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Palestine: A Tale of Two Families

Mneesha Gellman August 18, 2005 Mneesha Gellman

In June, 2005 I visited the Hope Flowers School in the town of Al Khadr, located in the West Bank territory of the Middle East occupied by Israel, also known as Palestine. Six kilometers outside of Bethlehem, the school implements a peace and democracy curriculum and was developed in response to the high level of violence the region has experienced. I interviewed two peace activists whose stories highlight the different realities the 1948 establishment of the state of Israel created for Jews and Muslims.

Anything but the Truth: The Art of Managing Perceptions

Greg Guma August 17, 2005 Greg Guma

In The Secret Man, Bob Woodward's new book about his Watergate source Deep Throat, he notes, "Washington politics and secrets are an entire world of doubt." Even though Woodward knew that the identity of his source was W. Mark Felt, then associate director of the FBI, what he could never be sure about was why Felt decided to gradually reveal the details of the Nixon administration's illegal activities. Three decades later, the Bush administration has made it immeasurably more difficult to be sure about what motivates many sources of information - both on and off the record - or trust that what we learn from the media will turn out to be true.

Keys to Understanding Bolivia: An Interview with Oscar Olivera

Claudia Acuña August 16, 2005 Claudia Acuña

Win the elections and arrive at a Constitutional Assembly that changes the roots of the power structure in Bolivia: such is the proposal of Oscar Olivera, a leader of the country's recent social struggles. He supports, with much criticism, Evo Morales' bid for presidency. "It's important to avoid a transition with deaths," he said, although suggested that the crisis will be defined by force. The conflict with Evo in an assembly I attended, demonstrated how, in this climate, the present and future is decided. It is ten o'clock in the morning and in Cochabamba, Bolivia it is the hour to decide the future. On the second floor of the Federacion de Fabriles (the National Fabric Workers Union) there are some two hundred men and a handful of women listening attentively to the words of Evo Morales. Meanwhile, voices from the streets reach the meeting, repeating this phrase: "the people united"

Media Reform in Post-Jennings Era at Disney/ABC?

Bob Feldman August 15, 2005 Bob Feldman

As 1960s U.S. antiwar activist Bill Ayers recalled in his 2001 book Fugitive Days, at the time of the October 1967 anti-war march on the Pentagon, the recently-deceased anchor of Disney/ABC's World News Tonight show, Peter Jennings, was the boyfriend of Diana Oughton's sister, Christina Oughton. [Diana Oughton would later perish in the March 1970 West Village Townhouse explosion that killed her and two other members of the Weatherman faction of Students for a Democratic Society]:

Sudan: The Shadow of a Death

Rene Wadlow August 11, 2005 Rene Wadlow

The death on July 30th of the southern Sudanese leader John Garang de Mabior endangers a fragile and incomplete accord to end the 1983-2005 North-South civil war and complicates further efforts to bring to an end the conflicts in the four provinces of Darfur in western Sudan. Garang, leader of the Sudan Peoples' Liberation Movement (SPLM) died in the crash of a Ugandan military helicopter on its return from a meeting of Garang with the President of Uganda Yoweri Museveni. Garang's aids and the helicopter's crew also died in the crash. News of Garang's death led to violent demonstrations from his supporters who feared that the crash was no accident, followed by counter-violence against southerners. The situation remains tense.

Garang had enemies both among the northerners he had long fought but also among rivals for leadership among southern groups. It was only a month ago, July 9th, that John Garang was installed as first vice-president of Sudan in a North-South power-sharing agreement, but the practical role of Garang and other southerners in the government, the administration and the army had not been worked out and may now be called into question.

The New American Security State

David Sugar August 10, 2005 David Sugar

Fresh on the heels of the London bombings, the U.S. government has been quick to exploit these incidents to further usher in the new security state, which claims to protect citizens from a threat it wishes the public to imagine requires governmental solutions. Never mind that none of these new measures actually increase anyone's security, except the security of those in power from those they govern.