Joe Catron

Joe Catron is a MintPress News contributing journalist. He covers Palestine and Israel and other human rights issues. Catron has written frequently for Electronic Intifada and Middle East Eye, and co-edited The Prisoners' Diaries: Palestinian Voices from the Israeli Gulag, an anthology of accounts by detainees freed in the 2011 prisoner exchange.

‘We Are Not Numbers’: New Project Connects Young Writers In Gaza To The World

“I really want to tell the world about the other side of Gaza they never hear about,” a participant in a new project by young Palestinian writers in the Gaza Strip tells MintPress.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron

GAZA --- As protests and gatherings around the world commemorate Israel’s most recent military operation against the Gaza Strip, which killed 2,251 Palestinians, 551 of them children, last summer, a new writing project by young writers in the besieged enclave aims to illustrate not only the human costs of repeated Israeli offensives, but also the

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#FreedomFlotilla III Gathers At Sea Before Setting Sail To Break Israel’s Siege Of Gaza

As global pressure and regional shifts undermine Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip, Palestine supporters from more than 20 countries are preparing for the latest attempt to defy it.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron

GAZA STRIP --- A converted Swedish fishing trawler left the port of Messina in eastern Sicily late Friday evening, sailing into the Mediterranean to meet other vessels before they attempt to break Israel’s nautical blockade of the Gaza Strip. “The goal is, as always, to challenge and eventually end the inhuman and illegal blockade of Gaza,”

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‘Wrong, Tasteless And Unperceptive’: Ban Ki-Moon Places Politics Over Justice For Palestinian Youth

Despite clear criteria and the advice of his top staff, the U.N. Secretary-General removed Israel, whose attacks made Palestine the world’s third-deadliest country for children last year, from a list of children’s rights violators.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, left and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shake hands at a press conference

Palestinian and solidarity groups criticized United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for not including Israel on an annual list of major violators of children’s rights released last week. “By removing Israel’s armed forces from the children’s ‘list of shame,’ Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has provided tacit approval for Israeli forces to

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Can Khader Adnan’s New Hunger Strike Reignite Support For Palestinian Prisoners?

As the legendary hunger striker passed his 30th day of a new fast against Israel’s imprisonment without charge or trial, supporters mobilized in Palestine and online.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron
A Palestinian holds a picture of a Palestinan prisoner jailed in Israel during a celebration for the liberation of Palestinian Khader Adnan in the West Bank village of Arrabeh, near Jenin, Wednesday, April 18, 2012.

RAMALLAH, West Bank --- As Israeli jailors prepared to force Palestinian political Khader Adnan into a hospital on the 30th day of his hunger strike on Wednesday, he released a letter thanking his supporters while they rallied in Palestine and online. Adnan, an activist fighting Israeli occupation and key figure in the Palestinian prisoners’

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Israel’s Antisemitism Ad Hominem To Silence Dissent Under Fire

“The anti-Semitism allegation against BDS is clear evidence that Israel and its allies have lost the battle to defend Israeli state policies. Name-calling and smearing opponents is all that is left. This strategy has failed miserably everywhere and will fail here,” a BDS organizer warns.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron
A Northeastern University student choosing not to give his name carries a Palestinian flag during a protest in support of Palestine after a Northeastern University student organization, Students for Justice in Palestine

NEW YORK --- Supporters of Palestine and sympathetic attorneys are fighting back against a slew of accusations of anti-Semitism that they say aim to obstruct their work and obscure Israel’s violations of Palestinian rights through inflammatory rhetoric. “False accusations of anti-Semitism and support for terrorism are one of a range of

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Gentrifiers And Prison Profiteers Are “Re-Engineering” The NYPD

A “re-engineering” proposal bankrolled by the wealthiest interests in New York City will likely push for the NYPD to hire hundreds of new cops for an already bloated police force under scrutiny for its brutal police practices.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron
New York City Police Commissioner William J. Bratton, right, joined by H. Dale Hemmerdinger, Chairman of the Board, New York City Police Foundation, speaks at the Foundation's State of the NYPD breakfast in New York, Thursday, Jan. 29, 2015.

New York City Police Commissioner William J. Bratton, right, joined by H. Dale Hemmerdinger, Chairman of the Board, New York City Police Foundation, speaks at the Foundation's State of the NYPD breakfast in New York, Thursday, Jan. 29, 2015. NEW YORK --- The New York City Police Foundation, a private body funded by New York City’s largest

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Netanyahu’s ‘Genocidal’ Cabinet Promises More Conflict, Isolation For Israel

Members of Benjamin Netanyahu’s new cabinet have previously called Palestinians “beasts” and their children “little snakes,” warned of the “cancer-like attributes” of Palestinian society, and celebrated the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, among other atrocities.

Joe Catron
By Joe Catron
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, second right, heads the new government as ministers take their place including Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon, left, and Moshe Kahlon, Housing Minister, second left, as the prime minister fills cabinet posts at the last minute forming the 34th government of Israel, two months after the mid-March general elections.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, second right, heads the new government as ministers take their place including Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon, left, and Moshe Kahlon, Housing Minister, second left, as the prime minister fills cabinet posts at the last minute forming the 34th government of Israel, two months after the mid-March general

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