- May 10, 2025
Palestine/Israel
A Kuffiya for Tony Benn – The British Warrior Who ‘Matured with Age’
By Ramzy Baroud Long before the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment campaign inched slowly from the fringes of global solidarity with Palestinians to take center stage, Tony Benn had been advocating a boycott of Israel with unrestricted conviction, for years. “Britain should offer its support for this strategy by stopping all arms sales to Israel, introducing […]
Al-Aqsa vs. Israel: The Lurking Danger Beneath
By Ramzy Baroud Something sinister is brewing around and below al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem, and it has the hallmark of a familiar Israeli campaign to strip the Mosque of its Muslim Arab identity. This time around, however, the stakes are much higher. The status of al-Aqsa mosque is unparalleled within the context of […]
Omar and the Checkpoint: Everyday a Nightmare
By Ramzy Baroud Omar is a 7-year-old boy from Gaza. His family managed to obtain the necessary permits that allowed him to cross the Erez checkpoint to Jerusalem, through the West Bank, in order to undergo surgery. He was accompanied by his father. On the way back, the boy and his father were stopped at […]
The Strange but ‘Stable’ Alliance: US Senate Await Israeli Instructions
By Ramzy Baroud Israel is often viewed by Washington politicians as the most ‘stable’ ally in the Middle East. But stability from the American perspective can mean many things. Lead amongst them is that the ‘ally’ must be unconditionally loyal to the diktats of the US administration. This rule has proven to be true since […]
The Whitewashing of Ariel Sharon
By Ramzy Baroud The death of former Israeli leader Ariel Sharon enlivened US media’s interest in the legacy of a man considered by many a war criminal, and by some a hero. In fact, the supposed heroism of Sharon was at the heart of CNN coverage of his death on January 11. Sharon spent his […]
2014: Failure of Palestinian Authority, BDS Success to Continue
By Ramzy Baroud 2013 was a year in which the so-called peace process charade was allowed to continue, leading Palestinians on yet another futile journey of broken promises. Meanwhile, the Israeli colonial project in the West Bank and East Jerusalem carried on unabated. But it was not entirely a year of doom and gloom either, […]
BDS: Permanent Address for Palestinian Solidarity
By Ramzy Baroud The intellectual dishonesty of Israel’s supporters is appalling. But in some odd way, it is also understandable. How else could they respond to the massively growing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign? When a non-violent campaign – empowered by thousands of committed civil society activists from South Africa to Sweden and most […]
With Leaders Like These: Yet a New Threshold for Gaza’s Misery
By Ramzy Baroud It is impossible to predict the future. But one can state with a degree of certainty that little good can possibly be awaiting Palestinians when their political leadership seems to value their ties with Israel more than the fate of Gaza and all of its inhabitants. An exaggeration? Hardly. In an interview […]
Underneath the Washed White Wall of Cynicism and Hope
By Ramzy Baroud – Outpost Magazine (Lebanon) The houses in my old refugee camp felt enormous. My neighbors’ homes had grown into strange dimensions because they had to make use of every inch of available space out of desperation. My old house stood still and unbending, vacant of glory and burdened with memories. It was […]
The Plot Thickens: Gaza is Flooded with Sewage and Conspiracies
By Ramzy Baroud The latest punishment of Gaza may seem like another familiar plot to humiliate the strip to the satisfaction of Israel, Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority, and the military-controlled Egyptian government. But something far more sinister is brewing. This time, the collective punishment of Gaza arrives in the form of raw sewage that is […]
As Gaza Dies Slowly, Waiting Game is on
By Ramzy Baroud Since the Hamas election victory in January 2006 — and particularly after the Hamas-Fatah clashes and split between Gaza and the West Bank in the summer of 2007 — Gaza has undergone a disturbing human experiment, whose toll is unprecedented in the history of the impoverished Strip. The plotters involve the usual […]
People’s History of Gaza and Egypt: The Bond Cannot Be Broken
By Ramzy Baroud Egypt’s new ruler, General Abdul Fatah al-Sisi, may not realize that the bond between Egypt, Palestine and especially Gaza is beyond historic, and simply cannot be severed with border restrictions, albeit they have caused immense suffering for many Palestinians. Gaza is being ‘collectively punished’, and is now facing economic hardship and a […]
Oslo Dead but Still Matters: Abbas’s Village Leagues and Palestinian Silence
By Ramzy Baroud Suppose several armored vehicles belonging to a branch of the Palestinian Authority raided an Israeli border village at the eve of a new round of peace negotiations. One can picture PA President Mahmoud Abbas defending the killings, stating that the attack was made in the cause of protecting the security of the […]
Back to Square None: Netanyahu, Abbas to Resume ‘Peace Process’ that Never Was
By Ramzy Baroud The political peddlers, think-tank experts and media professionals are all back in full force. They want us to believe that US Secretary of State John Kerry has done what others have failed to do. On his sixth trip to the Middle East during his post, and following intense shuttle diplomacy likened to […]
On Hamas, Fatah and the Squandered Years: When ‘Unity’ Loses Its Meaning
By Ramzy Baroud When Hamas and Fatah representatives met in Gaza on June 04, there was little media fanfare. In fact, neither party expected much attention to their ‘unity talks’ aside from the occasional references to ‘national reconciliation’, ‘building bridges’ and the ‘obstacles’ along the way. And since then, there was yet more proof that […]
No More Tunnels Please: Gaza Held Hostage to Egypt’s Turmoil
By Ramzy Baroud Air of uncertainty is engulfing most matters related to Egypt. Since the Egyptian revolt started over two years ago, the country remains hostage to a barefaced power struggle with many destructive implications that have polarized society in unprecedented ways, perhaps in all of Egypt’s modern history. And while in Egypt itself nothing […]
Church of Scotland and Hawking: Challenging Israel
By Ramzy Baroud The global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement has scored two major victories in May starting with a groundbreaking report issued by the Church of Scotland. It was followed by an equally courageous decision by internationally renowned cosmologist and physicist Stephen Hawking to boycott an Israeli conference. These two important developments have […]
Israel, Hawking and the Pressing Question of Boycott
By Ramzy Baroud It is an event “of cosmic proportions”, said one Palestinian academic, a befitting description regarding Stephen Hawking’s decision to boycott an Israeli academic conference slated for next June. It was also a decisive moral call which was communicated on May 8 by Cambridge University, where Hawking is a professor. Hawking is a […]
A Hundred Deir Yassin and Counting: Beit Daras and the Buried History of Massacres
By Ramzy Baroud Few with any sense of intellectual or historical integrity would still question the bloody massacre that took place in the village of Deir Yassin 65 years ago, claiming the lives of over 100 innocent Palestinians. Attempts at covering up the massacre have been dwarfed by grim details by well-respected historians, including some […]
Gaza’s Siege Intensifies: The Plan to ‘Moderate’ Hamas, Control Gaza
By Ramzy Baroud On September 17, 2012, Ismail Haniyeh, Prime Minister of the Hamas government in Gaza, made another appeal to his Egyptian counterpart Hisham Kandil to consider setting up a free trade area between Gaza and Egypt. The reasonable idea would allow Egypt to support Gaza’s ragged economy while sparing Cairo the political fallout […]
After Obama’s Israel Visit: What’s Left for Palestinians?
By Ramzy Baroud ‘Obama didn’t accomplish much of substance,’ is how Dana Milbank characterized US President Barack Obama’s 3-day visit to Israel and the Middle East. In an opinion piece in the Washington Post on March 22, Milbank outlined ‘substance’ as “obvious progress toward talks with the Palestinians (..) new ground in deterring Iran’s nuclear […]
Obama’s Peace Antics in Israel – Four More Years of This?
By Ramzy Baroud At the precise moment US President Barack Obama’s Air Force One touched down at Ben Gurion Airport on March 20, persisting illusions quickly began to shatter. And as he walked on the red carpet, showered with accolades and warm embraces of top Israeli government and military officials, a new/old reality began to […]
Of Hope and Pain: Rachel Corrie’s Rafah Legacy
By Ramzy Baroud ‘Hi Papa .. Don’t worry about me too much, right now I am most concerned that we are not being effective. I still don’t feel particularly at risk. Rafah has seemed calmer lately,’ Rachel Corrie wrote to her father, Craig, from Rafah, a town located at the southern end of the Gaza […]
Funding and Denouncing Israeli Occupation: Hypocritical EU Must Make a Stand
By Ramzy Baroud More bad news emerged from Israel in recent weeks. Indeed, good news is seldom associated with Israel and its military occupation and institutionalized discrimination and mistreatment of Palestinians. But now even those international organizations that are often supportive of Israel’s militancy seem to be joining the consensus that Tel Aviv is on […]
Photographing Tragedy: What the Victims Actually Want
By Ramzy Baroud When one looks at scenes of feeling refugees from Syria, browse through images of their squalid refugee camps, hears their plea for solidarity, for mercy, for God’s help to end their suffering, one finds eerie similarities between their experiences and those of Palestinians, Lebanese, Iraqis. The worse part of the tragedy, however, […]
What Palestinians Can Expect from Obama
By Ramzy Baroud – Special to Gulf News Judging by the final statement of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Summit held in Cairo on February 6-7, Arab and Muslim countries have little to offer Palestinians — or anyone else for that matter — apart from the ever-predictable rhetoric and promises of financial assistance. Fiery speeches […]
New Actors in Palestinian Peace Charade
By Ramzy Baroud Despite much saber-rattling by Israel and the US administration and hyped-up expectations by the Palestinian leadership, the recognition of Palestine as a non-member observer state last November is fast becoming yet another footnote in the protracted conflict. Only hours after the announcement of Palestinian’s "state" status, Israel had its own to make: […]
The Palestinian Prisoners’ Intifada
By Ramzy Baroud If Palestinian leaders only knew how extraneous their endless rounds of “unity” talks have become, they might cease their enthusiastic declarations to world media about yet another scheduled meeting or another. At this point, few Palestinians have hope that their “leadership” has their best interests in mind. Factional interests reign supreme and […]
The Forgotten Palestinians: Factionalism and Its Discontents
By Ramzy Baroud In and around the southern mountains of Hebron (Al Khalil) there are thousands of people who dwell in tents, huts and caves. Before Israel came to existence in 1948, they moved about unhindered in the vast area, tending to their crops, sheep and traditional way of life as they had done for […]
History of the People: Articulating ‘Palestine’ Despite Israeli Hasbara
By Ramzy Baroud What does a Palestinian farmer who is living in a village tucked in between the secluded West Bank hills, a prisoner on hunger strike in an Israeli jail and a Palestinian refugee roaming the Middle East for shelter all have in common? They are all characters in one single, authentic, solid and […]
