A former IDF medical officer and a Palestinian from a refugee camp are seeing the conflict in a whole new way this summer.

WASHINGTON -- When Waleed Issa walked into the Americans for Peace Now (APN) Washington, DC office on the first day of his summer internship in June, the 25-year-old Palestinian from the Dheisheh refugee camp south of Bethlehem was startled by what he saw.

The ugly reports keep rolling in. A rally against African migrants turns violent and a race riot ensues; the whole thing is repeated a week later. A Jewish-Israeli of Ethiopian descent is "mistaken" for a migrant and assaulted in Tel Aviv. A group of teenagers in Tel Aviv is arrested for a series of brutal, racially-motivated robberies and assaults targeting Africans.  A Sudanese man is viciously beaten in Tel Aviv. A Sudanese hotel worker is nearly lynched in Eilat. An apartment in Jerusalem is torched with 10 Eritreans trapped inside.

You have to laugh, or it would make you cry. That is, if you are someone who genuinely cares about Israel and believes that the two-state solution is the only thing that can save Israel as a democracy and a Jewish state, and that can end the occupation and permit the Palestinians to live, finally, as a free people with dignity and self-determination.

CHICAGO (JTA) -- When a family member behaves self-destructively, what do you do? Do you become an apologist, an enabler, or do you call him out? Do you blame everyone else but him, or do you intervene? Do you sit back and just hope things will improve on their own, or do you take urgent action?

Thank you, Ambassador Oren.  On Sunday you told an audience in Detroit what "pro-Israel" means.

You said that "The person who is pro-Israel recalls what Jewish life was like without a Jewish state and works to ensure that there always will be a Jewish state." Someone who "knows that there is a place at our table for divergent views. But irrespective of politics... asks, 'how can I contribute to Israel, how can I enrich it and be enriched by it...?'"  Someone who "appreciates the immense threats the people of Israel face every day" and "understands the threats to Israel of not achieving peace but also understands the threat to Israel of making a peace that will quickly unravel..."

The Israeli Supreme Court handed another ruling, on May 7th, blasting the Israeli government's position on illegal West Bank "outposts, built on land privately owned by Palestinians. Peace Now's lawyer, Michael Sfard.

The Forward's interview with Mousa Abu Marzook highlights some fundamental truths about peacemaking: You make peace with your enemies, not your friends; you make peace not to be nice, but because it is in your self-interest; real peace must reflect a balance of interests, not an imbalance of power, and security arrangements, not trust, will be the foundation of any peace treaty.

In characterizing all non-violent Palestinian measures as terrorism, Israel insults the memory of victims of real acts of terror.

Yesterday was Yom Hazikaron, Israeli Remembrance Day. Every year on this day Israelis stop to remember their fellow citizens who have given their lives for the sake of Israel, whether in wars or at the hands of terrorists.

According to the latest article by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren, Israeli democracy is "more robust and effervescent than ever."  Reading his lengthy piece, a variation on Queen Gertrude's quip comes to mind: "The Ambassador doth protest too much, methinks."

Peter Beinart's recent New York Times article advocating a settlement boycott has sparked a spectacular public display of Jewish angst. Apparently for many who view themselves as the judges, advocates and juries of what is "kosher" progressive Jewish activism, his suggestion is beyond the pale.

They agree that settlements are a problem, even a shonda, but boycott fellow Jews? Heaven forbid. And even if it weren't Jewishly distasteful, it wouldn't work anyway, so don't go there.