israeli forces used stun grenades to try to control...
July 27th, 20170Early October 2016, Misbah Abu Sbeih left his wife and five children at home and then drove to an Israeli police station in occupied Palestinian East Jerusalem.
The 39-year-old Jerusalemite was scheduled to hand himself over to serve a term of four months in jail for, allegedly, trumped up charges of "trying to hit an Israeli...
July 25th, 20170JERUSALEM - Palestinians have vowed to continue protests and confrontations with Israeli forces in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank, in rejection of new surveillance cameras installed at the gates to al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
After a security cabinet meeting late on Monday, a statement from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin...
July 24th, 20170NEW YORK - United Nations Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov warned on Monday that a solution was needed by Friday to the Jerusalem mosque crisis, which he said threatens to have "potential catastrophic costs well beyond the walls of the Old City."
Israel installed metal detectors at entry points to Al-Aqsa mosque compound in...
July 21st, 20170JERUSALEM — For the first time in decades, Israel closed the al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City to worshipers on Friday, July 14.
The closure followed an attack near an entrance to the compound that houses the al-Aqsa mosque, one of the holiest sites for Muslims, following a deadly shootout that killed two Israelis and...
July 21st, 20170By Ramzy Baroud
Early October 2016, Misbah Abu Sbeih left his wife and five children at home and then drove to an Israeli police station in occupied Palestinian East Jerusalem.
The 39-year-old Jerusalemite was scheduled to hand himself over to serve a term of four months in jail for, allegedly, trumped up charges of "trying to hit...
June 12th, 20170JERUSALEM — Israel has advanced plans for a further 1,500 homes in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, Peace Now, an Israeli non-profit organization advocating for a two-state solution, said on Thursday, the second such announcement in a week.
More than 3,000 units have been advanced this week, a spokeswoman for the group...
June 10th, 20171DEARBORN — The 1967 Six Day War was one of the most salient events of the Arab-Israeli conflict, its effect evident through its shaping of Israeli and Arab political discourse.
While its byproducts continue to resonate, the events of the Six Day War are solidified largely through oration and narrative.
"There's historical...
June 1st, 20170WASHINGTON — President Trump signed an order on Thursday to keep the U.S. Embassy in Israel in Tel Aviv temporarily instead of relocating it to Jerusalem, despite his campaign pledge to go ahead with the controversial move.
After months of fierce debate within his administration, Trump chose to continue his predecessors' policy of...
May 19th, 20170The Israeli Knesset (parliament) has hurriedly passed a new bill that defines Israel as the "national home of the Jewish people." Although the association between Jewishness and Israel goes back to the foundation of the state, the new law also carries clear discriminatory elements that target the country's Arab communities, numbering...
May 19th, 20170WEST BANK — A Palestinian man was killed in the occupied West Bank on Thursday when an Israeli settler opened fire as protesters crowded around his car and pelted it with rocks, according to multiple accounts.
A Reuters photographer and other witnesses said hundreds of Palestinians had gathered near the city of Nablus to show...
May 19th, 20170May 15 marked the 69th year of systematic expulsion and pillaging of Palestinian communities, in addition to the centennial of the Balfour declaration that began the travesty.
In May of 1948 alone, after the Israeli militiamen of the Haganah, Irgun and Palmach liquidated entire villages via massacres, forcing the spared from their...
May 5th, 20170DETROIT — Arab Americans are typically not regarded as a subset of immigrants with a history tied to labor movements.
However, Arab American involvement in labor movements is interwoven within the greater framework of workers' protests in the United States.
This renders Arab American history in the U.S., via its political...
May 5th, 20170Gaza is the world's largest open air prison. The West Bank is a prison, too, segmented into various wards, known as areas A, B and C. In fact, all Palestinians are subjected to varied degrees of military restrictions. At some level, they are all prisoners.
East Jerusalem is cut off from the West Bank, and those in the West Bank are...
May 5th, 20170DEARBORN — More than 1,500 Palestinian prisoners have joined a hunger strike led by Palestinian parliamentarian and prisoner Marwan Barghouti, beginning April 17.
People all over the world showed their solidarity by organizing demonstrations and vigils. Some have participated in the "#SaltWaterChallenge", in which they share videos...
May 4th, 20170WASHINGTON ― President Trump will travel to Saudi Arabia and Israel this month as part of his first foreign trip, wading directly into the tangled diplomacy of Middle Eastern politics, a senior administration official said on Thursday.
The swing through the Middle East, added to a trip that includes a NATO meeting in Brussels on May...
April 30th, 20170BEIRUT — Israeli warplanes struck a weapons supply hub operated by Hezbollah near Damascus airport on Thursday, targeting arms sent from Iran in commercial and military cargo aircraft, Syrian rebel and regional intelligence sources told Reuters.
The Israeli military said later that one of its anti-aircraft missiles intercepted a...
April 29th, 20170Israel has resorted to three main strategies to suppress Palestinian calls for justice and human rights, including the Right of Return for refugees.
One is dedicated to rewriting history; another attempts to distract from present realities altogether and a third aims at reclaiming the Palestinian narrative as essentially an Israeli...
April 20th, 20170BETHLEHEM ― Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian driver who rammed his car into a bus stop in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday injuring a pedestrian, the army and a hospital spokesman said.
An army statement said the car rammed a bus stop at Gush Etzion Junction, a busy intersection near a cluster of Israeli West Bank...
April 17th, 20170WEST BANK ― Hundreds of Palestinians in Israeli jails began a hunger strike on Monday in response to a call by prominent prisoner Marwan Barghouti, widely seen as a possible future Palestinian president.
Palestinians termed the open-ended strike a protest against poor conditions and an Israeli policy of detention without trial that...