17 Facts About Ali Abunimah

Ali Abunimah has appeared on many television discussion programs on CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and other networks, and in a number of documentaries about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including Collecting Stories from Exile: Chicago Palestinians Remember 1948.

Ali Abunimah's mother is originally from the village of Lifta, now part of Israel, but she became a refugee in the 1948 Palestinian exodus.

Ali Abunimah's father is from the village of Battir, now in the West Bank, and is a former Jordanian diplomat who served as ambassador to the United Nations.

Ali Abunimah received degrees from Princeton University and the University of Chicago.

In 2009, Ali Abunimah wrote an article entitled, "Israeli Jews and the one-state solution," covering some of the same arguments as he raised in his book, One Country.

Ali Abunimah said that if he were to be considered a POW, his status would fall under the guidelines set forth at the Third Geneva Convention.

Ali Abunimah has publicly supported the idea of a third intifada.

Ali Abunimah played a key role in the Gaza Freedom March in 2009, a joint effort with Codepink to bring humanitarian relief to Gaza via the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.

In March 2012, Ali Abunimah was among those Palestinian activists who signed a statement criticizing the views of Gilad Atzmon as racist and antisemitic.

Ali Abunimah visited the headquarters of the Popular Committee for Refugees in the Maghazi camp in the Gaza Strip in May 2013.

Ali Abunimah met Barack Obama personally in 2004 when the latter was a member of the Illinois State Senate.

Ali Abunimah wrote in 2007 that he had met Obama around half a dozen times before Obama held elective office.

Ali Abunimah has since accused Obama of having cut off his relationships with Arab Americans after his election to the US Senate.

Ali Abunimah said he was sympathetic to the Palestinians because he needed their votes in order to be elected.

Ali Abunimah was very supportive of US pressure on Israel.

Ali Abunimah wrote the book One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse, which proposes to revive the idea of one state shared by two peoples.

When many others have moved away from this discussion, Ali Abunimah's book refocuses it on the right goal, even if he's not clear about the path from here to there.