A day before Buy Nothing Day (today), an American salesman lost his life, as bargain hunters in a Wal-Mart shop in Long Island trampled him to death. No one was going to get in the way of a good deal: shoppers walked on and killed the 34 year-old, while pushing their way through the door...

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David Weinberg, the director of the CIC’s Israel’s office, recommends “Israel and the Palestinians: A New Strategy,” by Moshe Yaalon, published in AzureOnline.

In this wide-ranging essay, Yaalon, a former IDF chief of staff, proposes a different approach to dealing with an old conflict:

“The strategy outlined in this paper is not particularly uplifting. I doubt that it will thrill the public or win prestigious international awards. It requires, after all, diligence and a good deal of patience. Its enactment would mean giving up expectations of reaching an immediate ’solution’” to the Israeli-Palestinian problem, and instead adopting a more pragmatic attitude that focuses, at least in the short term, on ‘managing’ the conflict. Yet this new strategy is no less ambitious than the former one. It, too, strives to end Israel’s control over the Palestinians and to establish a new, safer, and more stable order west of the Jordan River. Unlike the Oslo paradigm, however, it begins by laying the foundations for the establishment of this new order, and only then proceeds to build from the bottom up. The policy proposed here rests on the understanding—which has so far eluded Israeli statesmen—that in our geopolitical arena, ‘the realities on the ground shape agreements, not the other way around,’ as Guy Bechor, an Israeli expert in Middle Eastern affairs, once said.”

Read the whole essay here »

One of the wonderful customs that the American settlers here in the Middle East has brought over from the old country is Thanksgiving. Here is my green tribute to them!In 1621, the Plymouth colonists, led by William Bradford and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast which is...

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The video is a bit slow to start and speaks to a somewhat unsophisticated audience, but it introduces an important concept of charity in Islam (sadaqah jariyah), and why Muslims should support “Waqf” –– for the environment’s sake. Or at the very least political stability (see...

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Flash floods are the most common natural disaster in the United States, and a big killer in the Middle East too (see Relief Web’s report on Yemen). And OneWorld blog here on the Yemen flash flood which recently displaced more than 20,000 people. Because of the unpredictability of flash...

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Famous for his Orange Suspendu sculpture in Jaffa, I had the pleasure to interview environmental artist Ran Morin. Rarely granting interviews with the press, Morin spoke with me a little about living and working in Israel, and man’s place in the environment. Earlier this week he sent me an...

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Air pollution from transportation is costing Arab countries $5 billion in damages, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Minister of Environment and Water recently announced. The cost is calculated based on the number of deaths, medical care for health problems and chronic diseases that are attributed to...

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