While Europe may think of itself as part of an enlightened West, using aid to defend Palestinians’ rights, the reality is less reassuring. The aid may actually be making things significantly worse. Shir Hever, an Israeli economist who has spent years piecing together the murky economics of the occupation, recently published a report that reaches a shocking conclusion – at least 78 per cent of humanitarian aid intended for Palestinians ends up in Israel’s coffers.

Adalah, The Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, has released a new report (PDF) on discriminatory and anti-democratic legislation being considered by the Israeli Knesset. “We are being introduced to new laws and bills that in some way are narrowing the meaning of democracy here,” Adalah legal advocate Nadeem Shehadeh tells Mondoweiss.

Patrick Willingham, executive director of Public Theater, told backer Stephen Low that Palestinian production of the Siege was only “under consideration” when the theater rejected it last month. In fact, Low says, there was a firm commitment to stage the play– twice– or he would not have contributed to the production.

An Israeli soldier in occupied Hebron tells a volunteer for the International Solidarity Movement that it is his job to intimidate Palestinian children of five years of age so that they don’t throw rocks at him in ten years’ time.

In a bid for Sheldon Adelson’s millions, Marco Rubio desperately issued a list of foreign policy advisers that is an Old Timers team of neoconservatives and Israel supporters, led by the inevitable Elliott Abrams, Eliot Cohen, and Dan Senor.

A Pew survey of Israeli attitudes reflects the deep racism in Israeli Jewish society: most Jews (48 to 46) want Palestinian Israelis to be transferred or expelled from the state, and 4 out of 5 say they like discriminatory legal system. More than 3/4 of Palestinians say that the U.S. is too supportive of Israel.

The New York Times is finally catching up with the ugliness of Israel. Reporter Isabel Kershner describes as “jingoistic” a Labor-left initiative to divide Jerusalem and fence off and disenfranchrize the Palestinian population so as to preserve the Jewish character of the society

Last spring we published Tamara Ben-Halim’s moving story about searching for her grandmother’s home in Yafa. Annie Robbins shares an amazing update that explains how Ben-Halim discovered that her family home is still standing.

Sara Halimah explains why Students for Justice in Palestine is calling on the University of Minnesota to divest from companies that enable the Israeli occupation, and responds to attacks that the campaign is anti-Semitic.

Bernie Sanders says his idea of God is to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. John Brown said the very same thing, 157 years ago, when he was hanged for trying to start a slave rebellion.