Israel

Israel’s new government is a daring, possibly doomed but nonetheless fascinating experiment. Headed by tech millionaire turned nationalist figurehead Naftali Bennett and TV journalist turned voice of centrism Yair Lapid, Jerusalem’s 36th government is an ideological hydra.  Bennett’s right-wing national-religious Yamina party is joined by the secular liberals of Lapid’s Yesh Atid, along with Kahol Lavan moderates, Labor social democrats, Meretz socialists, and the Likud breakaway faction Tikva Hadasha, plus Yisrael Beiteinu’s secular right-wingers and Ra’am’s Islamic conservatives. This unwieldy rabble is held together by a coalition agreement to focus on areas of consensus — more investment in education, bumping up defence spending, cutting bureaucracy and regulation, tackling crime and

In April, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi embarked on a six-nation Middle Eastern tour to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Oman. ‘Belt and Road’ cooperation, economic development and the Covid pandemic were the topics of discussion. The treatment of China’s Muslim Uighur population in detention camps, which some in the West have described as genocidal, didn’t come up. Both China and Saudi Arabia cleave to the belief that internal affairs are nobody else’s business — or at least as long as there are overriding economic interests at stake. Compare the silence of Muslim countries on the Uighur issue with the loud faux anger when the

So farewell, then, to Israel’s vaccine passport, the green pass. Less than three months after coming into effect, the Covid vaccination certification scheme was scrapped today, along with almost all of the remaining Covid-19 restrictions in public places. Israel was the first country to introduce a vaccine passport back in March. Cafes, bars, restaurants, gyms and plays were allowed to reopen to the public after months of lockdown, provided they only admitted vaccinated (and recovered) people. The pass took the form of a QR code downloaded from the health ministry or stored in a phone app. The scheme was vocally opposed by a small and passionate minority, but most Israelis

In the wake of its ceasefire agreement with Israel, Hamas has again attempted to paint itself as a struggling resistance movement against an occupying force. After 11 days of fighting, which left more than 250 people dead, Hamas’s co-founder, Mahmoud Zahar, claimed a strategic and a symbolic victory.  ‘The new element here is the degree of the resistance movement, in particular in Gaza, to attack the Israeli targets and very important points, including most of the overcrowded areas… the civilian society,’ he told Sky News. ‘So for how long will the Israelis accept that?’ By painting itself as a plucky victim, Hamas is trying to convince the Arab world –

The ceasefire between Hamas and Israel has started, and the gates to Gaza have opened for the international press. Now a new battle will begin over numbers and ratios. There will be calls for investigations, and endless debates about who ‘won’. Israel’s claims of precision targeting will come under scrutiny, but so too should Palestinian accounts, including claims of mass civilian deaths. At least 243 people are reported to have died in the Gaza Strip during Israel’s military action, including a reported 65 children. These figures rely on claims by the Gaza Health Authority – an unreliable body under Hamas control. The IDF says many civilian deaths are the result of

This week, Hungary defied Brussels and refusing to back a joint EU declaration on the Israeli-Palestine conflict. The bland EU statement calling for an end to the violence was underwhelming in itself – but with Hungary rejecting the bloc’s ‘one-sided’ approach, Brussels has been left embarrassed by its inability to coordinate a unanimous response to the fighting. The proposed statement from the bloc’s foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell read, ‘the priority is the cessation of all violence and the implementation of a ceasefire’, and said that: ‘we support the right to defence for Israel and the right to security – also for the Palestinians – and we consider that security