A closer look at Jerusalem's new construction plans are a testament to the fact that Israel cannot continue lording over hundreds of thousands of Palestinians without infringing on their basic rights. By Aviv Tatarsky After a considerably long lull, Prime Minister Netanyahu and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat have rebooted their plan to build beyond the Green Line in the city. These days, the government is working to build 2,000 housing units in East Jerusalem — and that's only the beginning. Israeli building in the territories occupied in 1967 is usually tied to Israel's attempt to thwart all attempts to make East…

For five decades, the High Court has legitimized nearly every aspect of the occupation. It may take time, but one day the settlers will thank the court for 50 years of Israeli rule over the West Bank. We should be enraged at the Israeli Right's attempt to ban left-wing NGOs from filing High Court petitions on behalf of Palestinians. There is no doubt that the motivation behind the initiative is to allow the occupation to continue undisturbed. There is no doubt that there are Palestinians who benefit from these petitions, just as there are women, residents of Israel's periphery, and other oppressed groups who have…

How Israeli authorities avoid their duty to indict settlers who build illegally on other people's land. By Yossi Gurvitz/Yesh Din In August 2009, the residents of Kfar Aqeb, a Palestinian village near Ramallah, noticed 12 illegal structures being built on their land near the settlement of Kochav Ya’akov. The residents urgently petitioned the High Court of Justice, assisted by Yesh Din, demanding the court order an immediate halt to the construction. What happened next is a microcosm of the behavior of the law enforcement apparatus in the occupied Palestinian territories. [tmwinpost] The IDF's Civil Administration issued work stoppage orders on…

Settler organization Ateret Cohanim has been gradually kicking out every single member of the Kirsh family from their homes since 2010. By Yael Marom Israeli police evicted a Palestinian family from their home in Jerusalem's Old City earlier this week, at the height of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha. The nine-member Kirsh family, which includes children and a pregnant woman, has been living in the same home since the 1930s. [tmwinpost] Their home was transferred over to Ateret Cohanim — a settler organization known for taking over Palestinian assets in the Old City and turning them over to Jewish families…

Ever since he filmed an Israeli soldier executing a Palestinian man in Hebron, Emad Abu Shamsiya has been subject to violent threats. Things became so bad his family had to leave their home. So why do the police refuse to help? By John Brown* Ever since a video showing Israeli soldier Elor Azaria executing an immobilized Palestinian attacker in Hebron was published, Emad Abu Shamsiya, the man who captured the incident on video, has been subject to threats against his life by right-wing activists and settlers. The latter even threw stones at his home, according to Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, where Abu Shamsiya…

Video shows Border Police officer taking away eight-year-old Anwar Burqan's bicycle and throwing it into the nearby bushes. An Israeli Border Police officer was caught confiscating a bicycle from an eight-year-old Palestinian girl in the West Bank city of Hebron last week. In a video shot by B'Tselem volunteer Raed Abu Ramileh and published Tuesday afternoon, the officer appears to seize Anwar Burqan's bike as she rides along a chain-link fence on al-Ibrahimi Street, before throwing it into the bushes. [tmwinpost] In September 2012, Israeli security forces put up a the fence along al-Ibrahimi Street, adjacent to the Cave of the Patriarchs, leaving the…

The fact that this year's Jerusalem Day did not include violence and racist chants against Palestinians signals a change of strategy in winning the hearts and minds of average Israelis. The main lesson I learned from Jerusalem Days past was to wear comfortable walking shoes. Or preferably running shoes, since I previously learned that there is no way to know what causes police on horseback to charge into and disperse Palestinian crowds out of the enclosures put up around Damascus Gate, into which they were corralled in the first place. [tmwinpost] Without a doubt Jerusalem Day is the most tense…

Days after an Israeli settler murdered 29 Muslim worshippers in 1992, the Israeli army put the city of Hebron on lockdown, closing off some of its main thoroughfare — Shuhada Street — to Palestinian traffic. Twenty-two years later, some parts of Hebron are still off limits to its Palestinian residents. Every year, Palestinian and Israeli activists demonstrate to commemorate the Ibrahimi Mosque Massacre, and call on the Israeli army to open Shuhada Street.  For more on Hebron's Shuhada Street: WATCH: Hebron's Shuhada Street: Authorized entry only PHOTOS: Israeli police arrest 12 left-wing activists at Hebron demo Prisoners in our own…

Without recognizing how deep-seated the trauma of ordinary Israelis really is, the Israeli peace camp will continue to be seen as elitist and disconnected. By Yakir Englander (translated by Dr. Henry R. Carse) My political opinions are aligned with Israel’s Left, but I was not born that way. Even today my personal Israeli narrative is far from typically liberal. I grew up in a modern ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in the city of Bnei Brak, and although I am sociologically far from that context today, many of the core values that still influence me stem from the Hasidic tradition. When I was…

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 —…

2015 was a year full of murder, stabbings, homophobia, and gender-based violence. I can't wait for it to be over. Damn you, 2015. Your place is in the dustbin of history. Leave us alone. You fraud. You began to shower us with specks of hope when the last elections were announced. We thought perhaps that the Israeli voter would cast away the thick layer of anxiety that has been sewn around him over 20 years of right-wing rule. Arab citizens worked tirelessly to put together the Joint List — for themselves and for the supporters of cooperation and democracy. For…

Violence engulfed Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza this month. Clashes around Al-Aqsa Mosque turned into stabbing attacks against Israelis, and Israeli security forces killed over 70 Palestinians. Photos by: Ahmad Al-Bazz, Anne Paq, Ezz Zanoun, Faiz Abu-Rmeleh, Hosam Salem, Keren Manor, Muhannad Saleem, Omar Sameer, Oren Ziv, Yotam Ronen Photo editing: Anka Mirkin                                                      

Israeli soldiers arrested two Israeli and one Palestinian photographers during a demonstration in the West Bank. What followed showed just how differently Israelis and Palestinian detainees are treated. By Oren Ziv / Activestills.org Israeli soldiers arrested three photographers, two Israelis and one Palestinian, during the weekly protest in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh last Friday. On Saturday night, an Israeli court ruled that there was no reason for the arrests and released the two Israelis from detention. On Sunday morning, Israel Police agreed to release the third photographer, Bilal Tamimi, without conditions, following a request by his attorney.…