Several Israeli ministers and Knesset members praised an Israeli sniper who cheered after shooting an unarmed Palestinian boy near Gaza’s borders. (See video below.) Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman said that the soldier “deserves an appreciation certificate” for doing his job properly. Education Minister Naftali Bennett said, “Anyone who was ever on the battlefield knows that to sit in Tel Aviv or studios and judge IDF soldiers according to their comments, when they are busy defending our borders, is not something serious.”

For the third consecutive Friday, Deema Abu Sharekh preferred to spend her school weekend participating…

Israeli leaders have been making downright genocidal claims against Palestinians, and the rhetoric finally seems to be backfiring. Israel’s line on “defending itself from terrorists” is being rejected by the world. And the process is accelerating Israel’s delegitimization as a supposed liberal democracy.

As several liberal Democratic politicians finally object to Israel’s shooting of unarmed Palestinians at the Gaza fence, a report in al-Monitor suggests that Israel targeted Palestinian journalists last week because it was concerned by the international criticism of its actions.

Alan Dershowitz has become an advocate for Donald Trump on the airwaves at a time when the president has few legal chums. And Israel’s interests are close behind. Dersh is a conduit to Israeli PM Netanyahu, and the EPA set up a research agreement with an Israeli water company of which Dersh is a board member– at the prodding of Trump donor Sheldon Adelson.

The killing by an Israeli sniper of Palestinian journalist Yaser Murtaja on April 7 at the Gaza fence is drawing mounting international outrage. The New York Times editorialized sternly about Murtaja’s killing, the General Federation of Arab Journalists wants the case prosecuted at the International Criminal Court, and Michael Moore calls on documentary filmmakers around the world to speak out against the crime.

Haidar Eid writes from Gaza: “We have reached the conclusion that our fight on the ground through a series of marches culminating on May 15, the 70th anniversary of the Nakba, can pose a serious challenge to Israel’s system of occupation, colonization and apartheid if it is accompanied by a global campaign of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions.”

A photo of 9-year-old Mohammed Ayyash wearing a mask with an onion stalk slipped inside to protect against Israeli teargas has become one of the iconic images of Gaza’s Great March of Return. Asmaa Tayeh talks with Mohammed and his family about the protests and the child’s hope for the future. “I want to have my own playground so I can play football and basketball the whole day,” Mohammed tells Tayeh. “And I want it to be named after my new nickname, Abu Basala (the kid with an onion).”

The Israeli Prime Minister and Defense Minister have painted slain Palestinian journalist Yaser Murtaja as a “terrorist,” but the amazing thing about this round of Israeli atrocities is that international press is ignoring the absurd claims. The Gaza killings are thus a landmark in Israel’s growing international isolation.

“Nobody wants a big war,” says Amb. Ryan Crocker, but the old foreign policy duopoly of neoconservatives and liberal interventionists certainly wants some kind of war with Iran in Syria. In tones reminiscent of the Iraq war runup, liberals call for bombing in the NYT op-ed page, while neocons call for joint operations with Israel that would bring “hellish consequences” to Syria’s Assad, as well as to Russia and Iran.