CIAO DATE: 02/2013
Volume: 42, Issue: 1
Autumn 2012
From the Editor (PDF)
Rashid I. Khalidi
IF AMERICAN POLITICIANS, the mainstream media, and most of the supposed experts in think tanks inside the Beltway are to be believed, Iran represents a looming threat not only to its immediate vicinity (and especially Israel), but also to the national security and well-being of the United States itself. The ceaseless demonization of this middling Middle Eastern power is linked to its past involvement in terrorism and its current support for Hamas and Hizballah, but particularly to its presumed nuclear weapons program. Conveniently forgotten is that many of the same suspects now focused on Iran were pushing a similarly alarmist line regarding Iraq as a deadly threat to world peace in the lead-up to the 2003 war, in the wake of which it was discovered that the dire warnings of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were baseless. In this issue, Edward S. Herman and David Peterson examine the shabby role of a broad range of actors involved in this anti-Iran propaganda campaign.
The "Western Wall" Riots of 1929: Religious Boundaries and Communal Violence (PDF)
Alex Winder
This article analyzes the outbreak of the deadly 1929 riots in Palestine. Focusing on Jerusalem, Safad, and Hebron, the cities most significantly affected by the events, the article sees the violence as attempts to reinforce, redefine, or reestablish communal boundaries. It argues that patterns of violence in each city can help us understand how these boundaries had been established and evolved in the past, as well as the ways in which new forces, in particular the economic, political, and social influence of the Zionist movement and the rise of nationalist politics among the Palestinian Arabs, had eroded older boundaries.
The Iranian "Threat" in a Kafkaesque World (PDF)
Edward S. Herman, David Peterson
From June 2003 to August 2012, the International Atomic Energy Agency published thirty-eight full written reports on Iran's nuclear program and conducted numerous inspections in the country. Yet although the Agency has never determined that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, Iran has never been able to free itself from the relentless U.S. campaign against its nuclear program. This article shows how the United States has mobilized the multilateral institutions to place Iran's nuclear program on the international stage and kept it there. It also examines the parallel role played by the news media, which have resumed their role of a decade ago when they helped Washington make a fraudulent case for invading Iraq on “weapons of mass destruction” grounds. The essay contends that the alleged Iranian nuclear weapons threat is a U.S. and Israeli propaganda construct intended to mask their own real threat to attack Iran.
Helit Yeshurun
Mahmoud Darwish—“national poet of Palestine,” “voice of the Palestinian people,” cultural icon for millions of Arabs—died four years ago this summer, on 9 August 2008, at the age of 67 following heart surgery. As befitted a man whose poetry readings filled sports stadiums and whose poems set to music became anthems across the Arab world, he was given the equivalent of a state funeral in Ramallah, his last abode, with a eulogy by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and three days of official mourning. A political as well as a cultural figure, Darwish was among the principal drafters of the 1988 Palestinian Declaration of Independence. His poetry, especially during the first period of his career, memorializes the Palestinian experience from 1948 onward, not only the broad sweep of it, but also specific events such as Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, the Tal Za’tar and Sabra and Shatila massacres, the first intifada, and so on. Under Israeli siege and bombardment in 1982, he wrote an autobiographical memoir of his ten-year exile in Beirut titled Memory for Forgetfulness, frequently referred to in the interview that follows. Darwish’s poetry was always a mix of the political/collective and the personal/individual. But while it was the first that predominated through the 1980s, his poetry thereafter became increasingly personal. His 1995 collection Why Did You Leave the Horse Alone?—also referred to in this interview—is seen by many as a turning point, the first of his some thirty books of poetry (translated into more than twenty languages) to be almost exclusively personal. The increasing emphasis on the personal could reflect, at least partly, a certain political disengagement after the 1993 signing of the Oslo agreement. It was then that he resigned from the PLO Executive Committee to protest its unequal terms, though it is worth noting that he never repudiated either the PLO or the agreement itself. But whether political/collective or personal/individual, all Darwish’s poetry embodies at multiple levels the themes of identity and exile, reflecting not only his personal itinerary (which took him from Galilee to Moscow, Cairo, Beirut, Tunis, Paris, Amman, and Ramallah) but also—and especially—a state of mind. These themes are explored in depth in a long interview conducted in Hebrew by the Israeli poet and literary critic Helit Yeshurun. The interview took place on 7 February 1996 in Amman, Jordan, where Darwish was awaiting Israeli permission to take up residence in Ramallah. The interview was first published in the spring 1996 issue of the Israeli cultural journal Hadarim (founded and edited by Yeshurun). It was almost immediately translated into French by Simone Bitton, and published in the autumn 1996 issue of JPS’s sister publication, Revue d’études Palestiniennes. It was also published in a volume of Darwish’s interviews titled La Palestine comme métaphore (1998), edited and translated by Elias Sanbar and Simone Bitton. Darwish, whose rock-star status never flagged, was interviewed hundreds of times. What makes this interview worth publishing sixteen years after it was recorded and four years after his death is not simply its length (the current excerpts constitute only half of the original), but the peculiar interaction between Darwish and his interviewer, a fellow poet intimately familiar with his work who is also an Israeli Zionist (however liberal). The amity, commonalities, shared interests, and connections combined with often-conflicting worldviews imbued the interview with the bracing tension of friendly adversaries; the probing questions pushed Darwish to formulate his thoughts or explain himself on various issues that would perhaps be taken for granted and therefore not be broached or explored by an Arab interviewer. The interview also delves at greater length than elsewhere into Darwish’s relationship to the Hebrew language as well as his attitudes toward Israel and Israelis. Such exchanges, revelatory of the richness and complexity of the man, also bring home the humanism, breadth of vision, and inclusiveness that were always hallmarks of his outlook and poetry. The interview in its entirety was translated from Hebrew into English for the first time by Adam Yale Stern, currently pursuing a Ph.D. in the study of religion at Harvard University, as a part of a larger project. The end notes are also his. The Journal of Palestine Studies is grateful to him for allowing us to publish these long selections from his translation.
Walid Khalidi
In this forty-fifth anniversary year of the 1967 war and the annexation of Arab Jerusalem, JPS is publishing Walid Khalidi’s address to the UN General Assembly Special Emergency session of June–July 1967, together with a contextual introduction, as a reminder both of how radically the political landscape has changed these past decades and how much certain elements have remained the same.
Ottoman Brothers: Muslims, Christians and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine (PDF)
Najwa al-Qattan
Ottoman Brothers: Muslims, Christians and Jews in Early Twentieth-Century Palestine, by Michelle U. Campos. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2011. xii + 251 pages. Notes to p. 307. Bibliography to p. 335. Index to p. 343. n.p.
Unprotected: Palestinians in Egypt Since 1948 (PDF)
Reem Abou-El-Fadl
Unprotected: Palestinians in Egypt Since 1948, by Oroub el-Abed. Beirut and Washington: Institute for Palestine Studies; Ottawa and Ontario: International Development Research Center, 2009. xxv + 245 pages. Appendix to p. 225. Bibliography to p. 245. Index to p. 253. $14.95 paper.
Violence, Nonviolence, and the Palestinian National Movement (PDF)
Lena Meari
Violence, Nonviolence, and the Palestinian National Movement, by Wendy Pearlman. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011. xiv + 230 pages. Notes to p. 275. Index to p. 287. $80.29 cloth.
Reparations to Palestinian Refugees: A Comparative Perspective (PDF)
Rex Brynen
Reparations to Palestinian Refugees: A Comparative Perspective, by Shahira Samy. London: Routledge, 2010. ix + 154 pages. Notes to p. 162. Bibliography to p. 174. Index to p. 181. $128.00 cloth.
From Empire to Empire: Jerusalem Between Ottoman and British Rule (PDF)
Amneh Badran
From Empire to Empire: Jerusalem Between Ottoman and British Rule, by Abigail Jacobson. New York: Syracuse University Press, 2011. 181 pages. Notes to p. 217. Bibliography to p. 247. Index to p. 262. n.p.
Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews (PDF)
Oren Ben-Dor
Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, by Alan Hart. Atlanta: Clarity Press, 2009. Three volumes. Vol 1: The False Messiah, 336 pages; Vol 2: David Becomes Goliath, 303 pages; Vol 3: Conflict without End, 391. $48.63 paper.
Israel and Palestine: Reappraisals, Revisions, Refutations (PDF)
Haim Bresheeth
Israel and Palestine: Reappraisals, Revisions, Refutations, by Avi Shlaim. London: Verso, 2010. xvii + 372 pages. Notes to p. 380. Acknowledgements to p. 382. Index to p. 392. $34.95 cloth, $22.95 paper.
Edward Said: A Legacy of Emancipation and Representation (PDF)
Neville Hoad
Edward Said: A Legacy of Emancipation and Representation, edited by Adel Iskandar and Hakem Rustom. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010. xiii + 512 pages. Index to p. 548. $65.00 cloth. $29.95 paper.
A Child in Palestine: The Cartoons of Naji al-Ali (PDF)
Nadia Yaqub
A Child in Palestine: The Cartoons of Naji al-Ali, by Naji al-Ali with an introduction by Joe Sacco. London and New York: Verso, 2009. ix + 117 pages. $15.84 paper.
Arab Views (cartoons from al-Hayat) (PDF)
This section aims to give readers a glimpse of how the Arab world views current events that affect Palestinians and the Arab-Israeli conflict by presenting a selection of cartoons from al-Hayat, the most widely distributed mainstream daily in the Arab world. JPS is grateful to al-Hayat for permission to reprint its material.
Selections from the Press (PDF)
This section includes articles and news items, mainly from Israeli but also from international press sources, that provide insightful or illuminating perspectives on events, developments, or trends in Israel and the occupied territories not readily available in the mainstream U.S. media.
Photos from the Quarter (PDF)
This small sample of photos, selected from hundreds viewed by JPS, aims to convey a sense of the situation on the ground in the occupied territories during the quarter.
Update on Conflict and Diplomacy (PDF)
Michele K. Esposito
The Quarterly Update is a summary of bilateral, multilateral, regional, and international events affecting the Palestinians and the future of the peace process. More than 100 print, wire, television, and online sources providing U.S., Israeli, Arab, and international independent and government coverage of unfolding events are surveyed to compile the Quarterly Update. The most relevant sources are cited in JPS's Chronology section, which tracks events day by day.
Settlement Monitor (PDF)
Geoffrey Aronson
This section covers items—reprinted articles, statistics, and maps—pertaining to Israeli settlement activities in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights. Unless otherwise stated, the items have been written by Geoffrey Aronson for this section or drawn from material written by him for Report on Israeli Settlement in the Occupied Territories (hereinafter Settlement Report), a Washington-based bimonthly newsletter published by the Foundation for Middle East Peace. JPS is grateful to the foundation for permission to draw on its material.
Bibliography of Periodical Literature (PDF)
Norbert Scholz
This section lists articles and reviews of books relevant to Palestine and the Arab-Israeli conflict. Entries are classified under the following headings: Reference and General; History (through 1948) and Geography; Palestinian Politics and Society; Jerusalem; Israeli Politics, Society, and Zionism; Arab and Middle Eastern Politics; International Relations; Law; Military; Economy, Society, and Education; Literature, Arts, and Culture; Book Reviews; and Reports Received.
16 May 2012- 15 August 2012 (PDF)
Michele K. Esposito
This section is part 115 of a chronology begun in JPS 13, no. 3 (Spring 1984). Chronology dates reflect North American Eastern Standard Time. For a more comprehensive overview of events related to the al-Aqsa intifada and of regional and international developments related to the peace process, see the Quarterly Update on Conflict and Diplomacy in this issue.