Making the deal at this particular time—with so many other issues grabbing the public’s attention—probably helped reduce politically consequential public reservations about it.

“Netanyahu’s strange new PR video is a bluff that deserves to be called out. The best response—by an American administration and by a Palestinian leader—would be to call the bluff. Fine, settlers can stay if they want. In fact, there’s no reason to make border changes to keep them under Israeli rule. Like other residents of newly independent Palestine, settlers who decide to stay put will become Palestinian citizens. Their position will be the mirror image of that of Israel’s Arab citizens,” writes Gershom Gorenberg.

Israel has embarked on the construction of 1,195 new settlement units in the West Bank for the first six months of 2016—a 40 percent increase on the previous six month period, an anti-settlement watchdog said Wednesday.

“Politicians on the Israeli right appear to see the writing on the Supreme Court wall and have abandoned the battle over dismantling the West Bank outpost of Amona,” writes Mazal Mualem.

Ban Ki-moon: “Let me be absolutely clear: settlements are illegal under international law. The occupation, stifling and oppressive, must end.”

Police arrested Muhammad Abu Hummus to prevent him from peacefully demonstrating against the Jerusalem Marathon — then lied about it.

Former defense minister Moshe Ya’alon joined ex-prime minister Ehud Barak Thursday in slamming Benjamin Netanyahu for the $38 billion military aid deal signed Wednesday with the United States, saying Israel should have gotten a bigger payday.

The Palestinian Authority is nearing a financial crisis if donors do not to step in to fill a shortfall of over half a billion dollars, the World Bank warned in a report published Thursday.

Less than half the $3.5 billion donors have pledged to aid with reconstruction efforts in the Gaza Strip following the 2014 war has been disbursed, according to the World Bank.