Middle East

South Africa lodges Urgent Complaint with Int’l Court of Justice over Israel’s Plan to Assault Rafah

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The South African government lodged an urgent complaint on Monday at the International Court of Justice against the plan announced by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to attack Rafah in southern Gaza, where 1.4 million people, most of them refugees from elsewhere, have been pushed by the Israeli military. So […]

Armenia

Jerusalem: Jewish Settler Movement makes bid for Large Expanse of Christian Armenian Quarter

The Conversation

By Svante Lundgren, Lund University | – The Armenian quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City is facing its biggest crisis in a long time. A Jewish businessman with connections to the radical settler movement is poised to develop a quarter of the neighbourhood’s territory, with plans to build a luxury hotel. If this goes ahead, it […]

Displaced and Refugees

Netherlands Judges Halt Export to Israel of F-35 Parts: “Disproportionate Civilian Casualties including Thousands of Children”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Dutch News reports that an appeals court in The Hague, Netherlands, has ruled that the Dutch government must cease sending spare parts for the F-35 fighter-jet to Israel. The spare parts are technically owned by the U.S., but are kept in storage at Woensdrecht Air Base. The news site quotes […]

Egypt

Egypt Threatens Netanyahu with End of Camp David Peace Accords if he Invades Rafah

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – It is being widely reported based on press leaks that the Egyptian government of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has privately threatened Israel. Cairo is said to have warned that the 1978 Camp David Peace Treaty will be suspended “with immediate effect” if the government of Binyamin Netanyahu tries to take […]

Israel/ Palestine

Israel: Rafah Displacement Plans Catastrophic, Unlawful (HRW)

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch – (Jerusalem) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the Israeli army and other officials to submit to the cabinet a plan to evacuate Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost governorate. Netanyahu said this action is necessary to attack Hamas battalions in the area. With a pre-war population of 280,000, Rafah is now housing […]

Arab Spring

Why, Despite the Arab Spring and Mass Protests of the 2010s, People Got the Opposite of What they Wanted

Marc Martorell Junyent

Review of Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution (New York: PublicAffairs, 2023). Munich (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – At the end of 2019, there was no shortage of articles looking retrospectively at the events that had shaped the decade of the 2010s. One of them was aptly titled “A […]

Iran

Little Room For Negotiation Between Iran And U.S. Amid Middle East Tensions

Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty

By Michael Scollon ( RFE/RL ) – Like two heavyweight boxers, the United States and Iran circle the ring — flexing their muscles without stepping close enough to actually trade blows. It is clear that neither wants to fight, but they also have no interest in settling their stark differences. That is how experts say […]

Israel/ Palestine

Netanyahu’s Position becoming more Uncertain as he rejects Hamas Deal to end War

The Conversation

By Anne Irfan, UCL | – (The Conversation) – The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has rejected a ceasefire plan put forward by Hamas, calling the terms “delusional”. Claiming that an Israeli victory in Gaza is “within reach”, Netanyahu has vowed to fight on until Hamas is completely destroyed. But the US, which is involved […]

Featured

Netanyahu Plans to chase 1.4 mn. Refugees from Rafah, then to Invade, as Biden complains, “Over the Top”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli newspaper Arab 48 reports that the Israeli army has agreed on a plan prepared for the land invasion of Rafah City in South Gaza. The city is the last refuge for over a million Palestinian refugees pushed out of the northern Gaza Strip by earlier Israeli military operations. […]