Category Archives: Israel

The world leaders pushing for peace in Ukraine, and their motives

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They claim to be honest brokers, but is that just a fig leaf to cover their moral bankruptcy?

How blessed are the peacemakers? After the first wave of intermediaries led by Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz, a new group have beaten their way to Vladimir Putin’s long table since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, or at least sought to intervene by phone.

The current crop includes Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, president of Turkey, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohamed bin Zayed of the UAE and now the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi.

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US accused of hypocrisy for supporting sanctions against Russia but not Israel

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Critics compare Israeli military actions of Palestinian territories with Russian invasion of Ukraine but pro-Israel groups dismiss allegations as false parallels

The US and some of its European allies are facing accusations of double standards for supporting sanctions and international war crimes investigations against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine while blocking them over Israeli military actions in the occupied Palestinian territories.

But pro-Israel groups in the US have dismissed the allegations by accusing critics of exploiting Ukrainian suffering to draw false parallels.

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Feud over ‘antisemitic’ Wailing Wall painting closes Israel museum

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Exhibited artists cover up their work in protest after piece portraying ultra-Orthodox Jewish man is removed

Four overlapping black and white rectangles make up Israeli artist David Reeb’s painting Jerusalem. On two, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man is portrayed praying at the Western Wall – known also as the Wailing Wall – from two different angles, his hands pressed against the stone. Opposite the images, thick brushstrokes spell out phrases in Hebrew: “Jerusalem of gold”, the title of a nationalistic song – and “Jerusalem of shit”.

The work was among several explicitly political, daring pieces featured in an exhibition that opened in December at the newly renovated Ramat Gan Museum of Israeli Art near Tel Aviv.

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Israel tries to balance backing for Ukrainians and not offending Russia

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Analysis: Criticism of invasion has been muted and officials yet to condemn Moscow for attack on Holocaust memorial

A week ago the sight was unthinkable: a memorial at the site of one of the worst massacres of the Holocaust, engulfed in smoke and flame from an airstrike.

Yet on Tuesday a Russian attack near the Babyn Yar memorial complex in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, achieved exactly that. Five people died in the strike targeting the television broadcast tower next door, while firefighters battled to extinguish a fire caused by the explosion in a building inside the Jewish cemetery.

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Israel under pressure to conclude flawed case against aid worker

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Latest court order raises hopes of verdict in trial of World Vision’s Mohammed El Halabi

Pressure is mounting on Israel to conclude the trial of a Gazan aid worker accused of funnelling relief money to Hamas in a six-year-old case widely derided by the international community as “not worthy of a democratic state”.

Mohammed El Halabi, the head of the US-based charity World Vision’s Gaza office, was detained in 2016 after being accused by Israel’s Shin Bet security service of transferring $7.2m (£5.4m) a year to the Palestinian militant group in control of the Gaza Strip.

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Ukraine appeals for foreign volunteers to join fight against Russia

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President Zelenskiy issues call to arms to foreign nationals in battle against ‘Russian war criminals’

Ukraine’s embattled president has issued a call to foreign nationals who are “friends of peace and democracy” to travel to the country to fight against the Russian invasion.

The appeal from Volodymyr Zelenskiy, published on the Ukrainian presidency’s website early on Sunday, said the Ukrainian armed forces were in the process of setting up a foreign legion unit for international volunteers.

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Why Israel faces new dangers in shadow war against Iran if nuclear deal is agreed

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Analysis: a new pact will be worse for Israel than the old one and Iran’s influence in the region has grown in recent years

The US decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal was an immense personal achievement for former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In a leaked video, he boasted that he had personally convinced Donald Trump to scrap the 2015 accord between Tehran and world powers.

“I had to stand up against the whole world and come out against this agreement,” Netanyahu told members of his Likud party in the clip from 2018. “And we didn’t give up.”

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Police use of Pegasus malware not illegal, Israeli inquiry finds

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Police have been accused of spying on at least 26 individuals who are not criminal suspects

An inquiry into allegations that Israel’s police force systematically hacked into the mobile phones of Israeli citizens has found that while the police did use NSO Group’s controversial Pegasus malware, there is no evidence suggesting illegality.

In a series of explosive reports over the last two months, the local financial daily newspaper Calcalist accused the police of spying on at least 26 individuals who were not criminal suspects. Those named included politicians, protesters, and members of the former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s inner circle – claims Netanyahu used to delay proceedings in his corruption trial.

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‘The police don’t care’: gun violence engulfs Israel’s Arab community

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Number of Palestinians killed rises year on year as firearms stolen from Israeli military proliferate on streets

There has been a break in the rain, and the sun is shining on the orange groves of Bir al-Maksur, a quiet Bedouin village near Nazareth in Israel’s north.

Three-year-old Ammar would have loved splashing in the winter puddles outside the Hujarat family’s home, his aunt said. But two days before, the little boy was shot and killed in a playground by a stray bullet fired during a car chase, and the grieving family is trying to make sense of the way his life ended.

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Berry large: Israeli farmer grows world’s heaviest strawberry

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Chahi Ariel makes the Guinness World Records with a 289g strawberry – five times the average weight of that variety

An Israeli farmer has grown the world’s heaviest strawberry, according to Guinness World Records.

At 289g, the strawberry was about five times the average weight of a regular berry of the local Ilan variety, said Nir Dai, a researcher at Israel’s Volcani Institute, where the strain was developed.

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More Polish opposition figures found to have been targeted by Pegasus spyware

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Analysis by Amnesty International linked them to Pegasus Project leak of more than 50,000 phone numbers

The use of intrusive spyware by members of the European Union is expected to face new scrutiny following revelations that the mobile phones of two more Polish citizens with close links to an opposition senator were targeted by a client of NSO Group, according to security experts.

Forensic analysis by Amnesty International found that both Magdalena Łośko, the former assistant to Polish senator Krzysztof Brejza, and Brejza’s father, Ryszard Brejza, received text messages in 2019 that researchers said were technically consistent with spyware attacks by clients of NSO Group using Pegasus.

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Inquiry finds Israeli police used spyware against three people, report says

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Initial investigation is said to have found NSO Group’s Pegasus tool was used against three of 26 alleged targets

An initial investigation into allegations that Israeli police targeted citizens with spyware has confirmed that the application was indeed used against three people, according to claims by a local news station.

The Israeli broadcaster Channel 12 said a police investigation ordered by Israel’s public security minister, Omer Barlev, had concluded that of 26 individuals named in recent reports as having been targeted using NSO Group’s Pegasus software, three named individuals were targeted, with the police successfully hacking only one of the phones.

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Helen Mirren says questions over playing Golda Meir ‘utterly legitimate’

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Maureen Lipman criticised decision to cast Mirren as former Israeli prime minister as she is not Jewish

Dame Helen Mirren has said questions over the choice to have her play Israel’s first female prime minister, Golda Meir, are “utterly legitimate”.

The Academy award-winning actress said there was “a discussion to be had” about the suitability of certain actors for certain roles.

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Israeli police ‘may have hacked phone’ of key witness in Netanyahu trial

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Claim emerges after officials admit finding evidence pointing to misuse of spyware by investigators

A key figure in the corruption trial of Israel’s former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have been illegally bugged by police, according to reports, amid global controversy about Israeli-made spyware and how it has been used.

In a recording broadcast by Channel 12 news, police are heard allegedly discussing tapping a phone belonging to Shlomo Filber, a former Netanyahu ally turned state witness. “It’s as if it’s illegal … to install the application,” a police officer says.

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Trump risked disaster with Abbas praise in key Israel meeting, ambassador says

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In new book, David Friedman recounts private meeting with Israeli president in which Trump also knocked Netanyahu – and how he says he turned his man around

Meeting then-Israeli president Reuven Rivlin in Jerusalem in May 2017, Donald Trump stunned advisers by criticising the then-prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for being unwilling to seek peace while Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian leader, was “desperate” for a deal.

The comment “knocked everyone off their chairs”, David Friedman, Trump’s ambassador to Israel, writes in a new book.

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Israeli police find ‘legally debatable’ use of spyware by investigators

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Admission follows allegations of snooping on mobile phones of protesters, politicians and criminal suspects

Israel’s national police force has found evidence pointing to improper use of spyware by its own investigators to snoop on Israeli citizens’ phones.

The announcement on Tuesday came two weeks after an Israeli newspaper reported a string of allegations that the police had used the NSO Group’s Pegasus software to surveil protesters, politicians and criminal suspects without authorisation from a judge.

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Amnesty International calls Israel’s actions against Palestinians apartheid

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Israel calls for report to be withdrawn and accuses human rights group of antisemitism

Amnesty International has joined other leading human rights groups in stating that Israel’s “system of oppression and domination” over the Palestinians amounts to the international definition of apartheid.

The report immediately prompted fury among Israeli politicians who called for it to be withdrawn.

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Israel military officers dismissed over death of Palestinian-American at checkpoint

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Antony Blinken pressed to investigate West Bank death of 78-year-old who was handcuffed, gagged and left by soldiers last month

Israel’s military has said it is dismissing two officers and would reprimand a battalion commander over the death of a Palestinian-American at a West Bank checkpoint after he was stopped by Israeli troops.

The death of Omar Abdalmajeed As’ad, who had lived in Milwaukee before retiring to his native village of Jiljilya, resulted from “a moral failure and poor decision-making”, it added.

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My support for sports projects in Israel is not ‘sportswashing’ | Letter

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Sylvan Adams, co-owner of the Israel Start-Up Nation pro cycling team, says his sports initiatives look to build bonds of coexistence and understanding

Jonathan Liew’s decision to attack my support for sports projects in Israel as “sportswashing” is perhaps the most ringing endorsement of why such bridge-building efforts are needed (Sportswashing is associated with certain countries – why not Israel?, 24 January).

When our liberal and open country holds its massive annual Gay Pride parade – the largest (if not the only one) in the Middle East, Israel is accused of “pinkwashing”. When Israel leads in environmental issues and breakthroughs in climate change technologies, Israel is accused of “greenwashing”. When our generous and supremely capable NGOs like IsraAid or Save a Child’s Heart provide support to communities in need around the world, we are accused of “aidwashing”.

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Israeli minister defends police over alleged Pegasus spying

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Omer Barlev denied claims that protesters’ phones had been hacked

Israel’s minister of public security has expressed his firm support for the country’s police force after allegations it used NSO Group’s controversial Pegasus software to spy on Israeli citizens.

In an interview with the Guardian on Wednesday, Omer Barlev, the cabinet minister with responsibility for policing, denied claims made this week by Hebrew-language financial daily Calcalist that the phones of people who led protests against former premier Benjamin Netanyahu had been hacked into or surveilled by police.

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