Yesterday, Israeli media reported on a blockbuster report alleging that the Obama Administration is lying when it says U.S. policy regarding the labeling of products from West Bank settlements hasn't changed since 1995, and alleging that the policy reiterated last month in a statement issued by the U.S. Customs Service (CBP), in fact, represents a change in U.S. policy.

These allegations rest on a “smoking gun,” unearthed by the intrepid researchers at a right-wing Israeli non-governmental organization called the Legal Forum for Israel, in the form of a 1995 document issued by CBP.  The Legal Forum for Israel alleges that the document proves that U.S. labeling policy since 1995, according to which exports from the West Bank cannot be labeled as made in Israel, applied only to those areas of the West Bank under Palestinian self-rule in 1995. The NGO insists that the “reminder” of the policy issued by CBP in January 2016, which stated that labeling rules apply to the entire West Bank, thus clearly represents a (stealth) shift in U.S. policy.

Is this document, in fact, a smoking gun? Not in the slightest.

Oded Adomi Leshem, a doctoral student at George Mason University’s School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution is an expert on hope. One of his areas of expertise is strategies for impacting Israeli public opinion to be more supportive of peace. A new study that he recently published shows that messages of hope from Palestinians can go a long way in  fostering and enhancing hope among Jewish Israelis. Listen to our February 16^th 2016 conversation with Leshem.

For many of my American friends and former colleagues in the media, I am the Israeli they know and therefore a go-to person on Israeli affairs. They contact me with questions on Israeli politics, Jerusalem restaurants, Hebrew slang and Israeli popular culture.

Recently, their curiosity is turning into bewilderment and astonishment. Their lovingly inquisitive approach toward Israel is turning into exasperation. Their focus now is on trying to decipher Israel’s shifting character, on its changing face, on the fading vision of the Israel they grew up loving and hoped to see thriving — a state that embodies progressive, democratic, pluralistic, tolerant values.
“What the hell is going on there,” I’m often asked, “have they totally lost it?”

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

This week, Alpher discusses former prime minister Ehud Olmert’s tenure as head of government; the ramifications of IDF Chief of the General Staff Gadi Eisenkot speaking out against excessive use of force by soldiers and police in dealing with knife attacks by Palestinian youth; and two key issues of domestic and international sensitivity that his comments point to.

As many question not only the viability but also the desirability of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, one of the world’s leading experts on the conflict and on efforts to resolve it discussed the state of the two-state solution.

Dan Kurtzer, is the former U.S. ambassador to Israel and Egypt and currently the S. Daniel Abraham Professor of Middle East policy studies at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.

We suggest reading Ambassador Kurtzer’s recent Brookings essay on the two-state solution.

Listen here.