Singing all the way to the bank: Lebanese protesters fear for their savings
December 13th, 20190 BEIRUT — Protests in Lebanon took a musical turn on Thursday when a group of activists toured banks, performing songs voicing fears over the fate of savings locked up in the banking system, which has been caught up in a major economic crisis sweeping the country. In lyrics set to the scores of famous Lebanese songs, a half dozen...Lebanon’s largest Christian political party says it won’t join government on Hariri’s terms
December 13th, 20190 BEIRUT — Lebanon’s largest Christian political party, Free Patriotic Movement, will not join a new government under the terms set by caretaker premier Saad al-Hariri, but will not obstruct the formation of a new cabinet, its leader said on Thursday. The position of the Free Patriotic Movement led by Gebran Bassil could ease the...Israel bars Gaza’s Christians from visiting Bethlehem and Jerusalem at Christmas
December 13th, 20191 GAZA — Christians in the Gaza Strip will not be allowed to visit holy cities such as Bethlehem and Jerusalem to celebrate Christmas this year, Israeli authorities said on Thursday. Gazan Christians will be granted permits to travel abroad, but none will be allowed to go to Israel and the occupied West Bank, home to many sites holy...Side by side, glimpses of Palestinian refugee camps then and now
December 13th, 20190 History has marched on since they arrived in the middle of the last century, seeking refuge for what they thought would be a few weeks, but staying for a lifetime. Around them the Middle East lurched from conflict to civil war to peace and back again. But for Palestinian refugees in these camps, there has been little movement over...Levin, more than 100 Democrats send letter to Pompeo expressing “strong disagreement” with Israeli settlement policy reversal
November 29th, 20190 WASHINGTON, D.C. — Led by U.S. Rep. Andy Levin (D-Bloomfield Township), more than 100 Democratic members of Congress have signed a letter expressing “strong disagreement” with the Trump administration's decision to no longer classify Israeli settlements in the West Bank of Palestine as illegal under international law. The...Israeli troops kill Palestinian teen at Gaza protest
November 29th, 20190 GAZA — Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian teenager near the border fence with the Gaza Strip on Friday, Palestinian officials said. Israel’s military said soldiers had been fending off Palestinians who had approached and tried to sabotage its security fence. The military also said the demonstrators threw a number of...Iraqi PM quits after cleric’s call, but violence rages on
November 29th, 20190 BAGHDAD - Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi announced his resignation on Friday after the country’s senior Shi’a Muslim cleric urged lawmakers to reconsider their support for a government rocked by weeks of deadly anti-establishment unrest. Violence raged on in southern Iraq, however, killing at least 21 people, and protesters...Israel’s Netanyahu Indicted on bribery and fraud charges
November 23rd, 20190 TEL AVIV — Shortly after Israel’s ceremonial President Reven Rivlin informed parliament that neither Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nor his main political rival were able to form a coalition, the country’s attorney general formally charged Netanyahu on serious charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust. With an...Lebanese protesters pack streets to mark independence day
November 23rd, 20190 BEIRUT - Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets in Lebanon on Friday to mark independence day with a fresh wave of demonstrations against a ruling elite accused of rampant corruption and steering the country into a deep crisis. The unprecedented wave of nationwide protests erupted five weeks ago, leading to the...Arab American leaders criticize Whitmer’s decision to ignore community concerns before departing for Israel
November 21st, 20190 DEARBORN — Arab American community leaders representing a wide group of civil rights advocates, political and local civic organizations held a press conference on Thursday, November 21 to express their strong disapproval of Governor Whitmer's trip to Israel this week and her decision to ignore their community concerns prior to...Statement of Michigan Arab Americans regarding Gov. Whitmer’s trip to Israel
November 21st, 20192 DEARBORN — Governor Whitmer is currently visiting Israel. We Arab Americans became aware of this trip, like most Michiganders, from media reports this past Sunday, November 17, the same day she departed. Michigan is home to the largest concentration of Arab Americans in the United States, boasting several hundred thousand residents...How Western media bias allows Israel to get away with murder in Gaza
November 20th, 20190 An Israeli attack on Gaza was imminent and not because of any provocations by Palestinian groups in the besieged, impoverished Gaza Strip. The Israeli military escalation was foreseeable because it factors neatly in Israel’s contentious political scene. The war was not a question of “if”, but “when.” The answer came on...U.S. angers Palestinians, violates international law with reversal on Israeli settlements
November 19th, 20190 WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Trump administration changed the U.S. position on Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank on Monday, reversing four decades of American policy and further undermining the effort to gain Palestinian statehood. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the U.S. is repudiating the 1978 State Department......
Governor Whitmer trip to Israel angers Palestinians and Arab Americans
November 19th, 20191 LANSING - Governor Whitmer decision to travel to Israel from November 17th to November 23rd, angers Palestinians and Arab Americans in Michigan. The governor will visit Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and Bethlehem to meet with government, business, and nonprofit leaders. Whitmer traveling to Israel while the Israeli army is bombing Gaza...Tenuous truce in Gaza as Islamic Jihad, Israel differ on terms
November 17th, 20190 GAZA/OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — The Palestinian Islamic Jihad group and Israel declared a halt to hostilities across the Gaza Strip border on Thursday, but a lasting ceasefire appeared tenuous as they differed on terms. Islamic Jihad said an Egyptian-mediated truce went into effect at 0330 GMT, about 48 hours after Israel triggered the......
Lebanese media: Major parties agree on ex-minister Safadi as prime minister
November 17th, 20190 BEIRUT — Three major Lebanese parties have agreed on nominating Mohammad Safadi, a former finance minister, to become prime minister of a new government, the Lebanese broadcasters LBCI and MTV reported on Thursday. The agreement was reached in a meeting on Thursday between outgoing Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri, Lebanon’s leading...A lesson for the Palestinian leadership: Real reasons behind Israel’s arrest and release of Labadi, Mi’ri
November 13th, 20190 The release on November 6 of two Jordanian nationals, Heba al-Labadi and Abdul Rahman Mi’ri, from Israeli prisons was a bittersweet moment. The pair were finally reunited with their families after harrowing experiences in Israel. Sadly, thousands of Palestinian prisoners are still denied their freedom, still subjected to all sorts of...Dearborn based poet finds beauty in ruin in her poem “Thawra: a whatsapp message gone viral”
November 9th, 20190 DEARBORN —As the Lebanon protesters clash against elite institutions and moneyed influence in their country, local Lebanese expats have come together to bring fresh perspectives on the political storm unleashed across their homeland. Many have gathered in Dearborn’s most recognizable institutions, with its municipal buildings...Iraqi forces kill 10 protesters in Baghdad and Basra
November 8th, 20191 BAGHDAD - Iraqi security forces shot dead at least six anti-government protesters in Baghdad on Thursday and killed four others as they broke up a sit-in in the southern city of Basra, police and medical sources said. Scores more were wounded in the clashes as weeks of deadly violence in Iraq over protests against an entrenched......
No sign of new cabinet as Lebanese leaders meet, bank curbs continue
November 8th, 20190 BEIRUT — Lebanon's outgoing Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri met President Michel Aoun on Thursday without announcing progress towards forming a new government, and banking sources said most financial transfers out of the country remained blocked. Already facing the worst economic crisis since the 1975-90 civil war, Lebanon has been...Haley Stevens should focus on serving her constituents in Michigan, not Israel
November 8th, 20191 This week, four members of the United States House of Representatives sent a letter to the United Nations Secretary-General expressing their "concern about the continuing, serious violations of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 and the resulting threat our ally Israel faces on its northern border." Resolution 1701 led to......
Microsoft should not fund Israeli spying on Palestinians
November 6th, 20190 The act of Palestinian activists covering their faces during anti-Israeli occupation rallies is an old practice that spans decades. The masking of the face, often by Kufyias — traditional Palestinian scarves that grew to symbolize Palestinian resistance — is far from being a fashion statement. Instead, it is a survival technique,...Dearborn protesters rally for change in Lebanon and in support of the uprising
November 2nd, 20190 DEARBORN — Protests in support of the uprising in Lebanon continued this past weekend in Dearborn, with nearly 500 people showing up to rally for reforms and the resignation of government officials in front of the Henry Ford Centennial Library and Dearborn Police on Sunday, October 27. The protest followed a pair of similar events......