by Ahmed Omar ( Al-Shabaka ) – In March 2023, after months of protests over Benjamin Netanyahu’s controversial judicial overhaul, Israel gave far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir the go-ahead to establish a national guard. The force, to be composed of an initial 1,800 officers and with an operating budget of one billion NIS ($273 million), […]
Confronting Energy Poverty among Palestinians in Israeli-Besieged Gaza
by Asmaa Abu Mezied ( Al-Shabaka ) – Palestinians in Gaza are suffering from a worsening energy crisis due to the Israeli regime’s ongoing siege. As a result, they have adopted different coping strategies, including solar energy technology to offset electricity shortages. Al-Shabaka policy analyst and 2022 Visiting Gaza Fellow Asmaa Abu Mezied examines this reality, […]
Why the Israeli Right’s new Tactic of Low-Intensity war on Palestinians Plus Economic Growth won’t Work
by Walid Habbas ( Al-Shabaka.org ) – Since 2021, Israeli leaders have proposed a new series of economic policies under the approach of “shrinking the conflict.” This strategy aims to afford Palestinians more economic opportunities and so-called freedoms as a way to sustain the Israeli occupation. In this policy brief, Al-Shabaka policy analyst Walid Habbas debunks […]
Challenging Israel-inspired Anti-Boycott Legislation in the US
By Tariq Kenney-Shawa | – ( Al-Shabakah) – The Israeli regime’s defenders across the US are ramping up efforts to criminalize the constitutionally protected right to boycott. Beyond violating the rights of Palestine solidarity activists, this threatens to undermine the tenets of a healthy democracy. Al-Shabaka’s US Policy Fellow, Tariq Kenney-Shawa, examines this development and […]
The Case for Palestinian Nationality
By Nadim Bawalsa | – Exiled Palestinians’ right to Palestinian nationality is protected under international law, irrespective of racist Israeli apartheid policies. How can Palestinians and their leadership in the diaspora activate this right through different legal and political channels? Al-Shabaka’s Commissioning Editor Nadim Bawalsa offers recommendations for how to secure exiled Palestinians their rights […]
The US Law Restricting Satellite Imagery of Palestine-Israel
By Zena Agha | – ( Al-Shabaka ) – Bipartisan legislation passed by the US Congress in 1997 limits the quality and availability of satellite imagery of Palestine-Israel. The Kyl-Bingaman Amendment (KBA) to the US National Defense Authorization Act was passed under the pretext of protecting Israel’s national security. It prevents US satellite operators and […]
Palestinians are Uniting, caught between Alliance of Authoritarian States and Western Indifference
By Tareq Baconi | – ( Al-Shabaka ) – Over the course of the past decade, a new regional architecture has come into focus in the Middle East and North Africa. The US has shown greater signs of withdrawal and retrenchment from the region. Tensions have arisen and subsided between regional powers, proxy wars continue […]
Palestine Beyond Partition and the Nation-State
By Leila Farsakh | – ( Al-Shabakah ) – In her new edited volume, Rethinking Statehood in Palestine: Self-Determination and Decolonization Beyond Partition, Al-Shabaka policy analyst and Associate Professor of Political Economy at the University of Massachusetts Boston, Leila Farsakh, brings together a diverse group of intellectuals to critically engage with the meaning of Palestinian […]
International Law and the Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Movement
By Rania Muhareb | – ( Al-Shabaka) – The Unity Intifada of May 2021 emphasized the centrality of Palestinian popular mobilization in the struggle against Israel’s settler-colonial apartheid regime. It is imperative that discussions of an anti-apartheid movement in Palestine remain true to the Unity Intifada’s decolonial praxis: to confront Zionism’s “racist settler colonialism in […]