It would be safe to call Israel’s Knesset elections on Tuesday a disaster. Initially depressed Arab voter turnout, a failed opposition campaign, typical right-wing Election Day shenanigans all point to the continuation of an unacceptable status quo.
The more a leader stokes the hate, the less he can claim that he couldn't have imagined the results.
In a nakedly political move, Jeremy Corbyn's right-wing critics are painting the lifelong anti-racist's criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic. Corbyn’s wing of the Labor Party is accused because criticism of Israel is now defined as anti-Semitism.
Biography of a world-class reactionary fixer who has thus far immobilized the Israeli left, won over Sunni Arab states paralyzed by fear of Shia Iran and is poised to become the longest serving prime minister is Israeli history.
Israel passed a law on today to declare that only Jews have the right of self-determination in the country, something members of the Arab minority called racist and verging on apartheid. Racist and discriminatory practices against non-Jews are legal.
Leaders and members from twenty organizations will be barred entry into Israel. This also further isolates Palestine, since entry to Palestine is via Israel. One group, AFSC said: Our response to the Palestinian BDS call is in line with our similar support for divestment from apartheid South Africa and boycotts during the civil rights era." Here are statements from the banned groups: Joyce Ajlouny, Rebecca Vilkomerson and Ariel Gold.
Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, removed an anti-Semitic meme from his Facebook page on Sunday after an outcry from Israeli politicians and Jewish community leaders in the United States. The image, posted by Yair Netanyahu on Friday, appeared to be a local take on a classic anti-Semitic cartoon suggesting that Jews control the United States. It has appeared widely on extreme alt-right websites.
Barghouti’s statement, posted to social media around noon EST in Arabic. The letter lauds gains from the strike, including increased family visits, more clothing, special unnamed services for female and child prisoners, expedited transfers and, most importantly, the establishment of a collective bargaining committee where Israeli prison authorities will 'dialogue with the prisoners’ representatives in the forthcoming few days to discuss all issues without exception.'*
In many ways the Security Council vote is Obama’s last hurrah, the swan song not only of his presidency but of unequivocal American support for a two-state solution and opposition to Jewish settlements.
An amazing turn for a major leader of the American Jewish mainstream - David Gordis rethinking view of Israel. He writes: Present day Israel has discarded the rational, the universal and the visionary. These values have been subordinated to a cruel and oppressive occupation, an emphatic materialism, severe inequalities...and distorted by a fanatic, obscurantist and fundamentalist religion which encourages the worst behaviors rather than the best.
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