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Bibi’s Hebron Illusions: The Back Story

February 26th, 2010 · 12 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
Alas, caught up in my teaching schedule at Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, I’ve been absent both from the physical South Jerusalem and the virtual one. Meanwhile, though, my columns are appearing in the American Prospect. The latest is here; two previous ones are below.
By all accounts, Benjamin Netanyahu devoted very little thought [...]

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The Old Paranoia and the New Israel Fund

February 26th, 2010 · 5 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
From my column in the American Prospect on the right’s defamation campaign against the New Israel Fund:
Ronen Shoval caught me off-guard. I’d phoned the newly prominent rightist to listen to him repeat his allegations that the New Israel Fund, the major philanthropic backer of Israeli human-rights groups, was “aiding Hamas.” But I wasn’t [...]

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Amnesty and Amnesia

February 26th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
From my column in the American Prospect on the amnesty for disengagement protesters as a means for warping Israel’s memory of its past and its policies in the future:
The amnesty law is impressive in its brevity, in its focus, and most of all in its terrible audacity. Passed by Israel’s Parliament this week, [...]

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To the Victor Go the Street Names

January 17th, 2010 · 27 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
My apologies to readers for being away for a while. My new article is up at The American Prospect.
Walking along the beachfront street in Akko recently with a social activist from the town’s Arab community, I looked up at a sign and saw I was at the corner of Shlomo Ben-Yosef Street. Then I [...]

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Bibi Zig, Bibi Zag

December 17th, 2009 · 2 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
So the furious reaction to Netanyahu’s settlement freeze has made you think that maybe, just maybe, it’s actually for real, and that he has become a pragmatist? Nope, he’s the same old Bibi, as I explain at the American prospect:
“No Entrance To Bibi’s Freeze Inspectors,” reads the long, professionally printed banner hanging at [...]

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Ultra-Orthodoxy, Made in Israel

December 17th, 2009 · 6 Comments · Judaism and Religion, Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
I have a new piece in Hadassah magazine describing how Israel created the ultra-Orthodox community as we see it today, with its life-time students, large families and poverty:
I’m standing in the Kerem Avraham neighborhood of Jerusalem. Across the street is the stone building where Amos Oz, Israel’s most famous novelist, grew up in [...]

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The Cotton Gin and the Jewish Problem

December 7th, 2009 · 30 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
My new article on whether Israel is a democracy is up at The American Prospect:
Infant mortality among Arab citizens of Israel is two and a half times higher than it is among Jewish citizens. One out of two Israeli Arab college graduates is out of work. Arabs make up 6 percent of the civil [...]

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Conscientious Objection in the Funhouse Mirror

November 19th, 2009 · 16 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
My new article on the right’s difficulties with the army is up at The American Prospect:
Driving through the West Bank recently, I picked up two hitchhikers. Both wore the long, thick sidelocks and extra-large skullcaps that have become the mark of young men on the religious right, especially among settlers. Since they were [...]

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A Jewish Fable Has An Argument, Not a Moral

November 19th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Judaism and Religion

Gershom Gorenberg
My new column is up at Moment Magazine:
My son and I found the story one Shabbat when he was home from the army. We slipped out of morning services a bit early to study Vayikra Rabba, an ancient collection of midrash. If I hadn’t decided to make aliyah before he was born, he’d [...]

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The People’s Holy Space

November 9th, 2009 · 6 Comments · Judaism and Religion

Gershom Gorenberg
My new piece on South Jerusalem’s unofficial, non-establishment, do-it-yourself holy place is now up at the Hadassah Magazine site:
On the far side of the circle from me, women sang, “If I forget you, O Jerusalem,” in a soft, melancholy melody. There were a couple of hundred silhouettes in the circle—the women mostly sitting on [...]

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The Allure of Lawlessness

November 7th, 2009 · 14 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
My new piece on the arrest of alleged terrorist Yaakov Teitel and its context is up at The American Prospect:
The glossy flier was posted on a bulletin border in a small, illegal outpost of Israeli settlers near Nablus in the West Bank when I visited last week. The black print appeared over a [...]

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Last One Out, TurnOff the Mike

October 23rd, 2009 · 18 Comments · Politics and Policy

Gershom Gorenberg
My new article on the implosion of the Israeli left at the very moment when American Jewish doves are finally speaking out is up at The American Prospect:
Danny Ben-Simon has quit. If anyone needed more evidence of the disarray of the Israeli left, this is it — but then, no one actually needs any [...]

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