There have been signs in recent days that the Israel lobby is solidifying inside the Republican Party, opening the possibility that the Democratic Party will begin to have a freer debate over the special relationship between the U.S. and Israel. It’s too early to say the Israel lobby will abandon the Democratic Party, Haim Saban, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Chuck Schumer will see to that, but the hard-core lobby is solidifying inside the GOP. And if the Israeli elections crown Netanyahu, we’re going to see more and more Crisis Zionists at the heart of the Democratic Party– J Street and Peter Beinart, which will leave room for non-Zionists to emerge.

To call someone an anti-Semite is a very serious charge. It is an accusation that can produce a great deal of personal unhappiness, destroying friendships and careers, reminiscent of the McCarthy period. But a professor at Fordham University made the charge irresponsibly last year.

Israel’s High Court ruled to freeze state plans to build a part of Israel’s “separation” barrier that would have gone through the middle of Battir, a victory for the farming village of 5,000 people located west of Bethlehem in the southern West Bank. Mondoweiss speaks with Hassan Muamer about what the ruling means for the village and for Palestinians.

Israeli forces injured a total of 1,190 Palestinian children in the West Bank during 2014, according to a UN agency report. More than in 1 in 5 of the child injuries were caused by Israeli forces’ use of live ammunition, with the rest from rubber-coated metal bullets, tear gas inhalation, and assault. Earlier this week, it was revealed that Israel had detained 1,266 Palestinian children in 2014, an average of seven children every two days.

2014 was a big year for academic boycotts of Israel. And 2015 is shaping up to be one as well. Anger over Israel’s continuing occupation, and its assault on Gaza last summer, is driving the discussion. Two more prominent academic associations, the American Anthropological Association (AAA) and the Middle East Studies Association (MESA), could consider the academic boycott. Both associations are already embroiled in debate over boycotting Israel.

Palestinians are going too far and too fast in their quest for statehood, a frontpage NYT analysis argues– and says that Palestinians have not made the “concessions” they have long avoided.

Alan Dershowitz says in defending himself from sexual abuse claims he is defending the values he’s always stood up for– seemingly including Israel.

Haj Ibrahim Abu el-Hawa, the 73-year old Palestinian proprietor of the Jerusalem “Peace House,” a modest hostel in the Mount of Olives, has shaken the hand of President Jimmy Carter, listened to Ravi Shankar perform in his honor, met the singer Alicia Keys and was a great friend to the settler leader Rabbi Menachem Froman. He is also indebted to the city of Jerusalem for nearly $100,000 in fines and taxes for building an extension to his family house. Because of this addition, Abu el-Hawa, a fixture of Jerusalem’s coexistence camp, has been entangled in legal woes that could end in his imprisonment and the demolition of his family home if he cannot cover the fines.

Reporters pressed State Dep’t’s Jen Psaki over a “double standard” — her threat to assistance to Palestine over its decision to take international legal steps even as the U.S. has never threatened aid to Israel over its neverending construction of settlements in occupied territories

In response to the Palestinian bid to join the International Criminal Court, pro-Israel members of Congress are threatening to cut off U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority. The U.S. gives the PA about $500 million annually, and U.S. law states most of it will be cut off if the PA initiates an investigation targeting Israel at the ICC. But analysts say that it is unlikely the U.S. will, in fact, cut off aid, since it would be a blow to the PA’s economic standing and could destabilize the authority’s rule.