We are undistorting the news about Palestine

Last month, I heard Mariam Barghouti tell a New York audience, “We are outspoken because the bullets are aimed at us.” I felt pride listening to Mariam speak because I work with her, and Mondoweiss is doing all it can to elevate her voice.

And we are now seeing bullets and more lethal force being unleashed on the Jenin refugee camp as Israel carries out its largest attack on the city in over 20 years. Our Palestine team is working round the clock to provide you with timely coverage of the attacks on the refugee camp.

There is growing awareness in the U.S. that Israel has only one answer to Palestinian resistance– brutal violence, year after year.

At such a time I can’t help but reflect on what a change Mondoweiss has meant for my own awareness.

Our work is providing larger audiences with similar levels of understanding over Palestinian dispossession and the role we all play in perpetuating it.

Can you make a donation to help educate others and push them to take action? We still need to raise $60,000 by the end of this week to reach our goal. Any and every amount helps.

This site began in 2006 as my blog at the New York Observer, and before long I began to focus on Israeli human rights abuses. I saw my American Jewish community’s role in enabling those crimes. I saw Israel’s importance in the lead-up to the disastrous Iraq invasion.

I often think of how I learned about the Nakba– because I’m so ashamed of it.

My publisher had worked at the Israel lobby group AIPAC, and he took me aside one day. “Of course, the Palestinians are angry,” he told me. “I understand that – we kicked them out of their homes and villages and took over their houses.”

That news was stunning. I was 50 years old and didn’t know it. I was being let in on a secret. And who was this “we” that had done such terrible things? Well, I didn’t want any part of the Jewish collective if it could not acknowledge such crimes and make amends.

Our society has come so far since then that it gives me hope. Today a sizable segment of the Democratic Party base is pushing for the recognition of the Nakba and for foreign policy not defined by support for Israel and Zionism.

And in the press, we no longer have to rely on former AIPAC operatives to tell us what to think or say. We at Mondoweiss are committed to educating folks and helping them make informed political decisions. We bring you the truth every day!

But we cannot forget that most Americans are ignorant about the ongoing Palestinian dispossession and the US’s role in financing these vicious assaults on Palestinians.

Help us reach folks with undistorted news by donating today!

My beat is what it was 17 years ago – trying to educate myself and our readers about the changes within the U.S. foreign policy establishment and the Jewish leadership over Israel and Zionism. Offering audiences coverage and analysis they can’t find elsewhere.

Many of our readers started as I did and have come a long way. Today, I can say with pride that the era of blindness and denial of the Palestinian narrative is over. Thanks to our efforts at Mondoweiss and many other activist organizations, Palestinian history and conditions are openly discussed. The American discourse has become far more diverse and inclusive.

We played a big role in that opening. I did, myself. It is still shameful to me that when I was 50 and had elite media status, I had no idea about the core historical experience of Palestinians. But thanks to platforms like ours, Americans are waking up, and we will not stop until we reach millions on a daily basis.

Thank you for amplifying our work by donating and sharing it with others!