A larger-than-life sky-blue chair with the word “Palestine” dominates the center of Manara Square in downtown Ramallah.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is responsible for the inability to reach a peace deal that would end the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, former U.S. President Bill Clinton said on Thursday.
A throng of young Palestinians charge the stage with what could easily be seen as malicious intent – if their vigorous stampede hadn\’t been in sync with a performance of Dabke, the traditional Arabic folk dance that literally translates as \”the stamping of the feet.\”
The next congressional election is more than a year away, and although California’s new political boundaries were formally approved on Aug. 15, Republicans are already considering launching a referendum to overturn them.
Newt Gingrich last week became the first candidate ever fired by his staff, as one wag noted, and if that proves a lethal blow to a doomed presidential campaign no one will be more disappointed than his old friend and collaborator Benjamin Netanyahu. The two worked closely in the 1990s to thwart Clinton administration peace policies and no doubt were looking forward to doing the same to President Obama.
One week ago, on May 19, President Barack Obama delivered powerful remarks on democracy and reform in the Middle East. He not only raised these normally hortatory ideals to top-tier U.S. interests, but he put the dictator of America’s most dangerous Arab antagonist —Syria’s Bashar Assad — on personal notice that he may soon find himself joining the leaders of Egypt and Tunisia in forced retirement. All this was welcome news.
Does President Obama need a “Shalom Chaver” moment a la Bill Clinton? More fraught back-and-forth between the organized Jewish community and the Obama administration again has brought to the fore the question of what the president feels in his gut toward Israel and the Jewish people.
The United States commended changes in the draft document for “Durban II” but said more was needed to entice it into joining the anti-racism conference.\n\nJewish groups had welcomed the U.S. decision earlier this year not to attend the event reviewing the original U.N. conference in Durban in 2001. The South Africa parley had devolved into an anti-Israel and anti-Jewish free-for-all, and the review conference April 20-24 in Geneva promised more of the same. Earlier versions of the “draft outcome document” singled out Israel and called for measures against “defamation of religion,” seen as a nod to Islamist extremists who seek to marginalize their critics.
It is already ugly out on the campaign trail, and reporters in the field are feeling the heat of the rising anger of a Republican base on the ropes.
An African American candidacy is different. Obama can\’t easily be the racial middleman as Clinton was. And being aggressive carries its own special dynamics.
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