From Apartheid to Democracy: A Blueprint for Peace in Israel-Palestine
Book presentation by Sarah Leah Whitson & Michael Omer-Man
- Date
- 17 September 2026
- Time
- 15:00 -17:00
- Room
- B6.12
What comes after Apartheid?
In their book, From Apartheid to Democracy: A Blueprint for Peace in Israel-Palestine, Sarah Leah Whitson and Michael Omer-Man break with three decades of failed Oslo-era diplomacy. The Oslo framework, presented under the guise of what was supposed to be a “two-state solution”, has instead allowed Israel to maintain a one-state reality of permanent occupation and apartheid.
In their book, the authors offer a roadmap for dismantling the deeply unequal system of occupation and apartheid in Israel-Palestine, while exploring what a genuinely democratic future for the region might look like.
Sarah Leah Whitson and Michael Omer-Man will discuss their book in this special book talk, organised by the Amsterdam Centre for Middle Eastern Studies (ACMES) in collaboration with the Amsterdam Centre for Conflict Studies (ACCS).
About the speakers
Sarah Leah Whitson is a human rights lawyer and former Executive Director of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN). She previously served as Executive Director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East and North Africa Division, where she led research and advocacy across the region. She has also written widely on human rights and US foreign policy in the Middle East, with her work appearing in publications including The New York Times, Foreign Policy, and The Los Angeles Times.
Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man brings a similarly longstanding engagement with politics, human rights, and accountability in Israel-Palestine, grounded in more than a decade of experience as a journalist in the region. He is currently Director of Israel-Palestine at DAWN, where his work focuses on Israeli policies of occupation and annexation, civil and human rights, and the influence of the US-Israel relationship.
Assistant Professor Farid Boussaid (University of Amsterdam) will act as discussant.
