FOA speaks to media consultant, author and editor of Palestine Chronicle, Ramzy Baroud about his tips and tricks of the trade and the importance of journalism and media in times of conflict, occupation and political strife. Social media and digital media has become a driving force for the future and the rise of citizen journalism […]
By Ramzy Baroud The Israeli ‘Right’, as demonstrated by a scary coalition of rightwing nationalists, ultranationalists and religious zealots, deserves all the bad press it has garnered since its formation last May. But none of this should come as a shock, as the ‘Right’ in Israel has never been anything but a coalition of demagogues […]
By Ramzy Baroud It is not true that only three wars have taken place since Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006 in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Other wars that were deemed insignificant or ‘skirmishes’ also took place. Operation Returning Echo in March 2012, for example, killed and wounded over 100 people. But since the death […]
By Ramzy Baroud By Friday, January 29, Palestinian journalist Mohammed al-Qeq had spent 66-days on hunger strike in Israeli jails. Just before he fell into his third coma, a day earlier, he sent a public message through his lawyers, the gist of which was: freedom or death. Al-Qeq is 33-years of age, married and a […]
By Ramzy Baroud The 12 million Syrian refugees may differ regarding the reasons why they had to flee their homes and country in the last five years. Yet, they are united in their plight and in the collective trauma of the violent dislocation they have all experienced. Half of those refugees are estimated to be […]
By Ramzy Baroud (With reporting from Yousef Aljamal in Gaza) Whenever Mariam Aljamal’s children hear the sound of thunder at night, they wet their beds. Their reaction is almost instinctive, and is shared by a large number of children throughout the Gaza Strip. Mariam’s three children – Jamal, Lina and Sarah – were all born […]
By Ramzy Baroud When ISIS militias swept into Mosel, Iraq, in June 2014, Ibrahim Mahmoud plotted his flight, along with his whole family, which included 11 children. Once upon a time, Ibrahim was himself a child escaping another violent campaign carried out by equally angry militias. In his life-time, Ibrahim became a refugee twice, once […]
By Ramzy Baroud Ali Abumghasib knows little about the current intrigues of the Fatah Movement, or, perhaps, he is just not interested. Although he has dedicated most of his life fighting within its ranks, he never saw his membership in Fatah as his defining identity. For him, it was, and will always remain, about Palestine […]
By Ramzy Baroud Although intended to inspire his Fatah Party followers, a televised speech by Mahmoud Abbas on the 51st Anniversary of the group’s launch highlighted, instead, the unprecedented crisis that continues to wreak havoc on the Palestinian people. Not only did Abbas sound defensive and lacking in any serious or new initiatives, but his […]
By Ramzy Baroud Taghreed has never been outside Gaza. Her family were exiled to the impoverished Gaza Strip when Palestine was ethnically cleansed, to make room for the state of Israel in 1948. She was born in Gaza City 30 years ago, where she dreamed of a world beyond the confines of sand, water and […]
By Ramzy Baroud Throughout her hunger strike, that of exactly 47 days, Hana Shalabi never slept consistently for a number of hours. In the first few days of her strike, she would doze off only to wake up with the sudden fear that someone was trying to hurt her. But after the first week of […]
By Ramzy Baroud When Egypt decided to open the Rafah border crossing which separates it from Gaza for two days, December 3 and 4, a sense of guarded relief was felt in the impoverished Strip. True, 48 hours were hardly enough for the tens of thousands of patients, students and other travelers to leave or […]
By Ramzy Baroud Israeli commentators, Yaron Friedman, of “Ynet News” and Haviv Rettig Gur, of the “Times of Israel” are clueless about the driving force behind the Palestinian mobilization and collective struggle. In two recent articles, and with unmistakable conceit, they attempted to highlight what they perceive as the failure of the current Palestinian uprising, […]
By Ramzy Baroud There is a possibility that you have heard of the famed British author, J.K. Rowling, writer of the popular fantasy series ‘Harry Potter’. While I knew of her books – through my teenage kids – I knew little about the author herself, until recently. Using generalised, ambiguous terminology that offered little by […]
By Ramzy Baroud Saeb Erekat is an enigmatic character. Despite minimal popularity among Palestinians, he is omnipresent, appears regularly on television and speaks with the moral authority of an accomplished leader whose legacy is rife with accolades and an astute, unwavering vision. When Palestinians were polled by the Jerusalem Media and Communications Center (JMCC) in […]
Interviewed by Info-Palestine (This interview was originally published in French.) Info-Palestine: Our interview with Ramzy Baroud is concerned with the situation in Palestine, the raging conflicts in the Middle East and the role of the International Solidarity Movement. — Dr. Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is […]
By Ramzy Baroud My first stop, after living for 22 years in a refugee camp in Gaza, was the city of Seattle, a pleasant, green city, where people drink too much coffee to cope with the long, cold, grey winters. There, for the first time, I stood before an audience outside Palestine, to speak about […]
By Ramzy Baroud When my book ‘Searching Jenin’ was published soon after the Israeli massacre in the Jenin refugee camp in 2002, I was quizzed repeatedly by the media and many readers for conferring the word ‘massacre’ on what Israel has depicted as a legitimate battle against camp-based ‘terrorists’. The interrogative questions were aimed at […]
By Ramzy Baroud The State of Israel was established on the ruins of Palestine, based on a series of objectives that were named after letters from the Hebrew alphabet, the consequences of which continue to guide Israeli strategies to this day. The current violence against Palestinian worshippers at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem is […]
By Ramzy Baroud When Zionist Haganah militias carried out Operation Yiftach on 19 May, 1948, the aim was to drive Palestinians in the northern Safad District outside the border of Israel, which had declared its independence a mere five days earlier. The ethnic cleansing of Safad and its many villages was not unique to that […]
أعزائي الفلسطينيون في كل مكان يقود المؤلف والمؤرخ والصحفي الفلسطيني د. رمزي بارود مجموعة من الباحثين والصحافيين للمساعدة في كتابة كتابه الجديد حول الشعب الفلسطيني. الفكرة من وراء الكتاب المساعدة في جسر الهوة بين السياسة، الأيديولوجيا، الدين، والجغرافيا، وذلك بالنظر للتاريخ، والماضي والحاضر الفلسطيني بطريقة تساعد في الإجابة على أسئلة متعلقة بالوحدة، والهوية والأمة الفلسطينية. […]
By Ramzy Baroud The crisis of leadership throughout Palestinian history did not start with Mahmoud Abbas and will, regrettably, be unlikely to end with his departure. Although Abbas has, perhaps, done more damage to the credibility of the Palestinian leadership than any other leader in the past, he is also a by-product of a process […]
Dear Palestinians Everywhere, Palestinian Author, historian and Journalist, Dr. Ramzy Baroud is leading a group of researchers and journalists to help write his new book about the people of Palestine. The idea behind the book is to bridge politics, ideology, religion and geography to look at Palestinian history, past and present in a way that […]
By Ramzy Baroud The legacy of Palestinian National Authority (PNA) President Mahmoud Abbas is draped in contradictions and utter defeat. His reign can only be regarded as an astounding failure, during which not a single Palestinian national objective was attained, nor a liberation vision put forward. Alas, the 80-year-old leader remains at the helm of […]
By Ramzy Baroud One-and-a-half year old Ali Saad Dawabsha became the latest victim of Israeli violence on July 31. He was burnt to death. Other members of his family were also severely burnt in a Jewish settlers’ attack on their home in the village of Duma, near Nablus, in the West Bank. A spokesman for […]
By Ramzy Baroud Another row is brewing between Israel and the Palestinian Resistance Movement, Hamas, over the release of Avraham Mengitsu, an Israeli citizen who, according to Israeli military sources, ‘slipped into Gaza’ on September 7, 2014. The circumstances of Mengitsu’s entry into Gaza remain unclear, especially since Hamas’ political leader, Khaled Mashaal, denied that […]
By Ramzy Baroud It would be fair to assume that Gershon Baskin’s recent article in the Jerusalem Post – Encountering Peace: Obviously no peace now, so what then? (June 24) – is not a mere intellectual exercise aimed at finding ‘creative’ solutions to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Baskin is a regular contributor to the […]
By Ramzy Baroud No matter what Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas does, his popularity is declining. In some ways, Abbas’ threshold for popularity was really never impressive to begin with, a trend that is unlikely to change in the near future. But now that a power struggle in his Fatah party is looming, and his […]
By Ramzy Baroud “What is the Palestinian strategy?” is a question that I have been asked all too often, including on 15 May, the day that millions of Palestinians around the world commemorated the 67th anniversary of the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians by Zionist militias in 1947-48. The question itself doesn’t require […]
By Ramzy Baroud In a western capital far away from Gaza and Cairo, I recently shared a pot of tea with an “Egyptian refugee”. The term is familiar to me, but never have I encountered an Egyptian who refers to himself as such. He stated it as a matter of fact by saying: “As an […]