A series of Security Oriented Events With the Palestinians Threatens Fragile Status Quo: Two explosions in two different locations in Jerusalem killed a young sixteen year old Yeshiva student and severely injured some more passersby. The explosions were the result of a preplanned action by a Palestinian terrorist squad. One of the explosions was at the main entrance to Jerusalem, which blocked all the roads for hours, and caused heavy traffic jams.
In another event, a young eighteen year old Israeli citizen, from the Druze community, was severely injured in a car accident in a Palestinian town, Jenin in the West Bank. He was hospitalized there, his family were at his bedside, when a group of masked and armed Palestinians entered the room and kidnapped him, removing him from the life support systems keeping him alive. Israeli Druze are a small Arab community who tried to negotiate with the Palestinian Authority. The kidnappers announced that they are willing to exchange the body for bodies of Palestinians who are kept by Israel for bargaining. Eventually with a lot of pressure from Israeli officials and some pressure from American officials, the body was safely returned to the family so that would be able to have a respectful funeral.
Earlier this week, on Saturday, some clashes occurred in the Palestinian city of Hebron, in the southern West Bank, when a group of observant Jews started harassing Palestinian residents. About 30,000 Jews came to Hebron to celebrate the annual Chayei Sarah with the settlers who live there. Some of them started attacking the Palestinians and when an army unit came to impose order on the Jewish celebrants, they attacked a woman soldier. This resulted in an extremely critical response from all high ranking army officers. Some protesters were arrested.
Netanyahu Still Faces Difficulties In Trying to Assemble His New Government: Political negotiations with the party members of the proposed new government coalition have placed a lot of challenges before Netanyahu. The Religious Zionists insist on receiving major and security oriented ministries so they can implement their ideology and have full control over the Jewish settlements in the West Bank. Netanyahu understands that may create obstacles especially with the international community in general and the US administration in particular who don’t want any change in the status quo. Religious Zionists, with Bezalel Smotritch and Itamar Ben-Gvir in the lead, are considered to be a red flag to the international community. Both are perceived as racists regarding Arabs, totally support expanding the Jewish settlements, and even campaign for annexation of the West Bank.
Meanwhile the Bank of Israel decided to raise interests raise again by 0.5% to 3.25% thereby raising mortgage payments for mortgages with variable rates of interest. And, in addition, food suppliers raised prices. The new government has promised to deal with the high cost of living in Israel, a perennial cause of dissatisfaction amongst Israelis.
Former PM Ehud Olmert Lost a Defamation Law Suit Against Entering PM Netanyahu and his Family: Netanyahu sued Olmert, who stated in a digital TV channel interview that Netanyahu, his wife Sara and their oldest son Yair are suffering severe psychiatric illness and they need to be hospitalized. Olmert will have to pay compensation to each of the family members. Since the trial drew a lot of public attention, the verdict was aired in a streaming channel of the court administration. Olmert announced that he may appeal to a higher court. It is important to say in this context that Netanyahu’s wife and son Yair are deeply involved in political decision making processes, the son Yair is extremely active on social media platforms in which he often uses base and defamatory language.
Many Israeli Soccer Fans Able to Travel to Qatar for the 2022 World Cup: Israel and Qatar don’t have diplomatic relations, but Qatar has enabled Israeli passport holders entrance to the country and purchase of tickets to the games. Israeli media are covering the world event extensively. Public TV broadcast stations are airing the games live and have built studios in the country. Qatar has even allowed direct flights from Israel by a third country carrier, Cyprus based TUS Airways.
Israel Marks International Day to Combat Violence Against Women: amidst political and security unrest, women’s groups are leading the media conversation and public activities to mark the International Day to Combat Violence Against Women, November 25th. The Knesset Information and Research Center released a research report on gender-based violence. The report shows that most Jewish women victims of femicide were murdered by their husband or intimate partner, only one third of the Arab women were killed by their husband or other family member. While more than 70% of the cases of femicide of Jewish women were solved and the killer brought to trial, less than 30% of the femicide cases of Arab women were solved.
The Association of Rape Crisis Centers published its annual report, showing that more than 14,000 people called the crisis centers’ hotline in 2021, half of them are minors. Only 717 inditements were filed against sexual assailants in 2021. The report also shows that most of those convicted of sexual crimes were not rehabilitated in prison, did not serve their full term and many of them were repeat offenders.
WIZO Israel published a research report and position paper on the acute problem of children exposed to violence. 600,000 children are exposed to direct violence in their homes and are witnesses to violence against their mothers. The report also says that educational teams lack the tools and knowledge to identify children exposed to violence and hence offer them the help and support they need.
As security threats are on the rise, right wing political leaders and social media activists call on people to carry firearms. Yet, a report published by the “Gun on the Kitchen Table” coalition of feminist and human rights groups shows, that the proliferation of firearms in public and domestic spaces poses a threat to women’s lives. Half of the women victims of femicide were killed by firearms, as compared with one third in the past decade.
Women’s groups will lead the traditional protest marches in major cities throughout the weekend, to demand safety and security for women in their homes and in the streets, and better policies and budget allocation to combat all forms of violence against women.
For further reading:
Security situation: Here, here, here, Here, here, here, Here, here, here
Political reality: Here, here, here
Netanyahu vs. Olmert: Here, here