MER Article Document: Shamir on Terrorism (1943) The following excerpts are from an article by Yitzhak Shamir, prime minister of Israel from 1983-1984 and 1986-1992. The article first appeared in the LEHI underground organization journal Hehazit (The Front) in the summer of 1943. (Author not identified) • 2 min read
MER Article Italian Communists' New Historic Compromise The revolt in the Occupied Territories broke out at a time when support for the Palestinian cause was at a low ebb in Europe. The Italian Communist Party (PCI), for example, had for the past couple of years been giving priority to building relations with the mainstream Israeli left rather than with Diana Johnstone • 5 min read
MER Article "The Ship of Return" Some day, an Israeli intelligence officer will write his memoirs. He will recount his brave deeds and reveal how his cunning strategy thwarted the enemy at every turn. The book will not be banned in Israel. The retired officer will appear on television to promote the book. Some interviewer, whose re Charles Glass • 6 min read
MER Article "Something Was in the Air All of 1987" Mahmoud and Naji, both in their early twenties, are full-time participants in the uprising. Both were politically active before the uprising and, in addition to joining demonstrations, they play leading roles in local neighborhood committees. Both are college students. Mahmoud majors in civil engine Beshara Doumani • 5 min read
MER Article Mosque and Church in the Uprising It was only one of the hundreds of incidents that cumulatively have come to be known as “the uprising.” Here there were no beatings or shootings, no bloodshed, and, as far as I know, no one was arrested. In fact, compared with the dramatic events we have been witnessing nightly on the evening news, Dale Bishop • 6 min read
MER Article Israel and the Palestinians, 1948-1988 Land In 1948 only 8 percent of Palestine was owned by Jewish individuals and concerns. The 1948-1949 armistice gave Israel control over 77.4 percent of all land. Since 1947, Israeli forces have destroyed 385 of the 475 Arab villages inside the “green line” -- Israel’s 1948 borders. Since 1967, Isra Lisa Hajjar, Mouin Rabbani • 15 min read
MER Article Two Poems About Palestine In the Refugee Camp The huts were of mud and hay, their thin roofs feared the rain, and walls slouched like humbled men. The streets were laid out in a grid, as in New York, but without the dignity of names or asphalt. Dust reigned. Women grew pale chickens and children feeding them fables from the Sharif Elmusa, Nizar Qabbani • 1 min read
MER Article "When the Rest Is Quiet, There Is Revolution in Dahaysha" We enter Dahaysha through one of several gates, past rusted oil drums piled high in a stockade and a chain-link barbed-wire fence that residents keep tearing down. The alleyways are quiet; people must be inside. M. takes us to the home of his friend A., 27, a business student at Bethlehem Universit Melissa Baumann • 6 min read
MER Article Abu Jamal's Family In MER 146,1 wrote about Abu Jamal and his family. In mid-December, two weeks into the uprising, soldiers came to the house of Abu Jamal in the Old City of Ramallah. They arrested two of his teenage sons, Nasir and ‘Umar, and one of their cousins from across the street, and took them to the new pris Joost Hiltermann • 3 min read
MER Article What the Uprising Means This article is adapted from a talk Salim Tamari gave at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC on February 25, 1988. Salim Tamari • 20 min read
MER Article More Deadly Than Tears The roll call of the 146 dead published by the Palestine Human Rights Information Center in Jerusalem, March 20, 1988, is dominated by gunshot victims: shot in the head, shot in the chest, shot in the neck. But among the 49 “deaths from other causes,” 31 were killed by a “non-lethal” riot control we Martha Wenger • 5 min read
