On Wednesday, Republicans in the House of Representatives initiated a rarely-used legislative procedure to try to force a vote on a controversial bill that encourages states and localities to penalize individuals, nonprofit organizations, and companies that boycott for Palestinian rights. This is the latest GOP move in an ongoing, concerted effort to to portray themselves as the saviors of Israel and the Jewish people and paint the Democrats as an anti-Semitic, BDS-loving, radical left horde. And Democrats seem to be falling into the trap.

At the “Jerusalem Prayer Breakfast Texas” in San Antonio one Christian charismatic speaker referred to Bill Maher as “the stupidest Jew in Hollywood,” to general laughter.  Another speaker bemoaned the inability of Jews to vote in Israeli elections, without any apparent worries about falling into the “dual loyalty” trope.

Playgrounds for Palestine has built 39 playgrounds for Palestinian kids since writer Susie Abulhawa started the organization 18 years ago. Now it’s selling a new line of Palestinian olive oils in the States so you can help the kids and help the farmers too.

The Jewish fascist group Im Tirtzu has a history of disrupting Nakba commemoration ceremonies at the Tel Aviv campus. This year they blasted the Eurovision-winning song ‘Toy’ over loudspeakers during a minute of silence for Nakba victims.

The Palestinian actor Faisal Abu Alhayjaa is known to the New York theater audience for his charismatic performance as a wounded resistance fighter in Bethlehem in “The Siege”, a production from the Jenin Freedom Theatre. He will be speaking about “laughter and liberation” at the People’s Forum in NY on Sunday.

New York City’s Whitney Museum of American Art’s legendary Biennial exhibit is taking place, but the Whitney has a problem. Warren B. Kanders, the vice chairmen of the board of trustees, has amassed a $700 million fortune selling law enforcement gear and tear gas that has been used against unarmed civilians in Ferguson, Baltimore, Standing Rock, Puerto Rico, the U.S.-Mexico border, and in Israel/Palestine. Calls for the war profiteer’s resignation are growing louder by the day.

President Trump’s veto of the resolution to end American support for the Saudi-UAE coalition in Yemen, and Congress’s failure to override it, has given U.S. defense contractors a green light to proceed with a business model that counts innocent Yemenis’ deaths as the cost of doing business.

Rev. Nour Sahawneh aids thousands of refugees at his church in Mafraq, Jordan, near sprawling city-like camps. “Their lives are a disaster,” he tells Alice Rothchild. “They are a tool of war. They became a subject in a war, not a people to help… War is business.”

Ambassador David Friedman’s religious remarks in Jerusalem Tuesday went well beyond his comment that Israel is “on the side of God.” Friedman likened the US-Israel relationship to the “altar” in the original Jewish temple in Jerusalem and called the embassy a “shrine” that people pray to and thank God for, and said the U.S. and Israel need to advance the relationship toward greater “holiness.”

Do all Palestinians have the right to citizenship in whatever state rules historic Palestine? The right of return of Palestinians to their places of origin now in Israel is both well-researched and uncontested in ethics and international law, for instance in many conventions and UN Resolutions.