Intifada II Was No Surprise to Cybernauts

by James M. Ennes, Jr.

When Jerusalem and much of the occupied territories erupted in September, many journalists expressed surprise. According to some news reports, even the White House and State Department were caught off guard. Few expected the explosion of pent-up anger that we saw when the Israeli government chose to test Palestinian tolerance by opening a new tunnel entrance in the Muslim section of Jerusalem.

Cybernauts were not surprised. Anyone with a computer who had been reading the reports from Birzeit University or from the Islamic Association for Palestine site or any of the several Web sites or e-mail news services reporting from the scene was well aware of the anger there and the likelihood of violence.

News Reports by Electronic Mail

E-mail reports from the area are now available from several sources without need for a sophisticated multimedia computer or subscription to any Internet service. Any Mac- or Windows-capable machine with a modem can receive e-mail using software provided free by the D.E. Shaw Company. For a no-strings copy by mail, call 1 (800) 988-5866. Then subscribe to any or all of the following newslists by free e-mail:

• LAWE, the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment,sends timely reports, often in concert with other groups including The Palestinian Human Rights Information Center, The Mandela Institute for Political Prisoners, The Palestinian Center for Human Rights, The Palestine Section of Defense for Children International, Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions, Palestinian Medical Relief Committees and others. To subscribe, send an e-mail request to lawe@netvision.net.il.

• Palestine Net, a very active moderated news list, distributes several reports daily. These include published reports along with reaction and commentary from members. To subscribe, send an e-mail request to pnet-sc@banumusa.cal.uiuc.edu with a short biographical sketch.

• Egypt Net sends one indexed and condensed report daily. To subscribe, send an e-mail request to Egypt-net-request@cs.sunysb.edu with subject Egypt-net-request[add] and text “LastName,FirstName e-mail-address” (example: Jack Jones Jack@halcyon.com ).

• Al-Akhbar distributes Muslim World News, including news about Palestine and the Middle East. To subscribe, send e-mail to listserv@yorku.cawith “sub akhbar (your name)” in the text.

• Al-Akhbar and The Friday Journal also provide free Daily Muslim World News Briefs for people without computer access. Call (516) 289-2599 to access the IMRAN-NEWWWS PHO news News By Telephone service. Pay only long distance charges.

• The Society of St. Yves, a Catholic legal resource center for human rights, has offices in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. For e-mail news reports send a request to styves@netvision.net.il.

• MSANEWS from Ohio State University exchanges news and news analyses for both activists and academics. To subscribe, send e-mail to listserver@lists.acs.ohiostate.edu with text “subscribe MSANEWS (your Firstname Lastname).

• During the recent violence, Palestinian Internet service providers have been frustrated by frequent disconnections of service and sometimes extreme delays in getting repairs from the Israeli-controlled telephone services. Whether these are normal or arranged outages is difficult to determine. Nigel Parry at Birzeit now maintains a mailing list to report on these and related problems in reporting from Birzeit. To subscribe, send an e-mail request to webmaster@birzeit.edu with the word “naseej” in the subject line. “Naseej” means Web in Arabic.

• Shomron News Service from London offers news from Palestine in their Web site or by e-mail. To subscribe, e-mail shomronnews-request@lists.dircon.co.uk with message text “subscribe.”

News Sources From Israel

• Anyone who thinks that every Israeli Jew supports the government’s abuse and persecution of Palestinian Arabs should visit some of the Jewish Web sites critical of Israeli policies.

• The Peace Now organizationleads the peace movement in Israel with picket lines, demonstrations and informational activities. Peace Now was among the first to protest the recent tunnel activity. The group organized picket lines at the offices of the Security Ministry in Tel Aviv, the prime minister’s home, and other places.

• The largest grassroots movement in Israel’s history, Peace Now was founded in 1978 by 348 reserve officers of the Israel Defense Forces. They believe that violence is not the answer to the age-old conflict in the Middle East. A major effort of Peace Now is to mobilize public opinion, especially that of Israeli youth.

• E-mail to peacenow@actcom.co.il with your name and e-mail address will bring regular e-mail reports. Peace Now will send reports by regular mail if you include your postal address.

• B’Tselem, The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the occupied territories, was founded in 1989 by a group of Knesset members, public figures, lawyers, academics and journalists hoping to inform the Israeli public and the world about violations of human rights in the occupied territories. B’Tselem maintains a Web site at http://btselem.netgate.net/about.htm.

• Oz Veshalom-Netivot Shalom was founded in 1975 to present an alternative expression of religious Zionism. The group is committed to promoting tolerance and justice which they believe are central to Jewish law. Their Web site presents their views and objectives, position statements, and reports on their activities.

• Meimad, The Movement for Religious Zionist Renewal at http://www.barak.co.il/meimad/, reports on activities in Israel and the occupied territories. The Web site includes appeals to religious Zionists to return from extreme positions to a moderate center.

• The New Israel Fund at http://www.nif.org/ is an international philanthropic group of Americans, Israelis and Europeans which provides financial support for the defense of civil and human rights in Israel. They work to promote Jewish-Arab equality and coexistence, to enhance the status of women, to bridge social and economic gaps, and to press for government accountability. They granted $6 million for such projects in 1995.

• The site includes policy and mission statements, names of grantees, addresses of offices, press releases, an annual report, and more. They also have a Canadian Web site at http://www.nif.org/canada/. The e-mail address for information is info@nif.org.

The Islamic Association for Palestine

The superb Web site of the Islamic Association for Palestine at http://www.iap.org, which actually emanates from Dallas, has become almost a one-stop Middle East shopping center with links to every important source of Middle East News or information.

Here you will find an attractive, well-designed, easy-to-navigate and unusually well-organized site divided into major sections for news, politics, pictures and sound. This is one of the few sites we have seen that makes truly effective use of the html frames feature. The IAP site offers the following direct links, each linking to even more sites: