;

Israel



  • Israel's Founding Contradictions Haunt 75th Anniversary

    by Bernard Avishai

    A bargain of tolerance between secular bourgeois and religious supremacist wings of Israeli society is being renegotiated by the right wing. Are concessions to religious groups made by David Ben-Gurion at the founding the root of conflict?



  • Who Attacked Jascha Heifetz in 1953?

    Although ties to Jewish extremist organizations were suspected, the person who attacked a violinist in 1953, allegedly for performing the works of Richard Strauss, has never been found. The story resonates with conflicts in Israeli society today. 



  • Have Protests Stopped Netanyahu's Attack on Israeli Democracy?

    by Bernard Avishai

    It's unlikely either Netanyahu will abandon his plans for overhauling Israel's Basic Laws to expand his power or that protests will cease in the near future. Israelis will increasingly have to choose whether the state will be a religious one with trappings of democracy or a democratic one with a nominal religious identity. 

  • Israel and Palestine Have a Way Forward. Will They Choose It?

    by Alon Ben-Meir

    It is time for Israel and the Palestinians to face the bittersweet truth and accept certain realities on the ground that neither side can change short of a calamity. These inescapable realities will frame the contours of a peace agreement in the context of an Israeli-Palestinian-Jordanian confederation.  



  • Israel's Judicial Struggle is Tectonic

    by Michael Oren

    The former Israeli ambassador to the United States writes that massive protests against Netanyahu's judicial reforms will determine whether there is a future for democracy in Israel. 


  • How Israel Lost its Way

    by Alon Ben-Meir

    After Israel has raised several generations as warriors and occupiers, has the nation lost sight of the toll on its own youth and the consequences for peace? 



  • Beinart: Some of Carter's Critics Should Apologize While they Can

    by Peter Beinart

    Peter Beinart says that Jimmy Carter's 2007 book "Peace Not Apartheid" had flaws, but many of its harshest critics ignored whether its claims about the Israeli occupation were factual and leaped to insinuation and outright accusation that Carter was motivated by antisemitism. 



  • Is a Third Intifada Imminent?

    by Daniel Byman

    The second intifada, between 2000 and 2005, ended not with negotiated peace but with an overwhelming application of force by Israel on Gaza and the West Bank. As Israeli politics tilts rightward and abandons the idea of a negotiated settlement, it is unclear what will prevent a new escalation of violence. 



  • Will the US Build an Embassy on Palestinian Land in Jerusalem?

    by Rashid Khalidi

    As the new ultra-right wing Israeli government prepares to escalate the dispossession of Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem, the United States should not allow the siting of its embassy to give cover to this project.