Israel

Sunday night I participated in a Webinar with Eve Harow for the One Israel Fund.  For those of you who might not have signed up, or who signed up but were not able to see it because of a Zoom glitch, I provide a link to it here: https://oneisraelfund.org/trips/guarding-israel-critical-juncture/ ~~~~~~~~~~ …

Israel has stopped the Western clock that was ticking during the 1950’s. We continue to embody the key values that drove an optimistic post-WWII West, particularly in the United States. BARS AND restaurants do a brisk business at Mahaneh Yehuda in Jerusalem. Israel regularly ranks as one of the happiest …

I begin with an announcement about a One Israel Fund Webinar in which I will be participating: In Conversation with Eve Harow (pictured), director of community development and tourism. “Guarding Israel at this Critical Juncture” Sunday, June 19, 10 AM eastern N. America time, 5 PM Israel time It is …

On Thursday, Times of Israel editor David Horowitz wrote: “Netanyahu and the right are about to regain power; they will hold it for a long time.”  (Emphasis added here and below) For which I say Thank Heaven. Continued Horowitz, “The final blow to the coalition could come from many directions, …

Whether or not the current government falls, there are essential issues that must be dealt with by any ruling coalition. Israel is currently mesmerized by the soap opera our government has become:  Specifically, will the current coalition expire, and if so, when and how?  As engrossing as the show might …

This is the political review I have been promising, dear readers – or at least the first installment.  As you read, below, you will be able to understand why I tabled this discussion time and again. It has been a balagan, a state of confusion, which rides on a tide …

After the high of Yom Yerushalayim, it’s important to sustain some of that positive feeling with good news items. And I will do that shortly.  But it’s a bit of a challenge, as there is much to deal with. I begin with comments that relate to the Flag Parade. We …

What ensued has been one of the greatest failures and embarrassments of the state of Israel: the willing severance of the connection of the Jewish people from its holiest site. For centuries, indeed millennia, our ancestors have reaffirmed the centrality of Jerusalem to their understanding of what it means to …

We, the Jewish People, are a miracle.  That we were dispersed from our Land 2,000 years ago and then returned is a one-time happening that defies all historical precedents and all logical understanding. That the Land has flourished when farmed by Jews, in a way that it simply does not …

As I sat down to write this posting, I felt overwhelmed by an awareness of how many significant problems we are facing at one time.  And yet, I was also in touch with a very promising perspective – the inspiration I refer to in the title of today’s posting.  We …

The Israeli government must reassert its sovereignty and control, starting with the Temple Mount. The columnist Melanie Phillips has suggested that governments should fight anti-Israel hate and antisemitism through the adoption of the successful though controversial law enforcement strategy known as Broken Windows Policing (BWP). BWP holds that the police …

One of the reasons that the conflict with the Palestinian-Arabs has dragged on for years, is that Israel has failed to conceptualize the conflict correctly. Failed comprehension has brought failed policy.  Poll: 23% of Arab Israelis would support Arab invasion in Israel— i24NEWS Headline, May 15, 2022. Paradoxically, perhaps an …

Hamas head Ismail Haniyeh has thrown down a gauntlet that must be picked up by those he describes as “rubbish.” Op-ed. In what should be cited as a classic example of the Laws of Unintended Consequences, Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh has just reminded the Government and the People of Israel …

Next Sunday, May 29, is Yom Yerushalayim – a day that marks Israel’s liberation of eastern Jerusalem in 1967 and its subsequent formal reunification with western Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. It is over 3,000 years ago – which is way before Islam existed – that King David chose Jerusalem as …

Part II The reader of Part I will have noticed that, to this point, there has been no historically recorded mention of either “Palestinians” or Arabs as sojourners in the land, and the end of Persian rule in the region marked the end of Canaanite culture as a result of …

Why has truth become the first casualty in the media’s coverage of Israel? There is something about covering Israel that causes the global media and even some of the most reputable journalists to take leave of their senses. This phenomenon doesn’t happen with coverage of any other conflict or country …

“And This Is the Way WE Do It!! “A hero of Israel lived among us,” said Binyamin Regional Council head Yisrael Gantz, speaking at the funeral of Sgt. Maj. Noam Raz, who was badly wounded during anti-terrorism operations in Jenin last Friday, and died shortly thereafter. “We were privileged to …

Does Israel belong to the Jews or have they usurped ancient Arab land? This question, or it’s seemingly endless variant, crops up with concerning regularity on various social and mainstream media fora, and particularly in the mass of anti-Israel posters, some partly knowledgeable, most hopelessly not. The 100 year Arab–Israeli …

I have found myself pondering this mystery a good deal lately: We Israelis are a good people.  I cited Alan Dershowitz in this regard recently: “No country in the history of the world ever contributed more to the welfare of humankind in such a short period of time than Israel.” …

If being an Arab in Israel is a catastrophe, one is hard pressed to imagine what a success would look like.   May 15 is marked by Palestinian Arabs and probably a substantial percentage of Israeli Arabs as Nakba Day, the day of catastrophe.The catastrophe in this telling is the …