- 10 Sep 2014
CLUELESS IN GAZA
ABSTRACT:
As the epicenter of Palestinian resistance, Gaza confounds the leaders of Israel, the Arab states, the Palestinian Authority, and the US. The inability of the local antagonists and the international community to come to grips with the issue of the oppressive Israeli occupation of Gaza has negative ramifications far beyond Israel’s current borders. MEI brought together three experts to discuss one of the longest standing conflicts in the Middle East that has commanded worldwide attention because of the disproportionate number of civilian casualties.
About the Speakers
PROFESSOR PETER SLUGLETT, Director, Middle East Institute, National University of Singapore. Peter Sluglett has taught Middle Eastern History at the University of Durham (1974-1994) and at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City (1994-2011), where he was Director of the University’s Middle East Center. He has published widely on the modern history of Iraq, including Iraq since 1958: from Revolution to Dictatorship, 3rd edn., (2001, with Marion Farouk-Sluglett), and Britain in Iraq: Contriving King and Country (2007). He has also edited and contributed to The Urban Social History of the Middle East 1750-1950 (2008), Syria and Bilad al-Sham under Ottoman Rule: Essays in Honour of Abdul- Karim Rafeq, (2010, with Stefan Weber), and Writing the Modern History of Iraq: Historiographical and Political Challenges (2012). He is currently co-authoring a book on the modern history of Syria.
PROFESSOR MICHAEL HUDSON (via Skype), Seif Ghobash Professor of Arab Studies and International Relations, Emeritus, Georgetown University AND Professor of Pol Science, Middle East Institute, NUS. Michael Hudson is Professor of Political Science at the National University of Singapore. He is also Professor Emeritus at Georgetown University, where he served as Director of the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies for many years. He has edited and contributed to numerous books, including Middle East Dilemma: The Politics and Economics of Arab Integration(Columbia University Press/CCAS, 1999), The Palestinians: New Directions (CCAS, 1990), and Alternative Approaches to the Arab-Israeli Conflict (CCAS, 1984). His other works includeThe Precarious Republic: Political Modernization in Lebanon (Random House, 1968, 1985) and Arab Politics: The Search for Legitimacy (Yale University Press, 1977), numerous chapters, and articles appearing in Middle East Journal,Middle East Policy, International Affairs, Comparative Politics, al-Mustaqbil al-’Arabi, and other scholarly journals. Hudson was awarded the 2011 Jere L. Bacharach Service Award from the Middle East Studies Association (MESA), of which he is a past president.
DR VICTOR KATTAN, Post Doctoral Fellow, Facult of Law, National University of Singapore. Most recently, Victor Kattan was a legal adviser to the Government of Palestine in Ramallah on secondment from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). Before this, he taught international law to Masters students at the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy at SOAS (University of London). He has worked as a consultant with DfID, FCO, and UNDP, and has done assignments for the Jordanian, Palestinian, and South African Governments. Kattan is the author of From Coexistence to Conquest: International Law and the Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1891- 1949 (London: Pluto Press, 2009) and is the editor of The Palestine Question in International Law (London: The British Institute of International and Comparative Law, 2008). His is currently completing the manuscript of his third book, a history of partitioned states in international law, for Hart Publishing.
