The regime change at the New Republic is continuing to command headlines and two storylines sympathetic to Chris Hughes are emerging. One is technocratic/neoliberal: He bought the goddamn magazine, what did they expect? The other is political: despite the New Republic’s claim to being a progressive leader, the old regime was not liberal; it was racist and neoconservative/rightwing Zionist. More evidence the Hughes putsch is epochal: it ends an era in which neoconservatism was fanned inside the liberal Democratic political community, out of concern for maintaining US support for the Jewish state.

34 department heads at the U of Illinois have written to the president that the unfair firing of Steven Salaita for outspokenness on Gaza has “damaged” the school because excellent scholars don’t trust it to honor free speech and will not come there to teach.

Last Friday, the American Anthropological Association’s annual business meeting in Washington, DC was packed with more members than any other time in recent memory – over 700. On the agenda was a proposed resolution against boycotting Israeli academic institutions. The atmosphere in the room was electric, as anthropologists from across the profession discussed the boycott and the ongoing violations of Palestinian academic freedom and human rights. Of the 24 members who spoke, three-quarters opposed the resolution, arguing that it was an attempt to shut down a crucial debate. In the end, the effort to prevent the boycott discussion backfired spectacularly: members present overwhelmingly voted down the measure, which mustered a mere 52 supporters.

Israeli ambassador to Europe: “The Jewish people.. will never ever forget that you failed us in the 1940s… And you are failing us again today.” Rep. Steve Israel calls this “honest.”

Why should Israel, a nuclear power that’s still very powerful economically, be afraid of the nonviolent nuisance of BDS? Omar Barghouti asks at Columbia. Well, maybe because Zionist IQ is dipping, the movement has advanced faster than it did in South Africa, and is no pushing on an open door.

Ahmed Alkhateeb organized an academic panel at Harvard University to discuss the tactics of The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement as part of the Harvard Arab Weekend – the largest Arab conference in the United States. He says the event did not pass without being described by pro-Israel advocates as anti-Semitic and advocating the destruction of Israel. Instead of engaging directly in these debates, which carries with it the possibility of adjusting their stance on the occupation, settlements, and the Gaza blockade, pro-Israel groups only attempt to control who holds the microphone. Alkhateeb writes, “Pro-Israel students on US campuses should confront the systemic oppression of the Palestinians instead of sheltering themselves from it. Silencing ‘the other’ will only lead to misunderstanding and thus does not promote peace.”

The number of Americans who want the government to push for one state in Israel and Palestine jumped 40 percent in the last year, to more than a third of respondents in a new poll. That group rivals the number who want the government to push for two states.

The journalism world is up in arms today that Chris Hughes the Facebook mogul who bought The New Republic magazine had the temerity to fire editor Franklin Foer and literary editor Leon Wieseltier. This is a landmark in the era of the Jewish establishment. It’s petering out in an elite generation of far greater diversity. The New Republic has been supported by one neocon after another, from Michael Steinhardt to Bruce Kovner to Roger Hertog. An era is over, and the Israel lobby (whose influence the magazine sought to deny) is losing power.

Blatantly bigoted Islamophobic comments follow a Newsweek piece about a Palestinian’s efforts to protect the Haram Al Sharif from Jewish religious incursion. “Towel head camel humpers,” says Dana Klein of Trumbull, CT

Israel’s proposed law to declare it the nation state of the Jewish people has dropped the mask from an ethnocracy, and the American media are at last reflecting Palestinian criticisms of the country