Avigdor Liberman

Prime Minister Netanyahu attends a planting ceremony for the Jewish holiday of Tu B'Shevat in the West Bank settlement of Mevo'ot Yericho, February 10, 2020. (Haim Zach/GPO)

The empty promise of annexation

The 'Deal of the Century' was supposed to be Netanyahu's ticket to re-election and out of prison. That may no longer be enough.

By Meron Rapoport February 18, 2020

Activists protest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Habima Square in Tel Aviv, November 23, 2019.(Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)

The many faces of Benjamin Netanyahu

Netanyahu has only been so successful because he reflects and represents the many faces of Israel: victor and victim, global citizen and international outcast, pyromaniac and war-shy.

By Dahlia Scheindlin December 22, 2019

A Jewish Israeli man holding an Israeli flag confronts a Palestinian woman holding a kaffiyeh on the sidelines of the ultra-nationalist "Jerusalem Day" march, May 13, 2018. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Jewish-Arab partnership as an antidote to Jewish supremacism

We need to redefine Israeli politics. No more left and right, liberal or conservative, religious versus secular. Instead: a new partnership of Arabs and Jews, working side-by-side to combat Jewish supremacism. By Meron Rapoport and Ameer Fakhoury Israel has been at a political dead end for many months, particularly since the most recent national election…

By Meron Rapoport and Ameer Fakhoury October 30, 2019

Latest

The Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar, West Bank. (Faiz Abu-Rmeleh/Activestills.org)

The demolition of an entire Palestinian village could be days away

With a green light from the Supreme Court, Israel is set to a demolish an entire Bedouin village in the West Bank. Human rights advocates warn that the demolition would constitute a grave violation of international law. Israel’s Supreme Court approved a government plan to demolish an entire Bedouin village in the occupied West Bank last…

By Joshua Leifer May 27, 2018

Natalie Portman at the premiere of "The Seventh Fire," Haus der Berliner Festspiele, February 7, 2015. (Siebbi/CC BY-SA 3.0)

The real danger of Natalie Portman

Israeli leaders are relentlessly hammering home the idea that the kind of political dissent displayed by Natalie Portman is foreign. And dissenters, by definition, are not real Israelis. When Natalie Portman announced that she would not attend the lucrative Genesis Prize ceremony because she opposes Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, who was to present the prize to…

By Dahlia Scheindlin April 24, 2018

Israeli minister of Defense Avigdor Liberman holds a press conference during the construction of the new Israeli settlement Amichai, to be established as the new home for the evacuated residents of Amona, October 18, 2017. (Hadas Parush/Flash90)

Liberman goes to war against alternative Memorial Day ceremony

Frustrated but unbowed, organizers of the Israeli-Palestinian Memorial Day ceremony hope this year’s event will be the biggest yet. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman announced Tuesday that Israel would deny entry permits to 110 Palestinians who planned to participate in the annual Israeli-Palestinian Memorial Day Ceremony. Liberman called the alternative Memorial Day ceremony, organized jointly by Combatants for…

By Joshua Leifer April 11, 2018

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (Photo: Kobi Gideon / GPO)

What will Israeli politics after Netanyahu hold for the Palestinians?

Disrupting Israel’s insular political discourse will require fully activating the Palestinian leadership in Israel, grassroots and civil society organizations, and foreign governments and institutions. In August 2017, three thousand Israelis greeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a rally in Tel Aviv organized by the Likud party. A few days earlier, media outlets reported that the…

By Amjad Iraqi March 16, 2018

Soldiers from the IDF's Egoz Reconnaissance Unit, which specializes in guerrilla warfare in southern Lebanon. (Illustrative photo: IDF Spokesperson/Flickr)

Another unnecessary war

The following is a prediction best left unfulfilled. Faced with the drums of war, one must remain resolute, even if there is no certainty that war will break out. Too much is at stake. And if war does not break out now, it will at a later time. It will materialize one way or another. By…

By +972 Magazine February 7, 2018

A Palestinian artist puts the final touches on a graffiti on a wall in Gaza City, May 8, 2010. The phrase is Arabic reads 'we will definitely come back.' (Wissam Nassar/Flash90)

How Arabic became a threat to ‘social cohesion’ in Israel

The absurd arrest of a Palestinian worker who was mistranslated by the police is a reminder that Arabic has been turned into a tool to oppress the native population in this country. Israelis read Sunday morning that Israeli police had mistakenly arrested a Palestinian worker after relying on a Facebook translation of a post he had…

By Orly Noy October 23, 2017

Palestinian kids seen at the entrance to a house in a flooded area following heavy rainfall, in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on February 15, 2017. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)

Gazans being held hostage by Israeli, PA gamesmanship

The Israeli cabinet decided to accept Mahmoud Abbas’ request that the electricity supply to Gaza be cut. The army has warned against doing so, but it seems that for Israel, Abbas’ interests are more important than people’s lives. Who says there is no coordination between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority? On Sunday evening,…

By Orly Noy June 12, 2017

Palestinian prisoners advocate, Hasan Safadi. (Addameer)

Israel renews admin detention of Palestinian prisoners advocate

Hasan Safadi, who was accused of affiliation with a proscribed organization and visiting an enemy state, will remain imprisoned without charge for another six months. Israeli military authorities extended the administrative detention of Palestinian prisoners’ rights activist Hasan Safadi on Thursday. Hasan Safadi, a journalist who works as media coordinator for Addameer, an NGO that supports…

By Orly Noy June 9, 2017

Palestinian members of the al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas movement, take part in military parade marking the second anniversary of the killing of Hamas's military commanders, Mohammed Abu Shamala and Raed al-Attar, August 21, 2016 in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)

Israel and Hamas need each other — now more than ever

The fact that Israel has no desire to destroy Hamas and re-occupy Gaza means the next round of fighting will end much like the previous ones: a ‘strategic tie’ with enormous human suffering in both Israel and the Strip. By Doron Matza It is impossible to understand what is happening in the Gaza Strip without understanding the following…

By +972 Magazine March 9, 2017

A Palestinian woman and children pass the slogan "Gas the Arabs! JDL" spray-painted on an exterior wall of the Cordoba School near Shuhada Street, Hebron, October 22, 2012. "JDL" stands for Jewish Defense League, an extremist group founded by Meir Kahane and designated as a terrorist group by the FBI. On February 25, 1994, JDL charter member Baruch Goldstein opened fire on Muslims at Hebron's Al-Ibrahimi Mosque (Cave of the Patriarchs), killing 29 worshippers and injuring 125. Afterwards, the JDL designated him "a martyr in Judaism's protracted struggle against Arab terrorism." (photo by: Ryan Rodrick Beiler/Activestills.org)

Unpacking anti-Arab racism in Israel

A new law aiming to silence the Muslim call to prayer is just one manifestation of efforts to erase Palestinian culture and identity. But language and heritage aren’t so easy to disappear. There is a building on Michelangelo Street in Jaffa, near where I used to live, which for a while featured the sentiment “We have no other country” graffitied…

By Natasha Roth-Rowland February 15, 2017