California Democratic party delegate Marcy Winograd responds to a cartoon of Benjamin Netanyahu UCLA’s student paper published, and then apologized for, citing alleged anti-Semitic undertones to the satire. Winograd defends the paper’s first position, to publish the cartoon.
A repentant David Friedman, Donald Trump’s nominee to be the next ambassador to Israel, got an easy ride at the Senate Foreign Relations committee this morning. The most exciting part of the hearing were the first few minutes, as Friedman’s opening statement was interrupted repeatedly by protesters.
Donald Trump became the first US President in recent years to suggest a shift in US foreign policy concerning the two-state solution during a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday. Saeb Erekat, head of the Palestinian Liberation Office’s Negotiations Affairs Department, said that the office would be willing to move away from the two-state solution, however he stressed that the only way Palestinians could accept sharing one state was if Israel was willing to give up the notion of a Jewish state. “Contrary to Netanyahu’s plan of one state and two systems — apartheid — the only alternative to two sovereign and democratic states on the 1967 border is one single secular and democratic state with equal rights for everyone, Christians, Muslims, and Jews, on all of historic Palestine,” he said.
Hours after President Donald Trump wrapped his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, protesters lined a path near the White House holding signs against Israeli’s occupation. Women’s March organizer Linda Sarsour addressed the crowd, “Let’s be clear here, this has been a long-term fight and we’re probably going to have to fight a lot of administrations to come, but Benjamin Netanyahu is not welcome with his racism and bigotry in this country.” About Netanyahu she said, “he found another bigot [Trump], two bigoted peas in a hateful pod.”
A new poll finds that 46 percent of Canadians, including a majority of those who support every party but the Conservatives, hold a negative view of Israel. The Canadian government is seen to have a pro-Israel bias by 61 percent of respondents, while 91 percent do not think criticism of Israeli government policy is necessarily anti-semitic. These results suggest that Canada’s big political parties are out of step with Canadians on these issues.
In the hours since President Trump said he was agnostic about whether Israel and Palestine should be two states or one, many supporters of Israel have taken to the airwaves to cite the danger that a one-state outcome would pose to Israel’s Jewish majority. Some liberal supporters of Israel spoke frankly, and illiberally, about demographic concerns in a one state outcome: that Palestinians will outnumber Jews, thereby endangering the “Jewish democracy.”
Outside Columbia University’s Lerner Hall on Monday evening, around 50 Palestine solidarity activists protested a speech from the Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon. Meanwhile, inside the lecture hall, contingent after contingent of Palestine activists holding Palestinian flags and keffiyehs interrupted Danon’s speech. Columbia University Apartheid Divest member Jeff Jacobs said “We stood up, one by one and said our piece; that we’re not going to accept this hate purveyor coming to campus and spreading his ideas.”
Cartoonist Katie Miranda imagines the encounter between Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday– both slinging the B.S., till they get to Jerusalem.
“After 24 years the flag of Palestine has been lowered and taken down from the post, to be substituted by the flag of Israel,” Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett proclaims
“I’m looking at two-state and one-state, and.. I’m very happy with the one that both parties like. I could live with either one,” Donald Trump says, changing US policy.