“Challenging a previous decision by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Judge Anne L. Mactavish determined that labels describing wines made in the settlements as Israeli products are ‘false, misleading and deceptive.’”

“Sources familiar with the matter told Haaretz that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s initiative for discussion included 700 Palestinian housing units and 6,000 Jewish settlement units which are currently in the process of approval.”

Sari Bashi writes, “It was June 1995, one year after South Africa’s first democratic elections brought anti-Apartheid activist and guerilla fighter Nelson Mandela to power. After being barred from the World Cup in 1987 and 1991, South Africa was hosting the world Rugby championship. Its national team, the Springboks, a symbol of white Afrikaner domination, had made it to the final round, fielding a lone black player, Chester Williams. Mandela had spent twenty-seven years in prison, many of them under brutal conditions on the beautiful but isolated Robben Island, where race classifications dictated even the food rations he received – as a black man, he received one ounce less meat and a half-ounce less sugar than Indian and colored prisoners. In a now- famous gesture that June day, Mandela walked onto the field at Johannesburg’s Ellis Stadium at half-time wearing the Springbok uniform, and when the South African team won the championship, he returned to the field and raised his green cap in a victory gesture. The message was clear: there is a place for everyone in the new South Africa, former oppressor and formerly oppressed. We will rebuild this country together.”

“Shaked said ‘Weeks of efforts have been fruitful. We have united the right wing parties to run together and ensure that precious votes are not thrown in the dustbin. I intend to pursue efforts to unite with Otzma Yehudit and Zehut as well. We should all run as one large party.’ Smotrich tweeted an appeal to the two remaining far-right parties to ‘show responsibility and join in in order to avert a waste of votes and to help bring about the establishment of a (new) right-wing government.'”

“The stated goal of the project was to prevent voter fraud in Arab communities, which the program’s organizers assert to be rampant. But Supreme Court judge Hanan Melcer, who oversaw the April elections and is doing the same with the repeat poll, has raised concerns over the use of the cameras. In April, Arab parties and other critics slammed the cameras as meant to intimidate Arab citizens and prevent them from voting.”

Anshel Pfeffer writes, “Lieberman’s decision two months ago not to join Netanyahu’s coalition, triggering 2019’s second election, has set a train of events in motion. Not one of the polls conducted in the last five weeks has given Netanyahu a chance of forming a right-wing/religious coalition without Lieberman. If that is indeed the outcome on September 17, it will be a cathartic moment for Israeli politics — after which any possible permutation of endorsements to the president, and the most bizarre coalition frameworks, are possible.”

Peter Beinart writes, “If you listened earlier this month to Republican responses to Donald Trump’s call for Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ayanna Pressley to ‘go back’ to the ‘places from which they came,’ you noticed something odd. Trump’s defenders kept mentioning Israel. ‘They hate Israel,’ replied Lindsey Graham when asked about Trump’s attacks on The Squad. Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin called Omar and Tlaib ‘anti-Israel.’ Trump himself responded to the controversy by declaring that Omar ‘hates Israel.’ This is strange. As reprehensible as it is to demand that an American politician leave America for allegedly expressing insufficient patriotism, the demand is at least familiar. ‘America, love it or leave it,’ has been a conservative slogan since the 1960s. What’s virtually unprecedented is demanding that an American politician leave America because they’ve expressed insufficient devotion to a foreign country. Can anyone imagine Republicans defending Trump’s calls for expelling Omar and company by accusing them of hating Canada, India or Japan?”

Mitchell Plitnick writes, “That’s all horrifying, but it’s also worth asking: if the U.S. is impeding non-violent Palestinian responses while doing nothing to curtail Israeli impunity, just what kind of response are they steering the Palestinians towards? The answer is obvious and should be of concern to all of us.”