At this week’s Yom Hazikaron ceremony on Mount Herzl to remember the fallen in Israel’s wars, Prime Minister Netanyahu commented: ‘We will realise the goals of victory – and at the centre of them is the return of all our hostages’. Many hostage family members simply do not believe him and regard such pronouncements as … Read more
Our Palestine Question: Israel and American Jewish Dissent 1948-1977 Yale University Press 2023, pp.320 In the early 1960s, Ben-Gurion implied that ideological Zionism, after the founding of the state, had lost its meaning. The imperative to emigrate and build up the Hebrew republic had been replaced by support for successive Israeli governments, bolstered by an … Read more
Sunday’s attack on Israel by Iran involved 185 drones, 36 cruise missiles and 110 surface-to-surface missiles, according to leaked Israel reports to the New York Times. Most came from the Iranian mainland with a few fired by proxies in Iraq and Yemen. Israel, in conjunction with the armed forces of the US, UK, France and Jordan, defended … Read more
Since the start of the war with Hamas, a mere 540 have enlisted to help the war effort. On the other hand, 66,000 young haredi men have received an exemption from military service during the past year, a member of the IDF’s Personnel Directorate told a Knesset Committee last month. The ruling exempting haredim from … Read more
Professor Colin Shindler, you have, for the first time, opened up a disciplinary field that did not exist before you. Indeed, you are surprisingly the very first Professor of Israel Studies in the United Kingdom. You are also the President and Founder of the European Association for Israel Studies. You have already written twelve books, … Read more
The result of the election in Israel in 1977 is known in Hebrew as ‘the Earthquake’. It marked the end of the Labour party’s long rule and the beginning of the long decline of the Israeli Left. The party with which Aneurin Bevan, Jennie Lee and Harold Wilson had identified was replaced by Menahem Begin’s … Read more
Last week, Amos Biderman published his daily cartoon in Ha’aretz. It depicted Netanyahu standing alone amidst the ruins of Gaza and sporting a MAGA (Make America Great Again) style hat — albeit in blue and white. The hat was labelled “Total Victory!” Below Netanyahu’s feet, hidden from view, deep underground in a tunnel, were the caged … Read more
When Israel’s Declaration of Independence was signed, only two of the 37 signatories were women – Rachel Kagan and Golda Meir. This is symbolic of the profound difficulty that women faced in the ideologically male-centered world that existed in the days of early Zionism, in which women were generally expected to remain at home and forget … Read more
British Jews view the killings of 7 October as another tragic episode in Jewish history and recalled past massacres in eastern Europe or the Farhud in Iraq in 1941. In contrast, few of the marchers on last Saturday’s pro-Palestine march would have understood it as a pogrom of ethnic cleansing. Many Ashkenazi Jews in the … Read more
Regardless of who was responsible for the deaths of hundreds at al-Ahli hospital on Tuesday, it is clear that Israel is being blamed unequivocally for this terrible event by the Arab street. Apart from setting back the prospect of Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation by years, this incident may provide the fuel to set the Middle East on … Read more