By Daoud Kuttab/ Sharm el Sheikh

A resounding and unanimous international message of support was sounded in the Red sea resort of Sharm el Sheikh March 2 with the participation of world leaders. Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak along with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, UN Secretary General and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were joined with foreign ministers as well as representatives of regional and international organizations, and foundations.
Ironically two key groups were absent from the meeting. Israel and Hamas.
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By Daoud Kuttab
blogging with the US secretary of state’s press corps in Sharm el Sheikh

Despite the clarity of the conference title the US will provide far more help to the Palestinian Authority and the people of the West Bank than to the people of Gaza In a press briefing on the eve of the “International conference in support of the Palestinian economy of the reconstruction of Gaza” Robert Wood, the Acting US state department spokesman failed to convince the US traveling press corps and a Palestinian blogger that America is indeed coming to help the people of Gaza.
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Until my family and I landed in New Jersey in August 2007, I had lost
touch with what it meant to be a US citizen. I had arrived in Jersey
City in 1969 as a 14 year old boy with my family who immigrated from
the Palestinian areas. In 1980 after college and a few jobs, I
returned to east Jerusalem and worked in journalism since. Since then,
I have not spent any extended period in the US. My appointment as a
Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton brought my own family and
I back to New Jersey. Although many of my family members couldn’t
vote, we hungrily consumed the US presidential elections, religiously
following the primary season with all its ups and downs.
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It ended rather quickly. After punching in the grades on the special peoplesoft web site of the university my last formal activity at Princeton University was over. In the span of this year I taught upper class students a seminar entitled New Media in the Arab world, ran a freshman seminar class entitled Authentic Arab Voice and taught helped a few more upper class with their Arabic in the Arabic Media III class.

My journey to Princeton started years ago when NY Times reporter Chris Hedges urged me to apply for a Ferris Journalism Professorship. He encouraged me again when I met him three years ago at a human rights event in Italy , I finally decided to apply and sure enough I was chosen one of the 2007 Ferris.
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By Daoud Kuttab

A decision by the outgoing Bakhit government rejecting an application for a radio license has exposed one of the major weaknesses of the current Jordanian Audio Visual Law. The applicant (author of this article) had requested permission to initiate a community radio station for the third largest city in Jordan, Zarqa. The request was made for the category of stations that would not broadcast news or political programming. No explanation for the rejection is made in the written decision made in the November 13 session. Clause 18b of the 2004 Audio Visual Law allows the council of ministers to refuse any request for a frequency without giving any explanation.
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Google in Arabic to find out

It might be fashionable these days to attack Islam and Muslims (Islam’s” Silent Moderates” December 7), but Ms. Ayaan Hisi Ali’s article fails on two important counts. Taking a religious passage out of context might please certain circles, that are bent on dehumanizing an entire people and region, but fails to contribute to real understandings of the challenges facing today’s Muslims and Arabs.

If we would followed the words of Joshua 6:21 in the Old Testament we would legitimize in the name of the Lord the destruction of every living thing including “men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.” In John 2:15 of the New Testament the apostle tells us that Jesus “made a whip of cords and drove all from the temple.” No one attacks Judaism or Christianity today based on these scripts taken out of context.

Her argument that “moderate Muslims” are silent about what recently happened in Sudan, Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh is far from true. A true reflection of what Muslims think will be seen in what they say in their own language and not just what is published in the English language media. A Google search in Arabic (which is not a strong search engine in Arabic) for Gillian Gibbons (the British school teacher who named a teddy bear Muhammad) produces 58,000 results reflecting a variety of opinions including many opposed to what happened to her. Similar results are found by searching in other languages where the world’s 1.2 billion Muslims live. Scanning independent Arabic language Satellite TV and blogs and you can see many opposed to these religious rulings.

Most independent Muslims have been on the right side of these issues denouncing misuse and abuse of the Quran and Islamic theology. But these independent minded Muslims are not given a chance to speak either on local (state run) media for domestic reasons nor by the western media which just loves to quote the tiny percentage of radicals. Furthermore, the problem is with official Islam in many of the countries that Ayaan refers to. The Islamic clergy in these dictatorial regimes (who are often allied with the US) are used as puppets to justify the latest small battle their paymasters want them to fight irrespective of whether it is representative of Islam or reflective of accepted theology.

Zuckerman’s factless facts
Mortimer Zuckerman lists in “Perilous path to peace” Daily News Monday the 3rd of December as “hard facts” items that are not so. Fatah has not “virtually ceased to exist in the West Bank.” Fatah did not lose to Hamas the Ramallah mayoral elections. The mayor Janet Mikil although not a Fatah member is a left wing Christian nationalists. Fatah whose leader has met with the Israeli leader more than any previous leader does ‘recognize Israel’ but can’t do better than Israelis who have not decided what is the nature of their state. The best that most Israelis can agree to is that Israel is a Jewish and democratic state. Palestinian secular leaders prefer to talk about a state for its citizens (which is what a democratic state is) and don’t want to give Islamists a political gift by inserting this sensitive religious issue in this conflict. The nakbeh or catastrophe that Abbas talked about is not referring to the creation of Israel but the dispersion of Palestinians. The unsourced claims by Zuckerman to oppose peace efforts by Bush Olmert and Abba are not facts and are certainly not hard facts.

July 4, 2007

The July 4^th reception at the US consulate in west Jerusalem is always a unique event. This is probably the only place that you will see Israelis and Palestinians mingling freely. While the majority of Israeli officials attend the Tel Aviv party, Jerusalem’s event is largely attended by Palestinians, Israeli local officials, NGOs and some journalists as well as American citizens who live in the city. Religious leaders with their colorful gowns and head covering are also plentiful.
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