Foreign Policy In Focus, March 23, 2003
by Stephen Zunes [source]
There has been a real fear in recent months that the right-wing government of Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon might take advantage of the international focus on the U.S. invasion of Iraq to increase its repression in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Few people realized, however, that one of the first casualties would be a young American. In December 2001, as violent Palestinian protests against the then 34-year Israeli occupation increased along with Israeli repression, the United States vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for the placement of unarmed human rights monitors in the occupied territories. In response, a number of pacifist groups from the United States and Europe began to send their own representatives to play the role of human rights monitors, even to the point of physically placing their bodies between the antagonists. Among these volunteers was Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old student at the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington…
Category: Israel and Palestine
Israel and Palestine
Pelosi and Sharon
By Stephen Zunes January 22, 2003 [source no longer available]
On Jan. 29, Israeli voters will face perhaps the most crucial vote in their nation’s history, between the right-wing incumbent prime minister Ariel Sharon of the Likud Bloc and the more moderate Amram Mitzna from the Labor Alignment. The reelection of Sharon – who has refused to negotiate with the Palestinian leadership, pledged never to withdraw from the bulk of the occupied Palestinian territories, and whose Likud Bloc is on record opposing Palestinian statehood – would set back any prospects for peace in the near future..
U.S. Declares Open Season on UN Workers
By Stephen Zunes January 10, 2003 [source no longer available]
In yet another example of the Bush Administration’s contempt for international law, the United States vetoed an otherwise-unanimous UN Security Council resolution on December 20 that criticized the Israeli government for a series of attacks by its armed forces against United Nations workers and facilities in the occupied Palestinian territories…
Swing to the Right in U.S. Policy Toward Israel and Palestine
Middle East Policy: Stephen Zunes, December 17, 2002
Also at OnlineLibrary.Wiley.com and ResearchGate.net
Don’t Blame the Jews for Cynthia McKinney’s Defeat
Common Dreams August 25, 2002 by Stephen Zunes
With the defeat of five-term Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney in the August 22 Democratic primary in Georgia, the U.S. House of Representatives will soon be losing one of its most outspoken progressive voices. This is very bad news for those of us who support peace, human rights, and social justice. It would be even worse news, however, if the blame for her defeat is placed primarily upon the Jewish community [source is no longer available].
A Bush Plan For Mideast Disaster
Alternet by Stephen Zunes, June 25, 2002 [source]
President George W. Bush’s speech on Monday actually represents a setback for Middle East peace. On the one hand, it is reassuring that, after thirty years of rejecting the international consensus that peace requires the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel, an American president now formally recognizes that need. The bad news is that President Bush is simply perpetuating the unfair assumption that while Israel’s right to exist is a given, Palestine’s right to exist… is conditional…
Aiding the War Effort
Alternet May 10, 2002 by Stephen Zunes
[source is no longer available]
The violence of the past year and a half between Israelis and Palestinians has left more than 2,000 people dead, torpedoed the peace process, and turned the streets of the West Bank and Gaza Strip into battlefields. As the U.S. reconsiders its role in promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace, the prospects for a final settlement that recognizes the security needs of Israel and the legitimate political rights of Palestinians seem worse than ever…
Challenging the Myths about the Failure of the 2000 Camp David Talks
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, May 10, 2002
[source is no longer available]
1. Both the Clinton and Bush administrations, along with leading members of Congress of both parties, have deliberately misrepresented what happened in the peace process before, during, and after Camp David, as well as what has transpired since the outbreak of the second intifada in late September 2000. This has served to justify a policy of supporting an increasingly repressive occupation army…
Congress Ignores Human Rights Groups In Pro-Israel Resolution
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, May 1, 2002
[Source] Republican Right and congressional liberals join together to show support for Sharon government despite reports by Amnesty and Human Rights Watch detailing gross human rights abuses. Despite new public opinion polls showing rising public concern about unconditional U.S. support of Israel, recently the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate overwhelmingly passed resolutions defending the policies of right-wing Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon in the occupied territories. Human rights activists are alarmed..
Why the U.S. Supports Israel
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, May 1, 2002
[Source] In the United States and around the world, many are questioning why, despite some mild rebukes, Washington has maintained its large-scale military, financial, and diplomatic support for the Israeli occupation in the face of unprecedented violations of international law and human rights standards by Israeli occupation forces. Why is there such strong bipartisan support for Israel’s right-wing prime minister Ariel Sharon’s policies in the occupied Palestinian territories?…
Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, April 12, 2002
[Source is no longer available] The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one of competing nationalist movements battling for a homeland on the same territory. It is not a religious or ethnic conflict at its root. The conflict is not intractable: the majority of both Israelis and Palestinians are willing to accept territorial compromise and share historic Palestine in two states side by side in return for peace and security. The root of the present war is Israel’s 34-year occupation of Palestinian lands…
The Bush Administration & the Israeli-Palestinian Stalemate
Foreign Policy In Focus October 1, 2001 by Stephen Zunes [Source]
Whether or not the shaky cease-fire in effect since the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States holds, the prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace remain dim…
U.S. Aid to Israel: Interpreting the “Strategic Relationship” (audio)
Report from a CPAP briefing by Stephen Zunes Jan. 26, 2001
Also at: The Internet Archive, ThirdWorldTraveler.com
WindowintoPalestine.blogspot.com & Palestine Center.
“The U.S. aid relationship with Israel is unlike any other in the world,” said Stephen Zunes during a January 26 Palestine Center presentation. “In sheer volume, the amount is the most generous foreign aid program ever between any two countries,” added Zunes… He explored the strategic reasoning behind the aid, asserting that it parallels the “needs of American arms exporters” and the role “Israel could play in advancing U.S. strategic interests in the region”….
Audio: The Evolution of U.S. Policy on Jerusalem: International Law versus the Rule of Force
For the Record No. 80, 2 August 2001
[Source & Audio, 40 mins.] July 26, 2001, by Stephen Zunes
“Recent moves by the Clinton and the current Bush administrations regarding Jerusalem have surprised even the most cynical observers of U.S. foreign policy for their disregard of … international legal conventions and their departure from the stated positions of their previous administrations,” said Stephen Zunes at a 26 July 2001 Center lecture. Zunes … explained the U.S. has become increasingly accepting of Israel’s unilateral annexation of East Jerusalem, which is in violation of international law…
Palestine: History, Actors, Prospects & the U.S.
Palestine: History, Actors, Prospects & the U.S. June 1, 2001
Foreign Policy In Focus By Stephen Zunes [no source available]
History: The land long considered by many Jews of the diaspora as their homeland had also been inhabited for centuries by Palestinian Arabs. Zionism emerged in Europe during the late 19th century as a movement for the ingathering of Jews to their ancestral land, with immigration increasing during theBritish mandate period following the demise of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I. A 1947 UN plan that would have partitioned Palestine in half, granting both Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs their own states, resulted in a war that led to Israeli control of 78% of the country. The remaining Palestinian areas, which became known as the West Bank and Gaza Strip, came under Jordanian and Egyptian control. The new state of Israel expelled the majority of the Palestinian population…
Mitchell Report on Israeli-Palestinian Violence Flawed
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, May 1, 2001 [source]
The report on the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict by the commission led by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell is a failed effort–not for what it includes but for what it does not include. The report’s recognition that the Palestinian Authority needs to do more to curb violence from the Palestinian side and the call for Israel to end its widespread use of lethal force against unarmed demonstrators is self-evident. Yet its failure to call for an international protection force underscores the commission’s unwillingness to support the decisive steps necessary…
Challenging Aid to Israel
Palestine and Israel
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, February 1, 2001
[Source is no longer available] Key Points:
* The U.S. has never supported the international consensus for Israeli-Palestinian peace, requiring the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the occupied territories and an independent Palestine alongside a secure Israel.
* The current Palestinian uprising is a direct result of the failure of the U.S. to support such a peace settlement based on international law and UN Security Council resolutions.
* Washington’s policies, including large-scale military and economic aid in support of the Israeli occupation, have compromised the credibility of the U.S. as an effective mediator…
U.S. Aid to Israel: Interpreting the “Strategic Relationship”
By Stephen Zunes, January 26, 2001
Audio at Internet Archive; Also at Window Into Palestine
“The U.S. aid relationship with Israel is unlike any other in the world,” said Stephen Zunes during a January 26 CPAP presentation. “In sheer volume, the amount is the most generous foreign aid program ever between any two countries,” added Zunes, associate professor of Politics and chair of the Peace and Justice Studies Program at the University of San Francisco. He explored the strategic reasoning behind the aid, asserting that it parallels the “needs of American arms exporters” and the role “Israel could play in advancing U.S. strategic interests in the region.” Although Israel is an “advanced, industrialized, technologically sophisticated country,” it “receives more U.S. aid per capita annually than the total annual [Gross Domestic Product] per capita of several Arab states.” Approximately a third of the entire U.S. foreign aid budget goes to Israel…
Camp David II: Clinton Should Pressure Israel, As Carter Did
Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes, July 1, 2000
[Source] It is highly unlikely that the upcoming summit between the United States, Israel, and Palestine at Camp David will the kind of positive results that came from the 1978 summit between the United States, Israel, and Egypt. At the earlier Camp David gathering, President Jimmy Carter was willing to pressure Israel to withdraw from all Egyptian territory seized in the 1967 war in accordance with UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338. President Bill Clinton, in contrast, has not supported total Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian lands seized in 1967, and he has actually pressured the Palestinians to allow the Israelis to maintain control of large amounts of their land, including Arab East Jerusalem, the historic capital of Palestine…