Review for Third Closed-book Assessment

The third and final Closed-book Assessment takes place on Wednesday, December 5. The review sheet is now available. I am working on securing a place and time for a review session.

There will be a review session on Tuesday, December 4, at 4:00 PM in 103 Buckman Hall.

Palestine Achieves "Non-member State" Status in UN

Today, the United Nations voted to uphold a resolution classifying Palestine as a "non-member state." Palestine had maintained "permanent observer" status in the UN since 1974.

Both the United States and Israel voted against the resolution, which passed by a 138-9 margin. The United Kingdom and forty other countries abstained.

Palestinian President Abbas characterized the vote as crucial to the two-state solution, while Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Clinton declared the move a step backwards in resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The measure is largely symbolic, but does allow a Palestinian delegate to hold the floor in debates in the General Assembly. Votes on full membership are subject to veto by the permanent members of the Security Council, a power the US exercised last year to prevent the full accession of Palestine.

Implications?

The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Expands into Cyberspace

This story is a couple of weeks old. I'm sure you remember the recent outbreak of violence in Gaza, quelled by a recent ceasefire agreement. What you may not have noticed was that the conflict spilled out onto—of all places—Twitter.

Specifically, the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and Hamas have been sniping at each other using the microblog service.

Hamas' claim that it has shelled "occupied" Tel Aviv… comes not from a news outlet, but from Hamas. And another tweet, from the Israel Defense Forces, assures me that, in fact, the Hamas rocket never reached Tel Aviv.

Do political actors actually manage to effect outcomes when they use services like Twitter (or Facebook, Tumblr, etc…) during truly violent conflicts like the one that recently occurred in Gaza, or is this just bluster?