Burt Cohen interviews Alison Weir about Israel’s new law… Cohen: “At least it’s now out in the open. All Israelis who are not Jewish have had their rights diminished. Given the longstanding discrimination against non-white non-European Jews, Palestinians and Druze are now just third class citizens…” Listen to the interview.
Jewish News Service reports: “A new poll by the Walla news website shows that most Israelis support the Nationality Law, with 58 percent agreeing with the current language and 34 percent opposed to it… The poll also showed that even more Israeli voters would choose Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party than prior to the controversy over the new law.”
Israel’s new Nation-State Law gives Jews exclusive right to self-determination; names Jerusalem as united capital; prioritizes ingathering of exiles and Jewish-only communities.
Palestinian reaction to Israel’s new Nation-State Law is hostile: words like “racism,” “ethnic cleansing,” “declaration of war,” “legitimization of hate,” and more.
If Israel is Jewish, it cannot be democratic; if it’s democratic, it cannot be Jewish. But now the nation-state law makes it plain. Israel is for Jews only, officially.
The Settlement Law is under scrutiny in the Supreme Court, accused of “breach[ing] an international convention on Apartheid”. If it stands, it may put Israel on track to annex the West Bank.
Samia Nasir Khouri boldly calls out Israel for a list of human rights violations and indignities perpetrated on Palestinians during the 70 years of its celebrated existence. She then offers a prayer of blessing on the dispossessed and repentance for the dispossessors from Rabbi Brant Rosen.
Amira Hass writes in Ha’aretz: ‘How did you destroy villages?’ one daughter will ask. ‘How did you agree to imprison two million people?’ another will whisper. The answers will only make their weeping louder.
Richard Falk discusses critical Middle East topics, including the legality of Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem, Iran and Trump’s “special relationships” with Israel and Saudi Arabia, the future of Syria, and hope for justice in Israel-Palestine.
South Africans – who should know apartheid when they see it – called out Israel as “the world’s last functioning apartheid state” during a UN hearing this week. They no doubt recalled the words of South African hero, the late Nelson Mandela, who famously said, “We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.”
Three former Israeli prime ministers, a winner of the Israel prize, two former heads of the Israeli internal security service Shin Bet, and one of Israel’s principal newspapers have warned that the Jewish state is becoming, or already is, an apartheid state…
A new ADL campus initiative conflates criticism of Israel with “anti-Semitism,” tells students how to block events that support Palestinian rights, & recommends joining student governments to block “anti-Israel” activism. Its head endorses legislation that would make supporting boycotts of Israel punishable by a million dollar fine and 20 years in prison…
Ha’aretz reports: American actor Richard Gere, who visited Israel earlier this month to promote his new film, “Norman,” had one analogy to make after touring the West Bank city of Hebron… “It’s exactly what the Old South was in America. Blacks knew where they could go, they could drink from that fountain, they couldn’t go…