Monday, March 15, 2010
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Synagogue opens in Jerusalem
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Rebuilt Hurva opens its doors as Israeli troops injure Palestinians in West Bank clash.
Synagogue opens in Jerusalem
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Rebuilt Hurva opens its doors as Israeli troops injure Palestinians in West Bank clash.
Iraqi PM pulls ahead of poll rivals
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Preliminary figures confirm strong lead for State of Law, followed by Iyad Allawi's Iraqiya.
US hand over of prison to Iraqis
BBC
The US military hands over control of a prison to the Iraqi authorities ahead of a larger troop withdrawal.
Somali deal to tackle militants
BBC
A powerful Sufi Muslim group joins Somalia's government to help tackle hardliners from the al-Shabab group.
Israel and the US: A bruised friendship
BBC
The BBC's Heather Sharp examines the current row between the US and Israel over building in occupied East Jerusalem, and asks if the relationship has really hit a three-decade low.
Iraqi PM pulls ahead of poll rivals
ALJAZEERA
Preliminary figures confirm strong lead for State of Law, followed by Iyad Allawi's Iraqiya.
Israel to go ahead with settlements
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Netanyahu defies calls from US to halt plans in Jerusalem that has sparked diplomatic row.
Israel to go ahead with settlements
ALJAZEERA
Netanyahu defies calls from US to halt plans in Jerusalem that has sparked diplomatic row.
Israel closes protest villages
BBC
The Israeli military has ordered two West Bank villages at the centre of protests against the "separation wall" are off-limits.

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AMW does not necessarily agree with or endorse the views expressed in either the newsfeeds or the events.
 


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Monday, March 15, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Action Alerts

Arab Media Watch urges its members and the public to watch the Dispatches programme "Children of Gaza" on Channel 4 tonight (15 March 2010) at 8pm, or on Channel 4 + 1 tonight at 9pm. The documentary is repeated on Channel 4 on Sunday 21 March at 4.15am, and Channel 4 + 1 at 5.15am.

read more...

Monday, March 15, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Analysis

By Max Blumenthal
15 March 2010
Electronic Intifada

One night about two weeks ago, while I was walking down Bleecker Street in New York City's West Village, I crossed paths with Norman Finkelstein. He was wearing a light jacket and eating a banana, seemingly impervious to the bitter wind and heavy snowfall pouring from the sky. I told Finkelstein that a YouTube clip of him parrying attacks from Zionist student activists during a speech he gave at the University of Waterloo was gaining popularity online. "Well, that scene hasn't been very good for me," he remarked in a near whisper.

The YouTube clip was an excerpt from American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein, a riveting 2009 documentary that has just opened in US theaters. In the scene, a female student tells Finkelstein that his comparisons of the Israeli government to the Nazis are "extremely hurtful" before she breaks down in tears. Instead of offering the demonstrative young woman a token gesture of empathy, Finkelstein grows indignant, angrily dismissing what he called her "crocodile tears." He then launches into a stentorian tirade about "the lessons of the Holocaust" he learned from his Holocaust survivor parents, booming above a chorus of heckles from pro-Israel students, "If you had any heart in you, you would be crying for the Palestinians!" While the young woman holds her head in hands as though she was bracing for an air raid, a substantial portion of the crowd leaps to its feet with wild cheers. Finkelstein may have regretted the spectacle he generates later on, but he seemed to be enjoying himself at the time.

With unfettered access to Finkelstein during the most dramatic stage of his career, American Radical directors David Ridgen and Nicolas Rossier provide a compelling look at one of the most roundly vilified academics in recent American history. If the film had simply rehashed the tale of Finkelstein as a rabble-rousing iconoclast who defied the Jewish-American consensus to agitate for Palestinian civil rights, it would have been prosaic at best. But by giving equal time to Finkelstein's critics, who proved unable to conceal their visceral disdain for him even though they have succeeded in isolating him from the intellectual mainstream, the film offers a devastating portrait of an academic establishment that will go to extraordinary lengths not only to rebut but destroy potent critics of Israel, even obviously idiosyncratic characters like Finkelstein. Even with his excessive tendencies and strident style on bold display, when seen in the shadow of his adversaries, Finkelstein appears more than odd -- he becomes utterly sympathetic.

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Monday, March 15, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Press Releases

During the week of 8-14 March 2010, Arab Media Watch issued an Action Alert urging its members and the public to thank Independent columnist Johann Hari for a commentary entitled "Palestinians should now declare their independence."

 

AMW met with Reuters and Agence France Presse.

 

Al Hayat published an article by AMW adviser Guy Gabriel on offensive Google results for the search term 'Arab.'

 

AMW adviser Tahrir Swift wrote to the BBC about its coverage of the Iraqi elections.

 

AMW liaised with the BBC, Reuters, Al Jazeera English, Al Hayat, Al Quds Al Arabi, the Global Arab Network, Arab News, JNews, Arab News Broadcasting, the Palestine Telegraph, the Arab Media Centre at Westminster University, Al Hiwar, the UN, the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office, and the Moroccan and Saudi embassies.

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Saturday, March 13, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Action Alerts

On 12 March 2010, the Independent published a commentary by columnist Johann Hari entitled "Palestinians should now declare their independence." It is arguably the best commentary to be published in the British press since Israel's latest announcements of new settlement construction. The Independent and Hari will no doubt be condemned for this, so please spare a few minutes to thank the newspaper and columnist.

read more...

Thursday, March 11, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Analysis

By Rime Allaf, Arab Media Watch adviser and associate fellow at Chatham House
11 March 2010
Bitterlemons International

The Obama administration is still an international novice compared to other governments around the world, but it can already claim to have achieved results with its approach to the Arab-Israel problem. Every time US officials have made a request or embarked on a trip aiming at resuscitating a process of some sort, they have been met, sometimes preemptively, with a significant Israeli gesture.

Indeed, Israel believes in confidence-building measures and will spare no effort in finding new opportunities to demonstrate them, as long as they achieve the desired goal: boosting its own position and its own confidence. And nothing can build Israel's confidence like the public rejection of a request, let alone a requirement, made by an ally: the closer the friend, the bigger the humiliation, the greater the Israeli self-confidence and the more futile the subsequent interchange.

read more...

Thursday, March 11, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Analysis

By Brenda Heard, Arab Media Watch member and Friends of Lebanon co-founder

11 March 2010

Antonio Cassese, President of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), recently presented the First Annual Report on the operation and activities of the Tribunal during the period from 1 March 2009 to 28 February 2010. With its remit to investigate the 14 February 2005 Beirut bombing that killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri and 22 others, the international Tribunal has been busy. The year has been spent "establishing the basic structure of the institution" and gathering "evidence against both the direct perpetrators of the crimes, as well as the 'perpetrators behind the perpetrators' - i.e. those senior political, military and paramilitary leaders who - although physically, geographically or temporally removed from the crimes - in fact bear the greatest responsibility." 

Cassese notes the "obvious discipline and sophistication of those behind the attack." He explores at length the theoretical ethos of the work being undertaken, a step he terms "indispensable." He concludes that:

"All the organs of the STL are not unmindful of the host of hurdles they will have to face, both at present and when they begin to discharge their judicial mandate fully. But they are prepared to surmount those hurdles with intrepidity. After all, the undertakings of anybody struggling for the realization of human rights, and in this case, for the vindication of the rights of the victims and the punishment of the authors of very serious misdeeds, is a labour of Sisyphus."

Intrepid as they may be, however, it must be remembered what the tale of Sisyphus has come to symbolise: a task that accomplishes nothing beyond its own futile implementation. The mythological figure, you will recall, was subject to the eternal punishment of pushing a boulder up a hill, waiting for it to roll back down, and then pushing it up again and again. 


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Thursday, March 11, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Press Releases

From the Council for Arab-British Understanding
11 March 2010

A British parliamentary delegation that returned from the Gaza Strip on Monday has welcomed the release of journalist Paul Martin, after the group raised his detention with Hamas officials.

read more...

Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Analysis

By Yousef Munayyer, executive director of the Palestine Center
10 March 2010

Mornings in Jenin, by Susan Abulhawa, is the story of one Palestinian family over four generations. It can be argued, however, that it is also a story about any and every Palestinian family. The novel begins in the picturesque village of Ein Hod in the north of Palestine. The Abulheja family leads the simple life that most Palestinian farmers led before their tragic dispossession in 1948. Love was plentiful in Ein Hod. Love for life, for family, for God, and for the land. This was the essence of a farming society for generation upon generation.

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Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Analysis

By Rami Khouri, Arab Media Watch adviser, director of the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut, editor-at-large of the Beirut-based Daily Star, and co-laureate of the 2006 Pax Christi International Peace Award.

10 March 2010

Watching US policy in the Middle East as I do these days from Boston, and seeing the deep and persistent tilt towards Israel, it is hard to see any breakthrough emerging from the US-concocted "proximity talks" to launch this week between Israel and the Palestinians. At the same time, it would be irresponsible simply to write off this effort as the latest example of that bizarre process that sees American romanticism or amateurism in mediating peace combine with strong American support for Israeli colonialism (settlements expansion), barbarism (the siege of Gaza that now results in stunting among Palestinian children), and recidivism (refusing to deal with the Goldstone Report on war crimes in the Gaza war).

read more...

Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Arab Media Watch: Press Releases

In February 2010, Arab Media Watch adviser Victor Kattan gave a talk on international law and the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict at the MIT Centre for International Studies, with an introduction by Noam Chomsky.

read more...

 

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