Category: Palestinian politics

  By Daoud Kuttab The four-minute video and 13 photos posted on the website of the Palestine News Network tells the story vividly. Members of various diplomatic missions to Palestine joined Palestinians in picking olives. The exercise was no simple picnic or an innocent act of voluntary work. It was another visible manifestation of the major problem…

  By Daoud Kuttab Municipal elections in most countries are not a big deal. But the Jerusalem municipal elections are a big deal for Palestinians, who have boycotted every election held in the city since 1967. Ever since the Israelis occupied east Jerusalem and unilaterally declared that the city’s two sides are now a “united city,”…

  By Daoud Kuttab For nearly two years, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior leaders have hammered home a single point: “Why are Palestinians refusing to negotiate with us?” Netanyahu repeatedly said that he would go anywhere — including Ramallah — to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and initiate peace talks. At one time, he…

  Daoud  Kuttab The world’s preoccupation with Syria and the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli peace talks have provided radical Israelis with the long-awaited opportunity to establish a regular Jewish presence on land around Islam’s third-holiest mosque, which they consider the holy Jewish Temple Mount. What was a once-in-a-season infiltration by radical Jews has now become a nearly daily affair…

  By Daoud Kuttab It seems that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu began attacking Iran and its newly elected president, Hassan Rouhani, even before the microphone at the UN General Assembly was turned on in New York. Without a proper introduction, except for recalling millennia-old Persian-Jewish relations, the Israeli leader launched into a blistering, take-no-prisoners…

  by Daoud Kuttab Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s official Twitter account made clear the goal of his late September visit to the United States. Before embarking on a plane Saturday [Sept. 28] for New York, Netanyahu posted on the 140-character social media site the simple statement, “I will tell #truth in face of the sweet-talk and…

  By Daoud Kuttab I received the following email Thursday, Sept. 26: Intifada Youth Coalition (IYC-PAL) invites the media to report on our protests across Palestine on Friday, Sept. 27, designated “Al-Aqsa Friday,” against Israel’s gross violations of human rights and continued brutal occupation of Palestine. –Third Intifada of Anger against the Occupation in all Palestine This…

  By Daoud Kuttab Declaring a problem to be dangerous always brings to mind the story of the man who repeatedly, but falsely, warned his fellow villagers about a wolf, only to find a lack of response when the wolf does in fact appear. This seems to be the situation unfolding in Jerusalem these days, specifically at the…

  By Daoud Kuttab So long as Palestinian-Israeli negotiations are not producing an agreement, there is at least one area that will continue to be a powder keg: the Jordan Valley. Actions on the ground in any conflict often reflect points of political disagreement. The US-sponsored negotiations, which are expected to last nine months, appear…