Tagged Hamas

(JTA) — Forget the Iron Dome defense system and the rest of Israel’s formidable military – Hamas is worried about Israeli spy-dolphins. The Palestinian daily Al-Quds reported this week that Hamas captured a dolphin outfitted with Israeli “spying equipment.” Hamas’ naval wing reportedly tracked down the dolphin, which gave itself away through… Read more »

TEL AVIV (JTA) — After more than a decade of failed diplomacy, Israel could be close to signing a major agreement with the Palestinians. They’re just not the Palestinians you thought. After years of vowing not to negotiate with Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, Israel may be finalizing… Read more »

(JTA) – This time, Israel and its supporters came prepared. Anticipating what they believed would be an unfair U.N. report on last summer’s Gaza War, the Israeli government and friendly groups in the United States were ready with at least three reports they say better reflects the reality of… Read more »

Ex-Israeli President Shimon Peres: "We call on Jews to immigrate to Israel when there's no crime and no other reason." (Taylor Hill/Getty Images)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Former Israeli President Shimon Peres said he is confident in France’s ability to fight anti-Semitism on its own soil. Immigration to Israel, he said, should be encouraged for positive reasons, not only as a response to persecution abroad. “We call on Jews to immigrate to… Read more »

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the Knesset during the opening of the winter session, Oct. 27, 2014. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

JERUSALEM (JTA) – An anonymous White House staffer apparently isn’t the only one who thinks Benjamin Netanyahu is shy about taking chances. A piece this week in The Atlantic magazine by journalist Jeffrey Goldberg ignited a firestorm with its revelation that an Obama administration official had called the Israeli… Read more »

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is talking tough. And Israel and the United States don’t seem to mind too much — or else think their best option at this point is to grin and bear it. Abbas used his Sept. 26 speech to the United Nations… Read more »

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his address at the U.N. General Assembly shows a photo of a rocket launcher in a civilian area of Gaza with children nearby, Sept. 29, 2014. (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)

NEW YORK (JTA) – In the end, there was much to talk about at the U.N. General Assembly but few genuine surprises. With an eye on the jihadist group ISIS, President Obama focused on the need for the international community to counter the dangers of violent extremism. Israeli Prime… Read more »

NEW YORK (JTA) — Following a five-week landmark civil trial and two days of deliberation, a Brooklyn jury found Arab Bank liable of knowingly supporting terrorism in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip. According to the U.S. District Court ruling on Monday, the Jordan-based bank provided material support… Read more »

The emir of Quatar, Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, right, with Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, second from right, during an official visit to the Gaza Strip, Oct. 23, 2012. (Mohammed Salem-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) – It was the first Persian Gulf state to establish ties with Israel, the first to welcome Israeli students and the only one to allow direct dialing to Israel. Israeli athletes shine on its courts. Now Qatar is on the outs with Israel because of its embrace… Read more »

JERUSALEM (JTA) — My kids are the first to tell me that God does not have a body. “But how can He write us in a book of life? God isn’t like a person, ima!” Indeed. The image of an anthropomorphic God is rife, however, throughout the machzor, the… Read more »

Iraqi families who fled ISIS fighters near the Iraqi city of Mosul prepare to sleep on the ground near the Khazair temporary displacement camp in a Kurdish-controlled part of Iraq, July 3, 2014. (Spencer Platt/Getty)

(JTA) – Between this summer’s war in Gaza and gains by Islamic militants in Iraq, Syria and Libya, there’s still plenty of cause these days for pessimism about the Middle East. But there’s also some good news for Israel. If it wasn’t obvious before, the conflagrations have driven home… Read more »

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and President Barack Obama meeting in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., March 3, 2014. (Andrew Harper-Pool/Getty Images)

(JTA) – All is not well in the U.S.-Israel relationship. Somehow, the 50 days of fighting between Israel and Hamas frayed ties between Washington and Jerusalem. How did this happen? In part, the contretemps stems from the divergent ways that the Israeli and U.S. administrations view the Gaza war.… Read more »

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at a press conference at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem, Aug. 27, 2014.

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Israel’s war is over, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fight may only have just begun. The past month has seen Netanyahu’s approval rating plummet, according to polling by Israel’s Channel 2. On July 23, about a week after Israel launched its ground invasion of Gaza,… Read more »

Palestinian militants of the Al-Nasser Brigades, the armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees, display their skills at their graduation ceremony in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, Sept. 27, 2013. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — After four weeks of a punishing Israel air and ground campaign that left nearly 2,000 dead and much of Gaza in ruins, Hamas has lived to see another day. For Israel, that might not be the worst thing. That’s because for all of Hamas’ violent… Read more »

A Palestinian man kissing a baby killed in an attack on a United Nations school in the northern Gaza city of Beit Hanoun, July 24, 2014. (Emad Nassar/Flash90)

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Shortly after dawn on July 30, a bomb hit a United Nations school sheltering thousands of civilians displaced by the fighting in Gaza, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens. The attack on the Jabalia Elementary Girls School was the fifth attack on U.N.… Read more »

The “barbaric violation of the cease-fire agreement,” in the words of the White House spokesman, by Hamas when they attacked Israeli soldiers, killing two and taking one hostage, sums up the challenge facing Israel and the West in this vital conflict. An organization that launches rockets at civilians, uses… Read more »

The bloody collision between Israel and Hamas is reaching a significant crossroad, with the U.S. Administration pressuring Israel to stop Operation Protective Edge now, and deal with demilitarization of Gaza later. However, many in Israel, including key ministers in Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, believe that stopping Israel’s ground operation now,… Read more »

(JTA) – Now that Hamas appears to have achieved one of the central goals of its confrontation with Israel, the capture of a live Israeli soldier, a number of things are likely to follow. Hamas is going to trumpet its operation as a success, and that assertion will reach… Read more »

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators protest across the street from a pro-Israel really in Chicago, July 28, 2014. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

NEW YORK (JTA) — In Europe, the fight over Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza has prompted violent street battles, firebombs thrown at synagogues and even a mid-game attack against a visiting Israeli soccer team by protesters in Austria. In America, it has been more a battle of commentary,… Read more »

The Israeli economist Yaacov Sheinin proposes a bold economic answer to the rockets – but with the repressive Hamas in charge, would it have any chance of materialising? Once again, Israelis and Palestinians have been plunged into another round of violence, which only brings bloodshed and destruction, breeds more… Read more »