Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has instructed his cabinet ministers to stick to a single message regarding the Fatah-Hamas reconciliation agreement, Israel’s Channel 10 News reports on its Nana-10 website. The message: “there is no possible positive component in the reconciliation agreement.” That’s right:Cabinet ministers are forbidden even to speculate on any conceivable upside. You…
Boy oh boy, Jews say the darnedest things, don’t they? You’ve got to love it. We’ve been hearing for years now that the Palestinian leadership under Mahmoud Abbas isn’t capable of making peace with Israel even if it wants to because, among other things, it doesn’t speak for Hamas, which controls Gaza (see here, here…
Crossposted from Haaretz For decades the music band Al-asheqeen has provided a soundtrack to life in the Palestinian territories; their songs are heard at weddings, funerals, and in daily living. The band, which was created in Damascus by Palestinians from refugee camps in Syria and Lebanon, has become a symbol of national heritage and a…
As Israel and the Palestinians come together in Washington, talk is cheap. Everyone has something to say for or against the meeting. One of the more unusual groups putting forward a more carefully considered opinion than most is the Parents Circle-Families Forum, an organization that consists of families who have lost a loved one in…
Bibi Netanyahu’s visit to the Obama White House this week gives us an opportunity to watch history unfold. Or unravel. It’s hard to tell. Maybe it’s like that old Palmach song said, Rabotai, ha-historia hozeret (“Folks, history repeats itself”). On the eve of the summit, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs is beating up…
The corruption trial of former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert took an unexpected turn today (Thursday, 6/24) when the chief judge of the Jerusalem district court assailed the prosecution for submitting what appeared to be misleading and possibly false documentation. Olmert’s defense team had written to Israel’s attorney general the day before and called for…
Maariv published a story (in Hebrew – my translation is below) on Monday, January 4, by its top political correspondent, Ben Caspit outlining what is described as a detailed American initiative to reconvene Israeli-Palestinian negotiations and reach a permanent agreement in two years. What is particularly surprising is the clear implication that Washington has Netanyahu’s…
The Nobel committee may not have done President Obama much of a favor in awarding him the Peace Prize. At best it’s a double-edged sword. As Yediot Ahronot’s Washington correspondent Yitzhak Ben-Horin points out in a smart news analysis on the paper’s Ynet Web site (in Hebrew — not yet translated into English as I…
במשך פֿון זיבן יאָר האָט דזשעף לויִס אַוועקגעגעבן צען טויזנט שפּײַזקאַרטלעך.
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