President Abbas's decision not to seek another term as head of the Palestinian Authority complicates issues but it also clarifies them. The announcement comes at the end of a turbulent few weeks that saw President Obama humiliate him in New York by asking him to a photo op with Prime...

As first lady of the United States, Hillary Clinton was the darling of Palestinians and Arabs when late in Bill Clinton's term she uttered the hot button word, Palestine.

Since then Ms. Clinton has flip flopped depending on the political winds. As a senator for the state of New York...

The decree issued by Mahmoud Abbass, the president of the Palestinian Authority, has pushed the conflict between PLO's main faction, Fateh, and the Islamic Hamas movement to yet another stage. While many consider this move very risky for the future of Palestine, others feel that it is the only democratic...

The social and economic life in Jerusalem and the West Bank appears to be on a positive upwards trend. Salam Fayyad's government has been successful (with the help of donors) in providing economic growth; people are working, shops are stocked restaurants and cafes are full of paying customers.

An improved...

The angry political and public reaction to the decision by the Palestinian leadership to postpone discussions of the Goldstone war crimes report requires a sober look at the reasons and lessons that need to be learned to avoid repetition.

Anger came from Palestinians and non-Palestinians alike, including many supporters of...

One of the most frustrating things about the American policy towards the Middle East is how Israel always seem to be treated symmetrically with the Palestinians, whether there is cause for such symmetry or not.

This false symmetry was crystal clear last week when US President Barack Obama unjustly chided...

AMMAN - Anthropologists define themselves as scientists who observe the behavior of people. I doubt that there were any anthropologists at the screenings this Monday and Tuesday at the Royal Film Commission. But the unique documentaries made by Arab filmmakers that hundreds of people saw would certainly qualify as visual...

Jordan, like many other Arab countries, seems to be having a hard time understanding and dealing with the idea of public service broadcasting.

After decades of government-owned and controlled radio and television stations, under King Abdullah, Jordan began a new era of opening up the airwaves to the private sector....

The summit meeting called for by President Obama on the eve of the opening of the UN general council is both good and bad news for Palestinians. President Obama should use the occasion to pressure the Israelis to live up to their obligations.

It is always good when senior U.S....

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to approve new Jewish settlements on the eve of a possible settlement freeze is the latest round in a cycle that has been repeated so many times over the past 40 years that it would seem mundane if it were not so dangerous.

The...

Palestinian nationalism has been a blessing and a curse.

On the one hand, one cannot underestimate the important role it played in pulling together the Arab people of Palestine under a unified and clear national goal. But at a time when major countries in the world downplay nationalism in favour...

Palestinians have finally started to act in a different way. Instead of cursing the occupation, the new strategy is aimed at building up the desired Palestinian state. The idea is to force the Israelis to the negotiating table rather than beg them to come. The way to do that is...

I had to rub my eyes a few times to be sure that what I was seeing was real. The setting was downtown Ramallah. The event, International Youth Day. The participants were wearing white T-shirts with logos on the front and back and blood red hats.

The International Youth Day,...

The Fatah movement, the key Palestinian guerrilla movement within the Palestine Liberation Organization moved one step closer to becoming a political party.

With the holding of their sixth congress for the first time in occupied territories, it is hard to continue pretending to be a liberation movement. Officially, however, the...

It has taken 20 years, but the Palestinian Liberation Movement (Fatah) has finally held its sixth general conference allowing for a much-needed influx of new blood into the movement. The conference, which opened in Bethlehem on August 4, registers many historic firsts. It is the first conference of a liberation...

The announcement has been long awaited. The Israeli Airport Authority announced that starting August 4, the King Hussein Bridge (sometimes referred to as Allenby Bridge) will be open daily till midnight on a 60-day experimental basis.

Ever since the outbreak of Al Aqsa Intifada, the Palestinian police that were stationed...

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu seemed to be making sense in his public argument with the Obama administration when he said that Jews should have a right to build homes in any part of Jerusalem. Unlike the rest of the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967, which Israeli considers disputed territories...

A year or so after the signing of the Oslo accords, I was one of a group of Palestinian journalists who were invited by Shimon Peres to his office at the Israel Foreign Ministry in West Jerusalem. When questions focused on continued settlement activities, the then foreign minister tried...

The gavel-to-gavel broadcast of the Jordanian Parliament was back on the air on June 7. Radio Al Balad (formerly AmmanNet), an independent community radio, succeeded in providing the public with an unfiltered version of the House of Representatives meeting. The return of live broadcasting is, however, nothing but natural.

Arab...

This is a story about one fleet of vans, two companies and three governments. The van is a 9 seat Hyundai which travels a three kilometer route joining the passport terminal on both sides of the King Hussein Bridge. The companies are a Jordanian one and an Israeli. The Jordanian...