Obama’s sorry legacy—no serious or direct talks, no agreed upon objective, no agreed upon framework for diplomatic engagement on Jerusalem or indeed on any of the basket of “final status” issues that had engaged the parties for decades—ripped open an inviting vacuum for Trump’s disruptive brand of diplomacy.

“The United States is slowly forgetting it was ever committed to Palestinian rights,” writes Khaled Elgindy.

“The Green Line disguises the fact that Palestinians in Gaza are no longer being oppressed outside the Israeli state, but are being caged and brutalized inside it,” writes Amjad Iraqi.

A talented writer whose short stories, many posted on his Facebook page, had won a wide audience, Mohanned was about to graduate in pharmacy, expecting excellent grades.

End the siege, negotiate with Hamas, tolerate unarmed demonstrations. There are many other ways Israel can deal with the reality in Gaza.

As Palestinians vow to continue protesting against the Israeli occupation of Gaza, Democracy Now speaks to a Canadian doctor who was shot by Israeli forces in both legs Monday while he was helping injured Palestinians.

While certain facts about Gaza may be inconvenient for the loudest partisans on either side, they should not be inconvenient to the rest of us.

Lara Friedman talks to the Jerusalem Post about how current law could require the US to withdraw from UN agencies which the Palestinian Authority joins as a full member.

For both critics and supporters of the BDS movement, a high level of Israeli concern may be the clearest evidence that the campaign is picking up momentum. Whether it will be able to change Israeli policy is a different question entirely.

The Democratic nominee for Congress in a key race in Philadelphia suburbs with a large Jewish population headed a charitable foundation that gave money to groups backing the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement targeting Israel.

Israelis have the right to defend themselves against Palestinian terrorism, Henry Siegman writes, but “the Israeli argument that there is no moral equivalence between Palestinian terrorism and Israeli preventive and retaliatory violence is deeply flawed.”

Highlights include:

• An increase in Area C demolitions, alongside decline in East Jerusalem.
• A donor-funded playground demolished and 12 donor-funded residential shelters placed at risk.
• A Bedouin community in Area C of the Jerusalem governorate experiencing a heightened risk of forcible transfer following a court hearing.