The United States says Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank threaten any peace between Israel and the Palestinians – yet it also encourages Americans to help support settlers by offering tax breaks on donations.
Showing all posts tagged settlements
Time to honestly debate Israel/Palestine
My following post was written for Khaldoun, the blog recently started by Macquarie University’s Centre for Middle East and North African Studies, where I’m a board member: Robustly debating Zionism has existed for as long as its existence. Jews, historically a persecuted people, were unafraid to discuss the merits or otherwise of the plan to…
How many years to go?
Israel, the coloniser: More than 2,600 housing units are under construction in West Bank settlements, including units in more than 1,000 new buildings, Peace Now contends in its semi-annual report. Basing its conclusions on aerial photographs and field visits, the organization says that slightly more than half of the new structures are going up east…
The inevitable collapse
Meron Benvenisti, Haaretz, August 21: It’s hard to tell whether the reports that more and more Palestinians are now leaning toward a one-state solution are genuinely due to an increase in supporters of the idea, or to Israeli sensitivity. The binational bogeyman is so off-putting to Israelis that any Palestinian expression on the issue gives…
Checkpoint Zero
Despite the extensive coverage of the Middle East in the media, there is little understanding of the realities of the Israel/Palestine conflict. For example, does the average person realise that Israel illegally occupies Palestinian land? In this sixtieth anniversary of the Jewish state’s birth, it’s more timely than ever to publicly discuss what is going…
Zionists don’t get serious (as usual)
As if the Palestinians had any other choice: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday rejected an Israeli peace proposal, which included withdrawal from 93 percent of the West Bank, because it does not provide for a contiguous Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. Nabil Abu Rdainah, Abbas’s spokesman, told the official Palestinian news agency…
Vote 1: militant Zionism
My latest New Matilda column is about the political realities in Israel and Palestine: Antony Loewenstein looks behind the pre-election rhetoric in Israel and says the lack of a real difference between the front-runners means deeper trouble ahead for both Israel and Palestine Israel is currently in political limbo. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s leadership of…
How to kill that Jewish “dream”
Leading Jewish American blogger Phil Weiss – a true friend and ally on Middle East matters – provides wider context to the recent comments by Israeli writer Naomi Ragen: Here’s Naomi Ragen, a writer who seems to split her citizenship between Israel and the U.S., speaking to the Sydney Morning Herald. She’s orthodox, and dismissive…
How to lose Jewish friends in one easy step
Naomi Ragen is a prominent American-Israeli writer and playwright about to visit Melbourne for the writer’s festival. She is a typical, radical Zionist who believes that “terrorists” should be killed by the Jewish state. “We need to kill these people”, she told the Sydney Morning Herald today. Her message of peace? No withdrawals from occupied,…
How to kill a state
What will it take for Diaspora Jews to realise that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, and the extremist Jews who populate the territory, is threatening their beloved homeland?