Haider Eid reflects on Amos Oz, the Israeli writer who died at age 79: “Through his glorification of the kibbutz regardless of the fact that it is built on a stolen land belonging to native Palestinians, he became an active participant in, and defender of, the aggressive colonialist politics of his country. In his work Palestinians are (mis)reprepresnted as marginalized and passive characters, they are never active agents.  Oz’s literary work was truly a fusion of literature and Israeli ideology.”

A cartoon incitement video from the rightwing Jewish organization Im Tirtzu targets those who criticize Israeli soldiers as ‘foreign agents’ and singles out the progressive New Israel Fund. “Do you want to experience what IDF soldiers feel when they are persecuted by New Israel Fund organizations?”

Speaking of Palestinian genocide is acceptable in Israeli discourse. Israeli PM Netanyahu lately published support for Avihai Boaron, an extreme settler who has blamed moderate rabbis for shirking their duty to create death camps for “Amalekites” — enemies of the Jewish people.

“As both a Jew and an African American, I recoil from the white supremacy and anti-Semitism on display this week. I have been gratified to hear Jewish leaders and organizations call for the destruction of racism, speaking eloquently about the shared history of oppression Jews and African Americans have faced. Yet, I confess to a certain discomfort in the many appeals to recognize the twin evils of anti-Semitism and anti-black racism in Charlottesville. I’ve thought about this a lot over the past week, and here’s  what I’ve realized: for Jews, Nazi symbols evoke a terrifying, traumatic past. For African Americans, they evoke a terrifying, traumatic, unending present,” writes Lesley Williams.

Adding to his already rabidly racist remarks, Iowa Congressman Steve King uses a comparison to Israel to make his demographic obsession seem more acceptable.

In an open letter to progressive Jews, Jewish activists says this moment calls for a strong, broad, united front against the Trump administration’s agenda but there are groups within the Jewish community that progressives should not stand beside: “Specifically, we refer to the February 12 rallies in support of refugees in which Jewish social justice groups cosponsored the action with, among others, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC), two organizations that have toxic anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian policies.”

A landmark piece in the New York Times: Omri Boehm of the New School says Trump era will force liberal Zionists to choose Zionism or liberalism, because Zionism is “a political agenda rooted in the denial of liberal politics” and the privileging of one ethnic group over another.

Concern for anti-Semitism has morphed into anti-Palestinianism in the mainstream press, as a means of distracting people from Israel’s crimes.

Ha’aretz diplomatic correspondent and gourmand, Barak Ravid, recently tweeted a picture of “a likeable wine from the Livni vineyard in Kiryat Arba.” “Surprisingly good,” he concludes. The reason that the quality of the wine, produced in the darkest heart of the Israeli-occupied territory, is surprising, I would guess, is that Ravid believes that an admitted, convicted and unrepentant terrorist is unlikely to also become a successful vintner. But in Israel all is possible, at least for Jews.

“What sane Israeli would choose to live in a state with an Arab majority?” Labor Party Leader Isaac Herzog challenges Gideon Levy in an argument over Zionism that would never appear in the U.S. press