Yesterday marked the 75th anniversary of the establishment of the state of Israel and the Palestinian Nakba, or “catastrophe.” It comes at a time when the prospects for peace are particularly dim, with internal political challenges on both sides and recurrent violence punctuated by periodic outbreaks of heavier fighting.
The Arab League announced the immediate reinstatement of Syria as a member on Sunday, opening the door to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s participation in the league’s upcoming summit on May 19. The diplomatic breakthrough affirms Assad’s legitimacy and confirms the acceptance across the region that he has won Syria’s civil war.
A controversy over a Netflix docudrama about Cleopatra escalated last week, when the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities asserted that Cleopatra was fair-skinned. The statement capped two weeks of debate about her ethnicity, after Netflix cast a mixed-race British actress in the leading role for “Queen Cleopatra.”