Malala, where is your money?
From Jerusalem, Al-Shabaka member Nora Lester Murad writes in The Hill Newspaper that she has tried unsuccessfully to track down the $50,000 that Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai gave UNRWA for rebuilding Gaza’s schools. “Problems with transparency and accountability are not unique to any one agency. Rather, it is a consequence of an entire aid system that has an interest in protecting itself from scrutiny to avoid being exposed as complicit in the ongoing denial of Palestinian rights.”
Since this op-ed was published, UNRWA has been in touch with Ms. Murad and Al-Shabaka, providing detailed information that had proved unobtainable at the time of writing, including about the completion of repairs to schools, and the import of 293 trucks of construction materials in October and November.
There Are No Centrists in Israel
Diana Buttu writes that “Israeli politicians who are called moderate would be considered right-wing extremists in other countries.”
Palestinian sovereignty: Between international recognition and security coordination
“Without an acknowledgment of the necessity to break Israeli security logic, there is very little to celebrate in the international recognition of a State of Palestine,” writes Al-Shabaka member Sabrien Amrov. “That the PA and the Palestinian people are expected to ensure that Israel, the occupying power, feels safe is taken for granted … International donors, including EU member states, should confront and rethink the reality that international development aid and state-building agendas supported by donor states are geared towards embedding this power dynamic…”
Subcontracting Repression in the West Bank and Gaza
“One high-ranking official from the Palestinian Authority’s Preventive Security Force told us: ‘We get lists with names’ from the Israelis. They ‘need someone, and we are tasked to get that person for them.’ These policies backfire. Palestinian forces lose the trust of local communities when they are seen as enforcing the illegal occupation and the losses of land and rights that go along with it.”
Analysis: The PLO must stop buying time
Ma’an News republishes our recent commentary by Executive Director Nadia Hijab and Policy Advisor Diana Buttu. The Palestine Liberation Organization and Palestine are constantly seeking new approaches to stop Israeli violations and secure Palestinian rights. But the tools already exist: They just aren’t being used to best effect, as Al-Shabaka Executive Director Nadia Hijab and Policy Advisor Diana Buttu point out. With Jerusalem burning, Gaza assaulted and under siege, and the West Bank remorselessly colonized, there is no more time to waste.
Unwilling to Change, Determined to Fail: Donor Aid in Occupied Palestine in the aftermath of the Arab Uprisings
A fascinating look at the aid industry in the occupied Palestinian territories that Al-Shabaka Program Director Alaa Adel Tartir and guest author Jeremy Wildeman published in the Journal of Mediterranean Politics. Tartir and Wildeman cite and draw upon their Al-Shabaka policy brief “Can Oslo’s Failed Aid Model Be Laid to Rest?”
Palestine & UNESCO: Protecting heritage and reasserting sovereignty
The first of two Ma’an installments of a policy brief from Al-Shabaka. The original can be found here. Palestinian leaders have not activated Palestine’s UNESCO membership despite the costly battle to join and even though it could help rebalance the skewed Israeli-Palestinian power dynamic.
Palestinian leadership must reevaluate liberation strategy
“Rather than continue security cooperation (a euphemism for being Israel’s security subcontractor), the current Palestinian leadership should turn its focus … away from closed-door negotiations to popular, nonviolent resistance that empowers Palestinians to achieve independence rather than perpetuating and deepening dependence on the goodwill of an ethnic cleanser,” writes Al-Shabaka Policy Advisor Diana Buttu, whose latest for Al-Shabaka, with Nadia Hijab, is “PLO/Palestine: Time to Stop Buying Time.”
Palestine’s statehood options: a dialogue
What are the choices facing Palestinians regarding their state sovereignty, and how best should they be pursued? The International Court of Justice (ICJ) or the International Criminal Court (ICC)? Read this debate by Al-Shabaka Policy Advisor Victor Kattan and University of Sussex lecturer Michael Kearney.
