Blog archive: Palestine

  • 24th October 2023
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    When an explosion caused mass casualties at al-Ahli hospital in Gaza last week it was scarcely surprising that Palestinians — along with many others — assumed Israel was responsible. Israel had already phoned the hospital more than once to demand its evacuation, and a...
  • 13th October 2023
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    For several days now, one of Elon Musk’s favourite customers on X/Twitter has been posting updates about Israel-Gaza every few minutes. At a time when reliable information is more important than ever it might be hoped that the posts from @MarioNawfal would help bring...
  • 3rd July 2021
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    The Serena Shim Award for Uncompromised Integrity in Journalism is named in memory of a Lebanese-American journalist who died in a car crash while working for Iran's Press TV in 2014. The purpose of the award, according to its website, is to honour non-mainstream journalists who "tell...
  • 2nd July 2020
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    The Palestinian authorities have declared a total lockdown in the West Bank just five weeks after their previous one was lifted. The decision comes amid a dramatic rise in new Covid-19 infections which has more than doubled the number of known cases in the space of a week. The new lockdown...
  • 24th June 2020
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    Until recently Israel and Palestine seemed to have brought their coronavirus epidemics under control but both are now seeing large numbers of new infections. Yesterday Israel reported 430 new cases – its biggest rise for two months. Palestine reported 179 – its highest number since the...
  • 18th June 2020
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    Palestinian authorities have reported a surge of coronavirus infections. Seventy-four new cases have been confirmed since Monday, mostly in the West Bank district of Hebron. This comes after several weeks when new cases were averaging less than four a day. CLICK HERE to jump to Middle East...
  • 22nd May 2020
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    Covid-19 infections in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza have more than doubled over the last few days, rising from 20 to 55. The new cases were discovered among Gaza residents who recently returned from Egypt or Israel, and the Hamas authorities have responded by announcing that no one else...
  • 4th April 2020
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    In a sudden reversal of policy, Israel's health ministry has announced a cutback in coronavirus testing. The World Health Organisation regards testing as an essential component in the battle against COVID-19 and Israel had been planning to increase testing levels to 10,000 a day by early next week...
  • 10th May 2019
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    "Labour Friends of Palestine" is a Twitter account that purports to be connected with the British Labour party. Its choice of name seems intended to cause confusion with Labour Friends of Palestine & the Middle East, a genuine organisation which is recognised and supported by more than 100...
  • 8th May 2019
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    A mysterious organisation that calls itself "Labour Friends of Palestine" has started posting tweets in support of Nigel Farage and his Brexit party. It posted two of them on Monday – one from the Brexit party saying "Another fantastic rally in Chester!" ... ... and one from Farage himself...
  • 7th May 2019
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    If you've seen the Monty Python film where the Judean People's Front were enemies of the People's Front of Judea, this story will sound a bit familiar. Here in Britain we have "Labour Friends of Palestine" and "Labour Friends of Palestine & the Middle East". The latter group – LFPME for...
  • 9th November 2018
    By
    Brian Whitaker
    In 2014 two human rights researchers from Britain went missing in Qatar. They had gone to investigate the conditions of migrants working in the Gulf state and it turned out that the authorities, displeased by the researchers' activities, had arrested them. International...

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