From audacious fraud and forgery to military seizures for ‘security needs’ and the ‘public good’ to dusting off antiquated Ottoman laws, the Israeli settlement enterprise has no shortage of tools for taking over Palestinian land in the West Bank. By Dror Etkes On February 9, 2004, Abdelatif Hassan Samarin, a resident of the West Bank village of Burqa, just a few miles east of Ramallah, woke up before dawn. After his morning prayers, Samarin drank two cups of sweet tea with mint, meant to combat the morning chill of winter, packed some clothing into a suitcase that his son —…

Ever since the eruption of the latest round of violence, the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Issawiya has been essentially blocked off from the rest of the city by a single checkpoint. Dozens of residents, along with students from Hebrew University and members of Knesset, held a demonstration calling to open the checkpoint and end the collective punishment of 16,000 people. 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

Fancy a vacation with breathtaking views of the Holy Land? Airbnb will let you rent out luxurious cottages atop barren hilltops, making no mention of the fact that they are in settlements on occupied land. By John Brown* Airbnb, it has come to our attention, enables anyone to rent rooms and vacation homes in Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Anyone who is not of Palestinian descent, of course. Without exception, the listings, some which appear to be luxurious cottages and others that are caravans sitting on barren hilltops, make no mention of the fact that they are in settlements on…

As long as Arabs are the ones being murdered, the State of Israel has no problem with illegally-owned weapons. Only when Jews are harmed does this become a national issue. And then they wonder why we aren't loyal. By Abed Abu Shehada I came home at around 9 p.m. and pressed the button for the elevator. Without any prior notice, dozens of armed policemen jump on me at the entrance to my building. I cooperated, told them where I live, and no, I did not resist — despite the fact that the police did not present me with any arrest warrant,…

A newly-approved Druze town is slated to be built atop destroyed Palestinian villages. But the Druze community refuses to let the government sow discord among Israel's ethnic minorities under the guise of development. With great fanfare, the Prime Minister's Office released a press statement Tuesday announcing that the National Planning Council had approved the prime minister's initiative to build a new Druze town in Israel. According to Netanyahu, the town would be the first since the foundation of the state. Netanyahu made much of the plan, claiming it would "advance the Druze sector." (Sector is the term Israel uses to describe its…

'It is infuriating to see a mosque destroyed. Those who destroy a mosque won't have a problem destroying my children's home.' By Michal Rotem Israeli Police officers accompanied by bulldozers destroyed a mosque Wednesday morning in the unrecognized Bedouin village of Rakhamah in the Negev Desert. [tmwinpost] Salima Azazma, one of the residents of the village, told +972's Hebrew sister site, Local Call, that "It is infuriating to see a mosque be destroyed. Those who destroy a mosque won't have a problem destroying my children's home." "I am sure that these kinds of things happening in unrecognized villages will turn…

On the backdrop of rising discrimination and violence against Israel's Arab citizens, a new children's book invokes the spirit of friendship between Arabs and Jews, giving us at least one thing to look forward to in 2016.  By Yoni Mendel (Translated from Hebrew by Ami Asher) A new children's book, "Sweet Tea with Mint And Other Stories" is being released in a climate of increasing discrimination. With the Education Ministry excluding books from its curriculum out of fear of “miscegenation,” at a time of record low of Arabic proficiency among Jews, and with the images of Jews dancing and stabbing photos of Palestinian…

Twenty three men and three women tell the captivating story of Netanyahu’s rise to power, and how he ended up on a collision course with the leader of the free world. Yes, 23 men and three women. "Netanyahu at War," a PBS Frontline documentary about Benjamin Netanyahu's rise to power and the background to his now-infamous, ongoing feud with Barack Obama, opens with the controversy surrounding the Israeli prime minister's address to Congress last March, which one of his former advisors frames as a Churchillian attempt to warn the world about the dangers of a nuclear deal with Iran. "Netanyahu,"…