On November 8, Arab Media Watch advisor Sami Ramadani was interviewed on BBC News 24, BBC 3 and twice on BBC Radio 5 Live about the US onslaught on Falluja. On November 9, he gives a talk on "Trade Unionism in Occupied Iraq" at the School of Oriental and African Studies. Last week he did a Ramadan Reflection piece for the BBC Asian network, and on November 10 he has a commentary published in the Guardian on events in Falluja.

AMW chairman Sharif Hikmat Nashashibi had an analysis on Palestinian President Yasser Arafat published in the November 7 edition of Ireland's Sunday Business Post. On November 11, he joins AMW director Muna Nashashibi and patron Dr. Ghada Karmi at a conference entitled "The Error in Terrorism? Political Violence and the Media".

http://www.arabmediawatch.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Calendar&file=index&type=view&eid=1594

You can listen to his piece on the BBC Asian network at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/asiannetwork/features/ramadan_2004/ramadan_reflections_wk1.shtml

Details of the conference on political violence and the media are at:

http://www.jc2m.co.uk/conference.htm

Following is Nashashibi's analysis in the Sunday Business Post:

Where now for Palestine?

I feel a sense of d??j?? vu about current events in the Arab world. Some four years ago the leaders of Jordan, Syria and Morocco passed away. Now so has the president of the United Arab Emirates, Somalia has a new head, and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat is on his deathbed.

While the successions in Jordan, Syria, Morocco and the UAE have been smooth, there is a great deal of uncertainty surrounding the fate of the Palestinian leadership. In fact the only consensus that seems to have emerged is that this is the end of the era of Arafat, a man at once hailed for the Palestinian cause's ascent and condemned for its demise. What follows it is open to much debate and speculation, not least in the occupied Palestinian territories, where I have been working with the UN Development Programme.

The mood among the many Palestinians I have spoken to, the vast majority of whom are heavily critical of their leadership, is one of great apprehension, of a pandora's box being opened. This, coming from a people whose daily lives and destiny are controlled by another, is striking. Everyone has their own theory, each plausible in its own right, but all agree that, for better or for worse, we are witnessing history in the making.

What I have found curious in the media's coverage is the constant questioning, and subsequent criticism, of why Arafat has not groomed a successor. Again people can argue this endlessly, but posing the question surely flies against the democratic principles which Palestinians want to enjoy, and which we want them to enjoy. A people who have been historically subjugated deserve an elected leader, not an appointed one.

In this respect, however, there are misgivings about the arrangements made should, or when, Arafat dies. It has been agreed that he will be replaced by a joint leadership comprising Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei and Mahmoud Abbas, the former prime minister and current secretary general of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

These are two unelected, unpopular figures associated by their people with much of what is wrong with the Palestinian Authority in terms of corruption and ineptitude, but endorsed by the US and Israel. Abbas was basically shunted out of office, and Qurei has threatened to resign as many times as he has been asked to, even within Arafat's mainstream Fatah faction and its military wing, the Al Aqsa Brigades.

Under the PA's basic law, parliament speaker Rawhi Fattuh is supposed to take over in the event of Arafat's death, but there is a consensus that he is far too marginal for this move to be practical or successful.

Abbas and Qurei have called for national unity, and they have certainly been helped by similar declarations from Hamas and Islamic Jihad, who have said they will strenuously avoid Palestinian infighting. However, it is difficult to say whether these declarations will hold in practice given the rivalries among and within various factions and personalities, increasing lawlessness, the presence of an occupying force, and deepening public disaffection with the status quo.

It is a consolation that this arrangement is meant to be temporary, until general elections can take place, but again the timeframe is uncertain. Local elections are due in December, but Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Sha'ath has said that "to go into national elections there needs to be a minimum amount of quiet, and withdrawal of Israelis from towns and villages. Once that is possible then elections are possible."

It is worth recalling that elections planned for early 2003 had to be cancelled because of Israeli restrictions on movement making it impossible for candidates to campaign and people to vote, and Israel has recently closed registration offices in occupied East Jerusalem. These actions by the Middle East's so-called "only democracy" do not bode well for Palestinian democracy and hence stability, which is in the whole region's interests, including Israel's.

As such, Israel also has responsibilities after Arafat's death. As well as enabling Palestinian elections, it should avoid endorsing any candidate - who would then be seen as a stooge - and any provocations on the ground. Israel has long argued, falsely, that it has no partner for peace. Obstructing the emergence of an elected Palestinian leader with a popular mandate would blow a further whole in this argument.

There is a big question mark over who would run and win in a general election. Marwan Barghouti seems an obvious choice. Currently in an Israeli prison for unsubstantiated accusations of "terrorism", he is untainted by corruption charges, he is an elected politician in touch with the grassroots, he is a fluent Hebrew speaker and, while upholding the Palestinians' right to resist occupation and fight for their basic human rights, he has also been a participant and advocate of peace negotiations. In fact, a recent poll by the prestigious Bir Zeit University confirmed that he is Palestinians' favoured choice as leader after Arafat.

Should Barghouti run, he would not need to campaign because he is a cause celebre, and should he win, Israel would be in the highly awkward situation of imprisoning an elected leader with subsequent diplomatic immunity, the same immunity shielding Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon from war crimes charges.

More immediately, however, Israel has rejected Arafat's request to be buried in Jerusalem. It should reconsider this decision as it could well incite further unrest, not least because Israel has no legal sovereignty over the holy city.

Currently in London for a few weeks, and having seen with my own eyes the horror of Israel's annexation barrier and the injustice of its settlements on Palestinian land, I have the distinct feeling that by the time I return to the West Bank, the landscape may have changed dramatically once again.