Date:

August 16, 2017

“Conservation and Sustainability in the Holy Land” by Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh
On June 26, 2017, Palestinian Scientist and Professor, Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh, spoke at the Houston Museum of Natural Science on the topic “Conservation and Sustainability in the Holy Land”. Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to his remarks.
  
After graduating from the University of Jordan, Qumsiyeh received his master's degree in evolutionary biology from the University of Connecticut and his Ph.D. in zoology/genetics from Texas Tech University. He completed a clinical cytogenetics fellowship at the University of Tennessee and clinical molecular genetics fellowship at Duke University. Following a prestigious career in cytogenetics in the US, Qumsiyeh returned to Palestine where he has been on the faculty at Bethlehem University and Birzeit University. In 2014, he founded the Palestine Museum of Natural History and Palestine Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability at Bethlehem University. He continues at PMNH as its director.

Date:

August 9, 2017

No U.S. War Planes Over Syria
On Tuesday, August 8, 2017, a coalition of six organizations (Veterans For Peace, The Nation magazine, RootsAction.org, Watchdog.net, World Beyond War, Daily Kos) held a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., calling on the U.S. to remove all military aircrafts from the Syrian airspace. The speakers argued that the U.S. military role in Syria is illegal and immoral and addressed concerns that “global policing” and intervention in Syria is an unwinnable military strategy. The speakers included:
  
John Kiriakou, CIA Whistleblower (he will be speaking in Houston on August 12)
Matthew Hoh, Former State Department official
Christie Edwards, Chair of the ASIL Lieber Society on the Law of Armed Conflict and an advisor to the Center for Civilians in Conflict on international humanitarian, human rights, and gender issues
David Swanson, Author and Director of World Beyond War
Norman Solomon, Co-Founder and Coordinator for RootsAction.org
  
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to the news conference and some of the questions and answers that followed.

Date:

August 2, 2017

Will Picard
Founder and Executive Director of The Yemen Peace Project (YPP). He is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in Modern Middle East Studies and Southwest Asian Conflict Studies. His senior thesis explored the importance of the Sa‘dah wars in the context of modern Yemeni history. He first visited Yemen in 1999, and has studied Yemeni history and contemporary affairs ever since. Will directs the YPP’s day-to-day operations, manages the organization’s website and Twitter account, writes for the Blog, and hosts the Mafraj Radio podcast.

We will speak live with Will Picard about Yemen, the dire situation there and the effects of the current Saudi-led war on Yemen that devastated the country, and the prospects for resolutions and peace in Yemen. We will also talk about the new report "America’s Role in Yemen 2017 and Beyond" produced by YPP about the United States’ involvement in Yemen.
 
According to the United Nations, Yemen is now the largest global humanitarian crisis where 20 million Yemenis, or 70 per cent of the population, require humanitarian assistance, making it the world's largest food security crisis. In addition, the world’s worst cholera outbreak is currently unfolding in Yemen with nearly 400,000 cholera cases have been recorded in recent months.

Date:

July 26, 2017

Maria LaHood's remarks on "Anti-BDS Legislation and the First Amendment"
Deputy Legal Director at the Center for Constitutional Rights, with expertise in constitutional rights and international human rights. She works to defend the constitutional rights of Palestinian human rights advocates in the United States. She works closely with Palestine Legal to support students and others whose speech is being suppressed for their Palestine advocacy around the country. She also works on the Right to Heal initiative with Iraqi civil society and Iraq Veterans seeking accountability for the lasting health effects of the Iraq war.
 
We will listen to Maria's speech on “Anti-BDS Legislation and the First Amendment: Recent Legislation that Threatens First Amendment Rights of Palestinian Solidary Activists and the Legal Challenges Thereto”. Her talk was delivered at the "Israel Lobby and American Policy" conference held on March 24th, 2017 at the National Press Club, organized by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.
  

Said Arikat
Journalist, author, and political analyst. He is the Washington, DC Bureau Chief for the daily Palestinian newspaper Al-Quds (based in occupied Jerusalem), for which he is a writer, columnist, and analyst. He is an adjunct professor at the American University in Washington, DC where he teaches a course on "The Role of the Media in the Arab World". He also served as spokesman and director of public information for the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq from 2005 to 2010.
 
We will speak live with Said Arikat about the situation in occupied Jerusalem where Israel shot and killed several Palestinians and injured more than 1000 over the past few days, and has been attacking and preventing Muslim worshippers from reaching and praying at Al-Aqsa mosque in occupied Jerusalem.

Date:

July 19, 2017

Dr. Missid Ghanem & Mays Kseibi
Dr. Missid Ghanem is a Psychologist, president of the World Wide Mental Health organization (WWHM) and Director of the new Summer of Hope (SoH) program in Houston.
 
Mays Kseibi is an educational management leader and a multicultural educator with an extensive background knowledge in international student services and academic advising. Mays has a masters in educational management development and currently serves as the Core Curriculum Director of the Summer of Hope (SoH) program in Houston.
 
We will speak with both Dr. Ghanem and Mrs. Kseibi about the new Summer of Hope (SoH) program that provides free English language and life skills training to the Syrian refugee children living in Houston.
   

Wajahat Ali remarks on "Israel Lobby Ties to Islamophobia"
Pro-Israel Organizations, Donors and Islamophobia: Findings from Fear, Inc.: The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America
 
We will listen to the full speech given by Wajahat Ali, journalist, writer, lawyer, an award-winning playwright, and lead author/researcher of “Fear Inc., Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America”, discussing the making of Fear Inc. and the Lobby’s role in contributing to Islamophobia at the "Israel Lobby and American Policy" conference held on March 24, 2017 at the National Press Club. The conference was sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).

Date:

July 12, 2017

In Memoriam: Dr. Jack Shaheen
On Sunday, July 9, 2017, Dr. Jack Shaheen, a pioneering Arab-American scholar in the area of media representations of Arabs, an internationally acclaimed scholar, and author, passed away in South Carolina at the age of 81. Dr. Shaheen was a writer and lecturer specializing in addressing racial and ethnic stereotypes. His books include "A is for Arab: Archiving Stereotypes in U.S. Popular Culture", "Guilty: Hollywood’s Verdict on Arabs After 9/11", and "Reel Bad Arabs", which was later made into a film documentary "How Hollywood Vilifies Arabs!" by Media Education Foundation. His work focused on racism and orientalism, particularly in popular culture such as Hollywood films. He has given over 1,000 lectures on the issue across the United States and on three continents. Dr. Shaheen was also a former CBS News consultant on Middle East affairs, and professor emeritus of Mass Communications at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. He received two Fulbright teaching awards, and was also the Distinguished Visiting Scholar at New York University’s Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies.
 
We will listen today to portions of Dr. Shaheen’s talk in the film documentary "How Hollywood Vilifies Arabs!" by Media Education Foundation, and also listen to his talk at the "Israel Lobby and American Policy" conference on March 24, 2017 at the National Press Club, organized by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. He spoke on the topic “Strategies to Successfully Push Back Against Harmful Hollywood Stereotypes About Arabs and Muslims, and the Work New Generations Must Take On”.
   

International Day of Quds
We will also listen to portions of the remarks that were delivered at the International Day of Quds rally that was held in Houston outside the Galleria on June 23, 2017. There were many remarks delivered during the rally, and we will air today portions of the remarks of the Reverend Ronnie Lister, Patrick Higgins, Rabbi Joseph Kohn with Neturei Karta, and Abbas Hamideh, co-founder of Al-Awda, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition.   

Date:

July 5, 2017

Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh - "A Christian Palestinian Scientist from Bethlehem Talks About Conflict Resolution"
Last week, on June 27, 2017, Palestinian Scientist and Professor, Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh, spoke at the Bay Area Unitarian Universalist Church in Houston on the topic: "A Christian Palestinian Scientist from Bethlehem Talks About Conflict Resolution". Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to his remarks at the church.
 
After graduating from the University of Jordan, Qumsiyeh received his master's degree in evolutionary biology from the University of Connecticut and his Ph.D. in zoology/genetics from Texas Tech University. He completed a clinical cytogenetics fellowship at the University of Tennessee and clinical molecular genetics fellowship at Duke University. Following a prestigious career in cytogenetics in the US, Qumsiyeh returned to Palestine where he has been on the faculty at Bethlehem University and Birzeit University. In 2014, he founded the Palestine Museum of Natural History and Palestine Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability at Bethlehem University. He continues at PMNH as its director.

Date:

June 28, 2017

                

Summer Fund Drive

Date:

June 21, 2017

               

Summer Fund Drive

Date:

June 14, 2017

Nawal Abou-Awad
We will speak with Nawal Abou-Awad, PAC Youth Ambassador, about the planned "Know Your Homeland Camp2" organized by the Palestinian American Council (PAC). It is a trip to Palestine from July 15 to July 30, 2017. For more information and/or to register, visit www.pac-usa.org.
   

Congressman Al Green's Houston Iftar Remarks
More than 1,500 people attended the annual Houston Ramadan Iftar Dinner on May 28, 2017. The keynote speaker was Sylvester Turner, Mayor of the City of Houston. Texas Governor Greg Abbott spoke via a pre-recorded video message, and Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee also spoke at the event, amongst many others. Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to the remarks of Congressman Al Green that he delivered at the event. The event was organized by Abu Dhabi, Baku, Basrah, Istanbul and Karachi Sister City Association along with the Islamic Society of Greater Houston.
  

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee's March & Press Conference on Anti-Hate
Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee held a march and a press conference on Sunday, June 11, 2017 at the Mickey Leeland Federal Building in Houston, with members of the Muslim Community, to stand against hate for Islam. It was a counter demonstration to the anti-Muslim marches held the day before across the US including the Houston area by ACT for America, an anti-Islam hate group. The group's founder and chairman, Brigitte Gabriel, believes Arabs “have no soul”, and “every practicing Muslim is a radical Muslim” and that a Muslim “cannot be a loyal citizen of the United States”. She also argues that “America is at stage two Islamic Cancer". ACT for America supports anti-Islam legislation and unequal treatment for Muslims. Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to some of the remarks made at the press conference including those of Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, HISD Trustee Rhonda Skillern-Jones, former Houston City Council member and President of ISGH MJ Khan, Executive Director of CAIR-Houston Mustafaa Carroll, Reverend Sadraque Cius, Muslim Child Yousef, and Imam Majid Siddiqui.

Date:

June 7, 2017

Melvin Goodman
Senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University. He was an analyst at the CIA for 24 years; a former analyst at the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research; and author of several books on international security, including "National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism" and "Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA". His latest book (just released) is "Whistleblower at the CIA". Goodman has written numerous articles and op-eds over the years, appeared on various media outlets, and has lectured all over the country. He is also the national security columnist for counterpunch.org.
    
This week marks the 50th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of the remaining 22% of Historic Palestine (Gaza Strip, West Bank, and East Jerusalem), the longest enduring military occupation in the world. Today on the show, we will talk about this 50th anniversary (Arab Voices' commentary).
 
We will also speak live with Mr. Melvin Goodman about what he saw during the six-day war in June 1967 while working at the CIA, and the lies Israeli officials at the highest level made to the White House about the start of the six-day war. Mr. Goodman helped draft the report that described Israel’s attack against Egypt on the morning of June 5, 1967. In a new piece he just published, The Six Day War and Israeli Lies: What I Saw at the CIA, he says "There were sensitive communications intercepts that documented Israeli preparations for an attack, and no evidence of an Egyptian battle plan. The Israelis had been clamoring about indications of Egyptian preparations for an invasion, but we had no sign of Egyptian readiness in terms of its air or armored power. The assumption was that the Israelis were engaging in disinformation in order to gain U.S. support.".
 
We will also speak with Mr. Goodman about his new book "Whistleblower at the CIA: An Insider’s Account of the Politics of Intelligence" (City Lights Publishers, 2017).

Date:

May 31, 2017

Arab Barghouti
We will speak live with Arab Barghouti, son of the Palestinian leader, parliamentarian, and political prisoner, Marwan Barghouti (who is being held in Israeli jails for more than 15 years and recently led the massive hunger strike that lasted 40 days). We will speak with Arab about the Palestinian political prisoners' hunger strike, its importance and the fight for dignity for all Palestinians. We will also speak with him about his dad, Marwan Barghouti, and more.
  
 
Houston Stands with Palestinian Political Prisoners on Hunger Strike
Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of Houston organized a protest on Thursday, May 25, 2017 in front of the Israeli consulate in Houston in solidarity with more than 1500 Palestinian political prisoners that were on hunger strike that lasted 40 days to protest Israel's inhumane treatment of thousands of Palestinian political prisoners. The protesters also participated in the global #SaltWaterChallenge that was launched by Arab Barghouti, son of the Palestinian leader and political prisoner Marwan Barghouti, in support of the demands of the Palestinian political prisoners.
     
Today on Arab Voices, we will hear the remarks of several local Houstonians who participated in the protest including the remarks of the Reverend Ronnie Lister.

Date:

May 24, 2017

1st Segment: Zaha Hassan
Human rights attorney, Middle East Fellow at New America, and former coordinator and senior legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team during Palestine’s bid for UN membership from 2010-2012. As a New America fellow, she will complete a novel, Die Standing Like Trees, which deals with a Palestinian-American woman’s search for answers twenty years after her mother’s violent death during the height of the Oslo peace talks. Zaha received her J.D. from the University of California at Berkeley, an LLM in transnational & international law from Willamette University, and graduated magna cum laude from the University of Washington in Seattle with a B.A. in political science and Near East languages and civilizations. She has been co-host for the last two years of the Portland, Oregon radio show, One Land Many Voices, on KBOO 90.7 FM and is a contributor to the online magazine, The Civil Arab.
  
We will speak live with Zaha about President Trump's visit to occupied Palestine, the ongoing (37 days and counting) Palestinian Political Prisoner's Hunger Strike, and more.
 
Please note there will be a protest "Houston Stands with Palestinian Political Prisoners on Hunger Strike" this Thursday, May 25, 2017, in front of the Consulate General of Israel in Houston organized by Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of Houston. Click here for more details.
       

2nd Segment: Sahar Aziz
Professor of law at Texas A&M University School of Law where she teaches courses on national security, civil rights, and Middle East law. She also serves as a Nonresident Fellow at Brookings Doha Center. Prior to joining Texas A&M, Professor Aziz served as a Senior Policy Advisor for the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security where she worked on law and policy at the intersection of national security and civil liberties. Her academic articles have been published in the Harvard National Security Journal, George Washington International Law Review, Penn State Law Review, and the Texas Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Journal. In 2015, Professor Aziz was named an Emerging Scholar by Diverse Issues in Higher Education and received the Derrick Bell Award from the American Association of Law Schools Minority Group Section. She is a blogger for the Huffington Post and the Race and the Law Profs blog. She also serves on the board of the ACLU of Texas. Professor Aziz earned a J.D. and M.A. in Middle East Studies from the University of Texas where she served as an associate editor of the Texas Law Review.
 
We will speak live with Sahar about President Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia. Sahar published oped on CNN titled "Trump's Doublespeak in Saudi Arabia", in which she says "If there's one thing we've learned about Donald Trump, it is that he has no qualms about contradicting himself to get what he wants. In Saudi Arabia, he wanted a $110 billion arms deal -- not to promote peace and tolerance, as he later proclaimed in his Sunday speech. Thus, his speech will not "be remembered as the beginning of peace in the Middle East," as he loftily put it, but rather a boost to the war that is ravaging it. Nor will Trump's speech put an end to the Islamophobia and bigotry that he has spent the past two years inciting. After all, he needs scapegoats to blame when the terrorism in the Middle East inevitably reaches the United States.".

Date:

May 17, 2017

"Israel's Politics of Fear and the Palestinians" by Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian
The Arab-American Educational Foundation Lecture Fund and the History Department at Rice University sponsored a talk titled "Israel's Politics of Fear and the Palestinians" on April 4, 2017, at Rice University with guest speaker Professor Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian from Jerusalem.
 
The talk was based on Professor Shalhoub-Kevorkian's newly published book about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict entitled Security Theology, Surveillance and the Politics of Fear. By drawing attention to violence against Palestinians, and by pointing to legal, symbolic and material means of dehumanization, Professor Shalhoub-Kevorkian explores the production of racialized and violent forms of surveillance and fear that results in human suffering. In connecting the structures of Israeli power with the invisible and mundane lives of the colonized Palestinian people, the talk shares data, including photos, videos, and relevant laws, to show how the personal has become profoundly politicized. Moving from the dead to the newborn, from the graveyard to the womb, from the attack on home to homeland, Shalhoub-Kevorkian discusses the way in which intimate agonies are political sites of colonial governance. Prof. Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian is the Lawrence D. Biele Chair in Law at the Faculty of Law-Institute of Criminology and the School of Social Work and Public Welfare at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
  
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Professor Shalhoub-Kevorkian's lecture on "Israel's Politics of Fear and the Palestinians".

Date:

May 10, 2017

1st Segment: Dr. Faiza Zalila
We will speak live with Dr. Faiza Zalila, President of the Arab American Cultural & Community Center (ACC) in Houston about the center, and the new community-wide needs assessment survey the ACC is conducting to obtain feedback from the community and constituents, Arabs and friends of Arabs, about social service needs and cultural programs you want to see offered at the ACC Center, as the ACC is looking to align its services and programs with the community needs and interests in order to better serve the community. We will also talk about the upcoming free Family Health Fair for the community at large, to be held Saturday, May 13th, where the ACC in partnership with other organizations will be offering free screening of vital health signs, vision, cholesterol, blood pressure, fitness tests, in addition to smoking cessation, mental health counseling, dental exams, and much more.
    

2nd Segment: Mustafaa Carroll
We will speak live with Mustafaa Carroll, Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Houston) about the new civil rights report titled "The Empowerment of Hate" released yesterday, May 9, 2017, by CAIR documenting a spike in Anti-Muslim bias incidents. The report reveals a 57 percent increase in 2016 anti-Muslim bias incidents over 2015. This was accompanied by a 44 percent increase in anti-Muslim hate crimes in the same period. Other issues covered in the report include public officials conditioning American audiences to fear Muslims, flying while Muslim, closure of bank accounts linked to Muslim names, the FBI, the impact of Islamophobia in educational institutions, watch lists, and workplace discrimination. We will also talk about the new Texas Senate Bill 4 signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott banning "sanctuary cities" in Texas and requiring local police to cooperate with federal immigration authorities and allowing police to inquire about the immigration status of people they lawfully detain.

Date:

May 3, 2017

1st Segment: Houston Palestine Film Festival
We will speak live with Mayk Chahine, Board Member with the Houston Palestine Film Festival (HPFF) about the 11th Annual Houston Palestine Film Festival (It's time to share stories from and about Palestine)! The festival will be held Friday, May 5 through Sunday, May 7 at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston and Rice University Media Center. Click here for more details and Program Lineup.
    

2nd Segment: The Israel Lobby and Fake Peace Processing by Khalil Jahshan
We will listen to the speech titled "The Israel Lobby and Fake Peace Processing" delivered by Khalil Jahshan at The Israel Lobby and American Policy Conference, which was held on March 24, 2017 at the National Press Club, Washington, D.C. The conference was sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep).
 
Khalil Jahshan has been serving as Executive Director of Arab Center Washington DC (ACW) since its inception in 2014. Between 2004 and 2013, Jahshan was a lecturer in International Studies and Languages at Pepperdine University and Executive Director of Pepperdine’s Seaver College Washington DC Internship Program. Previously, Jahshan served as Executive Vice President of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee and Director of its government affairs affiliate, NAAA-ADC. Throughout his career he has held numerous positions, including Vice President of the American Committee on Jerusalem, President of the National Association of Arab-Americans, and National Director of the Association of Arab-American University graduates. He received a bachelor’s degree in political science and French from Harding University in 1972. Mr. Jahshan has served on the board of directors and advisory boards of various Middle East-oriented groups including ANERA, MIFTAH and Search for Common Ground. He has appeared on various media outlets such as Al-Jazeera, Al-Hurra, CCTV, Al-Arabiya, C-SPAN, and Charlie Rose.

Date:

April 26, 2017

Joe Catron
Organizer with Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network. We will speak live with Joe about the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners including children, women and legislative council members held in Israeli jails, and the latest on the massive hunger strike that started 10 days ago on April 17, 2017 (Prisoner's Day) by nearly 1,500 Palestinian political prisoners in Israeli jails and detention centers, amidst resentment of Israel’s cruel policies towards Palestinian political prisoners.
 
We will also talk with him about the hearing held yesterday in a Detroit U.S. District Court where a plea agreement was reached to revoke Palestinian American Rasmea Odeh's U.S. citizenship and deport her from the U.S.!

Date:

April 19, 2017

"Beyond the Arab Muslim Ban: Feminist Futures and Joint Struggle" by Professor Nadine Naber
The College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences and The Arab-American Education Foundation Chair in Modern Arab History at the University of Houston held the Nijad and Zeina Fares Arab-American Educational Foundation Annual Distinguished Lecture in Modern Arab Studies on March 21, 2017, at the University of Houston. The lecture was titled "Beyond the Arab Muslim Ban: Feminist Futures and Joint Struggle", and the speaker was Professor Nadine Naber.
   
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Professor Naber's lecture on "Beyond the Arab Muslim Ban: Feminist Futures and Joint Struggle".
    
Professor Nadine Naber is a leading Arab-American feminist scholar, author, and social justice advocate. She is an associate professor in the Gender and Women's Studies Program and the Global Asian Studies Program and the director of the Arab American Cultural Center at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Professor Naber is author of Arab America: Gender, Cultural Politics, and Activism and editor of Race and Arab Americans; Arab and Arab American Feminisms (winner of the Arab American Book Award 2012); and The Color of Violence.

Date:

April 12, 2017

Philip Giraldi
Former CIA Officer and Army Intelligence Officer who spent twenty years overseas in Europe and the Middle East working terrorism cases. He is the Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest and a recognized authority on international security and counterterrorism issues. He writes regularly on terrorism, intelligence, and security issues, and appears frequently on national and international broadcasts. He holds a BA with honors from the University of Chicago and an MA and Ph.D. in Modern History from the University of London.
  

A live conversation with Mr. Giraldi about the recent U.S. missile attack on Syria after a horrific poisonous gas attack in Khan Shaykhun, south of the Syrian city of Idlib that killed dozens of civilians.
  
Mr. Giraldi is one of several prominent former intelligence and other officials with Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (from virtually every branch of the U.S. national security state) that have released a statement saying "Trump Should Rethink Syria Escalation", and also asking Trump to pull back from his dangerous escalation of tensions with Russia.

Date:

April 5, 2017

               

Spring Fund Drive

Date:

March 29, 2017

The 3rd Annual Lebanese Festival
A live conversation with Hiba Elroz and Fred Davis, members of the Lebanese Festival Committee, about the 3rd Annual Lebanese Festival that will be held Friday through Sunday, March 31-April 2 at Jones Plaza in Downtown Houston.
 
There will be entertainment, food, different activities, great festivities, enjoyable atmosphere for both adults and children, door prizes, music, folkloric dances, performances, and much more. This will not just be a festival...it will be a one of a kind experience as attendees are whisked away on a memorable and exquisite journey to explore all that Lebanon has to offer. The 3rd Annual Houston Lebanese Festival will be unlike any other festival before. It will be filled with surprises that take you to the streets, the sights, and the sounds of Lebanon. This event is hosted by the American Lebanese Cultural Center (ALCC) in Houston. 
              

Spring Fund Drive

Date:

March 22, 2017

1st Segment: The 7th Annual Houston Palestinian Festival
A live conversation with Ruba Afifi, Festival Chair and Board Member with the Palestinian American Cultural Center (PACC-Houston) and Alma AlQuqa, Festival Co-Chair about the 7th Annual Houston Palestinian Festival scheduled to be held March 25-26 at Jones Plaza in Downtown Houston. We will also speak with Dalal Abu Amneh who will be performing live at the Festival. Dalal is a Palestinian singer singing classical and folk music of the Arabic musical heritage, and also a neuroscientist from Nazareth. She is committed to achieving humanitarian goals through her art and draws from the rich culture of Palestine, and aims to develop this art and spread the Palestinian culture to the wider world. Dalal is crafting a global Palestinian identity and advocating for the Palestinian cause through her music. She has participated in many international and Arab festivals and has represented Palestine in several Arab operettas and also participated in many local and International cultural events. In addition to her participation with her own band, Dalal is the lead singer in the international orchestra MESTO where she performs Arab and Palestinian folk, accompanied by Western musicians and orchestral arrangement. A surprise to many of her fans, besides music and singing, Dalal is studying for a Ph.D. in neuroscience in the Faculty of Medicine at the Technical Institute in Haifa.
  

2nd Segment: ESCOWA's New Report: Israel is guilty of apartheid 
We will talk about a new report published a few days ago by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, ESCOWA, which directly accuses Israel of imposing an apartheid regime on the Palestinian people. The report also urges governments to "support boycott, divestment and sanctions activities and respond positively to calls for such initiatives." What did the U.N. do when the report was released? Secretary-General Antonio Guterres ordered the report be withdrawn and removed from the web! Rima Khalaf, the head of the U.N. agency ESCOWA, responsible for this report resigned in protest!

Date:

March 15, 2017

Trump’s Foreign Policy Positions on Palestine and the Middle East
The Palestine Center in Washington, D.C. held an event titled "Trump’s Foreign Policy Positions on Palestine and the Middle East" on February 7, 2017. Panelists Dr. Nathan Brown, Dr. Shibley Telhami, and Professor P.J. Crowley will examine in this panel the foreign policy positions of President Donald Trump with regard to Palestine and the Middle East. Among the many issues related to the subject of this panel are President Trump's campaign promise to relocate the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and his appointment of David Friedman, a pro-settlement lawyer with no foreign policy experience, as US ambassador to Israel. The panelists will discuss these issues, while examining the widespread regional and global effects the Trump administration will bring.
  
Today, on Arab Voices, we will listen to that panel.
 
Dr. Nathan Brown is a professor of Political Science and International Affairs and Director of the Institute for Middle East Studies as well as Director of the Middle East Studies Program at George Washington University. From 2013 to 2015, he was President of the Middle East Association–the academic association for scholars studying in the region. In 2013, Dr.Brown was named a Guggenheim Fellow. Four years earlier he was named a Carnegie Scholar by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. For the 2009-2010 academic year, he was a fellow at the Wilson International Center for Scholars.
  
Philip J. (P.J.) Crowley is a professor of practice and distinguished fellow at the Institute for Public Diplomacy and Global Communications at George Washington University, after serving a long career in the U.S. Department of State. He is a specialist on national security and from 2011- 2012 he was a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress where he authored detailed analyses on security issues including Safe At Home —a national security strategy to protect the American homeland, improve national preparedness and rebuild the US standing in the world.
  
Dr. Shibley Telhami is the Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and Development and the Director of the University of Maryland critical issues poll. He is also a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. His best-selling book, The Stakes: America and the Middle East, was selected by Foreign Affairs as one of the top five books on the Middle East in 2003. His recent book, The World Through Arab Eyes: Arab Public Opinion and the Reshaping of the Middle East, was published in 2013. Dr. Telhami was selected by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, along with the New York Times, as one of the “great immigrants” for 2013.

Date:

March 8, 2017

1st Segment: President Trump's new "Muslim Ban"
President Trump signed on Monday, March 6, 2017 another executive order to ban Muslims and Arabs from 6 Muslim countries from entering the United States. This is his second attempt at this after his first executive order to ban Muslims from 7 countries was stopped in courts. Several national organizations voiced opposition and concerns about this second attempt at banning Muslims from entering the United States.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to statements and reactions to this latest executive order from the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC). We will also listen to a news conference held by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).
       

2nd Segment: Dr. Michael Fares 
Instructional Assistant Professor of Arabic at the University of Houston. He joined the department of Modern and Classical Languages at UH in 2012. Michael grew up in the Middle East and has spent time in several Arabic speaking countries. He teaches beginning and intermediate Arabic, and is working to develop the curriculum for these courses as part of the department’s newly created Arab Studies Minor. Prior to teaching at the University of Houston, Michael worked as a teaching assistant for the Arabic Flagship Program at the University of Texas. He also served as an instructor of advanced Arabic for the University of Texas Arabic Summer Institute. Michael is interested in foreign language acquisition, as well as Medieval Arabic philosophy and literature. He also has several publications and projects, including University of Houston Arabic Speaking Faculty Interview Series, Online Beginning Arabic “Catchup” Lecture Series, The Phenomenon of Interlanguage and its Importance for Teaching Arabic as a Second Language, and Ghassan Kanafani’s “The Stolen Shirt”: A Translation and Introduction.
  
We will speak with professor Fares about the Syrian refugees and the upcoming “Sketches of the Syrian Diaspora: A night of Music and Storytelling” event that will be held at the University of Houston on March 22, 2017.

Date:

March 1, 2017

Dr. Ramzy Baroud
US-Arab journalist, media consultant, author, internationally-syndicated columnist, founder and editor of Palestine Chronicle, former managing editor of the London-based Middle East Eye, former editor-in-chief of The Brunei Times, and former deputy managing editor of Al Jazeera online. He is the author of several books including Searching Jenin: Eyewitness Accounts of the Israeli Invasion, The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People’s Struggle, and My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story. He is also the co-author, with Samah Sabawi and Jehan Bseiso, of the poetry collection I Remember My Name. His work has been published in hundreds of newspapers and journals worldwide, and is regularly translated and republished in several languages. He has contributed to and was referenced in hundreds of books and academic journals. Baroud has been a guest on many television and radio programs nationally and internationally, and he has been a guest speaker at many top universities around the world. Baroud has a Doctorate of Philosophy in Palestine Studies from the European Centre for Palestinian Studies at the University of Exeter.

Date:

February 22, 2017

1st Segment: Building Resistance: Japanese Imprisonment and the Fight Against a Muslim Registry
Produced by Making Contact (02.14.2017)
 
This year is the 75th anniversary of we now call Japanese Internment. And every year since 1942, Japanese Americans have tried to get the rest of us to remember what happened. To notice the scar that mass incarceration left, not just on the Japanese community, but on all of us. We found ourselves at similar crossroads in 2001 when the Bush Administration used the chaos of 9/11 to push through drastic changes, including the creation of a Muslim registry called NSEERS, the National Security Entry Exit Registration System. But, people fought it. And won. Today, as President Trump moves to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. and threatens to build another registry we are faced with similar choices. So, what can we learn from our history? And how do we fight back?
 
Featuring:
Satsuki Ina, documentarian; Mutsu Homma, Roy Ebihara, George Murihiro, Matsuo Watanabe, survivors; Joseph Arsinoe, US soldier; War Relocation Authority. Lara Kiswani, Executive Director of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center; Anirvan Chatterjee, Alliance of South Asians Taking Action Liz Ouyang, attorney; Mohammad Sarfaraz Hussain; Anirvan Chatterjee, Alliance of South Asians Taking Action; Jason Prado, Sophie Xie, DoBetter.Tech
     

2nd Segment: Lawyers, activists organize against Trump’s Muslim ban
A podcast produced by The Electronic Intifada (02.03.2017)
  
Immigration attorneys and immigrant rights groups continue to fight the Trump administration’s so-called Muslim ban but the executive branch of the US government remains intransigent in its refusal to comply with federal court orders against the ban. The executive order banning persons from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US was signed by President Donald Trump last Friday. On Saturday, thousands of activists poured into airports around the US to demand that Customs and Border Protection (CPB) release people it had detained under the ban. By the evening, a federal court in New York had issued an immediate order against the ban.
 
“What I saw at the protests at SFO [San Francisco International airport] was an organized and focused crowd of protesters … to respond and protest to the immediate implementation of Trump’s executive order,” said The Electronic Intifada’s Charlotte Silver in an interview for the podcast.
 
On Wednesday, immigration attorneys in Southern California told The Electronic Intifada that the US Marshals Service is failing to enforce federal court orders against the CPB at Los Angeles International airport, Silver reported.
 
There have been ”several” instances in the past few days where CBP agents “are telling lawyers, telling congress people, telling activists that they are specifically not complying with the court order, that it is not applying to them,” Silver explained.

She said that there are “serious reasons to be concerned about the Trump administration and its federal agency’s willingness to comply with court orders.”
 
Featured audio: Lara Kiswani, Executive Director of the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, speaking to crowd at SFO, 28 January; crowd chanting and drumming via Palestinian Memes

Date:

February 15, 2017

Panel Discussion about "Immigration Ban Statement"
The Arab American Cultural and Community Center (ACC) in Houston held a panel discussion of local immigration lawyers and experts on February 11, 2017 to help address the community's concerns and help clarify questions in regards to the immigration ban that was put in effect January 27, 2017. The Panel included:
 
Wafa Abdin, Esq.
Vice President for Immigration and Refugee Services at Catholic Charities. She oversees the Cabrini Center for Immigrant Legal Assistance, the largest non-profit provider of immigration legal services for low-income and indigent non-citizens and Refugee Resettlement Program. She has more than 15 years of experience in immigration law and is a frequent lecturer at immigration conferences and has also written several articles and papers on immigration law topics. In recognition of her outstanding work and dedication, she was awarded the Chrys Dougherty Legal Services Award in 2010 by the Texas State Bar.

Norma Ayoub
Attorney at the law firm of Ayoub & Associates, PC. She has been practicing law for about 18 years. Earlier in her career she handled international corporate matters while working overseas. Upon returning to the US, she opened her own office and has handled strictly immigration matters for the past 16 years and is licensed in both New York and Texas. She is admitted in various appellate courts. She speaks fluent Arabic.

Nejd Jill Yaziji
Attorney at Yaziji Law Firm. She has been practicing Immigration & Asylum Law for more than a decade. She represents clients from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Pakistan, Sudan, Egypt, Ukraine and other countries. She is a graduate of the University of Texas School of Law, and is Editor-in-Chief of The Houston Lawyer magazine (2016-2017), the official publication of the Houston Bar Association.
 
Today on Arab Voices we will listen to the remarks made at the panel discussion on refugees, asylum and non-immigrant visa. We will also listen to some of the questions and answers raised during the event such as could a Muslim registry be enforced, the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS), what do undocumented immigrants need to do, what to do if targeted by ICE, what can we do to counter hate speech and hate crimes, what will happen to TPS, when can one apply for asylum, what is the legality of agents asking for and searching smartphones and laptops at airports, what is the status of DACA, and more.

Date:

February 8, 2017

1st Segment: Wafa Abdin
Vice President for Immigration and Refugee Services at Catholic Charities. She oversees the Cabrini Center for Immigrant Legal Assistance, the largest non-profit provider of immigration legal services for low-income and indigent non-citizens and Refugee Resettlement Program. Ms. Abdin has more than fifteen years of experience in Immigration Law and is a frequent lecturer at Immigration conferences and has also written several articles and papers on Immigration law topics. In recognition of her outstanding work and dedication, Ms. Abdin was awarded the Chrys Dougherty Legal Services Award in 2010 by the Texas State Bar.
 
We will speak live with Wafa about President Trump's executive order, the lawsuits filed to stop it, where does it legally stand now, and more.
  

2nd Segment: Ussama Makdisi
Professor of History and the first holder of the Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair of Arab Studies at Rice University. In 2012-2013, Makdisi was an invited Resident Fellow at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (Institute for Advanced Study, Berlin). In April 2009, the Carnegie Corporation named Makdisi a 2009 Carnegie Scholar as part of its effort to promote original scholarship regarding Muslim societies and communities, both in the United States and abroad. Professor Makdisi is the author of Faith Misplaced: the Broken Promise of U.S.-Arab Relations, 1820-2001. His previous books include Artillery of Heaven: American Missionaries and the Failed Conversion of the Middle East, which was the winner of the 2008 Albert Hourani Book Award from the Middle East Studies Association, the 2009 John Hope Franklin Prize of the American Studies Association, and a co-winner of the 2009 British-Kuwait Friendship Society Book Prize given by the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies. Makdisi is also the author of The Culture of Sectarianism: Community, History, and Violence in Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Lebanon and co-editor of Memory and Violence in the Middle East and North Africa. He has published widely on Ottoman and Arab history as well as on U.S.-Arab relations and U.S. missionary work in the Middle East. Among his major articles are “Anti-Americanism in the Arab World: An Interpretation of Brief History” which appeared in the Journal of American History and “Ottoman Orientalism” and “Reclaiming the Land of the Bible: Missionaries, Secularism, and Evangelical Modernity” both of which appeared in the American Historical Review. Professor Makdisi has also published in the International Journal of Middle East Studies, Comparative Studies in Society and History, and in the Middle East Report. Professor Makdisi is now working on a manuscript on the origins of sectarianism in the modern Middle East to be published by the University of California Press.
  
We will speak live with professor Makdisi about President Trump’s Muslim ban executive order, what it means to U.S. relations with the Arab and Muslim world, President Trump's exempting Christians from his ban, and more. Professor Makdisi published an article last week titled "Trump's executive order pits Muslims against Christians" in which he says "The cynical executive order is not only blatantly discriminatory, but it plays Muslim against Christian, demonizing the former while pretending to be sympathetic to the latter. Trump's politics of sectarian sympathy and the purported protection of minorities has a long history. It has led to more persecution, not less."

Date:

February 1, 2017

Arsalan Safiullah
Staff Attorney at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Texas Houston). He earned his undergraduate degree from McGill University in Montreal and holds a Master of Biotechnology (M.Biot.) and a Juris Doctorate (J.D.) from Texas A&M University. In his current position, Arsalan focuses on employment discrimination, civil liberties issues, hate crimes, and know your rights community education.
         

Yolanda Rondon
Staff Attorney for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC National), where she works on legal cases and policy issues related to surveillance, racial and religious profiling, hate crimes, employment discrimination and immigration. She has provided written and oral testimony to the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board on surveillance, privacy and profiling concerns of the Arab American community, and has provided written testimony and reports to the United States Commission on Civil Rights on religious violations of prisoner rights and religious accommodation issues in immigration detentions. She has also addressed the United States compliance with the Convention Against Torture and privacy issues related to surveillance at the U.S. Department of State – Universal Periodic Review. She has also provide written testimony to U.S. Congressional committees on issues ranging from profiling and countering violent extremism to the refugee crisis and the visa waiver program, as well as oral testimony to the U.S. Department of Education on implementation of the Elementary & Secondary Education Act, resource equity, and accountability for English Language Learners.
   

We will speak live with Arsalan and Yolanda about President Trump's executive order to ban Muslims from 7 countries entry to the US, the effect of that on Houston and the nation, the nationwide stay issued by a federal judge halting part of Trump's immigration ban (after ACLU files emergency lawsuit), how should travelers deal with this ban and questioning by authorities at airports, the Texas Muslim Capitol Day that drew the largest crowd ever (held yesterday in Austin), the rise of attacks and hate crimes against Muslims in the US, and more.
   
    
We will also listen to the remarks of Sylvester Turner, Mayor of the City of Houston and Art Acevedo, Chief of the Houston Police Department (HPD) in the wake of President Trump's executive order on Immigration, and their message to the community.

Date:

January 25, 2017

           

Winter Fund Drive

Date:

January 18, 2017

President-elect Donald Trump said at the AIPAC (The American Israel Public Affairs Committee) conference last year: "In Palestinian textbooks and mosques, you've got a culture of hatred that has been fermenting there for years, and if we want to achieve peace, they've got to go out and they got to start this educational process. They have to end education of hatred. They have to end it, and now".
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to an interview Arab Voices conducted with Nurit Peled-Elhanan, Lecturer in Language Education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, an award-winning Israeli peace activist, poet and author, and one of the founders of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine. Nurit is the daughter of Israeli General Matti Peled. In 2001 she was awarded the Sakharov Prize for Human Rights and the Freedom of Thought by the European Parliament. She is also the author of the book Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education. We will speak with Nurit about Palestinian and Israeli textbooks. Please note that her book is available as a Thank-You Gift today on Arab Voices during KPFT's Winter Fund Drive at the $200 pledge level (call 713-526-5738 or email ArabVoices@hotmail.com).
   

We will also listen to an interview Arab Voices conducted with Sut Jhally, Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts, a leading scholar on advertising, public relations, and political propaganda. He is the author of several books including The Codes of Advertising; Enlightened Racism; and The Spectacle of Accumulation. Professor Jhally is the Founder and Executive Director of the Media Education Foundation (MEF), a documentary film company that looks at issues related to U.S. media and public attitudes. He is the producer, director, or executive producer of dozens of MEF films, including Peace, Propaganda & the Promised Land: U.S. Media & the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict; Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire; Reel Bad Arabs (featuring Jack Shaheen); Edward Said On Orientalism; Dreamworlds: Desire, Sex & Power in Music Video; and Advertising & the End of the World.
 
We will speak with professor Jhally about his new film The Occupation of the American Mind: Israel's Public Relations War in The United States, featuring Roger Waters, Amira Hass, M.J. Rosenberg, Stephen M. Walt, Noam Chomsky, Rula Jebreal, Henry Siegman, Rashid Khalidi, Rami Khouri, Yousef Munayyer, Norman Finkelstein, Max Blumenthal, Phyllis Bennis, Norman Solomon, Mark Crispin Miller, Peter Hart, and Sut Jhally. This film is available as a Thank-You Gift today on Arab Voices during KPFT's Winter Fund Drive at the $120 pledge level (call 713-526-5738 or email ArabVoices@hotmail.com).
         

Winter Fund Drive

Date:

January 11, 2017

"The Terrorism Label: an Examination of American Criminal Prosecutions" by Wadie Said
The Palestine Center in Washington, D.C. held its annual Edward Said Memorial Lecture on October 7, 2016. The speaker was Wadie Said, professor of law at the University of South Carolina School of Law, where he teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, and human rights law. Before joining the South Carolina faculty, Said represented terrorist suspects as an assistant federal public defender in Tampa, Florida, serving as counsel in United States v. Al-Arian, one of the largest terrorism prosecutions in American history. A graduate of Princeton University and Columbia Law School, he clerked for Chief Justice Charles P. Sifton of the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York. He is also the author of the recently published book, Crimes of Terror: the Legal and Political Implications of Federal Terrorism Prosecutions, which provides a comprehensive legal analysis of the criminal terrorist prosecution in the United States. His scholarship also appears in many prestigious law journals and reviews.
 
Professor Wadie Said spoke on the issue of terrorism and the ways in which it’s produced and dealt with in the American legal system. The lecture was titled "The Terrorism Label: an Examination of American Criminal Prosecutions".
   
Today, on Arab Voices, we will listen to that lecture and some of the questions and answers that followed his talk.

Date:

January 4, 2017

Noam Chomsky: With Trump Election, We Are Now Facing Threats to the Survival of the Human Species
On December 5, 2016, Democracy Now! held a special celebration event for its 20th anniversary at the historic Riverside Church in Manhattan, New York. More than 2,300 people attended the event. There were several speakers, including Noam Chomsky, world-renowned political dissident, linguist and author. He is professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and author of more than 100 books.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Noam Chomsky’s remarks at that event on “Trump and the decline of the American Superpower”, and will also listen to the conversation that followed his talk that Amy Goodman and Juan González of Democracy Now! had with Noam Chomsky and Harry Belafonte, who also spoke at the event. Harry Belafonte is a longtime civil rights activist who was also a popular singer and actor. He was one of Martin Luther King’s closest confidants and helped organize the March on Washington in 1963.

Date:

December 28, 2016

1st Segment: Dr. Riyad Mansour
Ambassador and Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations, and the non-resident Ambassador of the State of Palestine to Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic. He joined the Permanent Observer Mission of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to the UN, New York, in 1983 as Deputy Permanent Observer, and has since represented Palestine in several committees and bodies of the UN. Dr. Mansour has published several studies and articles about the Palestinian community in the US, lectured in several American universities, and has participated in numerous international conferences, symposia, seminars and panel debates as a representative of Palestine. He is also a member of senior officials committees of the State of Palestine and the PLO.
 
We will speak live with Ambassador Mansour about the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 that was adopted last Friday, December 23, 2016 stating that Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories including East Jerusalem have no legal validity, constitute flagrant violation of international law, and demands that Israel stop such activity and fulfill its obligation as an occupying power under the Fourth Geneva Convention. It was the first UNSC resolution to pass regarding Israel and Palestine in 36 years, and the first to address the issue of Israeli settlements with such specificity since Resolution 465 in 1980. We will also get his reaction to today's speech by Secretary of State John Kerry about Israel and Palestine.
  

2nd Segment: Paul Butler
Director of ANERA's (American Near East Refugee Aid) Palestine programs overseeing the West Bank and Gaza Strip since 2011. He is based in Jerusalem and supervises ANERA’s programs in health and education services, sustainable community development, water rehabilitation, agriculture, microfinance and emergency relief and medical aid. He is a veteran development professional with over two decades’ experience in the Middle East. He has directed programs in emergency relief, medical aid and economic development in some of the region’s most vulnerable places: Gaza, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Egypt. A fluent Arabic speaker, Paul has first-hand experience in the difficult political and economic situations of the region. He travels to Gaza regularly and was instrumental in ANERA’s relief efforts after the most recent war.
 
We will speak live with Mr. Butler about his experience on the ground in Palestine, an update on the humanitarian conditions there and what is being done to address them, the priorities for humanitarian relief and development work over the next few years, how has Gaza reconstruction progressed since the last war, how do the residents of Gaza cope with poverty and the blockade, how can development work advance peace in the region, and more.

Date:

December 21, 2016

Said Arikat
Journalist, author, and political analyst. He is the Washington, DC Bureau Chief for the daily Palestinian newspaper Al-Quds (based in occupied Jerusalem), for which he is a writer, columnist, and analyst. He is also an adjunct professor at the American University in Washington, DC where he teaches a course on "The Role of the Media in the Arab World". He also served as spokesman and director of public information for the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq from 2005 to 2010.

Date:

December 14, 2016

Liz Jackson
Founding Staff Attorney for Palestine Legal and Cooperating Counsel with the Center for Constitutional Rights. Her work includes representing students, professors and activists on free speech and academic freedom issues, documenting the chilling effect of repression campaigns, and educating activists on their rights. She advised the successful divestment campaign at UC Berkeley, and helped students respond to Title VI complaints, which were dismissed, rejecting the theory that Palestine activism creates a hostile environment for Jewish students. She has defended the right to advocate for Palestine on campuses from New Mexico to Southern Florida, Boston, New Jersey, and California. She has organized for Palestinian human rights as a member of Students for Justice in Palestine, as a Jewish solidarity activist, and as a former Co-Chair of the National Lawyers Guild Free Palestine Subcommittee. Liz has advocated for First Amendment rights to speak about Palestine in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Boston Globe, the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Electronic Intifada podcast, the Real News Network, Al Jazeera, and more.

We will speak with Liz about the controversial and unconstitutional "Anti-Semitism Awareness Act of 2016" that passed the U.S. Senate earlier this month, but failed to pass the U.S. House of Representatives last week despite intense lobbying by Israel advocacy groups. Will this be the end of it, or will we see it again during the next session? We will also talk about the efforts by some lobbying groups to restrict speech on U.S. campuses that are critical of Israel; the attacks on advocacy for Palestinian Rights; the rights of students advocating for justice in Palestine on university campuses; and more.

Date:

December 7, 2016

“Semitism and the Palestinians" by Joseph Massad
The United States Senate silently passed a dangerous piece of legislation last week called “The Anti-Semitism Awareness Act of 2016”. It was introduced by senators Tim Scott (R-SC) and Bob Casey (D-PA). This new piece of legislation requires the Department of Education to apply the State Department's definition of anti-Semitism in evaluating complaints of discrimination on educational campuses across the United States. It threatens the First Amendment rights and academic freedoms of students and faculty across the country by equating criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.
 
Arab Voices will be discussing this in more details on the show with experts on the subject matter within weeks, but today, we will listen to a lecture held a few years ago at the James A. Baker III Institute at Rice University in Houston titled “Semitism and the Palestinians”, delivered by Dr. Joseph Massad, who is now Professor of Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History at Columbia University. He is a historian, political scientist, a leading scholar of Arab culture, and author of several books and articles. This lecture addresses questions such as: What is Semitism and what does it have to do with the Palestinians? What is the relationship that Palestinians have to the Semite? Does the history of Semitism have anything to do with Palestinians? If so, what is it?

Date:

November 30, 2016

Sam Kadi
Director/producer of the award winning American feature drama THE CITIZEN. THE CITIZEN received five awards on the festival circuit before being released theatrically worldwide in 2013. The film was named among the "Best 10 Films of 2013" by Examiner.com. Kadi has been recognized by the prestigious Cinema For Peace organization for raising awareness of human rights issues through motion pictures, and was asked to speak on the same subject before the International Criminal Court at The Hague, Netherlands in June 2012. In 2013, Kadi was presented with a Humanitarian Service Award by the Life for Relief and Development Organization. Kadi is a member of the Directors Guild of America, where he serves on the Directors Guild Asian American Committee.

We will speak with Sam Kadi about the ongoing catastrophe in Syria; the war that has devastated the country and left hundreds of thousands dead and millions refugees. We will talk about the horrific situation in Aleppo; and the path for peace. We will also talk about the new award-winning documentary film "Little Gandhi" that will be screened in Houston on December 1 and 2.

Date:

November 23, 2016

Dr. Emran El-Badawi
Program director and associate professor of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Houston. He founded the Arab Studies program at UH and has designed, implemented and assessed degree programs in the Humanities and Sciences. He has consulted for various industries, including government, law and oil & gas, and he is also active in program development and fundraising. Dr. El-Badawi is founding executive director and treasurer of the International Qur'anic Studies Association, which is the world's first learned society of its kind. He has published in English as well as Arabic and has made dozens of national and international media contributions or appearances including for The New York Times, Al-Jazeera, Forbes, Christian Science Monitor and Association Relative à la Télévision Européenne (ARTE). His current research projects include a book on 'Arab Liberalism' between secular nationalism and political Islam, as well as a project documenting the evolution of Eastern Church/Canon Law to Shariah Law. Dr. El-Badawi has received numerous awards for his work and research including honorable acclaim by the British-Kuwait Friendship Society Book Prize for his book on The Qur'an and the Aramaic Gospel Traditions. Furthermore, his professional management and scholarly projects have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for several organizations.

We will speak with Dr. El-Badawi about several issues including the U.S. election results, populism, immigration, globalization; Trump's impact on minority groups in the US; Muslims, Arabs, South Asians in America (contributions and challenges); Middle East policy, and more.

Date:

November 16, 2016

Khalil Jahshan
Executive Director of the Arab Center Washington DC, a non-partisan, non-profit think tank focusing on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, as well as furthering economic, political, and social understanding of the Arab World in the United States. He is a Palestinian-American activist and media commentator. He previously served as Executive Director at Pepperdine University, Executive Vice President of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) and director of its government affairs affiliate (NAAA-ADC), Vice President of the American Committee on Jerusalem, President of the National Association of Arab Americans, National Director of the Association of Arab-American University Graduates (AAUG), Assistant Director of Palestine Research and Educational Center, and Lecturer in Arabic at the University of Chicago Extension and at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Mr. Jahshan has served on the boards of directors, and advisory boards of various Middle East-oriented groups, including ANERA, MIFTAH and Search for Common Ground.

We will speak with Mr. Jahshan about the U.S. elections, Trump’s victory and what we might expect in terms of foreign policy, the recent Arab Public Opinion Poll about the U.S. elections by the Arab Center Washington DC, and Trump’s rhetoric during the campaign about Muslims and other minority groups and its impact.
 
Since Trump's victory last week, we have seen a significant increase in violent hate rhetoric and crimes targeting Arab and Muslim American communities, and communities of color. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, more than 500 incidents of hateful harassment and intimidation have been reported in the U.S. following the election results (higher than the immediate post-9/11 backlash), and according to Campus Safety magazine, a series of racially-motivated incidents have been reported at schools at all levels across the U.S. following Trump’s victory. A new report released on  November 14, 2016 by the FBI reveals that law enforcement agencies across the country reported 257 anti-Muslim incidents in 2015, up 67 percent from the year before (many attribute that to the anti-Muslim rhetoric that came out of the presidential campaign).

Date:

November 9, 2016

1st Segment: Reactions to Trump's Election
We will listen to the reaction of several national U.S. Muslim and Arab organizations and interfaith organizations to the election of Donald Trump as the nation’s 45th president. The comments will include: Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), Muslim Alliance of North America, National Council of Churches USA, Islamic Circle of North America, American Muslims for Palestine, Muslim American Society, and others.
        
2nd Segment: Hani Al-Masri
Director General of Masarat, the Palestinian Center for Policy Research & Strategic Studies, and Policy Advisor at Al Shabaka Palestinian Policy Network. He founded and was director general of the Palestinian Media, Research and Studies Centre, Badael, between 2005 and 2011. He has published hundreds of articles, research and policy papers in Palestinian and Arab magazines and newspapers including Al-Ayyam and Al-Safir. He previously served as General Manager of the Printing & Publication Department at the Ministry of Information and as a member of the Committee on Government in the Commission of Dialogue held in Cairo in 2009. He is also a member of the board of trustees at the Yasser Arafat Foundation.
  
Please note that Dr. Hani Al-Masri will be speaking at the Arab American Cultural and Community Center in Houston on Sunday, November 13 at 5 p.m. Click here for more details.

Date:

November 2, 2016

Sheila Carapico
Editor of the newly released Arabia Incognita: Dispatches from Yemen and the Gulf, who is widely recognized as a leading expert on Yemen. She is the author of Civil Society in Yemen: The Political Economy of Activism in Modern Arabia and numerous other books, book chapters, and articles about Yemen, the Arabian Peninsula, and the region. Carapico acquired her reputation as a Yemen expert through her time as a Fulbright research scholar in the country and consultancy work she did there for bodies such as Human Rights Watch, the Royal Netherlands Embassy, and the International Fund for Agricultural Development. During 2010 and the crucial spring of 2011, she was Visiting Chairperson of the Department of Political Science at the American University in Cairo. She teaches Political Science and coordinates the International Studies program at the University of Richmond and is a long serving member of the Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP) collective.

Date:

October 26, 2016

ACC's Annual Unity & Friendship Gala
The Arab American Cultural & Community Center (ACC) in Houston held its 23rd Annual Unity & Friendship Gala on October 1, 2016. This year's theme was "Raising Hope", and it highlighted the Culture and People of Tunisia. The Gala Chairs were Mrs. Shiraz Ghedira Goucha and Mrs. Aicha Limayem Lassoued. The Mistress of Ceremonies was Kaitlin McCulley, Reporter at KTRK ABC 13 News in Houston.
 
This year's ACC honorees were the Levant Foundation for outstanding community service, Dr. Mohamed Rabie for the ACC lifetime achievement award, and Minuteman Press Southwest for the ACC business community award.
  
Today on Arab Voices we will listen to most of the remarks made at the Gala, including the remarks of Dr. Kamal Khalil, ACC President, Sylvester Turner, Mayor of the City of Houston, and Ambassador Fayçal Gouia, Tunisia’s Ambassador to the United States.

Date:

October 19, 2016

Date:

October 12, 2016

Ann Wright
Former US State Department official/diplomat, retired US Army Colonel, and a long-time CODEPINK activist. She resigned from the US government in March, 2003 in opposition to the war on Iraq. Since her resignation, she has travelled to Gaza seven times, helped organize the 1,300 person Gaza Freedom March in 2009, was a passenger on the Challenge 1 in the 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla, was an organizer for the 2011 US Boat to Gaza and a boat leader on the 2015 Gaza Freedom Flotilla. She was also an organizer for Gaza’s Ark. Ann Wright was an organizer and the boat leader for the 2016 Women’s Boat to Gaza that began to sail on September 14, 2016 from Barcelona in an effort to break the Israeli naval blockade on Gaza. The boat, Zaytouna-Oliva, was hijacked in international waters by the Israeli military on October 5, 2016 a few miles of the coast of Gaza, and all 13 women on board, including Ann Wright, were kidnapped by force by the Israeli military and taken to the Israeli port of Ashdod. On board with her were three parliamentarians from New Zealand, Sweden and Algerian, an Olympic athlete from South Africa, and Nobel Peace Laureate, Mairead Maguire, from Northern Ireland.

We will speak live with Ann Wright about her recent attempt to break the siege on Gaza, and her firsthand account of her kidnapping from international waters by the Israeli military.
   

Fall Fund Drive

Date:

October 5, 2016

     

Fall Fund Drive

Date:

September 28, 2016

Dr. Mohamed Rabie
Distinguished Professor of International Political Economy who taught at several Arab and American universities, including the University of Houston and Texas Southern University in Houston, Georgetown University, The Johns Hopkins University, and The American University in Washington. Dr. Rabie published 43 books in English and Arabic including The Politics of Foreign Aid; A Vision for the Transformation of the Middle East; The US-PLO Dialogue; Conflict Resolution and the Middle East Peace Process; and Global Economic and Cultural Transformation: The Making of History. He also drafted the original document that guided negotiations and coordinated secret contacts between the US and the PLO. Dr. Rabie received several awards and recognitions over the years including the prestigious 2015 State of Palestine Honorary Award for his contributions to the humanities and social sciences fields.

We will speak live with Dr. Rabie about various topics including the current situation in the Middle East and the wars that are destroying several Arab countries; the U.S. involvement and its foreign policy towards the Middle East; the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli problem; and the prospects for peaceful resolutions to what's happening in the Middle East.
 
Note: Dr. Mohamed Rabie is currently in Houston and on Saturday, October 1, 2016, he will be the recipient of the Arab-American Cultural & Community Center's Lifetime Achievement Award at the ACC's annual gala.

Date:

September 21, 2016

Edward Said - Palestine and the Universality of Human Rights
This week marks the 13th anniversary of Professor Edward Said's death, and on this occasion, we will air today on Arab Voices one of the last major speeches he delivered few months before he died. The talk was titled "Memory, Inequality, and Power: Palestine and the Universality of Human Rights". He delivered that speech at the University of California, Berkeley on February 19, 2003.
 
Professor Said is an internationally renowned writer, author, and scholar, whose writings about the Middle East and its relationship with the West have gone far to open new roads in academia and to influence public opinion. Dr. Edward Said was a giant figure in the Arab-American community, and for Arabs in the Middle East and across the world. During the course of his life, he articulated a vision of Palestine and the Arab world that not only recalled the significant contributions of the region’s people but also offered hope for the future. Edward W. Said was Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He died on September 25, 2003, in New York.

Date:

September 14, 2016

1st Segment: Israel's Netanyahu redefines “ethnic cleansing”!!!
Comments and reactions to the latest remarks by the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that those who want to create a Palestinian state are seeking “ethnic cleansing” of Jews from the occupied territories. We will also listen to the reaction of the US State Department, and a talk about ethnic cleansing by Israeli Historian Ilan Pappe.
    

2nd Segment: Gareth Porter on Syria
An American historian, investigative journalist, author and policy analyst specializing in U.S. national security policy. He has written several books about the potential for peaceful conflict resolution in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, including Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare. Porter has reported extensively on Middle East conflicts including Syria. Porter's analysis and reporting have appeared in academic journals, news publications, and periodicals for four decades, and in 2012 he was the winner of the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism.
 
We will speak live with Gareth about the latest ceasefire in Syria, and the probabilities of it succeeding.

Date:

September 7, 2016

US student politics “rapidly shifting” despite Israel lobby efforts
Podcast produced by The Electronic Intifada.
 
We will listen today to a Podcast by the Electronic Intifada titled “US student politics “rapidly shifting” despite Israel lobby efforts”. It features interviews with Omar Zahzah and Rahim Kurwa, both graduate students at UCLA and members of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), and Charlotte Kates of the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoners Solidarity Network, who was denied entry to Palestine by Israel. Kates was travelling to accompany a delegation of European parliamentarians and lawyers in support of Bilal Kayed, who ended a 71-day hunger strike last month. Charlotte was interrogated about her activism with the BDS movement.

Date:

August 31, 2016

     

Back to School Mini-Drive

Date:

August 24, 2016

Ghada Alatrash
Syrian-Canadian writer, author, poet, and certified translator based in Calgary, Alberta, in Canada. She is chair of the Syrian Women's Club of Calgary. She holds a Masters of English from the University of Oklahoma, with an emphasis on post-colonial studies, and is currently a doctoral student at the University of Calgary's Werklund School of Education in Canada. Ghada taught English at Abu Dhabi Women's College, Arabic at the University of Oklahoma, and is a Columnist for Gulf News. In 2012, she released her first work of translation "So that the Poem Remains", a collection of poems by Lebanese poet Youssef Abdul Samad, translated from Arabic to English. She also held a number of poetry readings set to music by Western and Eastern composers. Ghada just published her first book "Stripped to the Bone: Portraits of Syrian Women", a collection of seven short stories about Syrian women in war-torn Syria and the West, and it explores issues of identity, love, strife and courage.
   
We will speak with Ghada about her stories and work, poetry, Syrian women, women's issues, and her new book "Stripped to the Bone: Portraits of Syrian Women".

Date:

August 17, 2016

Rania Khalek
An independent journalist reporting on the underclass and marginalized; Associate Editor at the Electronic Intifada; and Co-host of the weekly podcast Unauthorized Disclosure. She's written for Extra, The Nation, Al Jazeera America, the Electronic Intifada, Truthout, Salon, AlterNet, Citizen Radio and more.
 
We will speak with Rania about last week's murder of  Khalid Jabara, a 37-year-old Arab-American man, who was shot and killed in front of his home in Tulsa, Oklahoma by his neighbor, Vernon Majors, who terrorized the victim’s family for years, referring to them as “dirty Arabs” and "filthy Lebanese". Majors shot and killed Khalid Jabara while he was out on bond from a prior hate crime where he intentionally drove his car into Khalid Jabara’s mother, despite a prosecutor telling the court that Majors was “a substantial risk to the public.” According to the Jabara family, Khalid called the police 30 minutes before he was shot and killed to report that Majors had a gun and that he was scared for what might happen, but the police came and told him there was nothing to be done!
 
We will also talk about the execution-style killings on Saturday of New York imam (religious leader) and his associate, as hate crimes against Arabs and Muslims in the U.S. continue to rise in an atmosphere filled with hateful rhetoric in politics and the society at large, and a growing climate of fear among Arabs and Muslims in the U.S.

Date:

August 10, 2016

Syrian Tragedy: Causes, Consequences, and Options
A fascinating overview and analysis of the history of Syria, from post-WWII to the current quagmire of war, the rise of ISIS, and the battleground of the world’s powerful military countries.
 
Featured Speaker: Stephen Zunes
Professor of politics and international studies and program director of Middle Eastern studies at the University of San Francisco. He has published scores of articles in academic journals, anthologies, magazines, and newspaper op-ed pages on such topics as U.S. foreign policy, Middle Eastern politics, Latin American politics, African politics, human rights, arms control, social movements and nonviolent action.
  
This segment is a production of Global Voices for Justice, a non-profit media organization.

Date:

August 3, 2016

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Khizr Khan's DNC Remarks, and Electronic Intifada Podcast on DNC Delegates Support for Palestinian Rights
Over the past week, the remarks of Khizr Khan at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia made, and continues to make headlines throughout the world. Khizr Khan (Muslim American) is the father of deceased Army Captain Humayun Khan, a Muslim U.S. soldier who was killed while serving in Iraq. Khizr Khan addressed the anti-Muslim rhetoric coming out of Donald Trump.

Today, we will listen to those remarks of Khizr Khan, as well as the remarks of Kareem Abdul-Jabaar, a Muslim American, former professional basketball player and advocate for racial and religious tolerance who also spoke at the convention condemning Trump's anti-Muslim speech.

During the second half of the program, we will listen to a Podcast by the Electronic Intifada titled “DNC delegates support Palestinian rights, even if Democratic Party doesn’t”. It features interviews with Rania Khalek, journalist and associate editor at Electronic Intifada; Josh Ruebner, policy director of the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation; and Jennifer Bing of the American Friends Service Committee.

Date:

July 27, 2016

KPFT Houston is currently in Summer Fund Drive, and Arab Voices needs your support to raise $800 during this drive. Arab Voices started in April 2002 (more than 14 years ago) with over 740 shows produced and hundreds of guests appearing on the show from around the globe covering a wide range of topics.
 
Please call during the show today, Wednesday between 7 and 8 pm central time and pledge your support (713-526-5738). Your donation qualifies as a charitable deduction on your federal income tax return because KPFT is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.
 
Arab Voices will be offering several "Thank-You Gifts" during the drive, including:
 
• $120 "The Occupation of the American Mind" Film
Today, we will air portions of the interview conducted in May 2016 with the executive producer of the film, Professor Sut Jhally.
 
Israel's ongoing military occupation of Palestinian territory and its repeated invasions of the Gaza Strip have triggered a fierce backlash against Israeli policies virtually everywhere in the world — except the United States. The Occupation of the American Mind takes an eye-opening look at this critical exception, zeroing in on pro-Israel public relations efforts within the U.S. Narrated by Roger Waters and featuring leading observers of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, the film explores how the Israeli government, the U.S. government, and the pro-Israel lobby have joined forces, often with very different motives, to shape American media coverage of the conflict in Israel's favor. The Occupation of the American Mind provides a sweeping analysis of Israel's decades-long battle for the hearts, minds, and tax dollars of the American people — a battle that has only intensified over the past few years in the face of widening international condemnation of Israel's increasingly right-wing policies.

• $150 "Understanding ISIS and the New Global War on Terror: A Primer" book by Phyllis Bennis

• $300 "Palestine 4 Film Pack" - FOUR documentaries (on DVDs)
Four films on the Israel-Palestinian crisis and history, some of which are multi-part series: 1 - "Al Nakba" (award-winning four-part series); 2 - "The Price of Oslo"; 3 - "Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land"; 4 - "Occupation 101"

• $150 "Al Nakba" (award-winning four-part series) DVDs

• $85 "The Battle for Justice in Palestine" book by Ali Abunimah

• $250 Edward Said Tribute 6 CD SET

• $180 “The General's Son: Journey of an Israeli in Palestine” book by Miko Peled

• $200 "Brokers of Deceit: How the U.S. Has Undermined Peace in the Middle East" book by Rashid Khalidi

• $150 “National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism” book by Melvin Goodman

• $200 “Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education” book by Nurit Peled-Alhanan
  

Membership Drive

Date:

July 20, 2016

Date:

July 13, 2016

Dima Khalidi
Founder and Director of Palestine Legal, and Cooperating Counsel with the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR). Her work includes providing legal advice to activists, engaging in advocacy to protect their rights to speak out for Palestinian rights, and educating activists and the public about the repression of Palestine advocates. Over the years, Dima worked on numerous cases that sought to hold Israeli officials and corporations accountable for Israeli violations of international law, including Belhas v. Ya’alon, Matar et al. v. Dichter and Corrie v. Caterpillar, as well as on CCR’s Guantanamo Bay docket. Prior to studying law, Dima worked at Birzeit University, heading a research project on the role of informal justice mechanisms in the Palestinian legal system. She has advocated on Palestinian rights issues in media forums such as the New York Times, the Jewish Press, The Hill, Huffington Post Live, The Real News Network, Al Jazeera English, Mondoweiss, Huffington Post, Law and Disorder Radio, and Radio Tahrir. She is fluent in Arabic and French. Dima is based in Palestine Legal’s Chicago office, and is admitted to practice law in Illinois.
 
We will speak live with Dima about the wave of bills that have been introduced in state legislatures across the U.S. aimed at punishing or suppressing boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaigns for Palestinian freedom. We will also talk about last month's Executive Order signed by Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York directing state agencies and authorities to divest public funds supporting BDS campaign against Israel.
  

Rabbi Brian Walt
Founding Executive Director of Rabbis for Human Rights-North America, co-chair of the Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) Rabbinical Council, and co-founder of Jewish Fast for Gaza.
   
We will speak live with Rabbi Walt about the ongoing incitement to racism and violence against Palestinians from senior Israeli religious, political, and military leaders. We will talk about the endorsement of rape by Israel's new Military Chief Rabbi, Eyal Karim, who was named to that post yesterday. Rabbi Karim stated on a site in the past that it is permitted for Jewish soldiers to rape non-Jewish women during times of war. Furthermore, and according to the English edition of Israel's Yedioth Arnot newspaper: "The rabbi gave a more shocking answer on the same site when asked if soldiers were permitted to rape women during war. Karim replied that, as part of maintaining fitness for the army and the soldiers' morale during fighting, it is permitted to 'breach' the walls of modesty and 'satisfy the evil inclination by lying with attractive Gentile women against their will, out of consideration for the difficulties faced by the soldiers and for overall success.'"

Date:

July 6, 2016

Hate Incidents & Attacks against Muslims on the Rise
Over the past ten days, hate incidents and attacks (including beatings and shootings) targeting Muslims and Islamic houses of worship have risen noticeably across the United States, as anti-Muslim sentiment continues to rise alongside the anti-Muslim political climate in the United Sates.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to remarks delivered by several community leaders at a news conference held by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Houston) on July 4, 2016, urging additional security measures in light of the recent hate incidents. We will listen to the remarks of Mustafaa Carroll, Executive Director of CAIR-Houston; Dr. Shahid Hasnain, Representing the Greater Houston community doctors; Rev. Kimberly Orr, Associate Pastor for Windsor Village United Methodist Church; Deric Muhammad, Community Activist; David Atwood with Pax Christie; Dr. Yusuf Shere, President of CAIR-Texas; Arsalan Safiullah, Staff Attorney at CAIR-Houston; Shaykh Waleed Basyouni, Imam of Clear Lake Islamic Center; and a statement from the Greater Houston Coalition for Justice sent to the US Department of Justice.
 
We will also listen to the remarks made by Syeda Bokhari, the wife of Dr. Arslan Tajammul, who was shot outside a Houston mosque on Sunday, July 3, 2016.
        
Confronting Fear: Islamophobia and its Impact in the U.S.
A new report released on June 20, 2016, by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR National) and the Center for Race and Gender at UC Berkeley, reveals that 33 Islamophobic groups had access to at least $205 million in total revenue between 2008-2013 used mainly to make people afraid of Islam and Muslims. The report, titled “Confronting Fear,” also presents a four-point strategy designed to achieve a shared American understanding of Islam in which being Muslim carries a positive connotation, and in which Islam has an equal place among the many faiths that together constitute America’s pluralistic society. The report also documents the negative impact of Islamophobia in America, including the anti-Islam bills that became law in 10 states. At least two states, Florida and Tennessee, have passed laws revising the way they approve textbooks for classroom use as a direct result of anti-Islam campaigns.
 
We will also listen today to Corey Saylor, Director of the Department to Monitor and Combat Islamophobia at CAIR National, discussing this new report.

Date:

June 29, 2016

Melvin Goodman
Director of the National Security Project and senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, and an adjunct professor of government at Johns Hopkins University. He was an analyst at the CIA for 24 years; and a former analyst at the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research. He is author of six books on US intelligence and international security, including "National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism" and "Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA". His forthcoming book is "Whistleblower at the CIA: An Insider’s Account of the Politics of Intelligence". His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Harper's, CounterPunch, and many others.

We will speak live with Mr. Goodman about the report released yesterday on the Benghazi attack in Libya that killed four Americans. He commented yesterday on that report by saying "This Benghazi report is of a continuing media circus that the Republicans have created. But we still have much to learn about the CIA's role in Benghazi; the interest of Ambassador Stevens in Benghazi; and the communications between the White House and the CIA in trying to explain the events of that terrible night." Mr. Goodman revealed before that the US consulate in Benghazi was a diplomatic cover for an intelligence operation.
  
We will also talk about American militarism around the world; US presidential candidates and their stance towards military spending and defense budget; US involvements in other countries; and more.

Date:

June 22, 2016

Notes From the Left Forum in NYC: Medea Benjamin and Amy Goodman
   
Rage, Rebellion, Organizing Our Power was the theme of the Left Forum in New York City held at John Jay College of Criminal Justice May 20-22, 2016.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to two remarks delivered at the forum by Medea Benjamin and Amy Goodman. Notes from the Left Forum is a new series produced by our sister station WBAI Radio in NYC.
 
Medea Benjamin, award-winning Peace Activist and co-founder of Code Pink addressed the conference. Speaking to the change that's needed out of a war economy, Benjamin said "We will only give peace a chance when we challenge those in power and replace the war economy with a local peace economy."
 
Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now, on a 20th Anniversary tour of the award-winning program, addressed the Left Forum. She spoke out about Donald Trump, "the man who has ripped open the underbelly of hate" and the importance of independent media, a media that covers power not a media that covers for power. She says "The media can be the greatest force for peace on earth, instead all too often it's wielded as a weapon of war."

Date:

June 15, 2016

Local reaction to the Orlando massacre, and bigotry towards Islam and Muslims
 
There was outrage and denunciation to the recent massacre in Orlando, Florida from all over the world, including Houston, while some news media outlets, some politicians, a presidential candidate, and others ceased the opportunity to continue their attacks and hostilities towards Islam and Muslims. In Houston, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee along with Muslim, Christian, Hispanic and LGBTQ community leaders held a press conference on Sunday, June 12, 2016, to denounce the massacre. Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to some of those remarks from MJ Khan, President of the Islamic Society of Greater Houston; Deacon Sam Dunning, Director of the Office of Justice and Peace for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston; Mufti Mohammed Wasim Khan, Muslim Imam and Director and Dean of ISRA Foundation; and Mustafaa Carroll, Executive Director of the Houston Office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
 
In addition, we will listen to some of the remarks delivered at the Annual Houston Ramadan Iftar Dinner on June 12, 2016, by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee; Congressman Al Green; Harris County Judge Ed Emmett; and Mayor of the City of Houston Sylvester Turner. They also talked about Islam, Muslims, and the Orlando massacre.
 
We will also listen to the speech delivered at Muhammad Ali's funeral on June 10, 2016, by Michael Lerner, a Jewish Rabbi and Editor-in-Chief for Tikkkun Magazine.

Date:

June 8, 2016

1st Segment: Remembering Hedy Epstein
On May 26, 2016, Holocaust Jewish survivor Hedy Epstein, passed away in St. Louis, Missouri, at the age of 91. Hedy was an internationally renowned, respected and admired advocate for human and civil rights. Throughout most of her life, she fought for justice and freedom for the oppressed. Following the 1982 massacre of Palestinians at Sabra and Shatila camps in Lebanon, Hedy began her courageous and visionary work for peace and justice. Much of her later activism centered on efforts to end the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Hedy traveled to the occupied West Bank several times, and attempted several times to go to Gaza with the Freedom Flotilla, the Audacity of Hope, and the Gaza Freedom March.
 
Hedy Epstein was a guest on Arab Voices twice over the years. First in April 2005, where she talked about her experience in occupied Palestine, and the second time was on December 23, 2009, where she talked about her participation in the Gaza Freedom March at the Egypt/Gaza border. Today, we will re-air her last interview on Arab Voices.
   
2nd Segment: "The Nakba, the Naksa, and the future of Palestine"
Making Contact, an award-winning, weekly magazine/documentary-style public affairs program that is heard on 140 radio stations in the USA, Canada, South Africa and Ireland, produced a new program titled “The Nakba, The Naksa, and the Future of Palestine”.
 
In 1948, Zionist militias expelled over 700,000 Palestinians from their villages and towns. The event, and the ongoing destruction and occupation of Palestine are referred to as the Nakba – the catastrophe. How did the events of 1948 shape Palestine and its diaspora? And generations later, how are Palestinians fighting to return home?
 
In this edition, Making Contact reflects on the Nakba, the Naksa, and the future of Palestine.
 
Featuring: Rami Almeghari, FSRN reporter; Ghazi Misleh, author of I Am from There and I Have Memories; Rabab Abdulhadi, Professor of Ethnic Studies and Senior Scholar of the Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas Initiative at San Francisco State University; Dina from Rammun; Mohannad from Ramle; Remi Kanazi, poet and author of Before the Next Bomb Drops

Date:

June 1, 2016

In Memoriam: Arab Voices interview with Dr. Clovis Maksoud
Dr. Clovis Maksoud, former ambassador and permanent observer of the League of Arab States at the United Nations and its chief representative in the United States for more than 10 years, passed away in Washington, D.C. on May 15, 2016, at the age of 89. He was a lawyer, journalist, and diplomat, and served as the League of Arab States’ Ambassador to India and Southeast Asia from 1961 to 1966 as well as the League of Arab States’ special envoy to the United States in 1974. He was also a member of the United Nations Development Program Advisory Board on the Arab Human Development Reports. Maksoud founded and served as director of American University’s Center for the Global South. He has authored several books on the Middle East and developing countries, including The Meaning of Nonalignment, The Crisis of the Arab Left, Reflections on Afro-Asianism, The Arab Image, and his memoir "From the Corners of Memory: A Journey on the Train of Arab Nationalism".
 
Arab Voices interviewed Dr. Maksoud more than once, and in his memory, we will re-air the last interview conducted with him last year. In that interview, we talked about the Middle East and what's happening in several Arab countries including Yemen, Syria, Libya, Iraq, and Egypt. We also talked about ISIS; the Arab awakenings; and more.

Date:

May 25, 2016

Sut Jhally
Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts, a leading scholar on advertising, public relations, and political propaganda. He is the author of several books including The Codes of Advertising; Enlightened Racism; and The Spectacle of Accumulation. Professor Jhally is the Founder and Executive Director of the Media Education Foundation (MEF), a documentary film company that looks at issues related to U.S. media and public attitudes.
 
He is the producer, director, or executive producer of dozens of MEF films, including Peace, Propaganda & the Promised Land: U.S. Media & the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict; Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire; Reel Bad Arabs (featuring Jack Shaheen); Edward Said On Orientalism; Dreamworlds: Desire, Sex & Power in Music Video; and Advertising & the End of the World.
 
Professor Jhally is executive producer of the just-released film The Occupation of the American Mind: Israel's Public Relations War in The United States, featuring Roger Waters, Amira Hass, M.J. Rosenberg, Stephen M. Walt, Noam Chomsky, Rula Jebreal, Henry Siegman, Rashid Khalidi, Rami Khouri, Yousef Munayyer, Norman Finkelstein, Max Blumenthal, Phyllis Bennis, Norman Solomon, Mark Crispin Miller, Peter Hart, and Sut Jhally.

We will speak live with professor Jhally about his new film The Occupation of the American Mind: Israel's Public Relations War in The United States.
 
About the Film:
Israel's ongoing military occupation of Palestinian territory and its repeated invasions of the Gaza strip have triggered a fierce backlash against Israeli policies virtually everywhere in the world — except the United States. The Occupation of the American Mind takes an eye-opening look at this critical exception, zeroing in on pro-Israel public relations efforts within the U.S. Narrated by Roger Waters and featuring leading observers of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, the film explores how the Israeli government, the U.S. government, and the pro-Israel lobby have joined forces, often with very different motives, to shape American media coverage of the conflict in Israel's favor. The Occupation of the American Mind provides a sweeping analysis of Israel's decades-long battle for the hearts, minds, and tax dollars of the American people — a battle that has only intensified over the past few years in the face of widening international condemnation of Israel's increasingly right-wing policies.

Date:

May 18, 2016

     

Membership Drive

Date:

May 11, 2016

Houston Palestine Film Festival
We will speak live with Houston Palestine Film Festival's President Khalil AbuSharekh about the Houston Palestine Film Festival (HPFF). This year HPFF will be celebrating the tenth anniversary with its largest festival to date, showcasing a number of award winning and internationally acclaimed feature films, documentaries and shorts that address a variety of themes and narratives in Palestinian society.
    
The festival will run for three consecutive weekends in May and will be the largest and most varied edition in the organization’s history in terms of the number of films screened and number of days running. This year’s highlights include two Oscar-nominated films, director visits and Q&A sessions, evening receptions and plenty of surprises for audience members.
  
Screenings during the first weekend, May 13-15, will be held at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. For the second and third weekends, May 19-22 and May 26-28, screenings will be held at the Rice University Media Center.
 
Click here for more details and Program Lineup.
      

Membership Drive

Date:

May 4, 2016

"The Hundred Year War in Palestine" by Dr. Rashid Khalidi
This lecture titled "The Hundred Year War in Palestine" was given by Professor Rashid Khalidi at the Centre for Palestine Studies at SOAS University of London on March 11, 2016. Professor Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies and Chairman of the Department of History at Columbia University.
 
The Balfour Declaration of 1917 launched what amounts to a hundred years of war against the Palestinians. This war had a unique nature – it was formally sanctioned and authorized by the great powers of the day at different times during this century, and via different fora, such as the League of Nations and the United Nations, but it was mainly waged by other actors. A much distorted and maligned feature of this long war has been the Palestinians’ continuing resistance, against heavy odds, to what amounts to one of the last ongoing attempts at colonial subjugation in the modern world.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Dr. Khalidi's lecture on "The Hundred Year War in Palestine".

Date:

April 27, 2016

Andrew J. Bacevich
Professor Emeritus of International Relations and History at Boston University; a retired U.S. army colonel; and New York Times bestselling author. A graduate of the US Military Academy, he served for twenty-three years as a commissioned officer in the United States Army. He received his Ph.D. in American Diplomatic History from Princeton University. Before joining the faculty of Boston University, he taught at West Point and Johns Hopkins. Bacevich is the author of the just released book America’s War for the Greater Middle East: A Military History (2016). His previous books include Breach of Trust: How Americans Failed Their Soldiers and Their Country (2013); Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War (2010); The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (2008); The Long War: A New History of US National Security Policy since World War II (2007) (editor); The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War (2005); and American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy (2002). His essays and reviews have appeared in a variety of scholarly and general interest publications including The Wilson Quarterly, The National Interest, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The Nation, and The New Republic. His op-eds have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Boston Globe, and Los Angeles Times, among other newspapers. In 2004, Dr. Bacevich was a Berlin Prize Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin. He has also held fellowships at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and the Council on Foreign Relations.
  

We will speak with professor Bacevich about his new book America’s War for the Greater Middle East: A Military History (2016); US wars in the middle East; US presidential candidates and their stance on wars, US foreign policy towards the Middle East; ISIS; the military-industrial complex; US-Israel relations; and more.

Date:

April 20, 2016

"Rousseau and Palestine: The Radical Tradition of Popular Sovereignty" by Professor Karma Nabulsi
The Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Arab History held a lecture on March 31, 2016, at the University of Houston titled "Rousseau and Palestine: The Radical Tradition of Popular Sovereignty". The speaker was Professor Karma Nabulsi of Oxford University.
 
Karma Nabulsi, D.Phil., is a distinguished Palestinian public intellectual, political theorist, historian, and former national representative. She is a senior faculty member and current director of undergraduate studies at the Department of Politics and International Relations at Oxford University. She is the author of Traditions of War: Occupation, Resistance and the Law and Palestinians Register: Laying Foundations and Setting Directions. Professor Nabulsi has been a columnist for the Guardian and is a regular contributor to a variety of publications including the Independent, The New Statesman, and the London Review of Books. She is Chair of Trustees and co-founder (with Bella Freud) of the HOPING Foundation.
  
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Professor Nabulsi's lecture on "Rousseau and Palestine: The Radical Tradition of Popular Sovereignty".

Date:

April 13, 2016

"America, Energy and War" by Toby C. Jones
The Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair of Arab Studies at rice University held a lecture on March 29, 2016, titled "America, Energy and War". The speaker was Toby C. Jones, Associate Professor of History at Rutgers University.
 
"Over the late 20th and early 21st centuries, the United States waged what should reasonably be argued was a long war in the Middle East. At the heart of this history is a complex relationship between energy, American geopolitical anxiety, revolution, radicalism and shifting crises in an embattled region. While it is commonly posited that wars in the region can or should be understood as struggles for direct control over oil or that the militarization of the Middle East only reflects the pursuit of petrodollars, I encourage a new way of thinking. By examining the steady increase of violence in the Persian Gulf that began in the mid-1980s, my talk argues that that the distinction between energy and war were systematically erased, remade in a new material order of militarized-energy networks. The result has been a deeply entangled history of weapons, oil and war ever since."
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Professor Jones' lecture on "America, Energy and War".

Date:

April 6, 2016

The 2nd Annual Lebanese Festival
A live conversation with Mirna Makhoul, Fred Davis and Linda Bousaid, with the American Lebanese Cultural Center and members of the Lebanese Festival Committee, about the 2nd Annual Lebanese Festival that will be held on Saturday and Sunday, April 9-10 at Jones Plaza in Downtown Houston.
 
There will be delicious food, great festivities, enjoyable atmosphere for both adults and children, door prizes, music, folkloric dances, performances throughout the day, and much more.   

A Thousand and One Journeys: The Arab Americans
We will talk about the groundbreaking documentary film "A Thousand and One Journeys: The Arab Americans", which will be screened (free admission) at Rice University on Friday, April 8, sponsored by The Arab-American Educational Foundation. Following the screening, there will a question and answer session with the film Director.
 
This documentary provides viewers with a first-ever glimpse of the Arab Americans experience told through the eyes of famous and everyday people. Mapping the arc of American History, the film explores early and multiple waves of immigration along with the tremendous impact of 9/11 on the Arab American community and its challenges and dreams in light of the zeitgeist. A Thousand And One Journeys: The Arab Americans is the untold story of almost 200 years of the contributions of those who immigrated to the United States from the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf have made to the American fabric.

Date:

March 30, 2016

Dr. As'ad AbuKhalil
Lebanese-American professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. He is the creator of and maintains the Angry Arab News Service blog. He is author of several publications including Historical Dictionary of Lebanon; Bin Laden, Islam & America's New "War on Terrorism"; and The Battle For Saudi Arabia: Royalty, Fundamentalism, and Global Power.
  

We will speak live with professor AbuKhalil about the Middle East (wars in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya); the ongoing Israeli/Palestinian crisis; US stance/foreign policy towards the Middle East; and more.

Date:

March 23, 2016

“What I would tell a visiting congressional delegation” by Gideon Levy
On March 18, 2016, a conference was held in Washington, DC called “Israel’s Influence: Good or Bad for America?”. It was co-sponsored by the American Educational Trust, publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep). Fourteen well-known expert panelists and keynote speakers analyzed the enormous impact Israel’s influence has on Congress, establishment media, academia and other major institutions. They explored the costs and benefits in terms of foreign aid and covert intelligence, foreign policy, America’s regional and global standing, and unbiased news reporting. There were 4-panel discussions at the conference:
  
 - Israel's Influence on Congress and Government Agencies
 - Israel's Influence on U.S. Foreign Policy
 - Responding to Israel's Influence on Campus and in Court
 - Israel's Influence on Mainstream Media
   
Today, we will listen to one of the keynote speeches delivered at the conference by Gideon Levy “What I would tell a visiting congressional delegation” - What politicians, members of Congress and media elites visiting Israel should know about the situation on the ground—as opposed to what they are told on hundreds of junkets organized by AIPAC. What harm is the relationship doing to the U.S.? We will also listen to the question and answer sessions that followed his talk. Levy is a journalist with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, and former spokesman for former Israeli prime minister Shimon Perez.
   
For more information on this conference, visit www.israelsinfluence.org.

Date:

March 16, 2016

1st Segment: The 6th Annual Houston Palestinian Festival
A live conversation with Ruba Afifi, Festival Co-Chair and Board Member with the Palestinian American Cultural Center (PACC-Houston), and Mona Fareed, Festival Team Member, about the 6th Annual Houston Palestinian Festival that will be held on Saturday and Sunday, March 19-20 at Jones Plaza in Downtown Houston.
 
This year, Palestinian Singer Rola Azar (from Palestine) will be performing live at the Festival. In addition, there will be live performances by Jabour, Ayman Al-Khatib, DJ Ashraf, and more. 
   

2nd Segment: Bill Corcoran
A live conversation with Bill Corcoran, President and CEO of ANERA, American Near East Refugee Aid, about the Syrian and Palestinian refugee crisis, and ANERA's projects and efforts to assist the refugees in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon.
 
Mr. Corcoran will be in Houston on Tuesday, March 22, to give a presentation about the current and ongoing projects in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon (Benefit Dinner: Stories of Hope from Palestine & Lebanon). This event will be held at 7 p.m. at Fadi's Mediterranean Grill, 12360 Westheimer Rd. in Houston. He will also be participating at the Palestinian Festival on Saturday and Sunday, March 19-20.

Date:

March 9, 2016

Ghada Talhami
Emeritus Professor in the Department of Politics at Lake Forest College in Illinois. She has published several books including "Historical Dictionary of Women in the Middle East and North Africa", "The Mobilization of Muslim Women in Egypt", and "Syria and the Palestinians". She has also published numerous articles including "Arab Women and the Attack of September 11", “Women, Education and Development in the Arab Gulf Countries”, and “Women and Philanthropy in Palestine and Egyptian Societies”. Professor Talhami previously served as Director of Arab Studies at the University of Illinois-Chicago, and Director of the Arab Information Center in Chicago (an office of the Arab League of States). She also served as President of the Association of Arab-American University Graduates, Editor of Arab Studies Quarterly, and Chair of Palestine Human Rights Campaign. She is also the recipient of several awards and honors over the years.
  

Tuesday, March 8th was the International Women’s Day, and today on Arab Voices we will speak with professor Talhami about women in the Middle East; their great contributions to societies; the important roles women play politically, economically, socially, and culturally; women's involvements in education; political activism; and their struggle and sacrifices for human rights, justice, and freedom. We will also talk about the west's view and stereotyping of Arab women; and more.

Date:

March 2, 2016

Joe Lauria (live from Iraq)
Veteran foreign-affairs journalist, author and political commentator based at the United Nation since 1990. He has been an independent journalist covering international affairs and the Middle East for more than 20 years. A former Wall Street Journal United Nations correspondent, Joe has been an investigative reporter for The Sunday Times of London. He has also corresponded from the U.N. in New York for numerous newspapers, and his work has appeared in many publications. Mr. Lauria has taught journalism at two American universities and traveled widely throughout the Middle East and the world. He is the author, with former U.S. Senator and American presidential candidate Mike Gravel, of A Political Odyssey: The Rise of American Militarism and One Man's Fight to Stop It. Joe has appeared on BBC World, PBS News Hour, Al-Jazeera, CNN, and other TV and radio programs.
  

We will speak live with Joe (currently in Iraq) about the situation in Iraq and what he is witnessing there; and the wars in Syria and Yemen. Joe just published an article titled "Obama’s Most Momentous Decision," which states: "With the Russian-backed Syrian army encircling Aleppo, cutting off Turkish supplies to rebels and advancing on the Islamic State’s capital of Raqqa, a panicked Saudi Arabia and Turkey have set up a joint headquarters to direct an invasion of Syria that could lead to a vast escalation of the war. And there’s only one man who could stop them: President Barack Obama".

Date:

February 24, 2016

Stephen Zunes (live from New Zealand)
Professor of politics and international studies and program director of Middle Eastern studies at the University of San Francisco. He has published scores of articles in academic journals, anthologies, magazines, and newspaper op-ed pages on such topics as U.S. foreign policy, Middle Eastern politics, Latin American politics, African politics, human rights, arms control, social movements and nonviolent action. He is the author of Tinderbox: U.S. Middle East Policy and the Roots of Terrorism; co-author of Western Sahara: War, Nationalism and Conflict Irresolution; and co-editor of Nonviolent Social Movements. Recognized as one of the country’s leading scholars of U.S. Middle East policy and of strategic nonviolent action, Professor Zunes serves as a senior policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, an associate editor of Peace Review, a contributing editor of Tikkun, and the chair of the academic advisory committee for the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict. He has contributed to the Nation, Huffington Post, and Alternet. Professor Zunes has presented numerous lectures and conference papers in the United States and over a dozen foreign countries and has traveled frequently to the Middle East and other conflict regions, meeting with prominent government officials, scholars and dissidents.
  

We will speak live with professor Zunes about the rewriting of the history of the Iraq War, challenging recent inaccurate statements by Marco Rubio, Hillary Clinton, and other presidential candidates.

Date:

February 17, 2016

The 2015 Edward Said Memorial Lecture with Dr. Cornel West
The Palestine Center in Washington, D.C. held its annual Edward Said Memorial Lecture on October 1, 2015. The speaker was Dr. Cornel West, Professor of Philosophy and Christian Practice at Union Theological Seminary and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University.
    
In this lecture, Dr. West discusses the profound legacy of Edward Said in social and political thought. He explores Dr. Said’s role as an “engaged intellectual” whose voice provoked introspection, deep questioning, dialogue, and enduring change.
    
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to that lecture.

Date:

February 10, 2016

Winter Membership Drive
Arab Voices Needs YOUR Support!
     
Please call during the show on Wednesday between 7 and 8 pm central time and pledge your support (713-526-5738), or send e-mail to ArabVoices@hotmail.com with your name and the amount you want to pledge (all gifts to KPFT are tax-deductible).
 
Click here for a list of the "Thank-You Gifts" offered.
    

Membership Drive

Date:

February 3, 2016

Listen: Israeli army is “making our lives impossible,” says Hebron activist
A podcast produced by The Electronic Intifada.
 
Activists in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron have been staging an around-the-clock sit-in protest at an Israeli military checkpoint located at the entrance to Shuhada street in the Old City. The checkpoint leads to an area occupied by Israeli settlers. In this podcast, The Electronic Intifada speaks with Issa Amro, coordinator of Youth Against Settlements.
      

Membership Drive

Date:

January 27, 2016

Dyala Husseini
Palestinian activist (born and currently lives in occupied Jerusalem) who is heavily involved in social work. She graduated with a general education degree from the American University in Beirut, Lebanon. She worked at the Jordan Pavilion during the New York World Fair in 1964-65, and worked as a guide at the United Nations in New York in 1965-67. She joined the Jordan Mission to the United Nations for a year. In 1967, she helped create the Social Society of Burj Al-LuqLuq NGO in the Old City of Jerusalem (it gives social and psychological support and services to the residents of the Old City).
 
We will speak live with Dyala about the ongoing Israeli atrocities in occupied Jerusalem; home demolitions; colony expansion; and the Israeli destruction of Mamilla Cemetery, the oldest Muslim burial ground in Jerusalem, displacing hundreds of Muslim graves dating as far back as the 7th century, in order for US-based Simon Wiesenthal Center to build a "Museum of Tolerance" on its ground!
      

Membership Drive

Date:

January 20, 2016

Joshua Landis
Director of the Center for Middle East Studies and Associate Professor at the University of Oklahoma’s College of International Studies. He writes “Syria Comment,” a daily newsletter on Syrian politics that attracts over 100,000 readers a month. Dr. Landis travels frequently to Washington DC to consult with government agencies and speak at think tanks. He has lived over 14 years in the Middle East (4 years in Syria, 8 years in Lebanon, and spent most summers in Damascus until the revolution began) and speaks Arabic and French fluently. He served as President of Syria Studies Association. He is a frequent analyst on various media outlets including Charlie Rose, PBS News Hour, Al-Jazeera, and many others. He is frequently published in many journals such as Foreign Policy and Middle East Policy. He has won the best teacher prize at his university; helped raised over one million dollars for a new chair in Iranian studies, and helped bring the government funded Arabic Flagship Program to OU. Three Fulbright grants, the SSRC and other awards have helped support his research. Dr. Landis teaches Political Islam, International Relations in the Middle East, Islam, The Modern Middle East, Culture and Society in the Middle East, and the US in the Middle East.

We will speak live with Joshua about the crisis in Syria; foreign interventions by various countries (Russia, Iran, US, Turkey, Arab States); the Syrian peace talks set for next week in Geneva; and the prospects of a real peace deal and/or path to end the crisis.

Date:

January 13, 2016

Chris Hedges' Talk in Houston
The Houston Peace and Justice Center (HPJC) held its 2015 Peacemaker Awards Dinner on November 14, 2015. The National Peacemaker Award recipient was Chris Hedges, who was also the keynote speaker.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Chris Hedge's talk at this event, and also listen to some of the questions and answers that followed his talk.
 
Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who writes a weekly column for the online magazine Truthdig. He spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa, and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years. Hedges left the Times after being issued a formal reprimand for denouncing the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq. In 2012, he sued President Barack Obama after the passing of the National Defense Authorization Act. Hedges authored numerous bestselling books, including Empire of Illusion; Death of the Liberal Class; War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning; Days of Revolt which he co-wrote with Joe Sacco; and his most recent book Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt. Hedges received many awards and recognitions over the years. He was part of the team of reporters at The New York Times that was awarded a Pulitzer Prize, and he also received the Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. Hedges is a senior fellow at The Nation Institute in New York City. He has taught at Columbia University, New York University, Princeton University and The University of Toronto. He currently teaches prisoners at a maximum-security prison in New Jersey. Hedges holds a B.A. in English literature from Colgate University and a Master of Divinity degree from Harvard University. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, California. Hedges speaks Arabic, French and Spanish and studied classics, including ancient Greek and Latin, at Harvard.

Date:

January 6, 2016

"Islam in Liberalism" by Joseph Massad
The Arab-American Educational Foundation Chair in Modern Arab History at the University of Houston held an event on December 3, 2015 titled "Islam in Liberalism". The guest speaker was Joseph Massad, Professor of Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History at Columbia University. He is the author of Islam in Liberalism (Chicago, 2015); Desiring Arabs (Chicago, 2007), which was awarded the Lionel Trilling Book Award; The Persistence of the Palestinian Question: Essays on Zionism and the Palestinian Question (Routledge, 2006); and Colonial Effects: The Making of National Identity in Jordan (Columbia, 2001).
   
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Professor Massad's lecture on "Islam in Liberalism".

Date:

December 30, 2015

Interviews from 2015
Arab Voices will air portions of several interviews conducted with different guests in 2015, including:

Remi Kanazi
Poet, writer, and organizer based in New York City. He is the author of the new released collection of poetry Before the Next Bomb Drops: Rising Up from Brooklyn to Palestine.

Zakaria Odeh (in occupied Jerusalem)
Executive Director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem.

Chris Hedges
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author who writes a weekly column for the online magazine Truthdig.

Phyllis Bennis
Fellow and the Director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. She is also a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. She has been a writer, analyst, and activist on Middle East and UN issues for many years.

Dr. Clovis Maksoud
Former ambassador and permanent observer of the League of Arab States at the United Nations and its chief representative in the United States for more than 10 years.

Date:

December 23, 2015

1st Segment:
We will first air the statement by the US Council of Muslim Organizations (US-CMO), a coalition of leading national and local Muslim organizations, announcing major educational, outreach and civic empowerment initiatives to address growing Islamophobia in America and to enhance national security through the promotion of freedom and justice.
 
We will also air few minutes from an interview Amy Goodman conducted on Democracy Now! on December 22, 2016 with Pulitzer-winning veteran journalist Seymour Hersh  about a new report he published in the London Review of Books that says the US Joint Chiefs of Staff has indirectly supported Bashar al-Assad in an effort to help him defeat jihadist groups!
 

2nd Segment: Vijay Prashad
Vijay Prashad is the George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College. He is the author of sixteen books, including The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South, Arab Spring, Libyan Winter, (co-edited with Paul Amar) Dispatches from the Arab Spring, and No Free Left: The Futures of Indian Communism. Vijay's latest book is Letters to Palestine: Writers Respond to War and Occupation. He is the chief editor at Leftward Press, and writes regularly for The Hindu, Frontline, Jadaliyya, Counterpunch, Himal and Bol. Vijay also served as the Edward Said Chair of American Studies at the American University of Beirut (2013- 2014).
 
We will speak live with Vijay about ISIS and the how it is able to extract and smuggle oil from the oil fields it controls in Syria and Iraq to other countries including Turkey and Israel to fund itself.

Date:

December 16, 2015

Rev. Ronnie Lister
Reverend Lister is an ordained minister in the National Baptist Convention. He is a social activist, scholar, and an advocate for the poor. He co-founded (with his wife, Minister Ann Lister) the International Center for Spiritual and Social Activism, committed to . He has also served as a teaching assistant at the Interdenominational Theological Center, and Candler School of Theology at Emory University both located in Atlanta, GA. Reverend Lister holds a Master of Arts Degree in Theology from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA, and has pursued post graduate studies at California State University, and the Interdenominational Theological Center.

Mustafaa Carroll
Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations Texas, Houston Chapter. He has more than 23 years' experience in business and leadership, and 18 years as a corporate management consultant specializing in leadership, service and diversity. Mustafaa began his civil rights activism at 16 as President of the NAACP Youth Council in his hometown of Gary, Indiana. Prior to his arrival to CAIR's Houston office in June 2010, he served on the CAIR-TX DFW board from 2004-2006 and the Executive Committee as Board President in 2007, and was appointed as Executive Director in June 2007. Carroll has also served on several other boards including the North Texas Islamic Council, Masjid Al-Islam, Dallas, the Islamic Medieval Studies Group, the Make-A-Wish Foundation of North Texas, the advisory committee of the Greater Dallas Chamber of Commerce, and he was a founding member and Chair of Humanitarian Day-DFW Event for 5 years. Together with the board and staff of CAIR-TX, Carroll is helping to develop and execute strategies that assure justice and civil rights for Muslims in the Greater Houston Community.
  

We will speak live with our guests about the anti-Muslim sentiment that is on the rise in the US; recent spike in attacks on American Muslims and their religious institutions including hate crimes, vandalism, shootings, harassment, and arson. We will talk about Islamophobia, fearmongering, stereotyping, racism, racial profiling, and surveillance of Muslims, Arabs, and mosques.
 
We will also talk about ways community organizers, organizations and religious institutions of different faiths work together to counter these issues through interfaith work/relations, and how to deal with the negative image portrayed by media outlets, politicians, presidential candidates and others.

Date:

December 9, 2015

Date:

December 2, 2015

ACC's Annual Unity & Friendship Gala
The Arab American Cultural & Community Center in Houston held its 22nd Annual Unity & Friendship Gala on November 14, 2015. This year's theme was "Embracing our Community's Needs and Aspirations", and it highlighted the culture and people of the Kingdom of Jordan. The Gala Chair was Mayada Al-Kaisi Coleman, and the Gala Co-Chair was Sarah Rabie. The Master of Ceremonies was Phil Snyder. Today on Arab Voices we will listen to most of the remarks made at the Gala.
     
This year's ACC honorees were the late Dr. Amer Sabbagh (2015 ACC Outstanding Community Service Award, presented by Wafa Abdin, ACC Board Member, and Abdel ElKhadiri, ACC Treasurer), and Dr. Samir Tuma (2015 ACC Lifetime Achievement and Leadership Award, presented by Dr. Kamal Khalil, ACC President).
  
There was also special recognition for FADI'S Mediterranean Grill (2015 ACC Business Community Award, presented to Fadi Dimassi by Wadih ElHajj, ACC Second Vice-President), and FotoFest (2015 ACC Service to the Arab Culture and Art Award, presented to Frederick Baldwin and Wendy Watriss, co-founders of FotoFest, by Dr. Rudeina Baasiri, ACC Board Member at Large).

Date:

November 25, 2015

Paul Gottinger
An independent journalist based in Madison, WI whose work focuses on the Middle East. He recently wrote an analysis of the "war on terror" in an article titled "Despite 14 Years of the U.S. War on Terror, Terror Attacks Have Skyrocketed Since 9/11". In this analysis, Paul Gottinger says: "Terror attacks have jumped by a stunning 6,500 percent since 2002, according to a new analysis by Reader Supported News. The number of casualties resulting from terror attacks has increased by 4,500 percent over this same time period. These colossal upsurges in terror took place despite a decade-long, worldwide effort to fight terrorism that has been led by the United States." "The analysis, conducted with figures provided by the U.S. State Department, also shows that from 2007 to 2011 almost half of all the world’s terror took place in Iraq or Afghanistan -- two countries being occupied by the U.S. at the time.
 

Date:

November 18, 2015

Date:

November 4, 2015

Remi Kanazi
Poet, writer, and organizer based in New York City. He is the author of the new released collection of poetry Before the Next Bomb Drops: Rising Up from Brooklyn to Palestine. He is also the author of Poetic Injustice: Writings on Resistance and Palestine, and the editor of Poets For Palestine. Remi's political commentary has been featured by news outlets throughout the world, including The New York Times, Salon, Al Jazeera English and BBC Radio. Kanazi has toured hundreds of venues across the United States, Canada, Europe and the Middle East, and he has appeared in the Palestine Festival of Literature as well as Poetry International. He is a Lannan Residency Fellow and an Advisory Committee member for the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. He has taught poetry workshops from Oklahoma to the West Bank, given talks from New York City to London, and has performed at hundreds of venues, from New Orleans to Amman.

Date:

October 28, 2015

Political Terrorism in the US: The Assassination of Alex Odeh
Today on Arab Voices we will air a special Pacifica Radio Archives documentary from interviews with law enforcement agents, possible suspects, politicians, and community members concerning the October 11, 1985 murder of Arab-American political activist Alex Odeh.
 
Thirty years ago this month Alex Odeh, who was the West Coast Regional Director for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) at that time, was assassinated in his office, and to this date, the murder case of Alex Odeh remains unsolved by the FBI.
  
"Political Terrorism in the United States: The Assassination of Alex Odeh" is an early look at the circumstances surrounding the terrorist attack. This documentary features the voices of Alex Odeh, family members, the FBI and from the Jewish Defense League, an organization originally named by investigators as the probably culprit of the crime. Just who killed Alex Odeh remains a question to this day.
   

Visit www.ADC.org for more details.
   
Born in Jifna, Palestine in 1944, Alex Odeh became a poet, lecturer and Arab-American peace activist. He originally studied to become an engineer at Cairo University in Egypt. When the Six Day War ended in 1967, Israeli authorities prevented Odeh from returning to his hometown in the West Bank. Living a life of exile changed him, starting off a life in politics. Alex Odeh immigrated to the United States in 1972 eventually continuing his studies with a Masters degree in political science from Cal State Fullerton. In 1982, the Palestinian activist joined the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, a newly formed group aimed at combating grotesque Arab stereotypes in the media and bias in Middle East reporting. A year later, Odeh became the West Coast Regional Coordinator, setting up an office in Santa Ana, California. Death threats haunted Odeh on nearly a daily basis. On October 10, 1985, a local television station interviewed him about the Achilles Lauro hijacking and murder of Leon Klinghoffer. Odeh spoke condemning terrorism across the board but argued that the media was too quick to link the attack to the PLO. As fate would have it, the activist opened the door to his officer the next morning for what was to be another routine day at work. When the door swung open, a powerful pipe bomb exploded killing Odeh.

Date:

October 21, 2015

Zakaria Odeh (in occupied Jerusalem)
Executive Director of the Civic Coalition for Palestinian Rights in Jerusalem (an independent, non-governmental, non-profit coalition of organizations, institutions, societies, and associations dedicated to the promotion and protection of Palestinian rights in Jerusalem). We will speak with Zakaria (in occupied Jerusalem) about the situation in occupied Palestine, especially in Jerusalem, and the ongoing Israeli atrocities and killing in occupied Palestine (more than 51 Palestinians were killed over the past three weeks including 11 children and 1 pregnant woman, and nearly 6,000 Palestinians were injured).
 
We will also hear the reaction and statements of several local Houstonians who participated in a demonstration/protest held in Houston on Saturday, October 17 to protest Israel’s actions in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Date:

October 14, 2015

Susan Abulhawa
Palestinian-American human rights activist, novelist, award-winning author and a frequent political commentator. She was born to Palestinian refugees from Jerusalem, where her family had lived for centuries. She is the founder of Playgrounds for Palestine, an organization dedicated to upholding Palestinian children's Right to Play. Susan received her Master's degree in Neuroscience from the University of South Carolina. She is a science writer for medical journals, and has contributed to several anthologies and has been published in several US and international newspapers and other periodicals. Her first book of poems was titled My Voice Sought the Wind. Her first novel, Mornings in Jenin, was an international bestseller, with rights sold in twenty-six languages, and her second novel (just released) is titled The Blue Between Sky and Water, and was sold in nineteen languages before its release. Susan tried to visit Palestine in July 2015 as a US citizen, but was denied entry by the Israeli occupation forces.
 

Date:

October 7, 2015

Fall Membership Drive
Arab Voices Needs YOUR Support to Raise $2,940
     
Please call during the show on Wednesday between 7 and 8 pm central time and pledge your support (713-526-5738), or send e-mail to ArabVoices@hotmail.com with your name and the amount you want to pledge (all gifts to KPFT are tax-deductible).
 
Click here for a list of the "Thank-You Gifts" offered.
     

Membership Drive

Date:

September 30, 2015

Fall Membership Drive
Arab Voices Needs YOUR Support to Raise $2,940
     
Please call during the show on Wednesday between 7 and 8 pm central time and pledge your support (713-526-5738), or send e-mail to ArabVoices@hotmail.com with your name and the amount you want to pledge (all gifts to KPFT are tax-deductible).
 
Click here for a list of the "Thank-You Gifts" offered.
   

Membership Drive

Date:

September 23, 2015

Fall Membership Drive
Arab Voices Needs YOUR Support to Raise $2,940
     
Please call during the show on Wednesday between 7 and 8 pm central time and pledge your support (713-526-5738), or send e-mail to ArabVoices@hotmail.com with your name and the amount you want to pledge (all gifts to KPFT are tax-deductible).
 
Click here for a list of the "Thank-You Gifts" offered.
   

Membership Drive

Date:

September 16, 2015

Shireen Jasser
Social Worker, community organizer and President of the Syrian American Council Houston Chapter.
 
We will speak with Shireen about the Syrian Refugee Crisis where more than half of the Syrian population (over 12 million) are now refugees as a result of the ongoing bloody and destructive war in Syria. We will also talk about the Syrian refugees in Houston, and how the Houston community is dealing with the situation, and also talk about ways to assist.

Date:

September 9, 2015

Chris Hedges
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who writes a weekly column for the online magazine Truthdig. He spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa, and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years. Hedges left the Times after being issued a formal reprimand for denouncing the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq. In 2012, he sued President Barack Obama after the passing of the National Defense Authorization Act. Hedges authored numerous bestselling books, including Empire of Illusion; Death of the Liberal Class; War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning; Days of Revolt which he co-wrote with Joe Sacco; and his most recent book Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt. Hedges received many awards and recognitions over the years. He was part of the team of reporters at The New York Times that was awarded a Pulitzer Prize, and he also received the Amnesty International Global Award for Human Rights Journalism. Hedges is a senior fellow at The Nation Institute in New York City. He has taught at Columbia University, New York University, Princeton University and The University of Toronto. He currently teaches prisoners at a maximum-security prison in New Jersey. Hedges holds a B.A. in English literature from Colgate University and a Master of Divinity degree from Harvard University. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, California. Hedges speaks Arabic, French and Spanish and studied classics, including ancient Greek and Latin, at Harvard.
 

We will speak with Chris Hedges about the US Foreign Policy towards the Middle East; ISIS; the crisis in the Syria, Iraq, Yemen and other countries in the Middle east; the BDS Movement; and more.
 
Please note that Chris Hedges will receive the Houston Peace and Justice Center HPJC's 2015 National Peacemaker Award and give the keynote address at the Awards Dinner in Houston on November 14, 2015. For more details on this event or to purchase tickets, visit http://www.hpjc.org/dinner2015.

Date:

September 2, 2015

Phyllis Bennis
Fellow and the Director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. She is also a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. She has been a writer, analyst, and activist on Middle East and UN issues for many years. She helped found and remains on the advisory board of the U.S. Campaign to End Israeli Occupation. Phyllis plays a leading role in US and global movements against wars and occupation, and writes and speaks widely across the U.S. and around the world as part of the global peace movement. She continues to serve as an informal adviser to several top UN officials on Middle East and UN democratization issues. She is the author of numerous books including "Understanding the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict", "Ending the Iraq War: A Primer", "Understanding the US-Iran Crisis: A Primer", and "Before & After: US Foreign Policy and the War on Terror". Her most recent book (just released) is titled "Understanding ISIS and the New Global War on Terror: A Primer".
 

We will speak with Phyllis about her new book "Understanding ISIS and the New Global War on Terror: A Primer". We will also get her views on the US foreign policy towards the Middle East, the turmoil that is engulfing several areas in that region, and more.

Date:

August 26, 2015

National Arab American Medical Association (NAAMA) National Medical Convention
The National Arab American Medical Association (NAAMA) will hold its 37th National Medical Convention in Houston from September 4th through the 7th. Today on Arab Voices we will talk about this important convention with Dr. Samir Tuma, founder and first President of the Arab American Medical Association in Houston (1979), co-founder of the National AAMA (1980), and co-founder and former President of the Arab American Cultural and Community Center in Houston (2009-2010). He is also co-founder of the prestigious Ben Qurrah Award. Dr. Tuma was born in Acca, Palestine, and has received numerous awards and recognitions over the years.
   
Dr. Bassem Youssef, renowned Egyptian satirist who turned his show, Al Bernameg, into the most watched program in the Middle East (by uniquely criticizing most political and public figures in Egypt) will be attending the convention. NAAMA will be honoring Dr. Youssef at the convention with the 2015 award for his accomplishments as a cardiothoracic surgeon and for his contributions to elevate the public awareness about civil rights. We will listen to some of Dr. Youssef's remarks during the show today.
 
In addition, we will listen to the special remarks of Dr. Elias Zerhouni, Arab-American medical doctor (born in Algeria), world-renowned physician, and former Director of the National Institutes of Health, that he delivered at the Biennial Ben Qurrah Award Gala held by the Houston Chapter of the Arab American Medical Association few years ago to honor Arab-American physicians who have made remarkable contributions in the field of medicine and who have succeeded in the worldwide advancement of science.

Date:

August 19, 2015

Ghada Mukdad
Board member with the Syrian Civil Coalition (a lobby of nearly 100 Syrian civil society organizations). She is a Syrian peace activist who was forced to leave Syria in 2012 and has been in the U.S. since then. She was the representative for the Syrian Women's Forum for Peace. In 2007 she ran as an independent candidate for parliament in Syria. She currently resides in Dallas, Texas, where she is actively involved in community efforts calling for an end to violence against civilians in Syria and peaceful resolution to the conflict.
 

We will speak with Ghada about Syria; the current situation there; Sunday's brutal massacre in Douma (one of many over the past few years); the refugee crisis; civil society in Syria; nonviolent opposition; women's involvement/role; foreign interventions; the letter sent yesterday from the Syrian Civil Coalition to the UN Security Council and the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Syria calling on sending mandated human rights monitoring mission to Syria; the best way out of the current crisis; and more.

Date:

August 12, 2015

Dr. Rania Masri's Houston Remarks on "Gaza: One Year Later"
The Palestinian American Cultural Center (PACC Houston) organized an event titled “GAZA: One Year Later”. It was held at and co-sponsored by the Arab American Cultural & Community Center as well as the Ramallah Club of Houston and Beirzirt Society. It was a fundraising event benefiting KinderUSA humanitarian relief projects that benefit children and families in Gaza. The keynote speaker was Dr. Rania Masri, Associate Director of Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship at the American University of Beirut, and an associate producer of The Status Hour.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to the remarks delivered at the event by Dr. Rania Masri.

Date:

August 5, 2015

▪ $300 "Palestine 4 Film Pack" - FOUR documentaries (on DVDs) on the Israel-Palestinian crisis and history. The 4 Film Pack includes:
   1 - "Al Nakba" (award-winning four-part series)
   2 - "The Price of Oslo"
   3 - "Peace, Propaganda and the Promised Land"
   4 - "Occupation 101"

▪ $85 "The Battle for Justice in Palestine" book by Ali Abunimah

▪ $200 "Brokers of Deceit: How the U.S. Has Undermined Peace in the Middle East" book by Rashid Khalidi

▪ $150 “National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism” book by Melvin Goodman

▪ $200 “Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education” book by Nurit Peled-Alhanan

▪ $250 Edward Said Tribute 6 CD SET

▪ $180 “The General's Son: Journey of an Israeli in Palestine” book by Miko Peled

▪ $240 "Dirty Wars" Combo (book and DVD) - documentary film and hardback book by Jeremy Scahill

▪ $150 "Al Nakba" (award-winning four-part series) DVDs

Membership Drive

Date:

July 29, 2015

Dr. Rania Masri
Associate Director of Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship at the American University of Beirut, and an associate producer of The Status Hour. She has been active on issues of human rights and justice since 1993. Before leaving North Carolina to Lebanon in 2005 to be a professor of environmental science at the University of Balamand, Rania was the Director of the Southern Peace Research and Education Center at the Institute for Southern Studies in Durham, NC. She also served as a national board member of Peace Action, a member of the Steering Committee of the United for Peace and Justice national coalition, and a state board member of the American Civil Liberties Union-NC. Her research and activism have centered on anti-sanctions/anti-war (Iraq), anti-occupation, anti-apartheid (Palestine), environmental justice, and civil rights. She served as an expert in the Court of Conscience on the Israeli 2006 War on Lebanon during which she presented expert testimony on the Environmental Impact of the Israeli War on Lebanon. She also serves on the advisory board of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.
 

We will speak with Dr. Masri about the ongoing occupation of Palestine; the crisis in Gaza one year after Israel's war on it; the BDS movement; the latest on the Syrian crisis; the U.S. foreign policy towards the Middle East; and much more.
  
Note: Dr. Rania Masri will be speaking in Houston on Sunday, August 2 at a special event titled "Gaza: One Year Later". One year after the Israeli war on Gaza, where are we now? What has happened in Gaza since? What has happened throughout Palestine? And how can we, as individuals and as a movement committed to justice, organize and respond? Click here for more information about this event.

Date:

July 22, 2015

Conflict in Yemen: The New Iran-Saudi Proxy War?
The World Affairs Council of Houston held an event on June 30, 2015 titled "Conflict in Yemen: The New Iran-Saudi Proxy War?". The guest speaker was Sama'a Al-Hamdani, an independent writer, researcher and analyst focusing on Yemeni politics. Her work has been published in Al-Monitor, Yemen Observer, Yemen Times and several other publications and academic journals. She is also a regular expert commentator for major international media outlets including: CNN International, BBC World Service, Al-Jazeera, and The Huffington Post.
 
Today on Arab Voices, we will listen to Sama'a Al-Hamdani's remarks and some of the questions and answers that followed her talk. During the event she addressed several points including what is happening in Yemen, the key players in the conflict, the Houthis and other groups, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the reasons many countries are participating in the war on Yemen, the possible outcomes of this conflict, the role of the US, and more.

Date:

July 15, 2015

Jamal Abdi
Policy Director at the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) and Executive Director of NIAC Action. Abdi leads NIAC Action’s efforts to monitor policies and legislation, and to educate and advocate on behalf of the Iranian-American community. He previously worked in the US Congress as Policy Advisor to Representative Brian Baird (D-WA). As one of a small number of Iranian Americans working on the Hill, he served as a Congressional advisor, liaison, and expert on foreign affairs, immigration, and defense. Abdi has written for The New York Times, USA Today, CNN, Foreign Policy, Huffington Post and The Hill, and he is a frequent guest contributor in print, radio, and television.
   

We will speak with Jamal about the historic long-term comprehensive nuclear deal between Iran and the P5+1 -- the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China, Russia and Germany -- along with the European Union; the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JPOA) agreed to by all parties; the reactions in Iran and the region to the deal; the effect of the deal on Iran and the region; U.S.-Iran future relations; the sanctions imposed on Iran; nuclear weapons; Iran-Gulf States relations; and more.

Date:

July 8, 2015

Noha Radwan
Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and Religious Studies at the University of California-Davis. She is an Egyptian literary scholar and was assistant professor of Arabic Literature at Columbia University. Her research interests focus on modern Arabic poetry and fiction. Radwan was born in Cairo, Egypt. She received her MA from the Department of Arabic Studies at the American University of Cairo and her PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. In February 2011 she spent 18 days with demonstrators in Cairo's Tahrir Square protesting the regime of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and was attacked and beaten by a mob of Mubarak supporters. She authored a book titled "Egyptian Colloquial Poetry in the Modern Arabic Canon: New Readings of Shi'r al-'Ammiyya (Literatures and Cultures of the Islamic World)", and also published a report in the Journal of Higher Education titled "Egypt's Revolution, in Verse".
 

Date:

July 1, 2015

 
We will first talk about the vote that took place yesterday, June 30, 2015, and that is the vote by the United Church of Christ in Cleveland, calling for boycotts and divestment from companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands. 80% of the United Church of Christ delegates voted for the divestment. It was a landslide vote with 508 delegates in favor, 124 against, and 38 abstentions.
 

David Heap
Steering committee member of the Canadian Boat to Gaza, part of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition and one of the organizing groups for Freedom Flotilla III. He is associate professor (French and Linguistics) at the University of Western Ontario, Canada and father of two. He participated in the 2009-2010 Gaza Freedom March. He was on board the Tahrir when it was stopped by Greek authorities in July 2011, and again in November 2011 when captured by the Israeli navy. Deported to Canada after six days in Israeli prison, he also joined the Swedish ship to Gaza Estelle for part of its voyage in September 2012, representing the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, and he visited Gaza in October 2012 with a group of linguist colleagues (including Noam Chomsky). He has spoken about previous Freedom Flotilla voyages and the Gaza Ark campaign (2012-2104) to challenge the blockade from Palestine from the inside out.
 

We will speak with David about Freedom Flotilla III (four boats carrying 47 people from 17 countries sailing to the besieged Gaza Strip to challenge the blockade of 1.8 million Palestinians), and Israel's attack on Monday on the "Marianne" one of the 4 boats (a Swedish vessel) while it was in international waters on its way to the Gaza Strip, and the kidnapping by force of the 18 participants on board (including Dr. Bassel Ghattas, Member of the Israeli Knesset, Dr. Moncef Marzouki, ex-President of Tunisia, Ana Miranda, Member of European Parliament, and several journalists). Four were released, but fourteen participants remain hostage in Israeli jails. During the attack on “Marianne”, Israeli soldiers used violence against the participants.

Date:

June 24 2015

Dahr Jamail
Staff reporter at Truthout and author of several books including "The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan", "Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches From an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq", and his recently released book "The Mass Destruction of Iraq: Why It Is Happening, and Who Is Responsible". Jamail reported from Iraq for more than a year (one of only a few independent and unembedded US journalists in Iraq), as well as from Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Turkey over the last ten years. Dahr’s stories have been published widely, and his writing has been translated into many languages. Dahr has reported for Democracy Now! and Al-Jazeera, and has appeared on numerous media outlets around the globe. Dahr’s reporting has earned him numerous awards, including the Martha Gellhorn Award for Investigative Journalism, the Lannan Foundation Writing Residency Fellowship, the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism, the Joe A. Callaway Award for Civic Courage, and five Project Censored awards.
 

We will speak with Dahr about Iraq and the situation there. We will also talk about the lawsuit filed by Sundus Saleh, an Iraqi single mother, suing members of the George W. Bush administration for their role in the war in Iraq, and the amicus brief filed on June 2, 2015 by an international group of lawyers (which includes former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark) in support of Saleh's claims.

Date:

June 17 2015

MPA Speakers' Remarks of Imam Ali & Comedian Obeidallah

The Muslim Professional Association (MPA) held a special anniversary event on March 28, 2015 in Houston titled "Building Strength: The Future of Muslims in America". There were several speakers at the event, and today we will listen to the remarks of Imam Wazir Ali, recipient of the Muslim Journal's prestigious "Imam of the Year Award" for 2010, and the keynote address by award-winning comedian Dean Obeidallah.
 

Imam Wazir Ali
Recipient of the Muslim Journal's prestigious "Imam of the Year Award" for 2010 and is the imam of the historic Masjid Warithud-Deen Mohammed and Masjid Al-Qur'an, both located in Houston. Imam Ali has co-trasnslated and has assisted in research for multiple Islamic texts. He is an entrepreneur, kinesiologist, registered dietitian and board certified specialist in renal nutrition, who also owns a private nutrition consulting firm in Houston. Imam Ali holds multiple undergraduate and graduate degrees in psychology, nutrition, and kinesiology and is currently pursuing a Doctoral degree in clinical nutrition.
 

Dean Obeidallah
Dean’s comedy comes in large part from his unique background of being the son of a Palestinian father and a Sicilian mother. He is an award winning comedian who was at one time a practicing attorney, and co-starred in the Comedy Central special “The Axis of Evil.” He is a also columnist for The Daily Beast and has written for CNN.com and The Huffington Post. Dean is the co-director/co-producer of the comedy documentary “The Muslims are Coming!” featuring a stand up comedy tour of Muslim-American comedians performing free shows across the South and West in the hopes of fostering understanding. He was also the co-creator of Comedy Central.com’s critically acclaimed Internet series “The Watch List” featuring a cast of all Middle Eastern-American comedians. In addition to performing comedy throughout the US, Dean has performed across the Middle East. For more details, visit www.deanofcomedy.com.

Date:

June 10 2015

Nick Rahall and MJ Rosenberg on "How Does the Israel Lobby Influence Congress"
On April 10, 2015, a conference was held in Washington, DC called “The Israel Lobby: Is It Good for US? Is It Good For Israel?”. It was organized by the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy and the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. It was unprecedented gathering that focused on the Israel lobby in America. There were several speakers at the conference including former Congressmen Paul Findley and Nick Rahall, Haaretz columnist Gideon Levy, former UN Special Rapporteur Richard Falk, Palestinian-American lawyer and human rights advocate Huwaida Arraf, photojournalist and radio host Jeffrey Blankfort, founder and Director of Palestine Solidarity Legal Support and Cooperating Counsel with the Center for Constitutional Rights Dima Khalidi, Israeli writer and activist Miko Peled, Internationally acclaimed author and media critic Jack Shaheen, director of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy Grant Smith, and other well-known experts. There were 6 Panel discussions at the conference:
 
 - What Is the Israel Lobby and How Does It Work?
 - Are Critical Voices Silenced?
 - Is Freedom of Speech Encouraged on American Campuses?
 - Is the Lobby Good for Israel?
 - How Does the Lobby Influence Congress?, and
 - Is There an Iraq-Iran Continuum?
 
Today, we will listen to some of the remarks delivered during the “How Does the Lobby Influence Congress” panel by former AIPAC employee MJ Rosenberg (his talk was titled “Is it all about the money?”), and former congressman Nick Rahall (his talk was titled “My experience with the Israel Lobby; The use of dark money”).
 
For a full list of the speakers and to listen to their remarks including the question and answer sessions, visit www.israellobbyus.org.