Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, May-June 2008, page 82

Publishers' Page

Nakba Voices.

Our readers sent poignant memories, photos, and even a 1948 map of Palestine for our special “Voices of the Nakba” commemoration, on pp. 16-43. Since, however, as some authors have pointed out, Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine is an ongoing process, we’ll continue publishing “60 Years of Nakba” stories throughout the year—and hope that this year will be the…

Nakba’s Last.

One of our readers, a photo collector, dropped by our office a few weeks ago with some stunning original, color-tinted photos taken by American Colony photographers at the turn of the century. We selected for this issue’s cover the photo of a man from Ramallah spinning wool. His dignity and patience seemed to personify those qualities in the Palestinian people who somehow have managed to retain their humanity while refusing to be wiped off the face of the earth.

Myths vs. Reality

As we read your remembrances and examined photographs from the era, we were struck anew by how pre-1948 Palestine was a thriving, cultivated, and multicultural land. Far from “making the desert bloom,” Israel uprooted a population that for centuries had cherished their terraced hills, orchards, and gardens. Palestinians had built and furnished their family homes, educated their children, played their pianos, loved their pets and cared for their livestock. Palestine was not “a land without people for a people without land.” As Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s prime minister-designate in 1947, put it, the Zionist plan neglected “one not unimportant fact...Palestine was not a wilderness or an empty, uninhabited place. It was already somebody else’s home.”

Nakba Blog.

As part of our observance of the 60th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba we have created a “Nakba Memories Blog” which can be accessed from our home page, <www.wrmea.com>. Click on the link at the top of our home page to add your stories, memories and comments. We will keep this Blog open for the remainder of 2008 so you can tell your and your family’s story.

Still Demolishing After All These Years.

On April 2 Israeli soldiers again demolished the Hamdan family home in Anata, north of Jerusalem, which had been rebuilt during the 2007 Constructing Peace Summer Camp. Prof. Jeff Halper, founder and coordinator of Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), was arrested for attempting to resist the demolition. Since 1967 Israel has demolished more than 18,000 Palestinian homes.

Israeli Attacks on Gaza Continue.

As we went to press Israeli undercover forces, in two separate raids, rolled into neighborhoods in the southern and northern Gaza Strip, wounding three people and arresting 12. It’s becoming ever more obvious, even to the most oblivious, that it is the Palestinians, rather than the Israelis, who lack a “partner for peace.” Meanwhile Gazans continue to queue in lines, sometimes for days, to purchase gas, which as this issue went to press was selling for $6.27 a gallon. Food remains scarce, prices have soared, and the dollar has plummeted in value. According to our Gaza correspondent, Mohammed Omer, the stench of sewage is overpowering as the…

Summer Heat Settles In.

First Darfur, Now Tibet.

Just as it was with Darfur and Myannmar, the world’s attention has focused on Tibet, which China invaded in 1949 and annexed in 1951. Tibetans, many of whom fled their homeland, have yearned for independence ever since. Sound familiar? As far as the mainstream media is concerned, however, it’s the only game in town. Maybe it’s time for…

Israel to Host the Olympics.

Remembering Grace Halsell.

We recently received a letter from a reader who discovered on our Web site Grace Halsell’s  article “What Christians Don’t Know About Israel,” from the May/June 1998 Washington Report. He thought this still-relevant article should be given to every pro-Israel Christian to dispel the myths Americans have been fed for 60 years. He was also struck by the fact that Halsell’s decade-old article could have been written yesterday, although Halsell, who died in August 2000, before “Intifada II, 9/11, the deaths of Yasser Arafat, Edward Said, and Rachel Corrie, G.W. Bush’s ongoing War of Destruction of Iraq, the democratic election of Hamas in 2006, and Is­rael’s War of Destruction of Lebanon in 2006.”

Update on Sami Al-Arian.

University professor and pro-Palestinian civil rights activist Dr. Sami Al-Arian’s prison sentence was up on April 7. Al-Arian, however, who was not convicted of a single count of terrorism by a jury of his peers, is again facing contempt charges for refusing to testify before a completely separate federal grand jury. As those of you who receive our e-mail Action Alerts already know, he has lost more than 32 pounds in his second hunger strike. We hope that Americans of conscience and responsible government officials will intervene on his behalf. Al-Arian’s treatment violates the principle of justice that this country is supposed to represent.

PAC Charts, Part One.

The first installment of our compilation of pro-Israel PAC contributions to 2008 election-year candidates appears on p. 50 of this issue. It’s a most useful exercise to compare the amounts received with one’s elected representatives’ votes on Middle East-related issues. It’s become obvious since the Democrats assumed power after the previous election that a change in party is not enough. What American voters need are leaders who…

Put America, Not Israel, First.

Nakba Commemorations.

We’ve ordered extra copies of this special  issue for readers and other activists to distribute to Americans at vigils, conferences, teach-ins, concerts and other events across the country commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Nakba. You can order extra copies online at our Web site, <www.wrmea.com>, by e-mailing <communications@wrmea.com>, or by telephoning our Washington offices. Please donate as generously as you can to help us distribute this special commemorative far and wide and.…

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