Kathleen Christison

Infobox Person
name = Kathleen Christison


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occupation = Political analyst & author
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Kathleen (McGrath) Christison (born 1941) is an American political analyst and author whose primary area of focus is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. She and her husband, Bill Christison, have gained recognition as vocal critics of Israel.cite web|title=Ex-CIA officials criticize Israel, draw student protestors|author=Euphemia Mu|publisher=Daily Princetonian|date=17 October 2005|accessdate=2007-07-26|url=http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2005/10/17/news/13487.shtml] [citenews|title=The Insane Brutality of the State of Israel|publisher=Arab News|date= July 24, 2006|url= http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7&section=0&article=84673&d=24&m=7&y=2006 |quote=Kathleen Christison is a former CIA political analyst and has worked on Middle East issues for 30 years] [citenews|title=The Arab/Israeli crisis|publisher=Jamaica Gleaner|date= August 6, 2006|url= http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20060806/cleisure/cleisure6.html]

For sixteen years, Christison worked as a political analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). [citebook|title=Crossing the Rubicon: Ronald Reagan and U. S. Policy in the Middle East |author=Nicholas Laham|year= 2004|publisher=Ashgate Publishing| pages=116|id=ISBN 0754639614 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=kdY54dooGVMC&pg=PA116&ots=iY4q_oKOnt&dq=%22Kathleen+Christison%22+-inauthor:%22Kathleen+Christison%22&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html&sig=uhukcPwePcpveQWo1jKmOxlmjTc] [citebook|title=Dishonest Broker: The U.S. Role in Israel and Palestine|author= Naseer Hasan |year=2003|publisher=South End Press|id=ISBN 0896086879] Between 1963 and 1972, her work concentrated on Vietnam. The last seven years before her resignation from the agency in 1979 saw her work there centered on the Middle East. Since leaving the CIA, Christison has worked as a free-lance author. Her articles have been published extensively by the Journal of Palestine Studies and Counterpunch [citenews|title=Impending War on Iraq|publisher=San Francisco Chronicle|date=February 13, 2003|url= http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/02/13/ED152326.DTL |quote=as documented by Bill and Kathleen Christison in the online magazine Counterpunch] [cite web|title=Before Their Was Terrorism|author=Kathleen Christison|publisher=Counterpunch|date=2 May 2002|accessdate=2007-07-26|url=http://www.counterpunch.org/kchristison0502.html] as well as in the Electronic Intifada [cite web|title=Atrocities in the Promised Land|author=Kathleen Christison|date=19 July 2006|accessdate=2007-08-21|url=http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5109.shtml] and Adbusters [cite web|title=Does the Israeli Tail Wag American Dog?|author=Kathleen Christison and Bill Christison|publisher=Adbusters|date=March-April 2007|accessdate=2007-08-21|url=http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/articles/article0058556.html] . She is also the author of two books: "Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy" (1999 & 2001) and "The Wound of Dispossession: Telling the Palestinian Story" (2002). [citebook|title=America's Palestine: Popular and Official Perceptions from Balfour to Israeli Statehood |author= Davidson, Lawrence Roy|year= 2001|publisher=University Press of Florida| pages=219|id=ISBN 0813024218|url= http://books.google.com/books?id=yyBYi2TWO3YC&pg=RA1-PA219&dq=%22kathleen+christison%22+-inauthor:%22kathleen+christison%22&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html&sig=ojGrF1s6VE-8dlTdRNBVNejvIdc] [citejournal|url=http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/shofar/v020/20.2davidson.html |title=Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on US Middle East Policy(review)|author=L Davidson|journal=Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies|year= 2001 |doi=10.1353/sho.2001.0136 |volume=20 |pages=140] [citejournal|title=The Gun and the Olive Branch|author=D Hirst |date= Journal of Palestine Studies|year= 2003|publisher=University of California Press|url= http://caliber.ucpress.net/doi/pdf/10.1525/jps.2003.32.3.39|doi=10.1525/jps.2003.32.3.39|journal=Journal of Palestine Studies|volume=32|pages=39]

Philosophical bases

Christison has described the ideological shift she made from "Reagan Republican" to foreign-policy critic as "a slow evolution" that was facilitated by the move she and her husband made away from Washington, D.C. to New Mexico.

In her book, "Perceptions of Palestine", Christison examines how perceptions, attitudes, and policies of the United States government towards the Palestinians and Israel over the last century have contributed to the irresolution of the conflict.cite web|title=Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy - Book Review|author= Husam Mohamed|publisher="Arab Studies Quarterly|date=Fall 2000|accessdate=2007-07-27|url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2501/is_4_22/ai_72118645/pg_1] The United States' special relationship with Israel is said by Christison to have undermined Palestinian political claims and downplayed the seriousness of their tragedy. According to the "Arab Studies Quarterly", the questioning of this lack of moral equality in American responses and treatments of both Arab and Jewish tragedies is a major theme of Christison's book.

Works

Books

*" [http://www.escholarship.org/editions/view?docId=kt5t1nc6tp;query=;brand=ucpress Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy] " (Hardcover 1999) University of California Press. ISBN 0520217179. [http://www.mepc.org/journal_vol7/9910_christisonbk.asp] (Updated softcover version released in 2001)
*"The Wound of Dispossession: Telling the Palestinian Story" (2002) Sunlit Hills Press. ISBN 097125480X. [http://www.amazon.com/dp/097125480X]

Articles in the "Journal of Palestine Studies"

*"The American Experience: Palestinians in the US" (1989)
*"Dilemmas of Arab Christianity" (1992)
*"Macro Microcosm" (1992)
*"The City and Its People" (1993)
*"Pax Americana" (1995)
*"A Frank Examination" (1995)
* "Uneven but Invaluable" (1996)
*"US Policy and the Palestinians: Bound by a Frame of Reference" (1997)
*"US Policy Realities" (1997)
*"A Morality Tale?" (1998)
*"Selective Memory?" (1999)
*"'All Those Old Issues': George W. Bush and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict" (2004)

References