An Interview with Usama Halabi Usama Halabi, a lawyer, works with the East Jerusalem Quaker Legal Aid Program and is the author of The Druze in Israel: From Sect to Nation (Jerusalem: Golan Academic Association, 1989) [Arabic]. Barbara Harlow interviewed him in Jerusalem in December 1994. In November, the Israeli military court Barbara Harlow • 4 min read
Transfers and Powers The Declaration of Principles (DOP), signed between Israel and the PLO on September 13, 1993, provided the “agreed framework for the interim period.” [1] This was to be based on the establishment, through elections, of a Palestinian interim self-governing authority for a transitional period not exce Raja Shehadeh • 10 min read
Palestinian Trade Unions and the Struggle for Independence Not so long ago, to visit the Erez checkpoint on Gaza’s “border” crossing with Israel was to witness a modem slave market. Tens of thousands of Palestinian workers would wake up at 3 am and gather at Erez for the privilege of working in their occupier’s economy, predominantly in construction and agr Graham Usher • 13 min read
An Interview with Mahmoud Darwish Mahmoud Darwish, a well-known Palestinian poet, resigned from the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1993. His most recent book in English is Memory for Forgetfulness: August, Beirut, 1982 (California, 1995). The following excerpts are from an interview with Mona Naim in Mona Naim • 3 min read
Fading Flags The basic challenge facing the Palestinian Authority (PA) today can be reduced to the twin tasks of legitimacy and control. Any observer of the events that led to the bloody confrontations between the Palestinian police force and Hamas and Islamic Jihad followers in mid-November 1994 realizes that the legitimacy of Salim Tamari • 8 min read
Palestine on the Edge Since Yasser Arafat returned to the Gaza Strip in July 1994 under the terms of the Israeli-PLO accords, many Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank find themselves worse off than before. Tens of thousands are out of work as a result of Israeli closures of its borders. Social services Dan Connell • 12 min read
MER Article Arafat and the Opposition With the return of Yasir Arafat and the installation of a Palestinian Authority (PA) in Gaza and Jericho, domestic political debates within the Occupied Territories are likely to focus less on the textual detail of the Israeli-PLO Declaration of Principles and more on the political nature of the nas Graham Usher • 12 min read
MER Article Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature Edited by Salma Khadra Jayyusi. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992. 744 pages. Salah Hassan • 3 min read
MER Article The Islamic Movement and the Palestinian Authority Bassam Jarrar, a leading Islamist thinker in the Occupied Territories, is a teacher of Islamic studies at UNRWA’s Teacher Training Center in Ramallah in the West Bank and a member of the board of trustees of the Union of Islamic Scholars. He was among the 415 Palestinians expelled by Israel in Decem Graham Usher • 6 min read
MER Article Israeli Women, Palestinian Women Deborah S. Bernstein, ed., Pioneers and Homemakers: Jewish Women in Pre-State Israel (SUNY, 1992). Barbara Swirski and Marilyn P. Safir, eds., Calling the Equality Bluff: Women in Israel (Pergamon, 1991). Elise G. Young, Keepers of the History: Women and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Teachers Purnima Bose • 5 min read
MER Article Searching for Strategies In a heated student election campaign at Birzeit University in November, the oppositional “Jerusalem First” coalition made a striking spectacle as hundreds of its supporters marched smartly across the university’s hilltop campus. In a prominent position at the head of the march, female students from the Popular Front, clad Rita Giacaman • 8 min read
MER Article An Interview with Hanan Ashrawi Hanan Ashrawi, a professor of literature at Birzeit University, was the spokesperson for the Palestinian delegation to the bilateral peace talks in Washington. In early December, Ashrawi announced she would not serve in any official capacity in the new Palestinian authority, but would instead work t Joe Stork • 2 min read
