Current Analysis Sharon's Sights on Strategic Objective Many critics of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon depict him as an adroit tactician who has a ready answer for every immediate problem, but entirely lacks a long-term strategy. Ari Shavit, a columnist for the liberal Israeli daily Haaretz, recently characterized the present Sharon government as ha Peretz Kidron • 9 min read
Current Analysis Sharon's Unilateral Steps As the Israeli army reimposed a nearly complete lockdown on the West Bank in the aftermath of the Christmas Day 2003 suicide bombing outside of Tel Aviv, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has reportedly deputized a top general to draw up the "separation plan" he threatened seven days Joel Beinin • 10 min read
MER Article Paying the Price of Injustice Around 30 soldiers invaded my home at 2:30 am on August 17, 2001. They searched the home and messed up our belongings, breaking the windows and confiscating our telephone agenda. They took me to the roof of the house for two hours and asked me about people they wanted. Catherine Cook, Adah Kay, Adam Hanieh • 14 min read
Current Analysis Final Status in the Shape of a Wall In Jayyous, a village of 3,000 in the northern West Bank, Najah Shamasneh cradles her granddaughter in her lap and listens to her husband Yusuf tell of the loss of their agricultural land. The Shamasneh family's 25 dunams (about 6.25 acres), their sole source of income, now lies on the western side Catherine Cook • 11 min read
Current Analysis Why There's No Peace in Palestine On September 13, 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat signed a Declaration of Principles on the White House lawn, heralding the beginning of the Oslo peace process. Ten years later, the process is completely deadlocked. Israel has de Catherine Cook • 2 min read
Current Analysis Declining to Intervene In its annual report issued in July 2003, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) painted a familiar yet surprising picture of Israeli army maltreatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. A wide range of army practices—from house-to-house searches in villages to "targeted killings" Jonathan Cook • 11 min read
Current Analysis A Road Map to the Oslo Cul-de-Sac The "road map" to resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the subject of Secretary of State Colin Powell's recent diplomacy in the Middle East, may never reach the conclusion of its first phase. To date, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has yet to accept the initiative developed Adam Hanieh • 12 min read
Current Analysis Appointing Abu Mazen: A Drama with Two Enactments The Palestinian Legislative Council's approval of the cabinet of newly appointed Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas on April 29, 2003 completed a political drama with two enactments: one received with cheers by the international community and the other watched warily by a sober audience at home. Charmaine Seitz • 11 min read
MER Article Letters (Spring 2003) PALESTINIAN DEBATE Lori Allen is to be congratulated for tackling head on the thorny issue of uses and abuses of violence in the Arab-Israeli conflict (“Palestinians Debate ‘Polite’ Resistance to Occupation,” MER 225). But she has missed the mark in crucial areas. (Author not identified) • 7 min read
Current Analysis The Palestinian Elections That Never Were January 20, 2003—the scheduled date of elections that existed on Palestinian Authority letterhead alone—passed with the incumbent presidential candidate nearly imprisoned in his offices in the West Bank town of Ramallah. Several weeks earlier, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat candidly told reporters Charmaine Seitz • 11 min read
MER Article Reading Palestine-Israel WORKS REVIEWED Gershon Shafir and Yoav Peled, Being Israeli: The Dynamics of Multiple Citizenship (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh, Birthing the Nation: Strategies of Palestinian Women in Israel (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002). Nadia Abu El-Haj, F Kaylin Goldstein • 8 min read
MER Article Learning Lessons from the Algerian War of Independece On May 9, 2002, Tony Judt, professor of history at New York University, began an essay on Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation with a quote from Raymond Aron’s book on the 1954-1962 Algerian War of Independence from French colonial rule. [1] France, Aron argued, could not impose its administ Nancy Gallagher • 12 min read
