Former US president Jimmy Carter’s historical narrative of the various efforts he has been involved in to bring peace to Palestine is a fascinating insight into the politics behind the would-be peacemakers. Carter shows great courage in describing how pro-Israeli bias within the current American administration is the real obstacle to peace in the Middle East; a bias which gives the green light to a system of oppression and apartheid.

Checkpoints, closures, curfews and the bureaucracy of permits and licences that back up these measures have long been the tools that facilitate the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory. However, since September 2000 the system has been intensified, ‘industrialised’ and, increasingly, brutalized. This article will make the point that the very existence of this massive scheme of obstacles, even when no physical or verbal abuse are perpetrated there, is in itself an abuse of a fundamental human/civil right: freedom of movement. More than this, allegedly a necessary security measure, the checkpoints are in fact instruments of control and humiliation of a civilian population and the paralysis and disruption of their economy and society (World Bank, 2007). Checkpoints are a tool towards Israel’s realisation of maximum territory with a minimum of Palestinians; yet another element in the ongoing system of population transfer that began with the Naqba-Disaster of 1948 and that continues, by various means, up to the present time.[1]

This is a review of a book on al-Quds written by a prominent scholar of the ahlus-sunnah school of law based in Qatar. The book deals with issues connected to Palestine in general. Issues dealt with by the scholar include the place of al-Quds in the Qur’an, the relevance and importance of al-Quds to Muslims. On the political side he deals with the enemy i.e. the Zionist, and their project of destroying al-Quds and installing the temple of Solomon on its ruins. He discusses at length the nature of the enemy utilizing various sources in Arabic and Hebrew. He points towards the support the Americans had given towards Israel in fulfilling their Zionist project of the expansion of Israel. He ends the book by outlining some recommendations for the Muslims in the face of this encroachment towards al-Quds.

A relentless war against the Palestinians has been portrayed as Israeli self defence, even as a search for peace. Meanwhile any resistance has been portrayed as the obstacle to peace, even as terrorism. Through this storyline, the so-called ‘international community’ has legitimised the Zionist occupation of Palestine through its imitation of these policies in the global ‘war on terror’.