This week events in the Middle East seemed destined for a perfect storm, with Palestinians amassing around the Gaza border commemorating the ‘Nakba’ or “the catastrophe”, against a backdrop of Israel’s 70th anniversary, and the official opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem: all destined for a perfect storm.
However, the deaths of more than 60 unarmed Palestinian protestors, with thousands wounded by Israeli forces, who say that they had no choice, still came as a shock to many. Leading Palestinian thinker and historian speaks about the future options for the Palestinian people and their leadership.
Listen to this segment on the ABC Saturday Extra program in which Geraldine Doogue speaks with Professor Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor of Modern Arab Studies, Department of History, Columbia University.
[Note: the caption for the featured image on the ABC Saturday Extra program site states:
KHAN YUNIS, GAZA – MAY 16: Israeli occupation forces intervene in Palestinians during a protest, organized to mark 70th anniversary of Nakba, also known as Day of the Catastrophe in 1948, and against United States’ plans to relocate the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, near Israel border in Khan Yunis, Gaza on May 16, 2018 (Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
There seems to be a definite disconnect between the image of a Palestinian Arab woman in some kind of discomfort with the text describing the image.]