Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council

"Thank God who heard our pleas," said Israel's Prime-Minister-elect to his euphoric followers on the night of 17 May 1977, as the unthinkable became fact: Menachem Begin, Leader of the Opposition for 28 consecutive years and the loser of eight straight general elections, was elected to lead the Jewi

The Australian (May 20) ran two articles from the Economist magazine looking at the 50th anniversary of the Six Day War with a subtext that accused Israelis of living the good life whilst Palestinians suffer... Although the main article noted that Israelis wrongly expected the Arabs would sue for p

Several thousand Palestinians participated in riots to mark May 15's Nakba Day (the "catastrophe" of Israel's establishment) with rock-throwing and Molotov cocktails prevalent.

Hamas' stance in its new political document that it will accept a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders if offered, but opposes ever recognising Israel, confused much media reporting.

After the horror of the Holocaust and the creation of Israel, relations between the two nations would not, could not, ever be "normal". Like it or not, Israel and Germany would be forever locked in a unique diplomatic embrace. So, it was not altogether surprising that Frank-Walter Steinmeier, on hi

When the North Jakarta District Court sentenced outgoing Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama to two years in prison for blasphemy for suggesting that some people had misused a Koranic verse to block his re-election bid, it added dramatic confirmation of the paradox surrounding South East

The security cabinet of 1967 appears in these never-published transcripts as a group of serious, professional and responsible decision-makers. While the ministers brought their worldviews to the table, they often didn't vote on party lines, often did listen to one another, and generally managed to m

Most anniversary discussions of the 1967 war and its consequences are going to focus on the hot-button item on this list: Israel's half-century of control over the lives of Palestinians. Indeed, it is a worthy and a thorny issue.

The swift and decisive victory of 1967 became the standard to which the IDF aspired - and the kind of victory expected by Israeli society in future engagements. This is problematic, considering the ways Israel's opponents have changed and the means they now deploy.

The Iranian tragedy is that it is entirely uncertain whether Rouhani is even capable of ushering in the desired change. After all, Iran is not a democracy, and the elections are far from expressive of the public's true wishes. The election race was limited to establishment insiders who were vetted a

Surely nobody but Donald J. Trump could get a warm laugh from an audience of Israeli notables within seconds of highlighting the Iranian regime's desire to destroy our country. That's what happened deep into the main speech of the President's May 22-23 Israel visit, at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem

When I received the invitation to speak at a Sydney event designed to help educate Muslims about Islam, I was both happy to accept and curious as to how my comments would be received...

A simple counting of 50 years of military occupation might lead reasonable people to believe that it can no longer be considered temporary. But that fails to take account of an alternative time frame: the Arab and Muslim countdown until the end of Zionism and the State of Israel.

This special edition of the AIR contains several different essays and articles looking back on the historical watershed that was the 1967 Six Day War from the perspective of half a century. However, I would strongly like to recommend one more important essay that we simply could not fit in this edit

The mortar shells came early in the morning. At about five. At regular intervals. Solemn and sinister. They were a reminder of how close it all was. We were in the Damascus Old City. There was still fighting in Jobar, about two kilometres away. The rebels had also counter-attacked from the east... T

The 1967 War was a watershed in Middle Eastern history. Israelis call it the Six Day War, which is symbolic of the euphoric sense of victory that Israeli Jews felt in the aftermath of the war. The Arabs don't call it the Six Day War; for them it's the "June War", or the "67 War". It was the most hum

The 1967 war was the product of the refusal of the Arab world to accept Israel's right to exist. Yet since then, many have come to assert that Israel's presence in the West Bank as a result of the 1967 war is the root cause of the conflict. This ignores not only what happened before 1967, but the fa