June 17, 2008

Tahdi'eh, and fading of two-state prospects

AP reports the following details about the tahdi'eh (ceasefire) deal that Hamas says it has now reached with Israel, with Egypt mediating: • The truce takes effect at 6 a.m....
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:03 PM | Fulltext link (23 comments)

December 22, 2007

Israel: a ceasefire with Hamas, or more militarism?

Binyamin Ben-Eliezer yesterday became the third member of the Israeli government-- after Shaul Mofaz and Ami Ayalon-- to support the idea of negotiations with Hamas over a ceasefire between Gaza...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:07 PM | Fulltext link (4 comments)

December 19, 2007

Hamas-Israeli ceasefire ahead?

AP's Sarah el-Deeb has an intriguing story on the wire today with background about a ceasefire proposal that Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh transmitted Tuesday to a reporter for Israel's Channel...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 02:45 PM | Fulltext link (49 comments)

December 15, 2007

WaPo: two good pieces on (refugee) Palestinians

Every so often, the WaPo does some real good. They are doing so this weekend, with the publication of two articles that throw some much-needed light on the intense harm...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:52 PM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

December 09, 2007

Washington losing struggle for Abu Mazen's soul?

Al-Hayat had an interesting report (in Arabic there) today saying that leadership sources in Hamas confirm that they have reached a "memorandum of understanding" with Fateh in preparation for the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:35 PM | Fulltext link (9 comments)

December 05, 2007

Olmert pokes finger in Annapolis's eye

In a clear challenge to the agreements reached in Annapolis, the Israeli government yesterday announced its plan to build more than 300 new homes in the east Jerusalem settlement of...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:40 AM | Fulltext link (4 comments)

December 03, 2007

My CSM op-ed on post-Annapolis diplomacy

Today's Christian Science Monitor carries the op-ed I wrote (last Friday morning) about the post-Annapolis diplomacy. The title is For Mideast peace, think bigger; Regional stability involves more than the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:05 AM | Fulltext link (2 comments)

November 27, 2007

After Annapolis: Bring the Syrians back in!

The bicycle is going forward, over rough ground, and very shakily. It might lose momentum at any time. And then, how many of those now perched atop it will tumble...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:45 PM | Fulltext link (13 comments)

Condi's conversion, Bush, etc

Two fascinating pieces in today's NYT. This one by Elisabeth Bumiller chronicles Condi rice's conversion from being a big Israeli-Arab negotio-skeptic to now being the cheerleader for Bush's extremely belated...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 12:04 AM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

November 23, 2007

Annapolis: Saudi and Palestinian dimensions

Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal said today in Cairo that he will attend the Annapolis meeting. I think this is a good decision. It will allow him to give the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:41 AM | Fulltext link (30 comments)

November 20, 2007

Any hope for Annapolis?

I would be so happy if the planned Annapolis meeting between Israel and the Palestinians succeeded. But succeeded at what? At orchestrating a pretty photo-opportunity? No, that would be no...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 01:41 PM | Fulltext link (39 comments)

November 12, 2007

Hamas "military" upgrading in Gaza?

Gideon Levy had a fascinating article in Haaretz yesterday, reporting this: The group of reservist paratroopers returned all astir: Hamas fought like an army. The comrades of Sergeant-Major (Res.) Ehud...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:54 PM | Fulltext link (19 comments)

November 03, 2007

Article in The Nation on Hamas and Hizbullah

I see that The Nation has put up on its website a teaser for a piece I wrote for them about a month ago, which is on the need for...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:38 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

October 16, 2007

Rice claims Egypt´s support as big achievement!

You have to believe how weak the US is in the Middle East when the administration claims that winning support from longterm US-aid-recipient Egypt for its latest Palestinian-related initiative is...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:34 PM | Fulltext link (17 comments)

October 12, 2007

Bush/Rice peace push floundering?

I know I haven't written much about the-- extremely belated and highly opportunistic!-- Israeli-Palestinian peace "initaitive" that Pres. Bush and Secretary of State Rice have been pursuing ever since Hamas...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:07 AM | Fulltext link (11 comments)

July 07, 2007

Crooke on Fateh, Hamas

I recently read and enjoyed the informative and generally very well argued review article on three recent books on Palestine that the British conflict-resolution entrepreneur Alastair Crooke has in the...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:08 PM | Fulltext link (3 comments)

July 04, 2007

Palestine: 'Parallel unilateralisms' revived?

Efraim Halevy, who was head of the Mossad 1998-2002 and Sharon's National Security Adviser for a year thereafter, has an important article in this week's New Republic in which he...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:29 PM | Fulltext link (16 comments)

July 03, 2007

Alan Johnston-- freed?

AP is reporting that BBC reporter Alan Johnston has been freed by Hamas from the clutches of the Gaza sub-clan/militia that has held him for nearly three months now, and...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:15 PM | Fulltext link (19 comments)

June 25, 2007

Ten reasons to talk to Hamas

1. Diplomacy is not mainly about talking to people you agree with, but to people you disagree with. 2. They won a free and fair parliamentary election in 2006. Fateh's...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:37 PM | Fulltext link (60 comments)

June 24, 2007

Discussing Jerusalem (reasonably)

Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:15 PM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

June 20, 2007

Hamas, the US big media, and the world

Ahmed Yousef, a senior political advisor to recently ousted Palestinian Ismail Haniyeh, scored an impressive double victory today by having slightly different op-ed articles published in both the WaPo...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:38 PM | Fulltext link (31 comments)

June 19, 2007

Understanding the Palestinian crisis

I have been scouring the web, trying to gain a deeper understanding of what's been going on in Palestine. So far, the very best account and analysis that I've found...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:02 PM | Fulltext link (9 comments)

June 14, 2007

Hamas takeover in Gaza; diplomatic stasis continues

Some good, if very sobering, reporting on the events in Gaza from AP's Sarah el Deeb is here. Doubtless JWN readers are aware that yesterday and today there were fateful...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:04 PM | Fulltext link (31 comments)

June 05, 2007

40 years of occupation (contd.)

Well, today is the 40th anniversary of the day the 1967 war started-- the war that brought under sraeli military occupation vast swathes of Arab land. Some of that land,...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 06:56 PM | Fulltext link (30 comments)

May 26, 2007

Living under military occupation for 40 years

What is 20 years? What is 40 years? (What is 59 years?) Twenty years ago, in the summer of 1987, I spent quite a bit of time in Israel and...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 12:04 AM | Fulltext link (11 comments)

May 18, 2007

Palestine open thread

So much to discuss and think about... Check out Laila el-Haddad's great writing from Gaza. Also this report from today's WaPo, spelling out quite clearly that, Israel this week allowed...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 09:45 AM | Fulltext link (47 comments)

May 09, 2007

CSM column to mark 40 years of Israel's occupation of the OPTs.

Here is my column in the May 10 Christian Science Monitor. (It's also here.) The title is The UN must drive Middle East peace and the subtitle is Global stability...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 11:06 PM | Fulltext link (14 comments)

April 02, 2007

Palestinians' lives in limbo (Part LXXXVIII)

Anthony Shadid has a great piece of reporting in today's WaPo from one of the bleak 'temporary' camps at the Jordanian-Iraqi border in which 1,300 Palestinians who fled from Iraq...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 01:46 PM | Fulltext link (8 comments)

March 28, 2007

Sewage-flood tragedy in Gaza

Laila el-Haddad has a great post on her blog about the collapse of the dam holding back a sewage lagoon in northern Gaza, which sent a flood of human excrement...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 12:52 PM | Fulltext link (19 comments)

March 26, 2007

The way forward in Palestine

Last December, when the co-chairs of the Iraq Study Group presented its recommendations to President Bush, the Prez angrily swept them aside, placing his emphasis instead on the planning for...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 02:06 PM | Fulltext link (12 comments)

March 15, 2007

Palestinian unity government formed

Congratulations to the negotiators of Fateh and Hamas who have been able to reach agreement on a governmental list that will be presented to the Legislative Council for a (now...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 03:04 PM | Fulltext link (5 comments)

February 19, 2007

J'lem 'Summit' fails: What's the alternative?

Today's three-way meeting in Jerusalem seems to have failed even more seriously than I and many others had been expecting. AP's diplomatic writer Anne Gearan reports that, Talks between Secretary...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 12:02 PM | Fulltext link (10 comments)

Rice's meeting with two other "weak reeds"

As I write this-- 10:30 a.m. Monday by Cairo time-- U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is meeting in Jerusalem with Israeli PM Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 04:29 AM | Fulltext link (1 comments)

February 14, 2007

Laila's blog featured in 'HaAretz'

I've been a huge admirer of Laila el-Haddad ever since I first read the brilliant blog Raising Yousuf (Unplugged) that she writes, mainly from her family's longtime home in Gaza...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:26 AM | Fulltext link (8 comments)

February 09, 2007

The Palestinian agreement; the Saudis' new stance

Please, please, please-- let's hope that this time the Fateh-Hamas agreement can be made to stick, and the hard-pressed people of the Occupied Palestinian Territories be relieved of the economic...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 07:49 AM | Fulltext link (46 comments)

January 28, 2007

New, weekly nonviolence events in Hebron

Jan Benvie, the very inspiring staff member of Christian peacemaker Teams (CPT) with whom I had the honor of working at our nonviolence workshop in Amman last October, is back...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 05:04 PM | Fulltext link (0 comments)

January 22, 2007

Soldiers and clowns in Tuwani, Palestine

This, from Art Gish, with the Christian Peacemakers Teams in At-Tuwani, Palestine: 18 January 2007 Israeli peace activists brought four clowns to the Palestinian village of At-Tuwani this morning to...
Posted by Helena Cobban at 10:10 AM | Fulltext link (21 comments)