Middle East Research and Information Project

Critical Coverage of the Middle East Since 1971

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Joost Hiltermann

Joost Hiltermann is program director for the Middle East and North Africa at the International Crisis Group.

A Day as Ordinary as Any Other — The Israeli settlement of Pisgat Zeev (L), built in a suburb of East Jerusalem, and the Palestinian Shuafat refugee camp (R) behind Israel’s separation wall, 2020. Ahmad Gharabli/AFP via Getty ImagesThe cover of the US edition.Israel’s System of Segregated Roads in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Courtesy Visualizing Palestine, Creative Commons license BY-NC-ND 3.0.

Current Analysis

A Day as Ordinary as Any Other

Nathan Thrall's Newest Book Offers a Timely Window into Israel's Infrastructure of Occupation.

Joost Hiltermann • 9 min read

Israel’s Latest Effort to Fragment and Disempower the Palestinians — Israeli and Palestinian activists gather at the Al-Haq Foundation in the West Bank city of Ramallah to denounce Israel’s decision to declare six Palestinian human rights groups as “terror organizations,” October 27, 2021. Abbas Momani/AFP via Getty Images

Current Analysis

Israel’s Latest Effort to Fragment and Disempower the Palestinians

In October 2021, Israel spuriously designated six Palestinian civil society organizations as “terrorist” groups, liable to suppression and severe punishment under Israel’s counterterrorism law. Joost Hiltermann analyzes why Israel is targeting these well-regarded groups—including the oldest Palestin

Joost Hiltermann • 8 min read

MER Article

Iraq: What Remains

American soldiers are gone from Iraq, along with much of Washington’s influence. The Obama administration, which came to office opposed to the entire enterprise but then tried, and failed, to extend the troop presence, professes still to play a leading part in what goes on. In reality, it looks more

Joost Hiltermann • 13 min read

MER Article

Deep Traumas, Fresh Ambitions

The seeds of future war are sown even as parties fight and, depleted or on the verge of defeat, sue for peace. The outcome is rarely stable and may be barely tolerable to one side or the other. This rule holds true for the two belligerents no less than for their respective sponsors, keen to protect

Joost Hiltermann • 19 min read

MER Article

To Protect or to Project?

Erstwhile kings of the mountains, Iraq’s Kurdish parties have become kingmakers in Baghdad. No federal government can be established without them—and they know it.

Joost Hiltermann • 24 min read

MER Article

Elusive Justice

Saddam Hussein's regime has long been one of the world's worst human rights violators. But the international community largely ignored Iraq's record of human rights abuse -- brutal repression of internal dissent, atrocities during the eight-year war with Iran -- until after Hussein crossed the red l

Joost Hiltermann • 9 min read

MER Article

Al-Haq

On a crisp November day in 1984, I first stepped into the small apartment on Ramallah's main street that housed the offices of what was then known as Law in the Service of Man (a somewhat ungainly translation of the more universal al-qanoun min ajal al-insan -- Law in the Service of the Human Being)

Joost Hiltermann • 8 min read

MER Article

Clipped Wings, Sharp Claws

Sarah Graham-Brown, Sanctioning Saddam: The Politics of Intervention in Iraq (London: I. B. Tauris, 1999). Andrew Cockburn and Patrick Cockburn, Out of the Ashes: The Resurrection of Saddam Hussein (New York: HarperCollins, 1999). Scott Ritter, Endgame: Solving the Iraq Problem Once and For All (New

Joost Hiltermann • 7 min read

MER Article

The Demise of Operation Provide Comfort

The evacuation of several thousand Iraqi Kurds from northern Iraq by the US military in December 1996 constituted the last gasp of Operation Provide Comfort. This operation was launched in the spring of 1991, in the wake of the Gulf war and Kurdish uprising against Baghdad, as hundreds of thousands

Joost Hiltermann • 4 min read

MER Article

The Destruction of Iraqi Kurdistan

Less than five years ago, the US-led coalition against Saddam Hussein established a “safe haven” in Iraqi Kurdistan following Iraq’s brutal suppression of an uprising against the regime during March-April 1991. The mood among the majority of Iraqi Kurds was highly optimistic: A certain measure of se

Joost Hiltermann • 13 min read

MER Article

Improvisation and Continuity

Sabreen is considered the premier Palestinian musical group performing today. Influenced by Western rock and jazz, their distinctive style blends traditional Arab rhythms and instruments with subtly political lyrics reflecting the current active resistance to Israeli occupation. Two members of Sabre

Kamal Boullata, Joost Hiltermann • 7 min read

MER Article

Teddy Kollek and the Native Question

On Saturday night, June 10, 1967, Israeli authorities informed more than 100 families living in the Moroccan Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City that they had three hours to evacuate their homes, where some had lived for generations. As Teddy Kollek, mayor of the western half of the city since 1965, rec

Joost Hiltermann • 11 min read