Hizb al-Tahrir, a group committed to the restoration of an Islamic Caliphate, recently held demonstrations in Gaza and Ramallah this week. In the past the Palestinian Authority (PA) has broken up demonstrations by the group. Not so much this time. The change has analysts worried that hard-line Islamist groups may be gaining a...

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Revelations made regarding the details of a 2008 peace offer by then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas are calling into question the willingess of the PA – and of broader Palestinian society – to accept a peace deal with Israel. In details revealed on TheTower.org,...

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A Palestinian man tortured by Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces has lost the ability to speak, a Ramallah-based human-rights group has revealed. The Independent Commission for Human Rights documented 28 cases of torture in PA prisons in the West Bank last month alone. One prisoner, Mohamed Abdel Karim Dar of...

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U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Israel on Thursday for talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It is his fourth visit to the country in as many months. Kerry was greeted warmly by Prime Minister Netanyahu: John, it’s a pleasure to welcome you in Jerusalem. You’re an old...

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Sari Essayah is no typical E.U. parliamentarian. The bespectacled Finn is a retired world-champion race walker, who inherited her distinctly non-Finnish family name from a Moroccan father. And while Essayah had little contact with her father growing up, something of the Middle East and North Africa appears to have stayed...

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A top Palestinian Authority official has dismissed an upcoming visit by Secretary of State John Kerry designed to bring Palestinian negotiators back to the peace process table: The Palestinian Authority does not believe that US Secretary of State John Kerry – who is returning to the region on Thursday – will...

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Officials closely linked to Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas are being investigated by a Palestinian watchdog group for corruption, nepotism, and mismanagement. The Coalition for Transparency in Palestine announced yesterday that it was checking into no fewer than 29 claims that PA officials stole public funds. Endemic corruption within political...

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Hamas is hailing the announcement by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan that he will defy requests from the U.S. not to visit the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in late May. Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh is celebrating the trip as marking the end of American hegemony: In a brief statement from...

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Fatah and Hamas are again engaging in tit-for-tat infighting, casting new doubts on the chances for a Palestinian unity deal. This week Palestinian Authority security forces arrested Hamas members in the West Bank and Hamas lashed out against the Palestinian Liberation Organization over PLO accusations of Hamas “Talibanization” and “Muslim...

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The U.S. State Department this week released its annual human rights report. The watchdog group NGO Monitor unpacked the report, noting the contrast between investigators’ descriptions of Israeli and Palestinian judicial systems. Palestinian Authority and Hamas security forces conduct “arbitrary arrest and associated torture and abuse” in a judicial climate...

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