May 8, 2024

Campus Tsuris, again

• J Street: The Situation on College Campuses: J Street U Students Discuss Anti-War Protests [Video]
• Jeffrey C. Isaac: An Open Letter to IU’s Pro-Palestinian Student Activists: Why I Can Support You Only So Far
• Jonathan Chait: Why Biden Is Correct to Denounce Campus Antisemitism: The problem is not physical violence.
• In Our Name: A Message from Jewish Students at Columbia University
• Judith Shulevitz: What Those Pro-Palestinian Chants Mean: A close look at the words being shouted at protests on campuses across the country reveals why some see the pro-Palestinian cause as so threatening.
• Jill Filipovic: Say Plainly What the Protesters Want
• Bashir Abu-Manneh: The Palestinian Resistance Isn’t a Monolith

Back to Gaza

• Ex-IDF ops chief: Rafah invasion PM readying to approve would be worst decision made since war’s outbreak.
• Amos Harel: The hostage deal is stuck between Netanyahu’s ‘rock’ and Sinwar’s ‘hard place,’ as the world waits for Hamas’ answer to the current proposal. The much anticipated Rafah offensive has been mythologized to Stalingrad status, but its strategic value is hardly the ‘total victory’ it has been chalked up to be.
• Anshel Pfeffer: Both Netanyahu and Sinwar Need to Win, So the Gaza War Will Carry On. Most Israelis and Gazans understand that they have lost too much for there to be any notion of ‘victory’ in this war. But as long as their fates are controlled by two men who insist on being the victor, at any cost, this war is going to continue.
• Tom Segev: Israel’s Forever War: The Long History of Managing—Rather Than Solving—the Conflict

An old but still relevant analysis:

• Ellen Willis: Is There Still a Jewish Question? Why I’m an Anti-Anti-Zionist. In this essay, from 2003, the leftist feminist rock critic Ellen Willis discussed her misgivings about Zionism—and about its opponents.

May 1, 2024

Opinion & Analysis

• Amnon Brownfield Stein: Arrested for ‘Statements Against Zionism’: The Worrying State of Free Speech in Israel
• Jo-Ann Mort: Zionism can – and must – be about liberation of Jews and Palestinians
• David Shulman: Israel: The Way Out
• Tom Friedman: Israel Has a Choice to Make: Rafah or Riyadh
• Amos Harel: Torn Between Biden and Israel’s Far Right, a Reluctant Netanyahu Weighs Hostage Deal Proposals He Once Dismissed
• Jose Andres: We’re going back to Gaza to feed people. Here’s what we need from Israel.

Some Insightful ‘Big Think’ Pieces

• Susie Linfield: From the River to the Sea: Getting it Right, Getting it Wrong

• Kian Tajbakhsh: Albert Memmi and The Problem with Postcolonialism

Tsuris on Campus

• Ross Douthat: What Students Read Before They Protest.
• George Packer: The Campus-Left Occupation That Broke Higher Education: Elite colleges are now reaping the consequences of promoting a pedagogy that trashed the postwar ideal of the liberal university.
• Bill Scher: The Divestment Encampments Don’t Make Any Sense: The demand that universities unload any investments having to do with Israel is half-baked and bound to fail.
• David French: Colleges Have Gone Off the Deep End. There Is a Way Out.
• Haviva Ner-David: An open letter to the Columbia University Gaza war protesters from a pro-Palestinian activist in Israel
• Lihi Ben Shitrit: I teach Israel studies at NYU. We are importing the worst of Israel and Palestine to our campuses: The campus protests are often adopting some of the most extreme rhetoric from the region

April 24, 2024

Opinion & Analysis

• Yuval Noah Harari: From Gaza to Iran, the Netanyahu Government Is Endangering Israel’s Survival: Israel is facing a historic defeat, the bitter fruit of years of disastrous policies. If the country now prioritizes vengeance over its own best interests, it will put itself and the entire region in grave danger.

• Less Than Quarter of Israeli Jews in Favor of Settlement in Gaza, Poll Finds

• Dahlia Scheindlin: Why Israelis Don’t Flinch When Settlers Kill Palestinians: For years, the radical settlers who committed arson, physical attacks or even pogroms on Palestinians were regarded marginal extremists, and widely condemned. But as once-fringe vigilante terror becomes lethally routine, Israelis are failing to respond.

• Harold Meyerson: Guess Which Two American Religions Share the Same Political Orientations

• Arash Azizi: Why America’s Leftist Literati Loves to Fetishize Hamas Brutality: When Western leftists celebrate an open defense of Hamas’ ‘exhilarating’ murder of civilians but censor texts that humanize Israelis or deplatform Jews, they’re not acting in solidarity with Palestinians. It’s an armchair glorification of faraway violence that could rightly be called colonial.

• Jay Michelson: The Head of the Largest Christian Zionist Organization Is No Friend to Israel — He Wants an Apocalypse There.

• Hillel Shenker: Where is the leftist Critique of Hamas? What is the view of most of the organizations and activists in the Palestinian solidarity movement about Hamas? The answer remains unclear—and rarely talked about.

• Alon Pinkas: Qatar Is Part of the Solution to Gaza War, Not the Problem: In what appears to be a coordinated effort, three separate attacks from U.S. lawmakers have blamed Qatar for a lack of progress on hostage talks and a temporary cease-fire in Gaza. But that is a blatantly unfair assessment, even if a convenient one for Benjamin Netanyahu

• Amos Harel: After Passover, Israel Faces a Choice: Hostages or War

More on Hamas Rapes

• Michael A. Cohen: The Rape Denialists: Why has it proved so hard for so many on the left to acknowledge what happened on October 7?
• Liza Rozovsky: 15 Witnesses, Three Confessions, a Pattern of Naked Dead Bodies. All the Evidence of Hamas Rape on October 7
  
  

J Street

• STATEMENT ON HOUSE PASSAGE OF NATIONAL SECURITY SUPPLEMENTAL (April 20, 2024)

April 17, 2024

Opinion & Analysis

• Ami Ayalon: The Only Way for Israel to Truly Defeat Hamas: Why the Zionist Dream Depends on a Two-State Solution
• Anshel Pfeffer: Israel’s Military ‘Maneuver’ in Gaza Was a Pointless Success. A successful maneuver without a viable strategy to follow it is just that: a maneuver for the sake of maneuvering. In hindsight, a more limited ground offensive was called for, which would have caused Hamas and Gaza less damage but would have left Israel with more options afterward.
• Sigal Samuel: The untold story of Arab Jews — and their solidarity with Palestinians: Jews from the Arab and Muslim world had a radical vision for Israeli-Palestinian peace.
• Chaim Levinson: Saying What Can’t be Said, Israel has been Defeated-A Total Defeat: The war’s aims won’t be achieved, the hostages won’t be returned through military pressure, security won’t be restored and Israel’s international ostracism won’t end.
• NYTimes: Military Aid to Israel Cannot Be Unconditional
• Noga Tarnopolsky: Israelis Are Hostages of Netanyahu with the prime minister still refusing to resign, every day feels like October 7

Iran vs. Israel

• Anshel Pfeffer: Iran’s Attack Is a Strategic Opportunity for Israel. Will Netanyahu Squander It? The unprecedented Iranian attack in the early hours of Sunday is an inflection point for Israel and its allies, offering the possibility of being a real game-changer in the Middle East in Israel’s favor – but only if Benjamin Netanyahu now makes the right moves

• Haaretz: Israel Took Part in Unprecedented Meeting With Arab States About Iranian Threat, Report Says: The Wall Street Journal reports that top military officials from Israel, Egypt, Jordan Saudi Arabia and Qatar, as well as representatives from the U.S., Bahrain and UAE, discussed the shared Iranian threat (June 2022)

• Tal Schneider: A Middle East defense alliance is as vital for Israel as the air we breathe: It’s time for Israel to face reality: If it weren’t for our regional partners including Jordan, the country would look completely different this morning.

• Amos Harel: Fending Off Iran Attack Is a Major Israeli Achievement. Retaliation Would Risk an All-out Regional War

• Amos Harel: Iran’s Attack on Israel Will Fuel the War on All Fronts

• Amos Harel: Israel Must Weigh Response to Iran’s Massive Attack Against Hezbollah Threat

April 10, 2024

Opinion & Analysis

• Yuli Tamir: We Israelis Are All Complicit in the Starvation of Civilians in Gaza (April 7, 2024)
• The Countdown to Israel’s Next Elections Has Begun
• Shlomi Eldar: Hamas Actually Believed It Would Conquer Israel, and Divided It Into Cantons: Tens of thousands of Gazans have fled to Egypt since the war broke out, many of them members of the elite who are able to pay the enormous costs. I met old friends in Cairo who were still astonished at the messianic insanity that seized Hamas’ leadership.
• Seyla Benhabib: An Open Letter To My Friends Who Signed “Philosophy for Palestine”
• The Forward: A ceasefire is the only credible endgame to the Israel-Hamas war 
• Interview with Barak Ravid on Cooper Anderson’s show on CNN
• José Andrés: Let People Eat
• ‘Serious failure’: IDF fires 2 top officers over deadly drone strike on Gaza aid convoy
• Audrey Clare Farley: Right-Wing Influencers Are Fighting Over What It Means to Be White: Candace Owens’s bitter split with Ben Shapiro, and the rise of “Christ is king” as an antisemitic troll, reveal just how weird things have gotten among very-online conservatives (April 3, 2024)

April 3, 2024

Opinion & Analysis

• Joint NGO Submission under National Security Memorandum 20: The State of the Humanitarian Response in Gaza

• Ben Samuels: U.S. Finds Israel in Compliance With Biden’s Demands on International Law, Humanitarian Aid: ‘We have not found them to be in violation, either when it comes to the conduct of the war or the provision of humanitarian assistance,’ the State Department said.

• Jeffrey Herf: Israel Is Antiracist, Anti-Colonialist, Anti-Fascist (and Was from the Start): The establishment of Israel was not a miracle but an episode of enormous moral and military courage.

• Letter of support to President Biden and Senator Schumer from Jewish leaders: We write to express our gratitude for your leadership in safeguarding a strong US-Israel relationship, grounded in a commitment to Israel’s security and safety for Jews worldwide. Together, you have articulated a vision for Israel’s present and future which we believe is widely supported by American Jewry.

• Aaron David Miller and Adam Israelevitz: Why Biden Can’t Force a Truce on Israel – or Won’t, Foreign Policy” Four reasons why President Biden can’t or won’t force a truce on Israel: the President’s love affair with Israel, the way October 7 changed the equation, how Israel’s domestic politics make It hard and how Biden can’t end the war without Israel’s cooperation.

• Phil Klay: U.S. Support for Israel’s War Has Become Indefensible: A good pretext for war is not enough to make a war just.

• Haaretz Editorial: Thou Shalt Not Starve Thy Neighbor

• Ido David Cohen: The New York Times Investigated Hamas’ Sexual Assault on October 7. Then the Trouble Started: The influential newspaper’s probe into Hamas’ sexual assault against Israelis was complicated to begin with. Soon, targeted by pro-Palestinian activists, the reporters found that they themselves had become the story.

• The Berl Katznelson Center (BKC). The Israeli Initiative: A Roadmap for Israel’s Security.

• Joshua Leifer: Oct. 7 Shattered Netanyahu’s Legacy. The War Saved Him – for Now.

• Rachel Burnett: BDS Resolutions & the Empathy Gap on College Campuses.

Attack on World Central Kitchen Staff

• Allison Kaplan Sommer: If Only Israel Thought of All Its Gaza Victims as a PR Disaster: Israel’s response to the deaths of seven World Central Kitchen aid workers killed in an Israeli strike stood in stark contrast to its reactions to previous humanitarian tragedies throughout the Gaza conflict.
• Yaniv Kubovich: IDF Sources: Gaza Aid Workers Killed Because ‘Officers on the Ground Do What They Want’; The IDF and defense ministry claimed that the aid workers’ killing resulted from poor coordination. Israeli army sources later refuted their claims, saying the incident has ‘no connection to coordination’ and was caused by the fact that ‘every commander sets the rules for himself’.
• José Andrés: Let People Eat.
• Must watch Barak Ravid, a highly esteemed Axios/CNN Israeli reporter with inside sources, discusses how IDF is no longer a professional army. “CNN Political & Foreign Policy Analyst Barak Ravid joins Anderson to analyze what went wrong when an Israeli attack in Gaza killed seven aid workers, including foreign nationals, from Chef José Andrés non-profit, World Central Kitchen.”

• March 25, 2024

  • Joshua Leifer: What is the real Hamas? How Israeli, Palestinian and US political actors understand Hamas is not merely a theoretical question – it will determine what kind of agreement can be reached to end the current war, and what the future of Gaza will look like.

  • ‘Part of My Core’: How Schumer Decided to Speak Out Against Netanyahu: In an interview in his native Brooklyn, America’s highest-ranking Jewish elected official said he felt obligated to call for new leadership in Israel.

  • Thomas L. Friedman: What Schumer and Biden Got Right About Netanyahu (March 19, 2024)

  • The Democrats Are Right. Being pro-Israel Means Being pro-Palestinian

  • Conference of Presidents Members Rebut Statement on Majority Leader Schumer Meeting

  • Yair Golan, Key Steps For Saving Israel as a Jewish Liberal Democracy

  • Oct. 7 Hamas Attack Is Tearing Apart Israeli Human Rights Group B’Tselem

  • David Brooks: What Would You Have Israel Do to Defend Itself?

  • Slavoj Žižek: The Real Dividing Line in Israel-Palestine (March 25, 2024)

  • Harold Meyerson: The Marginal Realists of Standing Together (March 25, 2024) 

  • Peter Beinart: The Great Rupture in American Jewish Life (March 22, 2024)

  • James Shotter: The threat to Netanyahu from Israel’s ultraorthodox army exemption: Conflict has laid bare tensions in ruling coalition over religious students skipping military service

  ory.

March 20, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Aluf Benn: Thomas Friedman: ‘The Gaza War Is the Real World War II’: New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman has made his stance on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist cabinet ministers very clear, and does not mince words at the Haaretz-UCLA conference either. ‘I would not let this Israeli cabinet be waiters at my grandson’s bar mitzvah,’ he says.

• Anshel Pfeffer: Deposing the King of Israel: America wants Binyamin Netanyahu out. But his exit is fraught with dangers. 

• Ben Samuels: Schumer Clears Path for Democrats to Disavow Netanyahu. Will Biden Follow?: Schumer’s landmark speech, calling on Israelis to shake off Netanyahu and find a new direction, made major waves in both U.S. and Israeli politics. Now those waves could turn into a tsunami if Biden and the rest of the pro-Israel U.S. left follow suit.

• Amos Harel: As the War and Hostage Talks With Hamas Stall, Israel Busies Itself With Scandals: Amid the rumble of war, the IDF chief is finding it difficult to control everything that happens below him ■ The hostage talks with Hamas haven’t made significant progress this week, but the issue isn’t totally deadlocked ■ Netanyahu’s repeated threats to send the IDF into Rafah serve a dual purpose

• Peter Beinart: Why Chuck Schumer’s Speech Matters (March 18, 2024)

• Jeremy Ben-Ami: Schumer’s “Unprecedented” Speech (March 15, 2024)

• Neri Zilber and Andrew England: Hamas has been shattered. Now it is fighting to survive: With its fighting ranks decimated and Gaza in ruins, the militant group’s goal is to avoid elimination.

• Dahlia Scheindlin: Netanyahu Didn’t Tell Biden the Whole Truth About Israelis and the Gaza War: Netanyahu told Biden, and AIPAC, that Israelis overwhelmingly back his wartime policies, omitting the public’s plunging faith in his leadership and promise of ‘total victory’ in Gaza. The question is when, and whether, Israelis will start calling for an end to the war (March 13, 2024)

• Top senator calls on Biden to ‘use all levers’ to pressure Israel over Gaza

• Chuck Schumer’s rabbi weighs in on his Israel remarks.

• Michael Powell: The Curious Rise of Settler Colonialism and Turtle Island: The problem with shoehorning a Middle Eastern war—or American history—into a trendy academic theory.

March 13, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Michael J. Koplow: Don’t Argue, Just Fix It: It doesn’t matter how many Palestinians were trampled and how many were shot in last week’s tragic aid truck fiasco. What matters is fixing the situation immediately.

• Dahlia Scheindlin: The Unhinged Denialist Frenzy Around Hamas’ Sexual Violence on October 7: Outlets and pundits disgrace both themselves and the American left with conspiratorial denialism of Hamas sexual violence on October 7. But calls to extend the Gaza war could perpetuate the horrors being committed against the hostages (Mar 6, 2024)

• Ben Samuels: Shocked and Profoundly Troubled’: American Jewish Leaders Decry ADL’s Honoring of Jared Kushner

• Nora Berman: An elite literary journal imploded over an essay about the war — because it dared to humanize Israelis as well as Palestinians: Guernica staff resigned en masse after a co-publisher declared a piece by a Hebrew and Arabic translator ‘an apologia for Zionism’ (March 11, 2024)

• Michelle Goldberg: Where Antisemitism and Anti-Zionism Collide (March 11, 2024)

• Christiane Amanpour speaks to Israeli historian and writer Fania Oz-Salzberger about the morality of this war. This is “certainly not the kind of war” that many Israelis “would have liked to fight against Hamas,” says Israeli historian.

• Avi Meyerstein and Avraham Spraragen: War through our eyes and theirs

• Jonathan Koppell: Colleges Must Do More to Help Students Manage Conflict and Have Civil Debate: At a time when our nation is more divided than ever, it’s on university leaders to teach students to engage respectfully – for the good of our campuses and our country (March 12, 2024)

March 6, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Jo-Ann Mort: BDS is counterproductive. We need to crack down on Israeli settlements instead.
• Franklin Foer: The Golden Age of American Jews is Ending: Anti-Semitism on the right and the left threatens to bring to a close an unprecedented period of safety and prosperity for Jewish Americans—and demolish the liberal order they helped establish.
• Zack Beauchamp: Biden Has Been Bad for Palestinians. Trump Would Be Worse
• Haaretz Editorial: Local Election Results Are a Flashing Red Light for Israel’s Democratic Camp
• David Grossman: Israel Is More Fortress Than Home Right Now (March 1, 2024)
• David Ignatius: Food convoy carnage distills what’s gone terribly wrong in Gaza
• Avner Gvaryahu: The Myth of Israel’s “Moral Army”: The Failure of the IDF’s Targeting Protocols Is Producing Massive Civilian Casualties (March 4, 2024)
• Noah Feldman: To be a Jew today: The aftermath of Oct. 7. How Oct. 7 is forcing Jews to reckon with Israel
• Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib: The left must stop apologizing for Hamas: Since Oct. 7, the left has been increasingly supportive of Hamas’s actions, despite its oppression of Palestinians

February 28, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Why Won’t Arab States Support Palestinians? Former U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker on why Arab states won’t accept Palestinians fleeing war.
• Netanyahu’s ‘Day After’ for Gaza Would Be Just Like the Day Before
• Zaid Jilani: The Palestinian Human Rights Cause Must Mature Beyond the Extreme Left
• Michael J. Koplow: The Palestinian Authority’s Inability To Get Out Of Its Own Way – The PA is poised to emerge from the chaos in Gaza better positioned than it has been in years. But its inability to lead or to even adapt will instead leave it weak, ineffectual, and barely relevant.
• Dahlia Scheindlin: Myth and Reality in Israel’s Hostage Negotiations
• Aluf Benn: Israel’ s Self-Destruction Netanyahu, the Palestinians, and the Price of Neglect
• Marc Lynch & Shibley Telhami: The Two-State Mirage: How to Break the Cycle of Violence in a One-State Reality

J Street

• J Street Welcomes Resetting American Policy on Settlements: ‘Inconsistent with International Law’

• February 21, 2024

  Analysis/Opinion

  • Elisheva Goldberg: What the Israeli Public Doesn’t See In largely ignoring the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, the Israeli media both shapes and reflects public opinion (February 7, 2024)
  • Mahmoud Jabari and Dahlia Scheindlin: Who Should Lead the Palestinians After the Gaza War, and How? These are the key questions that Palestinians should be asking about who will lead them – and the guiding principles that the big names and old guard can’t live up to, despite support from Western policymakers (February 14, 2024)
  • Despite Talk, Neither Netanyahu nor the IDF Are Eager to Operate in Rafah
  • Yossi Alpher: Gaza and Israeli Strategic Intelligence: the Failure that Just Keeps Failing (Hard Questions, Tough Answers- February 19, 2024)
  • Martin Indyk: The Strange Resurrection of the Two-State Solution: How an Unimaginable War Could Bring About the Only Imaginable Peace (February 20, 2024)
  • Neri Zilber: The extremists driving Netanyahu’s approach to war with Hamas: Once seen as fringe figures, ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir oppose a ‘reckless’ ceasefire deal in Gaza

February 14, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Amos Harel: Netanyahu Is Preparing His Alibi for Keeping Hamas Rule in the Gaza Strip: The declarations about an IDF ground operation in Rafah, along with the denial of any day-after plan for Gaza, may allow the Prime Minister to accuse the U.S. of failing to fulfill its promise of ‘total victory’ over Hamas. There are still no signs that Israel is close to this goal.
• Rob Eshman: Netanyahu’s plan for endless war must force a reckoning for American Jews: Israel’s longest-serving prime minister has made it impossible to feel uncomplicated support for the country (February 12, 2024)
• Thomas Friedman: Only Biden and M.B.S. Can Redirect the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (February 13, 2024)
• Julia Ioffe: The View From Gaza. Amaney Jamal, the Palestinian-American dean of Princeton’s School of Public and International Affairs, on polling inside a war zone, whether both sides still support two states, and how Palestinians are processing a generational calamity.
• Peter Beinart: Where are Our Jews? (February 12, 2024)

Recognize a Palestinian State

• Maya Sion-Tzidkiyahu & Nadav Tamir: The way to defeat Hamas: Recognition of a Palestinian state”: Recognition by the international “moral majority” of a Palestinian state is a Zionist imperative if Israel is to ensure its future as the democratic nation-state of the Jewish people (February 11, 2024)
• Larry Garber and R. David Harden: The US and UK Should Recognize a Palestinian State Now: The Middle East is being profoundly reshaped by October 7, the ensuing Gaza war, and an increasingly bloody proxy battle between the U.S. and Iran. The case for American and British recognition of Palestinian statehood makes more strategic sense than ever (February 11, 2024)
• Gidi Grinstein: Palestinian statehood: Do it right.
• Ori Nir: Reinvigorating the Two-State Vision Could Start Reversing Anti-Peace Attitudes (February 12, 2024)

J Street

• President Biden: Be Bold [Recognize Palestinian State] (February 13, 2024)
  • Press Release
  • Full Policy Statement
  • FAQ

AIPAC versus J Street on conditioning aid

• AIPAC Pans US Directive Requiring Aid Recipients to Provide Assurance of Adherence to Int’l Law, The Times of Israel
• J Street Welcomes New Oversight and Transparency Measures for Military Aid, J Street

February 7, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

BDS attacks Standing Together and Responses

• Linda Dayan: ‘Disheartening to Be Silenced’: Israeli-Palestinian Peace Group Responds to BDS Claims: The Standing Together movement was labeled ‘intellectually dishonest’ by BDS, leading the group to issue a statement emphasizing that ‘the fight for Palestinian liberation is multi-faceted’.
• BDS: Standing Together: Serving Apartheid Israel’s Propaganda
• Standing Together (Palestinian leadership’s) response
• BDS boycott of Standing Together a strategic failure
• Peter Beinart: Why is the BDS Movement Attacking an Organization Trying to End the War?

UNWRA

• Amira Hass: When the West Collectively Punishes Gaza by Suspending Funding to UNRWA (February 4, 2024)
• Jodi Rudoren: What’s really behind the sanctions on Israeli settlers and UNRWA: How to understand two seemingly bold Biden administration steps to crack down on terror in the Middle East (February 2, 2024)

Amos Harel: Military and Diplomatic matters

• Always follow Amos Harel at Haaretz
• Hamas Is in No Hurry to Seal a Hostage Deal. Neither Is Netanyahu’s Government (February 6, 2024)
• Biden Offered Netanyahu a Lifeline, but Israel’s Prime Minister Still Refuses to Take It (February 4, 2024)

Other Analyses

• Bernard Avishai: Co-Teaching a Class on Israel and Palestine: A miniature academic peace process suggests how a university might organize for difficult subjects—and what, after all, universities are (February 2, 2024)
• B’Tselem: Israel-based civil society and human rights organizations call for a ceasefire

J Street

• J Street Welcomes Executive Order Addressing Settler Violence
• J Street Supports Comprehensive Military Aid Package To Israel, Rejects Republican Ploy

January 31, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Anshel Pfeffer: The Man Who Could Unseat Netanyahu (January 24, 2024)
• Dahlia Scheindlin: Don’t Ask Israelis Right Now About Palestinian Casualties in Gaza: Recent opinion polls of Israelis and Palestinians offer bleak, distressing results – which is why leaders, not their broken peoples, need to offer a way out of this disaster. But instead of leadership, Netanyahu offers only a dark, cold void.
• Jo-Ann Mort: Who Is Marwan Barghouti, and Why Is He Israel’s Most Important Prisoner?: Many Palestinians and Israelis consider him the only person who can lead the way to a two-state solution. Maybe that’s why Netanyahu won’t release him (January 30, 2024)
• Patrick Kingsley and Edward Wong: How Leaders and Diplomats Are Trying to End the Gaza War: Top American, Israeli and Arab officials are seeking to forge three parallel but related deals that could end the war in Gaza, finalize its postwar status, and, most ambitiously, set commitments for the creation of a Palestinian state. (January 27, 2024)
• Steven Erlanger: Plans for Gaza’s ‘Day After’ Seem Ever Distant: The very idea that there will be a clear line between war and peace is misleading, given the politics, security needs and anxieties of all sides (January 25, 2024)
• Dahlia Scheindlin: Open Season for Israeli Politics and Peace (January 29, 2024)
• Alan Pinkas: An Orgy of Jewish Supremacy and Antidemocratic Euphoria, Encouraged by Netanyahu: U.S. President Joe Biden should remember the scenes from Sunday’s far-right conference calling for resettlement of Gaza the next time he talks to Benjamin Netanyahu about a reconfigured Middle East

UNWRA

• Anshel Pfeffer: UNRWA Is Riddled With Hamas. But Israel Has No Alternative: Western governments may have frozen their payments to the UNRWA refugee agency after some of its members took part in the October 7 massacre. However, like Israel, they know it’s essential when it comes to helping Palestinians in the Gaza Strip (January 28, 2024)

ICJ Ruling

• Rob Eshman: Why the ICJ Israel genocide ruling was branding genius: The charges may have been softened, but the label sticks (January 26, 2024)
• Ruth Marcus: A top U.N. court’s ruling on Israel and Gaza is a perversion of justice.
• Jay Michaelson: The International Court of Justice ruling on Israel got it right: It is “plausible” that the Genocide Convention has been violated in Gaza, but a one-sided “ceasefire” is not the answer. (January 20, 2024)

J Street

• J Street Responds to Provisional Measures Ordered by the International Court of Justice in South Africa Petition Against Israel

URJ

• The Moment We Are In, The Future We Pray For: A Statement from Reform Movement Institutions (January 30, 2024)

January 23, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Hagar Shezaf: Israel’s Army Drafted and Armed Thousands of Settlers. Accounts of Their Violence are Piling Up: ‘regional defense’ battalions have grown fivefold since the war in Gaza started, and there are more and more accounts of settlers serving in them assaulting and threatening Palestinians (January 17, 2024)

• Peter Rutland: Why so many Americans are misapplying ‘settler colonialism’ to Gaza (January 17, 2024)

• Jo-Ann Mort: Biden can – and should – press Israel to plan for what comes after this war: Unlike Netanyahu, Biden is popular in Israel. It’s time he took the US case for settling this war directly to the Israeli public

• Eva Illouz: Israel Is Facing Existential Threats From Inside and Out. There’s One Solution: Israel needs a social-democratic movement that can renew the contract between state and citizen (January 20, 2024)

• Dylan Williams: Both the Israeli and Palestinian governments should be obligated to recognize the other’s right to statehood: Netanyahu explicitly rejects a Palestinian state, yet continues to receive U.S. assistance

• Tom Friedman: Netanyahu Is Turning Against Biden (January 19, 2024)

• Ezra Klein Interviews Tom Friedman

  • Podcast

  • Transcript

J Street

• J Street Supports Accountability for Israeli Government Actions in International Forums and in the US Congress, Rejects “Genocide” Charge (January 16, 2024)

January 16, 2024

Analysis/Opinion

• Jay Michaelson: Liberal Zionists Are Finding Our Voices Again: Gradually, we are rejecting the false dichotomy between “opposing” and “supporting” Israel (January 4, 2024)
• Michael Hauser Tov: Israeli Defense Minister: Palestinians Will Be Responsible for Post-war Gaza: ‘There will be no civil presence by Israel in the Gaza Strip after the war’s goals are achieved,’ said Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant ahead of the first discussion by Israel’s war cabinet over ‘day after’ plans for the Palestinian enclave. (January 4, 2024)
• Claire Potter: What I Defend When I Defend Claudine Gay: Don’t be fooled: Republicans don’t care about plagiarism or antisemitism. They only care about taking over American education at every level, and in every state (January 8, 2024)
• Michael J. Koplow: Do Not Sleep on our own Extremists: Since October 7, we have often dismissed the most radical people and statements from our side due to the extremism of the other side. We should be able to condemn Palestinian extremism while also condemning Israel’s.
• Graeme Wood: Pressuring Israel Works: The U.S. provided a detailed list of steps, symbolic and concrete, that would prevent the West Bank from becoming another front in the war.
• Fania Oz-Salzberger: A Quick Guide to Zionism in Hard Times: Or, why in spite of everything I am a humanist Zionist (January 11, 2024)
• David Remnick. The Price of Netanyahu’s Ambition: Amid war with Hamas, a hostage crisis, the devastation of Gaza, and Israel’s splintering identity, the Prime Minister seems unable to distinguish between his own interests and his country’s (January 14, 2024)

Amos Harel, Haaretz, on Military and Diplomatic Matters

• Amos Harel: Israel-Hamas War Nears 100 Days. Many More Days of Fighting Lie Ahead: Hamas is digging in, and the IDF is far from achieving its goals. An Israeli ‘no’ to a new hostage deal could spell their doom. U.S. Secretary of State has his own plan for the day after – with one small problem (January 12, 2024)
• Amos Harel. The Price of Freeing Hostages Is an Admission of Failure by the Israeli Government: In the new round of talks for a hostage deal, Hamas’ demands appear to be almost immeasurably higher than in the last deal. Agreeing to these would mean ending the war with Israel having failed to achieve its goals of defeating Hamas and dismantling its capabilities (January 15, 2024)
• Follow all of Harel’s reporting

Genocide Case at International Court of Justice

• Meron Rapoport: Will the ICJ find Israel guilty of genocide? Attorney Michael Sfard outlines what could play out as the world’s top court decides if and how to intervene in Israel’s war on Gaza (January 11, 2024)
• Michael Hauser Tov and Chen Maanit: World Court Unlikely to Order Cease-fire in Gaza Genocide Hearing, Israeli Officials Tell Haaretz: Israel is expected to present its rebuttal to the charges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague on Friday (January 11, 2024)
• Anshel Pfeffer: Israel Isn’t Committing a Genocide, but It Has Genocidaires: Israel’s actions are aimed at destroying Hamas, an organization, not the Palestinian population of Gaza. What really worries me are the Israeli politicians holding senior posts from the messianic wing who see this war as the fulfillment of the Jewish people’s manifest destiny (January 5, 2024)

• January 5, 2024

  Analysis/Opinion

  • Nadav Tamir: Israel must work to maintain progressive support: If Israel is able to strengthen its partnership with the progressive liberal elements, then it will be able to generate a positive progressive discourse and curb the spread of anti–Zionism (December 24, 2023)
  • Axios, Barak Ravid: US Condemns Israeli Ultranationalist Ministers’ Call to Push Palestinians Out of Gaza (January 2, 2024)
  • Ido David Cohen: How Israeli Media Became a Wartime Government Propaganda Arm: After criticism of those in power in the initial days after the Hamas attack of October 7, the news channels have since devoted themselves to national morale, exclusively relying on official military statements and completely ignoring Palestinian casualties. (December 25, 2023)
  • Louis Fishman: ‘Good Jew’ vs. ‘Bad Jew’: Why pro-Palestine Protests Have a Problem: I have always protested Israel’s occupation and systemic anti-Arab discrimination, but I won’t join New York’s pro-Palestinian protests. I will never take a toxic test requiring me to denounce other Jews nor march with anyone legitimizing killing Israelis as ‘resistance’ (December 7, 2023)
  • Thomas L. Friedman: What Is Happening to Our World? (December 29, 2023)
  • Jean-Pierre Filiu: Why Gaza Matters: Since Antiquity, the Territory Has Shaped the Quest for Power in the Middle East (January 1, 2024)
  • Anat Georgy: ‘Israel Is Our Country Too’: The Arab Minority Fighting in Gaza While Facing Inequality at Home: This week, a seventh Druze IDF soldier was killed in Gaza since the war began. In Israel’s largest Druze town, Daliat al-Carmel, the locals identify with Israel while railing against its discriminatory laws (January 3, 2023)

  More on Hamas’ Sexual Assaults

  • Jeffrey Gettleman, Anat Schwartz and Adam Sella: ‘Screams Without Words’: How Hamas Weaponized Sexual Violence on Oct. 7: Times investigation uncovered new details showing a pattern of rape, mutilation and extreme brutality against women in the attacks on Israel (December 28, 2023)
  • Jill Filipovic: On Forensics and Sexual Violence in Conflict: War and terror are not episodes of Law & Order (December 29, 2023)
  • Quique Kierszenbaum: Why the full extent of Hamas’s sex crimes may never be known: First responders to massacre saw raped and abused bodies, but the rapidity of events – and cultural taboos – may leave the truth uncovered (December 30, 2023)

  J Street

  • J Street to Biden: Act Now to Save Lives, Hostages, Chance for Long-Term Peace.
    “We call on President Biden to heed the advice of this wide array of national security experts and veterans of counterterrorism operations and to convey to the Netanyahu government, both publicly and privately, that the time has come to end the all-out military campaign and massive aerial bombardment of Gaza and immediately shift to a far more targeted and limited operation.”

December 26, 2023

Analysis/Opinion

• Thomas L. Friedman: It’s Time for the U.S. to Give Israel Some Tough Love (December 22, 2023)
• Hussein Ibish: The Palestinian People Should Be Enraged at Both Israel and Hamas: Israel’s crimes in Gaza are clear. But Hamas has inflicted tremendous harm on blameless Palestinians in a political war of attrition against its Fatah rivals (November 1, 2023)
• Anshel Pfeffer: Hamas’ Gaza Fortress Is a Battlefield Like No Other in the World: Anyone asking why the Israeli army, with all its advanced capabilities, needs to wage a ground operation in Gaza in order to defeat Hamas, doesn’t understand the unique challenges of the territory. All of Israel’s options there are deadly (December 14, 2023) 
• Jo Becker and Justin Scheck: Israel Found the Hamas Money Machine Years Ago. Nobody Turned It Off: Agents worried as millions poured in. Hamas bought weapons and plotted an attack. The authorities now say the money helped lay the groundwork for the Oct. 7 assault on Israel (December 16, 2023)
• Emma Green: How a Student Group is Politicizing a Generation on Palestine: Activists with Students for Justice in Palestine have mobilized major campus demonstrations in support of Gaza—and provided an intellectual framework for protesters watching what’s happening in the Middle East (December 15, 2023)
• Michelle Boorstein: Long the heart of liberal Judaism, Reform Judaism shaken by Israel-Gaza war
• David Ignatius: In the West Bank, I saw how peace will require confrontation with Israel (December 16, 2023)
• Samer Sinijlawi: Mahmoud Abbas Must Go (December 21, 2023)

Economist Magazine

• Israel and Palestine: How Peace is Possible: A peace process can go wrong in many ways, but a real possibility exists that it could go right (December 7, 2023)
• Solution or delusion? Despite the war in Gaza, talk of a two-state solution persists. For there to be any hope, both Israelis and Palestinians need new leaders (December 7, 2023)

J Street

• J STREET TO BIDEN: ACT NOW TO SAVE LIVES, HOSTAGES, CHANCE FOR LONG-TERM PEACE (December 21, 2023)
• J Street Expresses Deep Sympathy Over Hostage Deaths, Urges Renewed Approach
• Tell Congress: Support Safeguards for US Military Assistance

December 15, 2023

Follow Amos Harel

• Follow Amos Harel, Haaretz military reporter, for up-to-date reporting on Israel’s military and strategy. Here’s a recent article: Israel’s Military Edge Over Hamas Is Blunted in Northern Gaza’s Crowded Urban Areas

Analysis/Opinion

• Michael J. Koplow: Antisemitism, Anti-Zionism, and Common Sense

• John B. Judis: Yes, Israel Is a Colonialist State. But Does That Matter Today? There are two views of how and why Israel was founded—and the debate is crucial to thinking about how the present conflict might be resolved.

• Matthew Yglesias: MATTHEW YGLESIAS: The two-state solution is still best: In defense of a cringe idea.

• Jenny Jarvie: U.S. college campuses have embraced the Palestinian cause like never before. The story began decades ago.

• Jill Filipovic: Denying the Gender-Based Violence of Oct. 7 Helps No One

• Zack Beauchamp: The return of liberal Zionism? For many Jews, the October 7 attacks discredited both the Zionist right and the anti-Zionist left — paving the way for the resurrection of a seemingly dead political tradition

• Dahlia Scheindlin: America Is Not Experiencing an anti-Israel Tidal Wave: Israelis are obsessed with the U.S. response to the war with Hamas in Gaza, with many believing that Americans are turning against their old ally due to the conflict. Analysis of recent surveys suggests a more complicated landscape.

• Michael A. Cohen: The fundamental disconnect in Democratic senators’ criticisms of Israel: Many of Israel’s critics and friends are ignoring reality.

Assessing Civilian Deaths

• William M. Arkin: Israel’s War on Hamas: How Many Palestinian Deaths Is Too Many?
• Steven Erlanger: Under Rules of War, ‘Proportionality’ in Gaza Is Not About Evening the Score: The concept, important for determining the legality of an act of war, is about weighing civilian harm against military objectives, not about achieving a balanced number of casualties.

December 7, 2023

• Lina Khatib: Why Arab States Must Lead on Gaza, Foreign Affairs
• Bret Stephens: Silence Is Violence — but Not When It Comes to Israeli Rape Victims
• Judy Maltz: “Yad Vashem ‘Appalled’ by University Presidents ‘Excusing’ Calls for Genocide Against Jews: The Holocaust commemorations chairman characterized the testimonies given by presidents of elite U.S. colleges as ‘a basic ignorance of history'”
• Benjamin Hart interview with Anshel Pfeffer, a reporter at Haaretz, correspondent for The Economist, and author of the 2018 book Bibi: The Turbulent Life and Times of Benjamin Netanyahu
  Why Israel Won’t Forgive Benjamin Netanyahu

Understanding Hamas

• Ezra Klein Interviews Tareq Baconi: ‘This Is How Hamas Is Seeing This’
  
  • Transcript

Understanding Israel’s Hamas policy before October 7th

• Berl Katznelson Center and Molad Institute. “Dangerous Delusions: The Misconceptions that Led to the Catastrophe of October 7.”
  This project delves into the flawed security and political ideas that dominated Israel since 2009, culminating in the disaster of October 7. In this series, we challenge the long-held assumption that the right-wing approach guarantees superior security and advocate for a new approach to Israel’s security.

J Street

• Moment Of Truth For Israel’s Government: Either Heed Biden Administration Limits Or Lose Us Support For Military Operation

December 6, 2023

• UN Women statement on the situation in Israel and Gaza
• Netanyahu is stuck as he battles Hamas: he can’t afford to lose, yet can’t find a way to win
  Paralyzed by the demands of the Israeli public and the US, the PM is struggling to offer solutions or a vision of the future, says Alon Pinkas, Israel’s consul general in New York, 2000-2004
• Michael Walzer: Gaza and the Asymmetry Trap: The defeat of Hamas is a moral necessity, but that does not obviate Israel’s responsibility to minimize civilian suffering.
• Niv Hadas: Shut Up and Dance: Tel Aviv’s Club Scene Pays a Price for Being Apolitical: Ever since ‘Rave Against the Occupation’ in 2002, there hasn’t been any interface between Israel’s nightlife scene and political activism. Now we’re paying a heavy price for that on the world stage.
• Olmert: World will soon halt the war if gov’t doesn’t say what it intends for post-Hamas Gaza
• Yehuda Kurtzer. How Oct. 7 is reshaping the Zionist — and anti-Zionist — left in the US: The Zionist left is reengaging to broaden the establishment’s big tent — and the anti-Zionist left is staying far outside

Statements of Mansour Abbas

• Mansour Abbas calls on armed Palestinian factions to throw down their weapons, work with PA to establish state
• Ra’am: Call for Palestinian groups to disarm — after establishment of Palestinian state

December 1, 2023

Opinion/Analysis

• Joseph Hillyard: My Black and Jewish background has made me uniquely equipped to acknowledge the multiple truths of the Israel-Hamas war. 

• Ezra Klein Interviews Rabbi Sharon Brous

• Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, the spiritual leader of the world’s largest LGBTQ synagogue, and her partner, union leader Randi Weingarten: Most U.S. Jews Don’t Want to Choose: They Can Stand With Israel, and Stand With Palestinians

• Jonathan Freedland: It’s not yet post-traumatic stress disorder … we’re still in it’: Israel, a nation at war

• Chuck Schumer calls rise in antisemitism a “5-alarm fire” in Senate floor speech

• Dahlia Lithwick, Mimi Rocah, Tamara Sepper, Jennifer Taub, Joyce White Vance, Julie Zebrak: The World’s Feminists Need to Show Up for Israeli Victims: Solidarity for victims of sexual assault should trump other politics

J Street

• J Street As Humanitarian Pause Nears End, US Must Demand Change in Israeli Tactics and Must Not Provide a Blank Check for Netanyahu

November 29, 2023

Opinion/Analysis

• David Ignatius, An inside look at what’s ahead in Israel’s shattering war in Gaza November 18, 2023
• Jonathan Freedland, Too many taking sides in this conflict miss the true nature of Hamas – and Netanyahu Fri 17 Nov 2023
• Susie Linfield “The Return of the Progressive Atrocity: It is the responsibility of Western activists to know who and what they support, and to separate themselves—openly and decisively—from programs and regimes that are predicated on violence and repression.”
• Bernie Sanders: Justice for Palestinians and Security for Israel
• Ayman Odeh: Many Israelis and Palestinians Have ‘Sobered Up’. I Refuse to Do the Same

Feminism & Gender-Based Violence

• Natalia Mehlman Petrzela: How feminists have failed Israeli victims of sexual violence: The skepticism that met Israeli women’s claims perpetuates traditions of dehumanizing Jews.
• KATHA POLLITT: Actually, Not Everything Is a Feminist Issue: And that’s okay.
• Guy Shalev, Executive Director, Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI): Gender-based violence as a weapon of war
• Jennifer Rubin: Israeli Women Count, Too

J Street

J Street Welcomes Hostage Release and Pause in Fighting; Urges Us to Set Red Lines for Netanyahu

November 20, 2023

Webinars

• The Foundation for Middle East Peace (FMEP) Repression in the Shadow of Israel’s War on Gaza Part 1: Five Israeli Human Rights Groups Sound the Alarm,” featuring Yahav Erez (Yesh Din), Anat Litvin (Physicians for Human Rights – Israel), Jessica Montell (HaMoked: Center for the Defense of the Individual), Tamara Newman (Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI)) and Tal Steiner (Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI)) in conversation with Lara Friedman (FMEP).
• There is also a part two (on be Tuesday, November 21st in this series, Israel’s Rapid Repression & Criminalization of Palestinian Life in the Wake of October 7th, featuring Hassan Jabarin of Adalah and Ghousoon Bisharat of +972 Magazine in conversation with FMEP Fellow Peter Beinart.

Opinion/Analysis Pieces

• Thomas Friedman: It’s Time for a Biden Peace Plan, The New York Times
• Yonatan Mendel: If Israel Aspires to Life, It Must Change Its Approach to the Palestinians, Haaretz
• Article on Standing Together’s tour of US: Israeli and Palestinian Activists Ask Americans to Take Side of Peace
• Hadar Susskind, In Israel and Gaza, I choose the side of humanity
• Arash Azizi: The One-State Delusion: Ignoring the national aspirations of Palestinians and Israelis won’t solve their conflict

J Street Updates

To stay updated on J Street’s activities and statements on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, please be sure to visit the J Street response page.

November 14, 2023

Opinion & Reporting

• Yuval Noah Harari: Israelis Need More Than a Vague Demand to ‘Destroy Hamas’ – Israel News – Haaretz.com
• Carly Pildis: Leftists who want a cease-fire: Demand Hamas surrender, instead (forward.com)
• Mohammed Darawshe: Arab Citizens of Israel Face a Cruel Quandary: Our State Is Fighting Our Own People – Israel News – Haaretz.com
• Michael Sfard: Opinion | Israel Is Silencing Internal Critics – The New York Times (nytimes.com)
• Michael Cohen: Peace is possible in Israel. But not until Hamas is defeated.

Longer Form Videos & Transcripts

• Ran Harnevo, Israeli Tech leader’s critique of some anti-Israel narratives
• Ezra Klein Interviews Yossi Klein Halevi
• The Israeli-Hamas War: A Conversation with Khalil Shikaki: Aaron David Miller with pollster and analyst Khalil Shikaki, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research
• Assessment of military and diplomatic situations. “Hard Questions: Tough Answers”: Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer.