In foreign relations, it is a longtime maxim that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” But despite its recent shift against the regime in Syria, that rule has done nothing, so far, for Hamas with the American government. The abrupt smashing of a decades-long bond between Hamas, which is designated by the United…
To understand the new unity agreement between the two Palestinian factions, Fatah and Hamas, it helps to recall the story of the village beggar and his cake. It happened once that the village beggar asked the rabbi for a ruble to buy some food. An hour later the rabbi saw the beggar in the market,…
Is Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad on his way out? Jonathan Tobin certainly seems to think so. In a blog post for Commentary, where he is the editor, he posits that Fayyad’s approach to governance and to foreign affairs places him outside the Palestinian mainstream. Citing Fayyad’s comments in an interview with the Jewish Chronicle…
I was last in Ramallah a year and a half ago, and the change since then is striking. The headquarters of the once-feared Palestine Liberation Organization had been on the second floor of a nondescript office building above a furniture store; now it is in a gleaming office tower adjacent to the sprawling compound of…
He is the Palestinians’ most famous prisoner and most popular politician. Now Marwan Barghouti is speaking to the American public, through the voice of his wife. Every 15 days, Fadwa Barghouti is allowed to visit her husband in an Israeli prison, where he has served 10 years of five consecutive life sentences for helping to…
If you’ve been following the news in the American and international press, you’ve probably heard that the unity talks between Fatah and Hamas have reached a new and alarming phase. According to an Associated Press report that’s been widely reproduced, Hamas has agreed to join the Fatah-dominated umbrella Palestine Liberation Organization, the body that has…
I was not in Stockholm in 1988. More precisely, I had declined an invitation to join what turned out to be a five-person delegation of American Jews who flew to Stockholm to meet with Yasser Arafat. I had cogent reasons for demurring, but I applauded the gumption of the five who went, and was pleasantly…
In the delicate Middle East, leaders are constantly watching their backs. But not quite enough, so it seems. Of all the hazards facing Ismail Haniyeh — Palestinian Prime Minister, according to his organization Hamas, a pretender to the throne, according to Fatah, and a terrorist, according to Israel — who would have thought that the…
100% of profits support our journalism
