APN Board Member Professor Michael Walzer will speak about the years after WWII as
three secular, leftist national liberation movements in Israel, India and Algeria succeeded in winning
independence and establishing states.
On January 6, 2016, APN hosted Professor Mordechai Kremnitzer of the Israel Democracy Institute for a conversation on the current state of Israeli democracy, as it faces new government measures to enhance the Netanyahu government’s hegemony and to stifle dissent.
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Professor Mordechai Kremnitzer is Vice President of Research at the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) and Professor Emeritus at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Faculty of Law, where he served as Dean. He is an expert on criminal, military, and public law, and widely considered as a leading expert on Israeli democracy and democracy education. At the IDI, he has been leading the following projects: Constitutional Principles and their Implementation, National Security and Democracy, Arab-Jewish Relations, and Proportionality in Public Policy.
Israel is on the verge of adopting an openly anti-democratic law seeking to stigmatize, delegitimize, and ultimately silence Israeli non-governmental organizations (NGOs) like Peace Now.
News from Peace Now's (Israel) Settlement Watch:
Two important settlement developments in this update:
1. Appointed Attorney General proposes to confiscate private Palestinian lands for
settlements
2. A new settlement established south of Bethlehem
Even as Israel endures daily “lone wolf” attacks from young Palestinians prepared to die for the cause of spilling Jewish blood, American Jewish leaders confide that generating support for the Jewish state is becoming increasingly difficult these days — even within the Jewish community, and especially among younger people.
In contrast to the widespread emotional identification shown for Parisians and others around the world who have been attacked by Islamic militants, it is hard to find much empathy out there for Israelis seeking to go on with their lives amidst the prospect of violence they face each day.
In a series of private conversations in recent days with a variety of professionals who make their living advocating for Israel and Jewish causes, I was struck by a consistent theme I heard: deep concern about Israel’s future and its relationship with diaspora Jewry. There was a feeling that the political and diplomatic situation is getting worse as Israel is increasingly isolated on the international scene — even spied on by the U.S., we learned last week.
Closer to home, efforts by the last Knesset to liberalize positions on personal religious status — on such issues as conversion, marriage, divorce and women’s prayer at the Kotel — have been reversed by the current coalition in Jerusalem. That is one more signal to the great majority of American Jews, who are not Orthodox, that they are seen as second-class Jews in the eyes of the State of Israel they are urged to support.
Continue ReadingWashington Post editorial on NGO bill mentions Peace Now among Israeli groups that would be impacted (Washington Post, 1/3/2016)
APN's Lara Friedman quoted in Gershom Gorenberg article on pro-settlement congressional legislation (American Prospect, 1/7/2016)
