The past months have witnessed an unprecedented series of attacks on Israel progressive, peace and human rights groups. No group has faced more frequent or aggressive attacks than Breaking the Silence.

US President Barack Obama on Wednesday said an Israeli-Palestinian deal would not be reached during his remaining nine months in office. “This is not something I was able to get done,” he said. “I am not that hopeful that it’s going to happen in the next nine months. It’s been 60 years; it’s not going to happen in the next nine months.”

” Pandering to the pro-Israel lobby was the order of the day for candidates of both parties,” writes Ali Gharib.

The IDF says in a statement that an initial investigation of the incident was a “serious” breach of conduct “contrary to the spirit of the IDF and what’s expected from IDF soldiers and their commanders.”

Demolitions take place in two areas of the West Bank as Israel’s High Court prepared to hear a high-profile case on the matter.

Israel and the United States are making intense diplomatic efforts to block a resolution slated to be voted on Thursday by the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva that would obligate the organization to draw up a list of all Israeli and international firms operating directly or indirectly in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights, senior Israeli and Palestinian officials said.

Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon on Thursday qualified a previous statement attacking the Breaking the Silence organization slightly, saying that gathering military secrets is not treason unless they are passed onto the enemy. He asserted that Breaking the Silence, an NGO founded by IDF veterans, and the soldiers who had provided it with testimony had committed information security offenses.

“I work for Breaking the Silence. But why should my grandparents be woken up by a 1 A.M. phone call telling them their granddaughter is a whore? Will anyone end the incitement?” asks Breaking the Silence director Yuli Novak.