There are times that one must look at the American Jewish community and say that it is deeply troubled, and Monday night at Temple Emanu-El’s Skirball Center was one of those times. Phil Weiss reports from Natan Sharansky’s event at the temple where the head of the of Jewish Agency repeatedly celebrated the “destruction” of Soviet Union but never referred to Palestinians and said those who support BDS are guilty of “classic anti-Semitism.” Weiss writes, “This is the state of the American Jewish establishment. It shows utter contempt for Palestinian human rights in a senior citizen prom of narcissism.”

Eli Lake of Bloomberg offers as evidence a tweet and a book blurb to attempt to smear realist scholars Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer as anti-Semites after they are granted a platform at the Koch Institute. And he does so because he sees neocons losing their traction in Washington.

As Israel marks 45 years since the Israeli Black Panthers’ anti-establishment protests, co-founder Reuven Abergil reflects on the political legacy of the Black Panther movement and the role of Mizrahi Jews in Israel today.

Stephen R. Shalom dismantles New Jersey Senate bill S1923 which prohibits the investment of state pension and annuity funds in companies that boycott Israel or Israeli businesses, “This bill violates our First Amendment rights. It threatens to exacerbate Islamophobia and anti-Arab sentiment. And it aligns itself against the cause of human rights in Israel-Palestine.”

Jonathan Ofir shares a tale of two idioms. Israel’s Chutzpah is shouting “help! Help!” to the world whilst beating Palestinians up. But Palestinians have demonstrated their own tradition, of sumud, or steadfastness, in refusing to buckle to ethnic cleansing and occupation and human rights abuses, “This is the fight that Palestinians are to endure with Sumud, if they are to remain. Israel may consider efforts to confront its subjugation as a Chutzpah in itself – how dare they resist? – whilst it engages in ever more inventive stratagems of deceit, to be able to continue its adventurism in the frontier of Greater Israel.”

After campaigning on a platform of “Anybody-but-Netanyahu,” Israeli opposition leader Issac Herzog is in discussion to join forces with the one man he said he would never work alongside in a unity government. While Herzog’s constituents are mad about it, analysts say Netanyahu is hoping to build favor with the Obama administration with a broader tent. Still it is the Joint List’s Ayman Odeh that might stand the most to gain and Herzog’s defection would leave him to lead the opposition, the first time a Palestinian citizen of Israel would ever be in that position.

The General’s Son, Miko Peled’s autobiographical account of his voyage from a Zionist youth and the scion of Zionist leaders to an avowed anti-Zionist peace activist, contains trigger points for any Palestinian, bringing back experiences of violence, discrimination and oppression at every turn of the account.

When he urged Jews to reflect on the meaning of the Holocaust in the wake of the murder of a Palestinian on the ground by an Israeli medic, Israeli General Yair Golan issued a historical challenge to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his propagandists in the west: that the use of the Holocaust to justify slaughter of enemies is bringing Israeli society to a point of no return

J Street has called on President Obama to use his last months in office to prevent violence in Israel and Palestine by releasing “Obama Parameters” laying out the resolution of the conflict. The group hints at US support for UN resolutions pushing Israel but offers no pressure on the country.

From May 21st to 26th, the annual Palestine Festival of Literature (PalFest) will be held in cities across historic Palestine as international literary stars – including Nobel laureate JM Coetzee, Pulitzer Prize finalist Laila Lalami and National Book Award winners Colum McCann and Barry Lopez – perform free, public events in Ramallah, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Haifa and Nablus.