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 what the ramifications are for Israel and the region of Aleppo's falling to the Assad regime and its allies, Russia, Iran and Hezbollah; if that means the end of the war; what will happen to Assad’s Russian, Iranian and Hezbollah allies as his regime regains control; how this is affecting Lebanon; what sort of Turkey is emerging from recent years’ revolution in neighboring Syria and recent months’ abortive revolution in Turkey itself; what sort of regime we can now expect to develop in Syria; where all this leaves Israel; how it contributes to Israeli-Sunni Arab relations; and how Syria affects the Palestinian situation.

NOTE: For full details of APN's policy - which advocates boycotts of settlement products and supports other activism targeting the occupation - see our dedicated policy webpage, here.

Israel’s settlement “Legalization Bill”: What it is and what it means

 The concept

Israel’s so-called “Legalization Bill” (aka “Regulation Bill” or “Regularization Bill”) is designed to retroactively legalize Israeli civilian construction in the West Bank (outposts and parts of recognized settlements) built on privately-owned Palestinian land, in violation of Israeli law.

The bill comes in reaction to years of legal efforts, led by Shalom Achshav (the Israeli Peace Now movement) to compel the Government of Israel to meet its obligation to respect and impose the rule of law by removing construction by settlers that violates Israel’s own laws. For years, the government of Israel has resisted these efforts, dragging out cases in courts with repeated requests for delays, allowing illegal construction to grow further.

Senator George Mitchell and Alon Sachar, the authors of "A Path to Peace: A Brief History of Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations and a Way Forward in the Middle East," will be the featured speakers for the APN Briefing Call on Thursday, December 15, 3:00 pm (Eastern).

To participate on the call,  phone 951-797-1058 and enter code 147414

(a recording of the call is posted here)

APN today sent the following letter to the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations regarding its decision to partner with the Republic of Azerbaijan for a Hanukkah party to be held at the Trump International Hotel in Washington:

Stephen Greenberg, Chairman

Malcolm I. Hoenlein, Executive Vice Chairman

Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations

(via email and fax)

7 December, 2016

Dear Stephen and Malcolm,

As longtime members of the Conference of Presidents, we were shocked to learn that you have decided to celebrate Hanukkah by partnering with the Republic of Azerbaijan and by choosing the Trump International Hotel in Washington, DC as the venue. We take issue with your choice of both partner and venue. Your failure to consult members of the CoP before making these odd decisions further compounds our frustration.

Americans for Peace Now (APN) is alarmed at recent statements and actions by President-elect Donald Trump's Israel affairs advisers, indicating support for West Bank settlements and dismissal of the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. APN is calling on the President-elect to clarify that he will follow the policies of all recent US administrations – Republican and Democratic – with respect to the Israel-Palestine question. 

On May 29, 2015, Abraham Foxman, then the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, authored an op-ed published by the JTA, entitled, "Comprehensive approach to fighting BDS is needed."  With respect to the question of legislation seeking to quash BDS and other activism critical of Israel - both at the state and federal levels - Foxman notes (among other things):

Legislation that bars BDS activity by private groups, whether corporations or universities, strikes at the heart of First Amendment-protected free speech, will be challenged in the courts and is likely to be struck down. A decision by a private body to boycott Israel, as despicable as it may be, is protected by our Constitution. Perhaps in Europe, where hate speech laws exist and are acceptable within their own legal frameworks, such bills could be sustained. But not here in America.

Full text of that op-ed is included below, or can be viewed on the JTA website.

On December 4, 2016, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at Brookings’ Saban Forum. He was interviewed by the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg. Kerry’s comments included sharp criticism of the Israeli government’s failure to pursue a two-state peace settlement with the Palestinians. The entire interview can be found here. Following are Kerry’s comments relating to Israel.

So what we have is an opportunity to redefine the Middle East, to redefine the region to meet the security needs of Israel and the security needs of the rest of the region. Now, I can talk about that ad infinitum. I’ve spent four years now in the most intensive effort I think – I don’t think – I asked my staff to go back and read the record. I have talked to Bibi Netanyahu more than 375 times in this term. That’s only the public recording, because I was in the habit of picking up the phone and calling him at home or calling him here and there and just getting him eating. I’ve talked to him in those public transactions more than 130 hours. My wife accused me of having talked to him more than I’ve talked to her in these four years.

In our jointly authored book, my father, a writer, and I, a historian, took a fresh look at the mystery of Jewish survival. "Ours", we wrote, "is not a bloodline but a textline."

Jews are not a people forged by blood and swords, but we are nevertheless an ancient nation. This belonging can cross international borders today; it tackles the religious-secular divide and the Israel-diaspora divide. Ours is a uniquely textual nation, whose sense of belonging comes from the Bible and a myriad of subsequent books, interpretations, arguments and questions. For many centuries, ours was the only pre-modern culture with universal male literacy, alongside significant female literacy.

"Tell your child": this is our oldest and best survival technique and cultural instrument. But we do not only teach our children to read and remember. We also encourage them to think afresh, and to challenge their elders with questions and ideas. Also to laugh: at ourselves, at authorities, and even at the Almighty.

As you know, all good Jewish families argue. Humor, irreverence, debate, originality, and text-based inventiveness: these are the ancient codes of Jewish survival. They explain our global sense of cousinhood - or at least a shared sense of humor - in today's world. It is the key to our three-millennia survival.

Does 'textual nationhood' mean that the Land of Israel is unimportant? That Jews ought to have remained stateless? Not in my book. The State of Israel, which my four grandparents helped build in the fields of the kibbutz and in the libraries of Jerusalem, is a miracle even to secular Jews like us. It came into being when young Jews of the 20th century transformed longing into activism, memory into state-building, and Talmudic reasoning into modern invention.

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 what's new about Fateh's long-delayed seventh conference in Ramallah and unanimous reelection of Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) to head the movement; what’s wrong with Abbas remaining in power and what are the alternatives; has this at least provided an extension of peace and quiet on the West Bank; If France’s decision last week to label all goods from the West Bank and the Golan as “settlement products” rather than “made in Israel” is a blow to Israel; the "flawlessness" of the French/EU approach; and where Yossi Alpher, himself, stands on boycotting settlement goods.

NOTE: For full details of APN's policy - which advocates boycotts of settlement products and supports other activism targeting the occupation - see our dedicated policy webpage, here.

News from Peace Now:

This morning (December 2) a plan for temporary housing on three plots of absentee property near the illegal outpost of Amona was deposited. This was done through a special order - originally used for the Migron settlers - which allows for the promotion of plans in an expedited process. It is now clear that the government is promoting temporary housing for the Amona settlers in the nearby absentee property, despite Israel’s legal interpretation since 1967 according to which absentee property cannot be used for the establishment of settlements.

It is important to note that while the plan is for eight months only, in the settlements what is temporary usually becomes permanent. For example the two year long temporary housing for the Migron settlers from in Givat HaYekev (or the New Migron) is still in place.