Headlines from the Live Blog:

• Far-right MKs taking part in Jerusalem flag march
• Joint List head outside Old City: Jerusalem will be capital of Palestine
• Police estimate 5,000 participating in Jerusalem flag march
• Iron Dome batteries deployed near Jerusalem ahead of march – Palestinian media

Also See – “Jerusalem Right-wing March Kicks Off as Police Clash With Palestinians Near Damascus Gate” (Haaretz)

“Israeli forces heavily fired stun grenades and tear gas canisters at demonstrators at the entrance to the town of al-Ram, northeast of occupied Jerusalem, causing dozens to suffocate.”

More Scenes from Jerusalem:

• “Police clear Damascus Gate ahead of flag parade through Jerusalem’s Old City” (The Times of Israel)
• “Palestinians clash with Israeli forces in Jerusalem ahead of flag march” (Jerusalem Post)
• “Israel deploys extra police forces ahead of flag march in Jerusalem” (Al Anadolu Agency)

“Several fires have broken out in the Sha’ar Hanegev Regional Council on the Israeli side of the Gaza border. The Fire Service says they were caused by incendiary balloons sent from the Strip. Yesterday, the Hamas terror group’s incendiary balloon unit announced that it would resume operations against the backdrop of the controversial Jerusalem flag march slated for this afternoon. Israel has warned that it will respond to breaches of its sovereignty, be it rocket fire or the launching of incendiary devices that have torched hundreds of acres of land near the Gaza border.”

More Scenes from Gaza:

• “Gazans clash with IDF troops on border; Palestinian reportedly shot in leg” (The Times of Israel)
• “IDF, Palestinians clash on Gaza border ahead of contentious Jerusalem march” (Ynet)
• “Egypt urging Hamas not to attack Israel during Jerusalem Flag March” (Arutz Sheva)

“Israel’s new government on Monday approved a Jewish nationalist march in Jerusalem, a step that risks inflaming tensions with Palestinians hours after veteran leader Benjamin Netanyahu handed over power to Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. In the flag-waving procession, planned for Tuesday, far-right groups will march in and around East Jerusalem’s walled Old City, where tensions have remained high since 11 days of fighting between Israel and Gaza militants in May.” Also See – “Far-Right March Tests New Israeli Coalition, Amid Hamas Threats” (New York Times)

“Ra’am chairman Mansour Abbas is slamming this evening’s flag parade as “an unrestrained provocation… an attempt to ignite the region for political purposes.” “There is no doubt that the goal of the parade initiators is to challenge the new government and exhaust it in a series of explosive events in the near future, and to take us back to an unnecessary escalation that will endanger human lives as we have experienced in the past month,” he says in a statement, referring to the recent violence following last month’s flag parade. He says authorities should have canceled the march.”

“Israeli authorities summoned a number of Fatah leaders and members in Jerusalem to appear before the intelligence for interrogation ahead of the Jerusalem Flag March later today. Israeli occupation authorities reinforced its police presence and raised its level of alert throughout the occupied city of Jerusalem, especially in the Old City, amid calls by Palestinian national and Islamic factions in the West Bank and the 1948 occupied land, to confront and thwart the so-called Israeli Flag March, which will be carried out today evening by thousands of extremist settlers.”

• “The imminent risk of the Flags Parade” (Terrestrial Jerusalem)
• “The Israeli ‘Flag March’ explained” (Middle East Eye)

“A nonprofit settler group took over a building in East Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood that belongs to the family of Michael Ben-Yair, a former attorney general and retired District Court judge. The group controlled the building for years, collecting rent totaling hundreds of thousands of shekels from Palestinian residents, without the knowledge of the legal heirs of the building’s original owner. Ben-Yair discovered two years ago that his grandmother’s house had been taken over by the group. No one from the Justice Ministry’s Administrator General and Official Receiver Division, rabbinical courts or a settler group had tried to find her legal heirs. Since then, he’s been waging a legal battle to wrest the building from the settlers, and to allow its Palestinians residents to remain there. On his journey, Ben-Yair discovered the settlers’ contorted and legally dubious methods to “Judaize” Sheikh Jarrah.”

“The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court said Monday that the global tribunal’s relationship with the United States — plunged into the deep freeze by former president Donald Trump — is undergoing a “reset” under his successor, Joe Biden….Bensouda did not say that her office was specifically looking at the attack, but said of the 11-day conflict: “We are not ignoring anything.” Asked whether Israel had provided any evidence to the court about the incident, she said: “Definitely we have not had anything come from Israel about this.””

“Al-Monitor also spoke to Haitham Khudair, owner of the Lamor Company established in 2006 as part of the Khudair Group. The company sells pesticides, fertilizers and plastic tools to farmers. Over 400 types of pesticides, fungicides and modified seeds were burned in the Israeli strike. Haitham said he is still shocked at the loss of his company, which he did not dream would be bombed. “Everything that enters these warehouses is approved by Israeli security. Materials are stored in an area very close to the fence separating Gaza and Israel,” where Israel can easily monitor it. The director of the Soil and Irrigation Department at the Ministry of Agriculture, Nizar al-Wahidi, warned of short- and long-term damage from the destruction of the Khudair warehouse. “The direct damage is environmental pollution. The fire changed the physical and chemical properties of the soil and the underground water reservoir.””

“The recent Israeli military strikes on the Gaza Strip in Palestine that lasted for 11 days did not even spare the dead buried in various cemeteries, besides leaving a trail of death and destruction. The Palestinian Awqaf (Religious Endowments) Ministry has identified at least six cemeteries of Al-Tunisi, Ali bin Marwan, Sheikh Shaban, Al-Sifa, Jabalia Al-Balad, and Al-Far in the Gaza Strip that have been damaged in the military strikes. Since the cease-fire was enforced on May 21, families in Gaza are flocking to the cemeteries to restore the graves of their beloved ones. In some instances, they have transferred the bodies to other cemeteries, where graves were destroyed beyond repair.”

“According to lessons learned from international experiences in this regard, a special national jury must be formed, be officially monitored, and must possess a participatory approach allowing the Palestinian society to engage with the activities of the jury. One reason to have a such a jury is that it can serve as protection from the governmental bureaucracy that could cause unnecessary delays in a return to normalcy in Gaza….The formation of a special fund for the reconstruction process will necessitate monitoring, accountability, and trust. This fund encourages the donor countries to contribute to the reconstruction process, reunite society through mobilizing active community members to take a role in the fund’s activities, and thus makes the reconstruction of Gaza a guaranteed and validated process. Such a fund can be the main channel to both receive the donors’ contributions to Gaza and project proposals from local implementing companies.”

““At first I thought the ambulance had been hit by stones until I saw the hole. The shooting wasn’t an accident, the Israeli soldiers were aiming at the ambulance as I was standing right near it. And it also wasn’t the first time ambulances I have driven have been targeted.” Sadaqa had been on the front lines with his fellow Palestinian medics on the day this happened, fighting to save lives and rushing wounded protesters to hospitals a half-hour’s drive away. Palestinian villagers protesting against the illegal establishment of yet another Israeli outpost on their village land had been confronted by Israeli settlers, resulting in violence and many injuries.”

“Lifta was among the first of 38 villages in the district of Jerusalem to be forcibly depopulated in 1948, and dates back to the Canaanite era, when it was known by the name of Nephtoah. The village extends over an area of around 8,743 dunams (2,160 acres), part of which was occupied in 1948, with the remainder seized by Israel during the 1967 war. Prior to the Nakba, some 3,000 people lived in 600 homes in Lifta. According to displaced residents of Lifta, only 73 houses still stand today – 56 of them quasi-intact, and 17 in ruins.  Among the landmarks still standing include a centuries-old mosque, the village cemetery, a water spring, and a primary school built in 1929, which today hosts Jewish-Israeli students. Over the years, a number of Israeli housing units and government buildings – including the Knesset, Israel’s parliament – and part of Hebrew University’s campus have been built on Lifta’s former farmlands.”

“The Palestinian Authority has assembled a new team of negotiators with the encouragement of the United States for renewed peace talks with Israel, according to a television report, as a new Israeli government begins work. Citing what it describes as a “senior official in Ramallah,” the West Bank city where the Palestinian Authority is based, Israel’s Channel 12 news says the PA was set to demand to extend its authority in the West Bank, as part of what the network said would be talks brokered by US President Joe Biden’s administration. The report says the US had already begun working on the matter before Prime Minister Naftali Bennett was sworn in on Sunday as part of a new power-sharing government with Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, replacing now-opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu.”

“A new poll finds a dramatic surge in Palestinian support for Hamas following last month’s Gaza war, with around three-quarters viewing the terrorist group as victors in a battle against Israel to defend Jerusalem and its holy sites. The poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research also finds plummeting support for PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who was sidelined by the war but is seen internationally as a partner for reviving the long-defunct peace process. The poll finds that 77% of Palestinians believe Hamas emerged as a winner, with nearly as many saying that it fought the war to defend Jerusalem and its holy sites, rather than as part of an internal struggle with Abbas’ Fatah party.”

“The PA is also worried about Egypt’s continued support for deposed Fatah leader Mohammad Dahlan, an archrival of PA President Mahmoud Abbas, the sources said. The Egyptians, on the other hand, are said to be outraged by Abbas’s alleged attempt to obstruct Cairo’s effort to contribute to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of last month’s fighting between Israel and Hamas.”

“Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, is currently on a diplomatic visit to the Egyptian capital Cairo where he arrived last week to discuss the terms of a long-term truce with Israel, including a potential prisoner exchange. While in Lebanon, he is expected to meet with Palestinian faction leaders and Hezbollah members, including Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. During the Iran visit, Haniyeh will meet with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, and senior members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.”

“The current movement that erupted in Sheikh Jarrah and across Palestinian communities is in part an expression of a popular Palestinian frustration with the traditional Palestinian political class, which has failed to defend the rights of Palestinians. It uses language different from the political and military language of the leadership that has been recycled for seven decades. And it is led by a young generation working to humanize Palestinian rights and build a new unifying narrative around justice and equality, garnering global support. Unfortunately, though the current Palestinian political structure is fundamentally incapable of joining this movement, its structure and support from allies mean it is well-equipped to fight and contain it.”

“The Likud and the member factions of the “Netanyahu Supporters’ Bloc” intend to file a petition with the Supreme Court against the amendment to the Basic Law: The Government that allows for the establishment of the “change government” of Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid. The exact same petition was submitted to the Supreme Court last year by the Yesh Atid and Telem parties against the government headed by Benny Gantz and Benjamin Netanyahu. This petition still exists and the Supreme Court is expected to rule on it next month. In a discussion held last year on the sections concerning the alternative government in the Basic Law: The Government, the Likud movement claimed that the court has no right to criticize and invalidate basic laws.”

“Haley met with Netanyahu on Monday evening at the official residence of Israel’s prime ministers, Balfour Street in Jerusalem. As the whole world saw on Sunday, Netanyahu is no longer Israel’s premier – he lost that position in a democratic vote in the Knesset, and on Monday morning vacated his desk at the Prime Minister’s Office to Naftali Bennett. Netanyahu’s current status in the official residence is that of a temporary guest, staying there at the mercy of Bennett. Under these circumstances, his decision to use Balfour for a political photo op with Haley is an unprecedented act of chutzpah, even by Netanyahu’s own standards.”

“Netanyahu leaves office as the longest serving prime minister in Israel’s history. In many ways his legacy is based on the length of his time in office and the self-interested strategies he used to stay there. But that legacy also includes opening a partisan debate on U.S. policy toward Israel, heightened tension in the Persian Gulf, and dividing Arab states on conditioning normal relations with Israel on an end to the Israeli occupation. Netanyahu was not responsible for Israel’s sharp rightward and nationalistic turn. This was well underway long before 2009, when he took office. But in terms of Israel’s relationship with the United States and the Arab world, and Israel’s role in stoking tension with Iran, his legacy will be long.”

“First, to paraphrase one of the United States’ revolutionary founders, Samuel Adams, all parties in this government know since they’ve pushed out Netanyahu, they must hang together lest they hang separately. All may honestly believe their government is driven by the interests of the nation, but they also have more parochial interests served by keeping their strange entity afloat. And they fear political oblivion if they don’t.”