Stanley Cohen

Stanley L Cohen is a US-based attorney and human rights activist who has done extensive work in the Middle East and Africa.

From Tel Aviv to Tallahassee

Surrounded by Israeli dignitaries, accompanied by AIPAC checkbooks, Sheldon and Miriam Adelson, and Morton Klein of the Zionist Organization of America, Ron DeSantis’ journey was nothing short of a full on fidelity cheer for Israel.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
Ron DeSantis Israel Feature photo

Please take your seat, sir, said the steward to the Governor. “We will be landing at Ben Gurion Airport shortly.” Snapping his seat-belt firmly into place, the edgy Governor fingered his rosary beads as he wondered, to himself, whether Israeli Jews would have big noses like those of Miami. Do they tan well? Would he understand what they say, given

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Death Can be a Slow Traveler: Peltier, Mumia and Rap Brown

While movements such as the Black Panther Party, the BLA, AIM and MOVE still resonate among some in a new generation of activists, many of their former members, now riddled with poor health and buried in prison, have been all but lost to the passage of time.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen

When the history of our times is recorded, any volume on domestic political prisoners must, per force, begin with the legendary ones of conscience. To these icons of principle, determination and courage we owe much. It is, after all, not by mere default that they risked, and often paid, all to demand the gale of change sweep away generations of

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The Brazen Detention of Marzieh Hashemi, America’s Newest Political Prisoner

Today Marzieh Hashemi sits alone.  Isolated and entombed deep in a government catacomb, she stands charged with no offense but in the eyes of this administration guilty as charged . . . a Muslim, a journalist, and a US ex-pat who has found shelter from its storm in Iran.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
Marzieh Hashemi | Detained

Any discussion of the detention of journalist Marzieh Hashemi must begin in the historical context that all presidents have used the Department of Justice for constitutionally prohibited personal ends. The calculated seizure and political intimidation of Mrs. Hashemi and her family in the United States is but the most recent flagrant

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The Peace Deal That is All Israel

The “grand” deal has nothing to do with the ends of justice but is all about personal partisan profit.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner, takes his seat to watch Vice President Mike Pence administer the oath of office to U.S. Ambassador to Israel David M. Friedman, March 29, 2017. (AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

Honor, like integrity, is not a commodity,  like a gilded condominium in New York City for sale to the highest bidder. Nor does it license a messenger to whisper through a backdoor that which cannot be said through the front because it’s been closed for want of fairness and respect. Yet, having been rebuked by Palestinian leadership due to the

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With All Eyes on Gaza, Israel Falls Back on the Hamas Card

When other excuses collapse to the honest lens of public transparency, the Hamas card is predictably played with almost sneering contempt for the world’s ability to pierce half-truths.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
Gaza Coronavirus

For days, now, the Israeli rewrite has been well underway, working overtime, to convince the world seven weeks of carnage in Palestine, more particularly Gaza, did not happen. Or, if it did, Israel’s response to the Great Return March was a measured, proportionate answer to the menace posed by some burning kites, waving flags and nihilist teens

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The Miseducation of Mohammed bin Salman

Perhaps, when next in New York City, Crown Prince bin Salman’s time would be better spent were he to stop and ask people of color, Native Americans, the LGTBQ community, immigrants, refugees, the elderly, unwell and US Muslims about America’s cultural influence.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (Photo: Dennis Van Tine/STAR MAX/IPx)

Looking back over the course of a long impassioned life as attorney and activist, nothing has been a greater source of education and inspiration, for me as a person, than the decades spent working in the Middle East, Gulf and Africa. Enrolled, there, as almost a student of life, I’ve seen and learned much in age-old cultures bound by tradition,

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BDS and Israel’s Declining Support Among Diaspora Jews

For Diaspora Jews, the battle against ruthless Israeli hegemony will neither be easy nor painless. At times, it will echo with the determined and peaceful call of BDS.

Stanley Cohen
By Stanley Cohen
Israel Palestine BDS

Opinion -- Like its predecessor movement decades ago in South Africa, assessing the success of BDS against Israel today necessarily rubs up against the tension between Israeli hasbara (propaganda) and its reality as an effective organizing tool against it throughout the world. Though Israel has repeatedly claimed BDS has proven to be a failed

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