“Every round of violence, in which the results are not a clear-cut IDF victory is, in the eyes of Israel’s enemies, another nail in the coffin of the Zionist entity.” – Veteran war correspondent, Ron Ben Yishai, June 1, 2019. …the ability to defeat the enemy means taking the offensive. …

I am, of course, aware that I used this exact same excerpt in commencing my recent column, Cracks in the Dome?, in which I warned of the disturbing defects of adopting an essentially defensive doctrine in facing the escalating threat from Gaza. However, I make little apology for its re-use, …

The endeavor to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by economic means not only shows a grave defect in understanding its underlying causes, but inverts the causal relationship that generates & sustains it. When senior representatives of the Trump administration, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt woke up this morning in Israel (May …

The huge investments made in defensive systems are slowly emerging as an exorbitant and costly failure—or at best a very partial and temporary success. The time has come to rethink Israel’s strategic paradigm. Earlier this week (5/21/2019), both Israel and Hamas denied reports that they had reached an agreement on …

Despite possible short term difficulties, Israel should seize on the impending collapse of the Palestinian Authority as an opportunity to extricate itself from the deadly cul-de-sac, into which the Oslo process has lured it The Oslo Agreements, which spawned the Palestinian Authority, were born in sin. Today that is beyond …

Intensive investment must be made in civil society frameworks that can not only draw the idea of extended Israeli sovereignty into the main-stream discourse as a legitimate political objective, but as one that can dominate that discourse.   In a significant departure from his usual ambivalent and non-committal policy formulation regarding …

In issuing his recent presidential decree, recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, President Donald Trump followed the commendable policy pattern he has set … of not following the policy patterns set by his predecessors. Recognizing reality. Much like his decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Trump’s decision was, …

What has unfolded in Gaza should not really surprise anyone willing to face up to the inclement realities. After all, it was not only entirely foreseeable, but easily foreseen. The nightmare stories of the Likud are well known. After all, they promised Katyusha rockets from Gaza as well. For a …

In overturning a previous decision of the Knesset’s Central Elections Committee, the High Court took another giant step towards further undermining the already dwindling public confidence in the Israeli judiciary.  In Israel, the negative impact of the judicialization of politics on the Supreme Court’s legitimacy is already beginning to show …

The two-state paradigm’s deadly detriments are now so glaringly apparent that it is becoming increasingly difficult to reconcile calls for Palestinian statehood with genuine concern for the well-being of the Jewish nation-state.    Ladies and gentlemen, when the Palestinians say “two states” they do not mean what we mean—Maj-Gen. (res.) …

The unrelenting drive to bring an indictment—any indictment—against Netanyahu has long exceeded the bounds of reasonable law enforcement. The issue at the center of these investigations seems trivial against the background of the existential crises Israel is facing…The first probe, also known as case 1000, involves gifts of cigars and champagne …

The purported electoral appeal of the Blue & White line-up is that it includes 3 former IDF Chiefs-of-Staff, yet virtually invariably when top military figures have departed from their field of expertise (security) & ventured into one where they have none (politics), they have been disastrously wrong.  The greatest tragedy …

It would seem futile to conduct yet another indecisive round of fighting, only to return to yet another tense and sporadically violent interbellum for several years—until the next major flare-up of fighting…  Military assessment warns of high risk of war with Gaza – The Times of Israel, Feb. 13. 2019. …

Despite claims to the contrary, the Palestinian-Arabs, territory and the fate of the Jewish settlements will permeate the agenda of the April elections, lurking below and hovering above all other issues.    Almost inevitably, elections in Israel revolve—one way or another—around one issue…even when everyone insists they don’t. This is …

In recent weeks, rumours have been swirling as to the substance of the much anticipated “deal of the century”, billed by the Trump administration as a compelling blueprint for resolving the seemingly intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has plagued the region for decades.  Shrouded in secrecy, it has long been held …

If, as Morris maintains, a peaceable two-state outcome is unattainable, and a one-state outcome will lead to a Muslim-majority tyranny, then a large-scale initiative for incentivized Arab emigration is the only policy that can preserve the Jewish nation-state. As readers will recall, I have, for years, been urging the initiation …

Once inconceivable, the dismantling of UNRWA; the naturalization of stateless Palestinian residents in Arab countries; and the emigration of Palestinians from Judaea-Samaria & Gaza are slowly emerging as realistic outcomes  Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth – Sherlock Holmes, in “The …

As a rule, on entering Israeli politics, senior military and security figures have played a troubling role, which has—almost uniformly—proved disastrous, both for the country and/or for themselves. Little could have reflected the perversity of politics in Israel more than the ten minute prime-time interview with former Prime Minister and …

If the “New Right” is to really advance “Right wing” causes, it must abandon schemes that lead to the Lebanonization or Balkanization of Israeli society & work towards legitimizing the idea of incentivized emigration of the Arab population of Judaea-Samaria Last week, Education Minister, Naftali Bennett, and Justice Minister, Ayalet …

One cannot but think that if another country treated Jews, wearing “kippot” and “peyote”, the way Jewish minors, accused of “terror” are treated in Israel, it would surely be engulfed in a wave of outrage and condemned for blatant antisemitism. This was a week, in which there was much for …