What you should know about Palestinian juvenile offenders The law, international and domestic, apparently only recognises two groups who may be imprisoned, soldiers and criminals. Is Ahed Tamimi a child soldier?  Is she a political prisoner?  Is she a juvenile delinquent?  Is she Joan of Arc?

Fault-finders of Edward Horgan‘s ‘Standing up for Palestine’ in this week’s Ireland’s Sunday Independent newspaper (print, digital online) and Irish Examiner’s reader’s blog with slight changes in all three expect to be hit by the standard ‘Criticism of Israel isn’t antisemitism’ cliché. Well here’s a message.  Lies aren’t criticism. Here’s …

My answer to a Facebook question. I only realised after that the question really wasn’t addressed to me but to intellectuals and politicians in Arab states, a status I clearly don’t hold. The information is still valid. Pity to waste the effort.

His Majesty’s Government may have viewed with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. In 1917 the British still had to defeat the Ottomans who had ruled for five hundred years.

More Fauxtography This is how minor accidents are recycled into anti Israel propaganda. Decide for yourself whether this is lazy journalism or straight out deception. Take a quick look at this photograph. I have emphasised the medic in Magen David Adom (Israel’s Red Cross) uniform and the Israeli license and …

With all the Balfour centenary kerfuffle and Palestinian demands for an apology for the Balfour declaration I don’t think anyone has discussed whether Perfidious Albion should issue an apology to Israel. Seventy-five percent of Palestinians polled, last October, said that they supported the call from President Mahmoud Abbas on Britain to accept …

Trump: Giving Peace ‘A Shot’ The President of the United States could have worded his failure only just a little worse. He could have ‘taken a stab’ at peace negotiations before not moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her …

Virtue signalling is NOT a good reason for Ireland, or anyone else, to recognise the Palestinian State. This post is a response to Symbolic step of Ireland recognising Palestine would mean so much by T.P. O’Mahony in the Irish Examiner on Tuesday, August 22nd, 2017. Ireland should not recognise a Palestinian …

Does the punishment fit the crime? The Internet is humming over the story of Kevin Myers, veteran Irish columnist who received his marching orders for an off-the-cuff antisemitic reference in an article that he penned. Speaking as someone both Jewish, Zionist (chose to move to Israel as an adult) and …

For some of us the Saltwater Challenge is a stupid and dangerous teenager craze from about one year ago, something like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge of 2014. For others it’s a series of videos about fishing on the ocean waves. There is a third option. In the last few …

With so much coverage of a Palestinian threat to sue the United Kingdom for the 1917 Balfour Declaration I was surprised to find no one had investigated if they actually make a go of it.  To my surprise, it’s a long, long shot but, yes, it’s a possibility.  They could …

All you need is a credit card I just joined Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP).  All I needed was a credit card – not even a real one.  They will probably catch on – eventually but I bet they will still number me among the members for a long time …

If you have recently visited a university, college or in not a few cases a church you have probably seen the latest Israeli Apartheid Week poster. You will find quite a change of public approach from the IAW Israel Haters. Yet as far as I am aware no one has …

Yolande Knell displays her ‘half a story’ cred. Fisking  Can Paris summit save fading two-state solution?  For many, the holy city of Jerusalem is meant to be a shared capital for Israel and the Palestinians – two peoples in two nations, living peacefully, side-by-side. At least that is the dream …

Déjà Versailles History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. Karl Marx Just in the interests of symmetry the Paris Peace Conference due to take place next week should have waited two more years. It won’t of course, not even four more months, because the organisers are aware that not …

The World against Israel or Israel against the World The question about whether Obama would deliver a last minute FU to Israel by abstaining on a United Nations Security Council vote has been answered. YES HE WILL That leads to two additional questions. The first is will he repeat the …

Gvirotai veRabotai – Mahapakh! Does anyone recall an election in a democracy which generated so many apocalyptic rants from the losers? I do. 1977’s Israel’s Mahapakh … and the more I think about it the more similarities I find. This follows from a brief conversation on Facebook (screen grab) with a Clinton …

Random thoughts loosely connected by the U.S. election. This week someone called me ‘White’ and clearly considered that to be an insult. Unless her Facebook profile picture was a lie or she was a black Rachel Dolezal, she was no less Caucasian than me. It did get me thinking. The conversation, minus …

Voting for Israel – a rough guide Like most of us, I guess, Five Minutes for Israel has been obsessing about the upcoming American Presidential election. I concede, something that partisans on both sides seem to find impossible, that there are genuine Israel advocates and it-is-politically-convenient-for-me-to-appear-to-support-Israel advocates on both sides. There …

Peter Stefanovic exposes what passes for Middle East journalism − and doesn’t acknowledge that he is doing it Aussie journalist Peter Stefanovic chases the bang-bang in a way that reminds me of a young Jeremy Bowen. That was not meant as a compliment. News is only the first rough draft of history. Alan …