Many older Jews still carry scars of the Nazi Holocaust that live on in the form of guilt, victimhood and fear of another genocide. They must protect Israel for they hear, “without Israel there would be no safe Jews.”  These fears are exported within the context of Zionist racist ideology. 

American media and politicians underplay how rightwing Israel is in order to salute it as a robust democracy. The reality is that Israeli politicians are under “brutal” pressure from the right– and legislator Idit Silman stepped down from the coalition government this month because she was getting physically attacked and threatened on the street for her participation in a government that wasn’t vocal enough in its support for “Judea and Samaria,” biblical terms for the West Bank.

Democratic Party voters’ growing sympathy for the Palestinian cause has not changed Democratic Party policy in any sizable way.

“You were washing the floors just like any other prisoner,” NPR reporter Daniel Estrin says to former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert in a long and respectful interview. But more than 4,000 Palestinian political prisoners are held on different terms by Israel, conditions cited by human rights reports charging apartheid– a charge that was unmentioned by the radio reporter.

The same settler-colonial project that carried out the Deir Yassin massacre in 1948 is responsible for the killing of 16-year old Qusay Hamamra last week.

Soheir Asaad, Mariam Barghouti, and Ahmed Abu Artema, Palestinian activists from ’48 Palestine, the West Bank, and Gaza, share their reflections and analysis of the current situation on the ground across Palestine, and what recent moments of popular resistance mean in the broader context of the Palestinian struggle.

Rabbi Seymour Rosenbloom does the right thing for J Street at Passover by admitting that the Tantura massacre of Palestinians took place in the early days of Israel’s existence. But he cannot acknowledge that Israel was then and is now an apartheid state that continues to push Palestinians out of their homes. The rabbi’s view that “Israel’s challenge is to reclaim the ‘child we prayed for'” is simply a delusion, especially in light of rightwing governments that are all committed to maintaining military occupation.

“The United States has no better friend in the world than Israel,” President Obama once said. But rank-and-file Democrats don’t agree. They put Israel at 9th on a list of America’s most important allies, way behind Canada, the U.K., Germany, Japan, and China among others.

“We deplore the Israeli government’s decision to introduce senseless violence to a prayer space. There was no need for the violence we witnessed. This situation
could have been defused peacefully. This Ramadan/Easter/Passover Israel betrayed its trust with the world’s Muslims, Christians and Jews.” From JVP rabbis’ statement on the fourth day of Passover.

Mothers checked on their sons and told them to stay home Monday night in Gaza as the sound of Israeli warplanes spread terror across the sky.