Theme Week Palestine – Al-Bireh

29 December 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  11 minutes

Manara Square, border between Ramallah (left) and Al-Bireh (right) © Abutoum

Manara Square, border between Ramallah (left) and Al-Bireh (right) © Abutoum

Al-Bireh is a city in the central West Bank, 15 kilometers (9.3 mi) north of Jerusalem. The city borders Ramallah to the west. To the north is the Israeli settlement Beit El, to the east another Israeli settlement called Psagot and to the south al-Am’ari Refugee Camp and Kalandia. It is situated on the central ridge running through the West Bank and is 860 meters (2,820 ft) above sea level, covering an area of 22.4 square kilometers (8.6 sq mi). Because of its location Al-Bireh served as an economic crossroad between the north and south, along the caravan route between Jerusalem and Nablus. The city has a population of approximately 40,000. Al-Bireh is the second largest center of Palestinian administration after Gaza. Besides the governor’s headquarters, it also hosts a considerable number of governmental, non-governmental, and private organizations, including the Ministries of Transportation, Supply, Information, Public Works and Higher Education, as well as the Palestine Broadcasting Corporation and the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. Due to its proximity with Ramallah, the cities form a single constituency for elections to the Palestinian National Authority.   read more…

Theme Week Palestine – Beit Jala

28 December 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  9 minutes

Saint Nicholas Church © SalibaQ/cc-by-sa-3.0

Saint Nicholas Church © SalibaQ/cc-by-sa-3.0

Beit Jala is a Palestinian Christian town in the Bethlehem Governorate of the West Bank. Beit Jala is located 10 km south of Jerusalem, on the western side of the Hebron road, opposite Bethlehem, at 825 meters (2,707 ft) altitude. In 2007, Beit Jala had 11,758 inhabitants. About 75% of the population were Christians (mostly Greek Orthodox) and about 25% Muslims. A crypt, dating to the 5th or 6th century C.E. was located under the Church of St. Nicolas. In the Crusader era, the village was called Apezala, and the Church of Saint Nicholas was possibly rebuild during that time. In 1883, the Palestine Exploration Fund‘s Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described Beit Jala as: “A large and flourishing village of white well-built stone houses, on the slope of a steep hill. The water supply is artificial, with a well in the valley below. The population is said by Pere Lievin to amount to 3,000, of whom 420 are Catholics, and the rest Orthodox Greeks. There is a Greek and a Latin church in the village. There are remarkably fine groves of olives round and beneath the village, and the hill is covered with vineyards which belong to the place.”   read more…

Theme Week Palestine – Beit Hanoun

27 December 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  8 minutes

© Lencer/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Lencer/cc-by-sa-3.0

Beit Hanoun is a city on the northeast edge of the Gaza Strip with a population of 49,000. It is located by the Hanoun stream, 6 km north of Gaza City, 5 km east of Beit Lahia, and just 6 kilometers west of the Israeli town of Sderot. There are twelve secondary, primary and agricultural schools in Beit Hanoun and an agricultural college which is related to al-Azhar University – Gaza. There is a medical center and hospital in the city and several clinics mostly managed by the United Nations.   read more…

Theme Week Palestine – Beitunia

26 December 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  7 minutes

Water tower © Abutoum

Water tower © Abutoum

Beitunia is a city located 3 kilometers (1.9 mi) west of Ramallah and 14 kilometers (8.7 mi) north of Jerusalem. The city is in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank. The city has a population of 25,000, making it the third largest locality in its governorate after al-Bireh and Ramallah.   read more…

Theme Week Palestine

25 December 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  14 minutes

Bethlehem - Church of the Nativity © flickr.com - Neil Ward/cc-by-2.0

Bethlehem – Church of the Nativity © flickr.com – Neil Ward/cc-by-2.0

Palestine is a de jure sovereign state in the Middle East claiming the West Bank (bordering Israel and Jordan) and Gaza Strip (bordering Israel and Egypt) with East Jerusalem as the designated capital although its administrative center is located in Ramallah (Arab–Israeli conflict). Most of the areas claimed by the State of Palestine have been occupied by Israel since 1967 in the consequence of the Six-Day War. The population is at 4.7 million. The State of Palestine is recognized by 136 UN members and since 2012 has a status of a non-member observer state in the United Nations – which amounts to a de facto, or implicit, recognition of statehood.   read more…

Union for the Mediterranean: Bon appétit!

7 November 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Editorial, European Union, Bon appétit, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  185 minutes

Union for the Mediterranean © AndrewRT/cc-by-sa-3.0

Union for the Mediterranean © AndrewRT/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) is an intergovernmental organization of 43 countries from Europe and the Mediterranean Basin: the 28 member states of the European Union and 15 Mediterranean partner countries from North Africa, the Middle East (the western and middle part of the Middle East & North Africa region (MENA)) and Southeast Europe. It was created in July 2008 at the Paris Summit for the Mediterranean, with a view to reinforcing the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (Euromed) that was set up in 1995 and known as the Barcelona Process. The Union has the aim of promoting stability and prosperity throughout the Mediterranean region. It is a forum for discussing regional strategic issues, based on the principles of shared ownership, shared decision-making and shared responsibility between the two shores of the Mediterranean. Its main goal is to increase both North-South and South-South integration in the Mediterranean region, in order to support the countries’ socioeconomic development and ensure stability in the region. The actions of the organization fall under three, interrelated priorities—regional human development, regional integration and regional stability. To this end, it identifies and supports regional projects and initiatives of different sizes, to which it gives its label, following a consensual decision among the forty-three countries. The region has 756 million inhabitants and is culinary very diverse (European cuisine, Mediterranean cuisine, Maghreb cuisine, Levantine cuisine, Middle-Eastern cuisine and Arab cuisine, traveller365.com: 22 Maps That Shows You The Most Delicious Dishes Around The World).   read more…

Theme Week East Jerusalem – The Jaffa Gate

6 September 2017 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  8 minutes

Jaffa Gate plaque © Djampa/cc-by-sa-4.0

Jaffa Gate plaque © Djampa/cc-by-sa-4.0

Jaffa Gate (Bab al-Khalil, Hebron Gate) is a stone portal in the historic walls of the Arabic East Jerusalem (Old City). It is one of eight gates in Jerusalem’s Old City walls (Damascus Gate, Dung Gate, Golden Gate, Herod’s Gate, Huldah Gates, Jaffa Gate, Lions’ Gate, New Gate, and Zion Gate). The Crusaders calling it “David’s Gate”. Jaffa Gate is the only one of the Old City gates positioned at a right angle to the wall. This could have been done as a defensive measure to slow down oncoming attackers, or to orient it in the direction of Jaffa Road, from which pilgrims arrived at the end of their journey from the port of Jaffa. Inside Jaffa Gate is a small square with entrances to the Christian Quarter (on the left), Muslim Quarter (straight ahead) and the Armenian Quarter (to the right, past the Tower of David). A tourist information office and shops line the square. The entrance to the Muslim Quarter is part of the suq (marketplace). Jaffa Gate was inaugurated in 1538 as part of the rebuilding of the Old City walls by Suleiman the Magnificent.   read more…

Israeli settlements

3 February 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  9 minutes

Jerusalem barrier 2007 © The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)

Jerusalem barrier 2007 © The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)

Israeli settlements are Jewish Israeli civilian communities built on lands occupied by Israel since the 1967 Six-Day War. Such settlements currently exist in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and in the Golan Heights. Settlements previously existed in the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip until Israel evacuated the Sinai settlements following the 1979 Israel-Egypt peace agreement and from the Gaza Strip in 2005 under Israel’s unilateral disengagement plan. Israel dismantled 18 settlements in the Sinai Peninsula in 1982, and all 21 in the Gaza Strip and 4 in the West Bank in 2005, but continues to both expand its settlements and settle new areas in the West Bank, despite pressure to desist from the international community (the Gulf States do not speak of “Israeli settlements” but of “Israeli colonies“. On closer inspection, the designation fits far better).   read more…

Rafah in the Gaza Strip

8 January 2016 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  6 minutes

Gaza Strip map © Gringer/cc-by-sa-3.0

Gaza Strip map © Gringer/cc-by-sa-3.0

Rafah is a Palestinian city and refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip. It is the district capital of the Rafah Governorate, located 30 kilometers (19 mi) south of Gaza City. Rafah’s population of 153,000 (2014) is overwhelmingly made up of Palestinian refugees. Rafah camp and Tall as-Sultan camp form separate localities. When Israel withdrew from the Sinai in 1982, Rafah was split into a Gazan part and an Egyptian part, dividing families, separated by barbed-wire barriers. The core of the city was destroyed by Israel and Egypt to create a large buffer zone.   read more…

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