MER Article From the Editors (July/August 1983) An interesting instance of the politics of culture is the “Heritage of Islam” exhibit currently on display at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington. The exhibit, which toured a number of US cities over the past year, is a project of the National Committee to Honor the Fourteenth Ce The Editors • 2 min read
MER Article Janet Lee Stevens Janet Lee Stevens died in Beirut at the age of 32, in the United States Embassy bombing on April 18. More than anyone that I knew, Janet had an extraordinary sensitivity toward the people and cultures of the Middle East. Since the early 1970s she had lived in Tunisia, Egypt and most recently in Leba (Author not identified) • 3 min read
MER Article Halabi, The West Bank Story Rafik Halabi, The West Bank Story (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982). Rafik Halabi is a Palestinian-Israeli Druze. He writes at times with the viewpoint of an Israeli soldier and a former aide to Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek, sometimes as an Arab villager. The West Bank Story explores seve (Author not identified) • 3 min read
MER Article Cohen, Political Parties in the West Bank Under the Jordanian Regime, 1949-1967 Amnon Cohen, Political Parties in the West Bank Under the Jordanian Regime, 1949-1967 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982). Joel Beinin • 4 min read
MER Article Sharon and Eitan After Sabra and Shatila Ariel Sharon: “These Years Have Been Exciting” What is your assessment of the week? Victory, defeats, the end of a career, of an ambition? You can make the assessment yourself; there is no doubt that it was tough, but the fact is that I am still a government member. Is that so important? Very im (Author not identified) • 3 min read
MER Article The Kahan Report: Mossad and the Massacres The final report of the Kahan Commission shows the extent to which the Lebanese Phalangists and Major Sa’ad Haddad’s “Free Lebanon” forces are little more than hired hands in the eyes of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and the intelligence agency, Mossad. The Israeli government decides and the Phal Konrad Ege • 4 min read
MER Article The Kahan Report: The Commission and the Evidence I will begin at the end; I am not satisfied by the report of the commission of inquiry.... I have great respect for the three members of the commission. They did an excellent job. The conclusions were reached according to their conscience and understanding. They added honor to Israeli democracy and Uri Avnery • 16 min read
MER Article The Kahan Report: Banishing the Palestinian Ordeal If politics is the art of the possible, then the impact of the Kahan Commission Report has to be understood as “beyond politics,” Israel’s final victory in the Lebanon war is not the expulsion of the PLO or even the extension of its sovereign reach to challenge Lebanese territorial and political ind Richard Falk • 14 min read
MER Article The Lebanon War and the Occupied Territories Until the war in Lebanon, official Israeli policy toward the Palestinians under its occupation rested on the premise that the PLO was the only obstacle on the road to what Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir called “the fullest advancement of the process that began in Camp David.” [1] The elimination of Khalil Nakhleh • 10 min read
MER Article Danger Signals and Dress Rehearsals for a Palestinian Exodus Jonathan Kuttab works as an attorney in Ramallah. He grew up in the West Bank. After finishing college in the US and getting a law degree from the University of Virginia, he returned to the West Bank in 1979. He recently obtained accreditation from the Israeli bar. He works with Law in the Service o (Author not identified) • 12 min read
MER Article Demographic Consequences of the Occupation The residual areas of Palestine occupied by Israel in June 1967 (generally referred to as the West Bank and Gaza) contained a population of between 1,300,000 and 1,350,000 Palestinians. At that time, this population represented over half of all the estimated 2,650,000 Palestinians in the world. At p Janet Abu-Lughod • 13 min read
MER Article Palestinian Communists and the National Movement George Hazboun is a leading Palestinian trade unionist. He was dismissed from his elected position as deputy mayor of Bethlehem by a January 22 municipal council decision, spearheaded by Mayor Elias Freij, for his alleged abstention from attending council meetings since May 1982. Coming as it did th (Author not identified) • 9 min read
