Scholars, advocates, and activists seeking to make the U.S. a more responsible global partner.
Israel

Does Israel Belong in the Club?

by | Apr 27, 2010

Next month, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is expected to invite Israel to join its 30-strong club of rich, mostly Western countries pursuing a “stronger, cleaner, fairer world economy.” Accession would conclude three years of formal negotiations and almost two decades of lobbying from successive Israeli governments, with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman especially keen to align his country with the world’s advanced democratic nations. OECD status will accelerate investment, raise Israel’s credit rating, and strengthen its voice in international affairs.

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No Tea Parties for Bibi

by | Apr 7, 2010

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s arrival in Washington shortly after President Barack Obama’s victory on healthcare reform had both symbolic significance and practical implications for the Likud leader. Obama’s win was interpreted as Netanyahu’s loss, reflecting the zero-sum nature of the diplomatic clash between the rightwing Israeli leader and the liberal occupant of the White House.

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Obama Stumbles on Human Rights

by | Mar 4, 2010

It was a relatively short response to a question in a town hall-style meeting in Florida, yet it said much about President Barack Obama’s lack of concern about human rights in his foreign policy. The question came not from a hostile Republican opponent, but from a young college student who had volunteered on Obama’s campaign. She spoke directly to an issue that has alienated much of Obama’s Democratic base since the president took office: ongoing U.S. support for Israeli and Egyptian human rights abuses. The Israeli and Egyptian governments, both of which have notoriously poor human rights records, are the two largest recipients of U.S. security assistance.

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Bipartisan Attack on International Humanitarian Law

by , | Nov 4, 2009

In a stunning blow against international law and human rights, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a resolution on Tuesday attacking the report of the United Nations Human Rights Council’s fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict. The report was authored by the well-respected South African jurist Richard Goldstone and three other noted authorities on international humanitarian law, who had been widely praised for taking leadership in previous investigations of war crimes in Rwanda, Darfur, the former Yugoslavia, and elsewhere. Since this report documented apparent war crimes by a key U.S. ally, however, Congress has taken the unprecedented action of passing a resolution condemning it. Perhaps most ominously, the resolution also endorses Israel’s right to attack Syria and Iran on the grounds that they are "state sponsors of terrorism."

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The Goldstone Report: Killing the Messenger

by , | Oct 7, 2009

On October 1, the Obama administration successfully pressured the Palestinian delegation to the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva to drop its proposal to recommend that the UN Security Council endorse the findings of the Goldstone Commission report. The report, authored by renowned South African jurist Richard Goldstone, detailed the results of the UNHRC’s fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict. These findings included the recommendation that both Hamas and the Israeli government bring to justice those responsible for war crimes during the three weeks of fighting in late December and early January. If they don’t, the report urges that the case be referred to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for possible prosecution.

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Defeating Hitler and Saving Israel

Defeating Hitler and Saving Israel

by , | Sep 28, 2009

Avraham Burg, author of The Holocaust is Over: We Must Rise from its Ashes (Palgrave Macmillan 2008), is a left-leaning dissident Israeli whose views on issues such as Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians are well-known but hardly mainstream. Burg comes from a distinguished Israeli political family, and was himself speaker of Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, from 1999-2003 as a member of the Labor Party. He served as a paratroop officer in Israel’s Defense Forces, opposed the 1982 war on Lebanon, and was wounded in a 1983 grenade attack by an Israeli right-winger on a demonstration sponsored by Peace Now, an Israeli nongovernmental organization that supports a just peace and conciliation with the Palestinians. He also has been Chairman of the Jewish Agency and the World Zionist Organization. His mother, born in what’s now the Israeli-occupied West Bank, survived the Hebron massacre of 1929; his father was a refugee from Nazi Germany in 1939.

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The Goldstone Report

by , | Sep 23, 2009

Judge Richard Goldstone’s report on the war in Gaza threatens the Obama administration’s global public diplomacy options and its scrupulously graduated approach to whatever passes for a Middle East Peace process. State Department Spokesman Ian Kelly complained that Goldstone opted for "cookie-cutter conclusions" about Israel’s actions, while keeping "the deplorable actions of Hamas to generalized remarks." However, Kelly urged the Israeli government to investigate further.

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