Professor Matti Steinberg, an expert on Palestinian politics and political ideology briefed APN on July 11, 2014, focusing on Hamas. Steinberg analyzed Hamas’ strategy, its ideology, and how they relate to its launching of rockets and missiles into Israel.
by APN's summer intern Hannah Ehlers
Israel is no stranger to blaring sirens and rockets soaring overhead, crashing violently or intercepted in repeated close calls. Israel also is no stranger to fear—a genuine, existential fear that does not subside even when the rocket fire goes away. Every reasonable person wants peace and knows that violence is not the way to achieve it. But do enough people, Israelis and Palestinians, believe in the possibility of peace to make it happen?
Having urged a ceasefire for the past week, APN was excited at the news of an agreement Monday night, and then
deeply disappointed when Hamas and other Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip rejected it and intensified their
rocket fire. Now that the Egyptian ceasefire initiative has collapsed, We must redouble our efforts to urge for a
credible ceasefire agreement to prevent further bloodshed and devastation and to clear the path for leaders to
pivot from war to peace talks.
We therefore ask
once again for our supporters to write to President Obama and ask him to use his influence with other world
leaders to continue to work for a ceasefire – one which will lay the groundwork for resumed negotiations
leading to an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.
These are difficult and painful times. Fear and violence have overtaken both Israelis and
Palestinians. Rockets from Gaza are threatening Israelis in every corner of the country, sowing terror and
anger; intentional attacks on Israeli civilians by Gaza-based Palestinian terrorists should rightfully be
condemned. Israeli military retaliation, irrespective of its intended targets, is causing destruction, death,
and injury across Gaza, including the deaths (so far) of scores of innocent civilians, among them many children.
In the face of this crisis, all of us who care about Israel feel terribly powerless. Powerless to stop the violence and suffering. Powerless in the face of the simplistic, false narrative that military force - combined with a metaphorical Iron Dome - can provide Israel real security. Powerless, when we know that the only thing that can provide Israel security is a negotiated agreement that ends the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
But we are only powerless if we choose to be. I urge you: Do not be powerless – Take action. We can and must tell the Obama Administration: Work for a Ceasefire NOW.
Please join us on Friday at 1:00 PM (EST) for a briefing call with Dr. Matti Steinberg, an Israeli expert on Hamas, on Palestinian politics and on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
A former senior adviser to the heads of the General Security Services in Israel and a professor of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, Steinberg is one of Israel’s leading experts on Palestinian affairs. He is the author of the award-winning book “Unending Quest: The Development of Palestinian National Consciousness, 1967- 2007 (Hebrew).
Peace Now has just announced that in the last few days, following the killing of the three Israeli teens, there have been alarming developments on the ground in settlements: Three new (serious) outposts were established and a new road to Givat Eitam outpost was paved, in addition to other several protest tents and other developments that the settlers put up in different places in the West Bank.
The settlers are taking advantage of the killing of the three teens in order to set facts on the ground that they wouldn't dare to do before. We don't know if they got a green light from the government (although such a green light could not have made the acts legal, short of planning procedures), however, those developments will be judged by the government's reaction.
On July 1, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu eulogized the three Israeli yeshiva students murdered in the West Bank. “A deep and wide moral abyss separates us from our enemies,” he said. “They sanctify death while we sanctify life…”
When 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Khdeir was kidnapped and murdered in East Jerusalem a few days later, Netanyahu’s words — and words like them — framed the story. Indeed, an unbiased consumer of media reports about Abu Khdeir’s killing would likely conclude that while the perpetrators turned out to be Jewish Israelis, they might just as likely, or more likely, have been Palestinians.
Israel's Peace Now movement, Shalom Achshav, organized a demonstration in Tel Aviv Thursday, calling for restraint and denouncing violence, incitement and revenge. Several thousand Israelis gathered for this Demonstration of Sanity, and listened to speeches by Knesset members and leading peace activists, including Peace Now's Secretary General Yariv Oppenheimer.
Washington, DC –Americans for Peace Now (APN) strongly condemns the firing of rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israel, supports Israel's right of self-defense and calls on the government of Israel to avoid harming innocent civilians as it retaliates for the rocket attacks.
Commenting on the current escalation, APN President and CEO Debra DeLee stated:
"The escalating violence on Israel's border with Gaza is deeply alarming. Once again innocent Israelis are being targeted by rockets, while innocent Palestinians are caught in the crossfire as Israel exercises its legitimate right to self-defense.
Link to the article from American President Obama at the top of the page, as well as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' piece also published in conjunction with the Ha'aretz Israel Peace Conference.
See a large and readable version of APN's Ad
Israeli strategic affairs expert Yossi Alpher, who authors Hard Questions Tough Answers, APN's
weekly news analysis, was our guest on Thursday, July 3rd, for a briefing call on the current
Israeli-Palestinian security crisis and its repercussions. Since Thursday, Alpher's presentation has been
overtaken by events; we have included here the still relevant Q&A session.