My letter to NYTimes editor
Israel and the Gaza War Published: September 24, 2009 To the Editor: Re “The Gaza Report’s Wasted Opportunity,†by David Landau (Op-Ed, Sept. 20): The only missed opportunity regarding the report by Richard Goldstone was Israel’s illogical refusal to meet with the United Nations commission headed by a respected South African jurist who also happens […]
Obama Should Publicly Declare Israel’s Failure to Honor International Obligation
The summit meeting between President Obama with Palestinian and Israeli leaders in New York yesterday might have been necessary. But for serious negotiations to resolve the decades long Middle East conflict a much more robust US involvment is needed. Washington can’t be neutral anymore and must announce which party is holding up progress.
In the Public Broadcasting Service
In the service of the community By Daoud Kuttab Jordan, like many other Arab countries, seems to be having a hard time understanding and dealing with the idea of public service broadcasting. After decades of government-owned and controlled radio and television stations, under King Abdullah, Jordan began a new era of opening up the airwaves […]
Freeze the settlement freeze
by Daoud Kuttab This cycle has become so bizarre and confusing that Palestinians are not sure whether they should hope for continued tensions with Israel (which usually means no new settlements) or for continued negotiations (which usually provide cover for building settlements) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to approve new Jewish settlements on the […]
Getting real about a Palestinian state
OPINION (LA Times) Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad is moving the process forward. By Daoud Kuttab September 10, 2009 Writing From Ramallah, West Bank – Something different is happening among the Palestinians. Their political leaders and civil servants are spending more time planning for a Palestinian state than criticizing the Israelis for their intransigence. […]
Palestinian Nationalism
by Daoud Kuttab Palestinian nationalism has been a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, one cannot underestimate the important role it played in pulling together the Arab people of Palestine under a unified and clear national goal. But at a time when major countries in the world downplay nationalism in favour of regionalism, […]
A phone call from Prime Minister Fayyad
By Daoud Kuttab Except for a short encounter on a plane years ago, I had never met in person Salam Fayyad. I certainly didn’t have any communications with him before I wrote the piece praising his two year planhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/daoud-kuttab/fayyads-brilliant-two-yea_b_270253.html for Palestinian statehood. No one from his office had sent me a copy of the plan […]
Fayyad’s brillian two-year plan for Palestinian statehood
Palestinians have finally started to act in a different way. Instead of cursing the occupation, the new strategy is aimed at building up the desired Palestinian state. The idea is to force the Israeli to the negotiating table rather than beg them to come. The way to do that is to work for a state […]
Americans and Ramallah youths
Americans and Ramallah youth By Daoud Kuttab I had to rub my eyes a few times to be sure that what I was seeing was real. The setting was downtown Ramallah. The event, International Youth Day. The participants were wearing white T-shirts with logos on the front and back and blood red hats. The International […]
Fatah closer to becoming a political party
By Daoud Kuttab Fatah, the key Palestinian guerilla movement within the Palestine Liberation Organisation, moved one step closer to becoming a political party. Having held its sixth congress for the first time in the occupied territories, it would be hard to continue pretending to be a liberation movement. Officially, however, the over 2,000 delegates, representing […]