It’s going to take time for the Hamas-Israel cease-fire to take hold, which is why Israel’s military hasn’t responded to the firing of Kassam rockets from the Gaza Strip over the last three weeks, Ha’aretz writes in an editorial. Hamas is trying, Ha’aretz says: Hamas’ public effort to fully keep its commitment is evident. The… More ▸
Gilad Sharon pens an angry Op-Ed in Ynet delivering Israeli Arabs an ultimatum: “Do you wish to enjoy all the good Israel bestows upon you? Then be completely loyal to it. If you cannot do it, be prepared to pay the price.” Sharon’s missive was prompted by last week’s terrorist attack in Jerusalem by a… More ▸
A day after the second major terrorist attack in four months by a Jerusalem-area Palestinian, the Jerusalem Post’s Calev Ben David asks how Israel can protect its people against terrorists among the 200,000 Palestinians who live on the west (i.e. Israeli) side of the West Bank security fence. It’s not so easy. More ▸
Sascha Baron Cohen narrates “the running of the Jews” in Borat. The serious-minded former director of Tel Aviv University’s Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, Yossi Alpher, who also is co-editor of Bitterlemons.org, a Palestinian-Israeli Web site, writes about a close encounter of the Bruno kind in his latest column in the Forward. More ▸
Marty Peretz has a piece in The New Republic that echoes JTA’s analysis last week about Israel’s sudden “peace offensive.” Peretz declares the chances of success of an Israeli-Syrian peace deal (as measured by Syria moving away from Iran) virtually nil, and he opposes Israel’s latest cease-fire with Hamas in the Gaza Strip (which doesn’t… More ▸
The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto suggests that the accidental killing of American activist Rachel Corrie by an Israeli tractor in March 2003 may have given the Palestinian who perpetrated yesterday’s tractor attack in Jerusalem the idea for turning a tractor into a deadly weapon. Come on. On a related note to my post yesterday… More ▸
Many readers – and some fellow reporters – are questioning JTA’s use of the more general term “Arab” rather than “Palestinian” to describe the terrorist who perpetrated Wednesday’s deadly attack in Jerusalem. A note of explanation: In the aftermath of the attack, it was not immediately clear exactly who the perpetrator was. His name was… More ▸
The debate in Israel about the efficacy of the prisoner swap deal with Hezbollah continues. Alexander Yakobson writes in Ha’aretz that the real cost of the exchange of “prisoners for bodies” with Hezbollah is more Israeli bodies, since the deal projects Israeli weakness. He could have argued his point much more effectively and clearly simply… More ▸
Israel has been engaged in heated debate in recent days about the efficacy of trading Arab prisoners with blood on their hands for the remains of two Israeli soldiers kidnapped by Hezbollah in July 2006. The Jerusalem Post’s Matthew Wagner weighs in with a piece on what the Jewish sages might have said about this… More ▸
Borrowing a page from Fatah’s playbook, Hamas is criticizing Fatah militants who are shelling southern Israel from Gaza as acting against the Palestinian national interest by risking the shaky truce begun June 19 with Israel. Years ago, it was Fatah – then led by Yasser Arafat – that was signing agreements with Israel and criticizing… More ▸
