Annie's New Letters (& notes): Al Jazeera

Showing posts with label Al Jazeera. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 11, 2026

"Insane how little media coverage the occupied West Bank gets while Israel steals more land and terrorizes Palestinians every, single, day." Assal Rad

Please FOLLOW HER: Assal Rad

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes or watch videos) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]

Assal Rad

@AssalRad

https://x.com/AssalRad/status/2087088992999309741

Al Jazeera English

@AJEnglish

BREAKING: Israeli military continues attacks and raids across the occupied West Bank, with arrests, home raids, and forced displacement reported in several areas. LIVE updates: aje.news/s92crs

Escalation in settler attacks in occupied West Bank driven by upcoming Israeli elections

The recent escalation in settler attacks against Palestinians is state-sponsored and driven by the upcoming Israeli elections at the end of October, according to Ubai Al-Aboudi, a human rights advocate and former executive director of the Bisan Center for Research and Development.

“As a policy and a way to promote their policies or to promote themselves among the general electorate, the Israeli politicians that are now in charge of the government are giving more of a free hand and encouraging settlers even more to do these kinds of widespread attacks, pogroms, ethnic cleansing operations against Palestinians,” Al-Aboudi said.

Al-Aboudi noted that the surge in violence is also linked to a potential change in government in October.

“So, the settlers also understand that any new government might not be as lenient towards them, towards the ethnic cleansing process that they are taking right now on the ground,” he said, emphasising that the primary objective is to displace Palestinians from their land.

“The fact [is] that Israelis, through the government policy, through their genocidal policies, through their support of the settler militias … have been trying to push Palestinians out of our lands, to drive us away to make us refugees again,” Al-Aboudi added. https://aje.news/suhi9z?update=4845765

ANALYSIS

Israeli illegal settlement enterprise aimed at denying Palestinians their rights

Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise in the occupied West Bank is aimed at preventing Palestinians from exercising their rights and ultimately preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state, political analyst Xavier Abu Eid has told Al Jazeera.

“The effect on Palestinians is exactly the same. It’s part of the same settler enterprise aimed at preventing Palestinians from enjoying their rights in their homeland,” Abu Eid said. He said the issue of Israeli settlers has been normalised locally and internationally, with attempts to distinguish between those living in illegal settlements for economic reasons and more ideologically driven settlers.

But Abu Eid said such distinctions obscure the broader system Israel has built around illegal settlements. “It’s not just about settlements and housing, but about the whole infrastructure,” he said.

As an example, Abu Eid said it is cheaper to travel by bus to an Israeli settlement than to a Palestinian village in the West Bank, highlighting how Israel prioritises illegal settlements and the infrastructure serving them.

He described this as part of a creeping takeover of Palestinian land, accompanied by restrictions on Palestinian movement and the seizure of more territory for Israeli settlers. https://aje.news/suhi9z?update=4845425

Western Media manufactures consent for genocide https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/834977/dont-say-palestine-by-assal-rad/

Sunday, August 9, 2026

Israel’s ‘Green Rafah’ plan aims to fragment Gaza, experts say Analysts warn Israel’s new administrative zones seek to erase the Palestinian cause and force mass displacement.

Buildings lie in ruins amidst the rubble in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, December 8, 2025 [Nir Elias/Reuters]

By Mohammad Mansour

Israel has quietly given the green light for infrastructure work to begin in a designated area of southern Gaza, according to Israeli media, as it advances a post-war vision that experts warn is designed to reshape reality on the ground and permanently fragment the enclave.

Dubbed “Green Rafah”, the project backed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz is in eastern Rafah near the unilaterally imposed “Yellow Line”, the effective Israeli buffer zone squeezing Palestinians into smaller areas.

Army Radio, which reported the approval on Sunday, said the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office described the initiative as an Emirati-backed pilot project aimed at establishing temporary housing “free” of the influence of the Palestinian group Hamas.

While the Israeli military will reportedly supervise the installation of water, sewage and electrical infrastructure, Palestinian labourers will be subjected to intense security screenings by the Shin Bet intelligence agency.

Furthermore, strict limitations have been imposed on the project, with Israeli authorities reportedly banning the entry of “caravans” or mobile homes into the area until at least November.

Also on Sunday, Netanyahu said he rejects the 15-point plan for Gaza announced last month by the United States-led Board of Peace.

The plan calls for the disarmament of Hamas in stages and the phased withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Strip, but Netanyahu said an Israeli pull-out won’t happen until Hamas is fully disarmed.

As political negotiations over the future of Gaza stall, Palestinian political researcher Ahmed al-Atawneh warned that projects such as “Green Rafah” are designed to create isolated cantons under total Israeli administrative and security control. With this framework, he argued, Israel leaves Palestinians with only three choices: “Either they fully submit to Israeli policies, face death or imprisonment if they resist, or emigrate.”

Far from providing genuine humanitarian relief, al-Atawneh said Israel’s strategy relies on stripping the Palestinian struggle of its political dimension.

“Treating Palestinians merely as residents rather than citizens with a national cause means, in practice, undermining and liquidating the Palestinian cause,” he said, adding that this approach aligns with the broad consensus in the Israeli parliament rejecting any Palestinian political entity.

Al-Atawneh further criticised Arab involvement in such frameworks outside of a unified Palestinian consensus. “If any country is involved in this project based on the Israeli vision and away from the Palestinians, it raises many questions and essentially serves Israeli policy, rather than genuinely assisting or relieving Palestinians,” he added.

The Israeli ban on mobile homes and delay of meaningful reconstruction of civilian infrastructure carry deep strategic implications, according to experts.

Mohammad Hamed al-Aila, a Palestinian researcher, pointed out that the humanitarian protocol attached to a ceasefire agreement signed last year in Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh explicitly mandates the entry of temporary housing (caravans) and repair of civilian infrastructure.

“Israel has not adhered to these obligations, despite 10 months passing since” the signing of a ceasefire deal, said al-Aila, noting that Israel continues to stall while Hamas demands the full implementation of the first phase.

“Preventing the entry of caravans and postponing any serious reconstruction track cannot be separated from the broader Israeli goal of perpetuating the humanitarian catastrophe,” said al-Aila. “Israel views the humanitarian situation in Gaza as a tool of political pressure aimed at gradually pushing the population towards migration.”

Al-Atawneh agreed, suggesting that Netanyahu is using these delays to buy time ahead of Israel’s elections in October in an effort to preserve his far-right-wing coalition, all while pursuing long-term goals of demographic engineering and displacement.

The international force dilemma

In tandem with these administrative zones, preparations are moving forward to deploy a limited International Stabilization Force (ISF). Reports indicate that countries such as Morocco and Uganda may send small contingents of around 200 troops each, falling drastically short of initial plans for a much larger multinational force.

Al-Aila argued that these token numbers reflect Israel’s traditional tactic of superficially accepting US proposals while hollowing out their actual implementation.... READ MORE https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/8/9/israels-green-rafah-plan-aims-to-fragment-gaza-experts-say

Saturday, May 16, 2026

Historical reckoning: The push for the US to acknowledge the Nakba... On the 78th anniversary of the mass expulsion of Palestinians, experts say US ‘political amnesia’ continues.

Palestinian villagers who fled from their homes during fighting between Israeli and Arab troops, on November 4, 1948 [Jim Pringle/AP Photo]

By Joseph Stepansky

Washington, DC – It is a question that reaches a fever pitch this time of year for Palestinian survivors and rights advocates: Can the United States government create just policy in the Middle East without a full accounting — or recognition — of Palestinian history?

Thursday marks the annual day of remembrance for the Nakba, a period that began in 1948 with the mass expulsion of Palestinians and the creation of the state of Israel.

Since then, Palestinians have endured decades of displacement and ethnic cleansing.

But the US government does not recognise the Nakba, which translates to the “catastrophe” in Arabic, even as it continues to assert gargantuan influence over the region and maintains ironclad support for the Israeli government.

Under the second administration of President Donald Trump, the US has taken a further active role in Palestinian affairs, establishing the controversial “Board of Peace” to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, even as it continues to take a permissive approach towards Israel’s genocide.

When faced with the question of whether the US can responsibly address Palestinian issues without acknowledging the Nakba, Khaled Elgindy, a senior fellow at the Quincy Institute, believes the answer is simple: No.

“If you only acknowledge the humanity and suffering of one side, that forces you also to ignore historical realities that are still with us today,” he told Al Jazeera.

Elgindy said “political amnesia” has long defined the US government’s approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

For decades, the US has supported Israel with billions in foreign assistance and military aid, despite the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory and a system of segregation that rights groups say constitutes apartheid.

Since October 7, 2023, Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza has killed at least 75,000 Palestinians. Elgindy told Al Jazeera that the US has played a key role in underwriting the conflict.

“For better or worse, mostly for worse, the United States is inextricably tied to the Palestinian issue,” Elgindy said.

A fundamental – if long delayed – corrective step would be recognition of the Nakba, he said. “It is a historical reality that Palestinians have a collective trauma that is part of their identity and part of their political psychology.”

‘The ongoing Nakba’

On Thursday, US Representative Rashida Tlaib introduced a resolution to officially recognise “the ongoing Nakba and Palestinian refugees’ rights”.

It was the fifth consecutive time she has put forward the bill, with the latest version carrying 12 co-sponsors, up from six when it was first introduced in 2022.

In a video conference this week, she explained that it was necessary to draw attention to the Nakba, given that the human rights abuses against Palestinians continue.

“Too many of my colleagues in Congress like to act like … the state violence against the Palestinian people began with [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” Tlaib said.

“We know that Palestinian history has been one of the ongoing Nakba and the ethnic cleansing campaign since the creation [of Israel] in 1948.”

All told, about 750,000 Palestinians were violently expelled during the Nakba, displaced to refugee camps across the West Bank, Gaza and neighbouring Arab countries.

About 400 cities and villages were depopulated, with massacres committed in Balad al-Sheikh, Saasaa, Deir Yassin, Saliha and Lydda, among others.

Like in past years, Tlaib’s latest legislative effort is largely symbolic, with little chance of progressing in Congress, which remains predominantly pro-Israel.

Still, the latest resolution comes amid signs of shifting public awareness, with polls showing increasing sympathy for Palestinians and a rise in negative views towards Israel’s government. Polls have shown tanking support for Israel, particularly among Democrats, amid the genocide in Gaza.

Attitudes in Congress have also shown significant, if more incremental, signs of change. Though support for Israel was once considered sacrosanct... READ MORE https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/5/15/historical-reckoning-the-push-for-the-us-to-acknowledge-the-nakba

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES (or quotes or watch videos) IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]

The original Nakba

Abdel Mahdi’s sharp memory carries him back to his childhood, living with his parents on their land, among their livestock and property – a normal life, before everything changed.

Abdel Mahdi says he still remembers the heated discussions among families in Bir al-Saba when news first spread that Zionist Haganah militias were approaching, with some wanting to flee, and others insisting on staying.

The decision was eventually made to leave for Gaza, to the west, with the hope of returning in a few weeks.

And so Abdel Mahdi, along with his parents, three siblings, and the rest of his extended family, left, carrying whatever livestock, money and supplies they could manage.

“We all left … We walked for days. We would rest, then continue walking,” he says. “We carried some of our belongings with us. We never imagined it would become a permanent exile.”

The family initially settled in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood before later moving to Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, where the harsh realities of refugee life began.

“We lived in tents. The rain and wind would flood them, the cold was unbearable, then came the scorching heat,” he says. “There was hunger, exhaustion, long lines for food and water, shared toilets, lice, poor sanitation … painful memories.”

Right of return

“I remember my father and grandfather always saying we would return, and they told their children and grandchildren to hold on to the right of return,” Abdel Mahdi says.

But the return never came. Instead, decades of exile, wars and repeated attempts to rebuild life followed.

Abdel Mahdi worked for years inside Israel in construction, during a period when Palestinian labourers were granted work permits.

Together with his brothers, he managed to build homes and buy land, only for the current war to erase everything once again.

“We worked, built homes and bought land,” he says. “We thought we were finally compensating for something after the displacement that destroyed our families and lives. We thought it was over.”

“But this war destroyed everything completely,” he adds. “At the end of our lives, it brought us all back to zero. Nothing is left – no stone, no trees.”

Abdel Mahdi acknowledges that life in Gaza was never truly stable – with several Israeli wars and a years-long blockade – but he says the scale of destruction during the latest war is unprecedented.

“A Nakba at the beginning of my life … and another Nakba at the end of it. What can we even say?” he murmurs while staring at the devastation surrounding him.

The war on Gaza

Abdel Mahdi recounts how his life was turned upside down during the latest Israeli war on Gaza, beginning in October 2023.

This time, he was forced to flee his home as an elderly man, struggling to walk alongside his ageing wife and the families of his nephews.

He was displaced multiple times – once to the Gaza seaport area in western Gaza City, another time to Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

Before that, he had sought shelter in a United Nations-run school in Jabalia before Israeli forces stormed it.

He recalls the terrifying moments when Israeli tanks and soldiers entered the school during the early months of the war, as chaos, gunfire and screams erupted while loudspeakers ordered everyone to evacuate southwards.

“They forced us out of the school,” he says. “My elderly wife and I leaned on each other to walk. Some people couldn’t get out and were killed there.”

“We walked long distances until we reached western Gaza, together with what remained of our family, who had scattered in different places,” he adds.

“We were collapsing from exhaustion, but the shelling and fear forced us to keep moving.”

Abdel Mahdi says that he considered staying in his home and refusing to leave, unwilling to repeat what he called “the mistake of our ancestors” when they fled in 1948. But he says the danger eventually forced him to flee.

For the elderly man, displacement itself became one of the cruellest parts of the war.

“When a person leaves his home, he loses his dignity and worth,” he says quietly. “We lived in tents, in the sand, exposed to everything… We lived through famine and shortages of absolutely everything.”

“I wished for death with all my heart,” the octogenarian admits, his eyes filling with tears. “All I wanted was a concrete wall to lean my exhausted back against, but there was nothing. It was unbearable for both the young and the old.”

A taste of return ... READ MORE https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2026/5/16/from-the-nakba-to-gazas-ruins-one-mans-lifetime-of-displacement

Nakba: Jewish voices are challenging the stories Israel tells about itself A film director, historian and Holocaust survivor speak to Al Jazeera as opinions shift.

Stephen Kapos and Gillian Mosely at the London screening of Planet Israel [Beardvoyage]

By Indlieb Farazi Saber

London, United Kingdom – The lights come up slowly inside a cinema in London’s buzzy Soho district, but nobody rushes for the exit.

As the credits roll, one woman lowers her face into her hands. A couple sit motionless. In the row ahead, someone exhales and says “Free Palestine”.

This screening of Planet Israel: A Cautionary Tale took place on the eve of Nakba Day, the annual commemoration of the 1948 forced displacement of more than 750,000 Palestinians and the killing of thousands more during the creation of the Israeli state.

The documentary, set for UK-wide release from 5 June, explores how trauma, nationalism and militarisation have shaped Israeli society after October 7, 2023, and during the war on Gaza. Featuring interviews with historians, academics, former soldiers and everyday Israelis, the film arrives at a moment when old political certainties around Israel are fracturing — increasingly among Jewish and Israeli intellectuals, artists, rabbis and historians themselves.

“The media has not reported this,” the film’s director Gillian Mosely told Al Jazeera from her London home, days before the screening. “British Jews are being treated as a monolith, which I think is fuelling anti-Semitism.”... READ MORE https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2026/5/15/nakba-jewish-voices-are-challenging-the-stories-israel-tells-about-itself

Screenshot from Planet Israel, featuring historian Avi Shlaim discussing Israel and shifting public perceptions [Planet Israel] Historian Avi Shlaim, who is featured in Planet Israel, spoke of a rupture between Israel and Jewish communities around the world.

Wednesday, May 6, 2026

Know Her Name: Shireen Abu Akleh [a prominent Palestinian-American Journalist] spent 25 years making sure people could not claim they did not know what was happening. Then she was killed by Israeli military fire doing exactly that.

Know Her Name

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On the morning of May 11 2022, Shireen Abu Akleh put on her press vest, marked clearly with the word PRESS, and went to cover an Israeli military raid in Jenin. She was shot in the head within minutes of arriving.

She was one of the most recognisable journalists in the Arab world, a face millions trusted for over two decades on Al Jazeera. The bullet that killed her came from Israeli military fire. Multiple investigations, including one by the United States government, confirmed it. Israel called it unintentional. No one was charged.

Abu Akleh had reported from Palestinian territories since 1997, covering the second intifada, the siege of Ramallah and the daily reality of life under occupation when few Western outlets were present. Her death triggered a global outcry. At her funeral in Jerusalem, Israeli police beat mourners carrying her coffin. The images circled the world before her body reached the ground.

She spent 25 years making sure people could not claim they did not know what was happening. Then she was killed doing exactly that.

Follow Know Her Name — a new name every day.

#KnowHerName #WomensHistory #PressFreedom

Annie's New Letters (& notes)

Labels

Tuesday, August 11, 2026

"Insane how little media coverage the occupied West Bank gets while Israel steals more land and terrorizes Palestinians every, single, day." Assal Rad

Please FOLLOW HER: Assal Rad

Escalation in settler attacks in occupied West Bank driven by upcoming Israeli elections

Israeli illegal settlement enterprise aimed at denying Palestinians their rights

Sunday, August 9, 2026

Israel’s ‘Green Rafah’ plan aims to fragment Gaza, experts say Analysts warn Israel’s new administrative zones seek to erase the Palestinian cause and force mass displacement.

The international force dilemma

Saturday, May 16, 2026

Historical reckoning: The push for the US to acknowledge the Nakba... On the 78th anniversary of the mass expulsion of Palestinians, experts say US ‘political amnesia’ continues.

‘The ongoing Nakba’

Recommended Stories

From the [first] Nakba to Gaza’s ruins: One man’s lifetime of displacement. Nakba survivor in Gaza recounts displacement after 1948 and 2023 and his unwavering attachment to his homeland.

The original Nakba

Right of return

The war on Gaza

Nakba: Jewish voices are challenging the stories Israel tells about itself A film director, historian and Holocaust survivor speak to Al Jazeera as opinions shift.

Wednesday, May 6, 2026

Know Her Name: Shireen Abu Akleh [a prominent Palestinian-American Journalist] spent 25 years making sure people could not claim they did not know what was happening. Then she was killed by Israeli military fire doing exactly that.

Know Her Name

Know Her Name