As the Israeli judiciary continues to side with the state and its security services, advocates and human rights lawyers must reevaluate the strategy of litigating Palestinian grievances in the occupier’s courts. By Sagiv Galai Palestinian human rights organizations submitted a classified communication to the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor last month. The information contained will most likely involve the documented targeting of non-military facilities during the 2014 Gaza war. At least 28 schools were damaged or destroyed during the 2014 offensive, according to Human Rights Watch hospitals, medical staff, sewage and electricity plans, and other civil infrastructure were also allegedly…

'When you push an entire population up against the wall, when you demonize them and trample their rights, [the situation] will explode in the end,' the Israeli parliamentarian writes with no sense of irony. Jewish Home MK Bezalel Smotrich, a member of Israel's ruling coalition, penned an oped on Wednesday arguing that Jews cannot be terrorists. The two labels are mutually exclusive, he argued. “Terrorism is only violence carried out by our enemies in the framework of a war against us,” Smotrich wrote in settler news outlet Arutz 7, "us" referring to Jews. (Hebrew) “Anything else is a serious crime,…

Following a wave of stabbing attacks in Jerusalem, Israeli security forces erected checkpoints and barriers at the entrance to many of the city's Palestinian neighborhoods, causing untold hardship to the vast majority of residents who had nothing to do with the violence. How would you feel if you found infantry officers holding a barbecue at the checkpoint sealing to your neighborhood? Read more on the situation in Jerusalem: 'East Jerusalem youth no longer distinguish between life and death' Jerusalem becoming mini-police state and ghost capital

One of the first Israeli politicians to champion the two-state solution, Yossi Sarid was also one of the last vestiges of the Israeli Left's old guard. He will be remembered warmly for never turning away a person in need, but also for his contentious attitudes toward religious and Mizrahi Jews.  For better or worse, there has never been a more perfect embodiment of the old Israeli left than columnist and politician Yossi Sarid, who passed away from a heart attack age 75 late last week. He was an uncompromising champion of human and civil rights, of free speech, of separation…

Israel's prime minister defies staffers and lawmakers, pledging to host the Republican presidential contender. Trump, the Islamophobe, says he plans to visit what might be the most religiously sensitive site on earth. Just how worried should we be? While local leaders in the United States are declaring Donald Trump persona non grata, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is gearing up to host the xenophobic presidential candidate later this month. Trump’s racist outbursts and policies have focused on Muslims in recent days and weeks, something one might think the Israeli prime minister would be sensitive about, considering that 20 percent of…

­ A number of Palestinian youngsters have been turned in by their own families in recent weeks, despite the fact that they had not yet committed any crime. Leveraging threats of collective punishment, the state is becoming Big Brother. By Noam Rotem Generations of Soviet children grew up with the story of Pavel Morozov, the 13-year-old boy who, according to legend, was so loyal to the state that he turned in his father to the authorities for forging documents on behalf of “enemies of the revolution.” George Orwell used the Morozov myth in his dystopian classic “1984,” where children were…

It’s been exactly 10 years since I crossed the border into Israel. I’ve been imprisoned, I've become ill, I was forced to renew my visa 62 times, and now I’m back in a detention facility — Holot. Is seeking asylum a crime? By Hassan Rahima This Sunday marked 10 years since I applied for refugee status in Israel. I’ve been waiting since December 6, 2005, the day I crossed the border from Egypt. My journey into the unknown continues. I was 17 years old when my village, Smasm, in the South Kordofan province of Sudan’s Nuba Mountains, was attacked. Most…

Ahmed sat in jail for six days after being accused of trying to attack soldiers with a knife. How many other Palestinians are sitting in jail because of planted evidence? By Michael Salisbury-Corech A Palestinian minor was released from military prison last Thursday after spending a week in detention on suspicion of carrying a knife and attempting to stab soldiers. [tmwinpost] Israeli soldiers stationed in the Tel Rumeida neighborhood in Hebron said they saw the youth, Ahmed, walking around a military post with a knife with the intention of stabbing soldiers stationed there. After six days in detention, Ahmad was…