Joseph A. Massad

1 week ago | middleeasteye.net | Lubna Masarwa |Huthifa Fayyad |Joseph A. Massad

Israel is poised to move forward with a highly contentious settlement project east of Jerusalem that would effectively divide the occupied West Bank in two, according to Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich. “This is how we effectively kill the Palestinian state,” Smotrich, a far-right minister who also oversees settlement activity and civilian affairs in the West Bank, said during a conference on Tuesday.

2 weeks ago | middleeasteye.net | Madeline Edwards |Ali Hüseyin Bakir |Joseph A. Massad

Rami lived through more than a decade of war in Syria, yet had never picked up a gun. That all changed this week. Deadly clashes between pro-government fighters and local Druze gunmen ignited on Tuesday, in part over a now-debunked audio clip of a Druze cleric allegedly insulting the Prophet Muhammad. Rami, a 27-year-old Druze activist and former Red Crescent worker, feared his community was in grave danger. He decided to join his friends on the frontline, borrowing one of their weapons.

2 weeks ago | middleeasteye.net | Areeb Ullah |Joseph A. Massad

Staff inside Google DeepMind are attempting to unionise in order to challenge the tech company's ties with the Israeli government and its decision to sell artificial intelligence technologies to defence groups, according to reports. Figures with knowledge of the organising spoke to the Financial Times and said approximately 300 employees inside Google DeepMind, the company's artificial intelligence London office, want to join the Communication Workers Union (CWU).

3 weeks ago | middleeasteye.net | Syma Mohammed |Joseph A. Massad

Human Rights activists and legal experts have slammed the US state of Michigan and the FBI for conducting a "witch hunt" against pro-Palestinian protesters in what they say is an excessive use of force. On Wednesday, the FBI and local law enforcement agencies raided several homes of both current and former American students who participated in pro-Palestinian protests at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

3 weeks ago | middleeasteye.net | Syma Mohammed |Joseph A. Massad

The Trump administration said on Tuesday that it would respond to Harvard’s lawsuit against them in court after the Ivy League university filed a lawsuit on Monday challenging a $2.2bn federal funding freeze. Harvard’s lawsuit marks an escalation in Harvard’s fight to maintain academic autonomy in the face of US President Donald Trump's administration's demands. In a letter to the Harvard community, the university's President Alan M.