In the southern neighborhoods of Beirut, far from the highways and glass towers that compose this cosmopolitan Mediterranean city’s downtown, sits the Palestinian refugee camp of Shatila. The camp is a towering complex of dilapidated apartment buildings, their concrete sides marred by bullet holes and mortar scars that speak to the decades of conflict the Palestinian people have endured.

Today the systematic dispossession of the Palestinian people continues unabated and largely unchallenged by the United States and the European Union. Barriers to Palestinian mobility, social and political development are visible everywhere.

"As I arrived there I found many people in the area, working on their lands. It was calm so I felt comfortable and stayed there. Suddenly one of the jeeps on the border stopped and bullet after bullet was fired."

This past Sunday July 31, on the eve of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent “greetings” to the Muslim world. In light of the Arab Spring, he stated that “Israeli-Arabs” can serve as examples to their brothers in the region because they “know the taste and meaning of democracy”.