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.

30 September 2009

At almost every international or regional gathering these days on how to fix the assorted problems and deficiencies in the Middle East, a common theme keeps popping up: What is the most effective and legitimate way for foreign parties - governments, international agencies, non-governmental organizations, universities or companies - to help achieve advances in areas like human rights, economic growth, social protection, democratization, or technological advancement?

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.

28 September 2009

Activities at UN headquarters in New York City Thursday commemorating the 60th anniversary of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) coincided with the latest political developments revolving around the meeting last Tuesday of US President Barack Obama, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Mahmoud Abbas. Political leaders on all fronts have wildly failed the Palestinian and Israeli people's right to live in secure, stable societies, while the thousands of UNRWA employees have consistently made sure that millions of politically abandoned and physically vulnerable refugees receive the basic services and common decencies that are the birthright of every human being.

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.

23 September 2009

No concrete results are expected from the September 22 meeting at the United Nations among US President Barack Obama, Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (I write this the morning of the 22nd in Beirut, before the meeting takes place). This marks the end of phase 1 of Obama's intriguing foray into Arab-Israeli peace-making.

I disagree with the widespread sense that Tuesday's meeting is mainly a photo opportunity. I think it is more of a farewell souvenir photo for some of the players - though who exactly is leaving the scene is not quite clear. I suspect that peace among Palestinians and Israelis will not be achieved by the trio of Obama, Netanyahu and Abbas. It is not clear, though, which one of them will depart the scene. They are all vulnerable.

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.

21 September 2009

The amount and quality of available scientific data on the global impact of climate change is staggering - as I rediscovered at a seminar organized by the Danish foreign ministry in Copenhagen this week. The debate that swirled around the issues of climate change and global warming just two or three years ago has vanished. There is much more certainty now on the nature and extent of the changes to the Earth's climate that can be attributed to the impact of human activity, mainly the burning of fossil fuels that emit greenhouse gases.

The collective technical knowledge of humankind, however, is not yet matched by parallel political will to act early and decisively enough to reduce the consequences of climate change, and nowhere is this more evident than in the countries of the Middle East. The contrast between the actions of European countries - individually or collectively via the European Union - and the relative inaction in the Arab world is staggering.

By Patrick Cockburn
16 September 2009
The Independent

The image of an Iraqi journalist hurling his shoes at President George Bush at a press conference will be remembered long after the war in Iraq is over. It is right that this should be so because the shoe-throwing by the Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi dramatically underlines the detestation most Iraqis feel towards foreign occupation.

By Ghayth Armanazi, Arab Media Watch adviser and executive director of the British Syrian Society.

The Diplomat magazine
September 2009 issue

In the past few months Syria has enjoyed a considerable upswing in its fortunes. Until recently perceived as a pariah state, Syria is now a country courted by many, including a number of those who formerly advocated its isolation.

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.

14 September 2009

I marked the eighth anniversary Friday of the 9/11 terror attack in the United States by flying from Beirut to New York - apt symbols of their wider American and Arab societies that in so many sectors are locked in an ongoing confrontation that includes the use of violence by both sides. This day of remembrance occurred at a time when the United States was refocusing seriously on waging the hitherto inconclusive "global war on terror" in Afghanistan.

This is a moment, therefore, to consider whether the "global war on terror" since late 2001 has achieved its aims, made the United States and the world safer, and reduced the number and capabilities of terror organizations around the world. The war in Afghanistan that is now escalating in many ways closes the circle on two parallel and deeply linked aspects of both global terror and the "global war on terror" that the United States would do well to appreciate more profoundly at this moment of remembering.

By Jonathan Cook, author of Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East and Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair.

8 September 2009

The Israeli government has launched a television and Internet advertising campaign urging Israelis to inform on Jewish friends and relatives abroad who may be in danger of marrying non-Jews.

The advertisements, employing what the Israeli media described as "scare tactics," are designed to stop assimilation through intermarriage among young Diaspora Jews by encouraging their move to Israel.

The campaign, which cost $800,000, was created in response to reports that half of all Jews outside Israel marry non-Jews. It is just one of several initiatives by the Israeli state and private organizations to try to increase the size of Israel's Jewish population.