Top Ten Posts

Now that I have 64 entries spread out over three years, they’re starting to stack up a bit, and it seems like it would be hard for a newcomer to wade through them all, even with a Blog Table of Contents. So I thought I’d do a quick list of my ten favorite posts.

(This list doesn’t include the excerpts from my book that I’ve posted. For those, go to the book’s online Table of Contents, which has links to all of them.)

Yoga, Concerts, Prison (August 2009)
In which I’m hit once again by the insane cognitive dissonance of Palestine — so much fun and beauty, and so much pointless pain
Beer Fest in Palestine
Oktoberfest 2009 at a gorgeous Palestinian Christian village called Taybeh, which brews Palestine’s delicious golden beer
Maps of Israel, Palestine, the Wall, and Settlements
An indispensable visual primer on the conflict. By far my most popular post
Olives and Rabbis
Israelis and Palestinians work together to harvest olives in the fall of 2009, and I make some new friends
Photo Essay — Last Days in Palestine 2009
It’s always hard to leave Palestine. Hopefully some of these pictures and stories will help explain why. But it was time to head home, finish my book, move to New York, and find a publisher
Changing Tides
Overview of the happenings in Palestine in 2009
‘Berlin Airlift’ needed for Gaza, says Congressman
Non-violent resistance to the occupation intensifies, and so does Israeli repression. Meanwhile, voices all over the world are joining the call for justice in Palestine
The Conflict in a Nutshell
A tongue-in-cheek review of how the conflict perpetuates itself, then a more serious (and brief) review of what’s been going on since the Second Intifada ended in 2005
The Storming of the Gaza Flotilla
Narrative compilation of the week of worldwide coverage following Israel’s assault on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla
The Last Refuge of the Apologist — Dithering
This is me getting tired of people wasting time with words when actions are called for in the face of oppression

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Note from the Future: Click here to view the next Top Ten Blog Posts, from 2011-2013
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Not that much new is really happening at the moment. The BDS movement and the non-violent campaign of resistance in Palestine continue to gain ground. An incredibly gorgeous poem was written about the humanity we share in struggles all over the world. (My words sound clicheed, but the poem is fresh and wrenching.) An Israeli ex-President was convicted of rape.

Israel continues to slide down the path of racism and violence (and more violence). And Israel, along with our own FBI, continues to target and intimidate non-violent protesters (who are fighting back with eloquent words that will echo through history).

And the world is getting fed up with the Obama Administration’s fecklessness and inaction. More and more countries are recognizing a Palestinian state, and the Palestinians are looking for more ways to bypass the US and Israel, both of which are hopelessly intransigent toward the wishes and conscience of the rest of the world.

But so far there haven’t been any front-page shake-ups or spikes in violence (just the usual Israeli turkey shoot of Gaza civilians, which is so horrific it makes one numb — the latest being the bombing and killings of five young sisters as they slept in their home).