Top news stories from Israel/Palestine: September 14, 2018

What We’re Reading

Occupation/Human rights

Khan al-Ahmar: Scores of arrests and injuries in protest against demolition,

Palestinian and international demonstrators tried to prevent Israeli bulldozers from making earth mounds to block the road to village.

Oslo Anniversary

For Palestinians, America Was Never an Honest Broker,

“The Trump administration’s policies don’t represent a radical shift. The White House has simply abandoned the facade of neutrality and rubber-stamped the Israeli government’s agenda,” writes Dalia Hatuqa.

Oslo Accords at 25: Many negatives and a few positives,

“Despite the return of Palestinian leaders and the release of prisoners and withdrawal from populated cities, the negatives have outweighed the positives,” writes Daoud Kuttab. “Oslo also created a class aligned with the occupation and has further entrenched economic dependency on Israel.”

With Oslo, Israel’s Intention Was Never Peace or Palestinian Statehood,

“The transformation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip into separate Bantustans was all part of the plan,” writes Amira Hass.

The Oslo Accords Are Dead, but There Is Still a Path to Peace,

“Only when Palestinians regain some leverage as they did during the First Intifada will Israel begin to rediscover the need to seek common ground,” writes Daniel Levy.

Israeli politics

The State of Israel vs. the Jewish People,

“Israel has aligned itself with one nationalist, even anti-Semitic, regime after another,” writes Eva Illouz.

US-Israeli/Palestinian relations

Opinion: Trump administration tells Palestinian refugees to submit or starve,

“Since its establishment, Israel has equated the return of Palestinian refugees with its destruction. Not because of capacity or security, but because the return of Palestinians would undermine a myth of uninterrupted Jewish presence in Palestine and, more importantly, a Jewish demographic majority achieved through ethnic cleansing and maintained through racist bureaucracy,” writes Noura Erekat.

Kushner says punitive measures against Palestinians will help peace chances,

Jared Kushner, tasked with leading the US administration’s Middle East peace efforts by his father-in-law US President Donald Trump, said Thursday that a series of recent punitive measures against the Palestinians will help, not harm, the chances for a peace deal.

BDS

When support for Israel means abandoning universal values,

On a recent trip to Germany, Jewish Israeli filmmaker Udi Aloni finds himself defending the Palestinians’ right to resist Israeli apartheid and occupation. Before pledging unconditional loyalty to Israel, he says, people should ask themselves what values they are helping promote.

Prominent DJs Back Israel Boycott Over 'Brutal Oppression of the Palestinian People',

Several artists post #DJsForPalestine along with statement saying they refuse to perform in Israel ‘As long as the Israeli government continues its brutal and sustained oppression of the Palestinian people.’