West Asia

No matter what Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas does, his popularity is declining. In some ways, Abbas’ threshold for popularity was really never impressive to begin with, a trend that is unlikely to change in the near future.

The continued aggression of Saudi Arabia against civilians in Yemen, and the use of cluster munitions, highlight the crucial links between human rights, arms control, and the resolution of conflicts through good faith negotiations.

For the last 10 years, the West Bank village of Bil’in has been the site of weekly protests against Israeli occupation. Home to some 1,900 Palestinians and, in recent years, a rotating cadre of international activists and visitors, the village has become known around the world for its nonviolent tactics and its persistence against the Israeli Defense Forces.

The Palestinian Nakba (the catastrophe of war, displacement and dispossession of 1948) has now become the Arab Nakba. Palestinian refugees know too well what their Arab brethren are going through: the massacres, the unredeemable loss, the despair, and the sinking boats.

Washington DC is presently the converging point for some of the world’s most oppressive regimes. On May 13th and 14th, President Obama is hosting a billionaire conglomerate known as the Gulf Cooperation Council, which consists of the Middle Eastern countries of Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and Oman.

A student group recently asked me to address socialism in the Arab world, with the assumption that there is indeed such a movement that is capable of overhauling inherently incompetent and utterly corrupt regimes, across the region. But of course, no such group, or configuration of socialist groups exist today, but in name.