InDepth

The likelihood of Iran complying with its commitments is minimal. But there would be hundreds if not thousands of hours, days and weeks of new negotiations over whether and how the agreement is holding up. Once a deal is struck, the Western powers will be loath to cancel it, even when they know Iran is cheating.

By now everyone has heard of Deborah Feldman’s Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots. The book received much more attention than it should have.

I have long felt the holiest Jews are members of the IDF, the Israel Defense Forces. At countless rallies I’ve called out from the heart, “Blessed is the nation that has as its army the Israel Defense Forces.”

This is how it works: A minister or MK who steps out of line – opposing the destruction of the Ulpana neighborhood, for example – is immediately accused of “Feiglinism.” It makes no difference if the accuser is Tzipi Livni or Ehud Barak. “This is simply terrible,” Kadima MK Nachman Shai explained on the afternoon news. “Feiglin determines the fate of the Likud MKs.”

The Jewish Press urges readers to sign a circulating petition that calls on Shimon Peres to do all he can, in advance of accepting the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama, to persuade Mr. Obama to free Jonathan Pollard, the Israeli spy serving a life sentence in a federal prison. (President Obama announced last month that he would be awarding the Medal to Mr. Peres, the president of Israel, in June.)

We were dismayed by the criticism Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel leveled at Prime Minister Netanyahu following the latter’s speech marking Holocaust Remembrance Day. Mr. Wiesel took issue with what he said was the prime minister’s likening of the Holocaust to the threat posed to Israel by Iran. Obviously whatever Mr. Wiesel says about the Holocaust is worth listening to. But we are nonetheless puzzled.

.

.

For anyone with historical memory the expulsion of Jews – by the Romans, English, French, Spaniards, Nazis, and Muslims – instantly evokes tragic episodes in Jewish history. Now the state of Israel expels Jews from their homes. Something is amiss in Zion.

Benzion Netanyahu – historian, one-time political activist and father of Israel's prime minister – died Monday in Jerusalem at 102. An accomplished scholar and the patriarch of one of Israel's most important political families, he also played a surprising and little-known role in American political history.

Israel is apparently going to have elections this autumn and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will almost certainly win by a big margin. Understanding why explains a lot about the country that people think they know the most about but in fact comprehend the least.

President Barack Obama's recent self-congratulatory comments on the killing of Osama bin Laden must be viewed against the backdrop of past presidents, and how they related to the role of the military.

Instead of going after top officials suspected of embezzling public funds and abusing their powers, the Palestinian Authority government has chosen to wage an unprecedented clampdown on those who dare to raise their voices in support of transparency and freedom of speech.

As you know, just about everyone in the world outside of Israel has been claiming that an attack is imminent or that it is only being held back by the U.S. government. My argument has been that this is simply untrue. Most of the Israeli strategic and intelligence leadership oppose an attack, for the same reasons I do. Moreover, these people don’t believe it is going to happen in the near future.

The Bible consists of 613 commandments, one of which is for a man to marry and have children, and the other is for a man to avoid gay sex with another man. That leaves 611 commandments for gay men to observe. That should keep them pretty busy. Homosexuality should be treated like lighting fire on the Sabbath or eating non-kosher foods, both Biblical prohibitions

Perhaps an artist should be judged without regard to his/her political affiliations or actions, but the Metropolitan Museum's exhibit on the collection of Gertrude Stein and her family purports to present the story of the collection and of Gertrude's life in France. It ends with a misleading description of her activities during the war years, suppressing the fact that she collaborated with Nazism during the German occupation of France.

We have to believe in the superiority of our Western values. If we do not, we will not be prepared to defend them. That is why we have to end the biggest disease in the world today, the cultural relativism which posits that all cultures are equal. Our Judeo-Chrisitian, humanist civilization is more free, more democratic, more tolerant than any civilization the world has ever seen. We should not be afraid to say so.

Contrary to the statement in the NY Times obituary for Benzion Netanyahu that "ultimately, Israel was created as a result of the partition the revisionists opposed," Zionist Jews in the Land of Israel created the state, and not any UN resolution.

Nir Barkat: "Google Street View is an important tool to increase the number of tourists to Jerusalem," which received a record amount of more than 3 million tourists in 2010. Still, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) has in the past indicated that it made use of Google Earth technology to fire rockets into Israel.

Whatever the different formulations of Zionism, all proponents share the view that the area is the birthplace and the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people, linked by historical ties and by religious and cultural traditions.

The result may well be an Islamist versus Islamist run-off. In any event, it is likely that by the end of the year Egypt will have an Islamist president, parliament, and Constitution. Laws will be drastically altered, women’s rights will disappear, and Hamas will be backed up if it attacked Israel.

In the time that I spent with Professor Benzion Netanyahu, I discerned a Jewish nationalist of phenomenal determination. Zionism was in his DNA and I have rarely met a more passionate Jewish patriot or a prouder Jew. He had a sweeping view of history and could clearly argue the precarious state of the Jewish people throughout time.

Geert Wilders, the controversial Dutch lawmaker, has authored a new book about Islam, Marked for Death: Islam's War against the West and Me. In it he offers a detailed criticism of Islam and its incompatibility with the West: "To preserve our freedom from the encroachments of Islam, we must do four things: defend freedom of speech, reject cultural relativism, counter Islamization and cherish our national identity."

President Obama recently unveiled the Atrocities Prevention Board, and appointed Samantha Power as its head; the same Samantha Power that has called Israel a "major human rights abuser." This is only one of the many troubling aspects of this new initiative.

The failure thirty-two years ago of Operation Eagle Claw convinced U.S. military leaders to rethink how they would conduct special operations in the future: formulating plans that were simpler, carrying them out under unified command, and managing the risk. While our military has learned the lessons of the failed Iranian hostage rescue mission, however, our political leaders have not.

Unless new elections are called, this year's Summer Session will last less than three months, ending on July 25, 2012.

Boycotts on products from Judea and Samaria harm Palestinian livelihood. The simple truth is that industry in Judea and Samaria are imperative for Palestinian livelihood.

"I'm no expert on the Jews, but May 20th, 2012 might be the most Jewish event in the history of Judaism," writes my friend Baruch Herzfeld. On the money, assuming Baruch means (as I believe he does) that this thing is confusing and self-contradictory like a delicious Talmudic debate.

Anti-Israel messages and campaigns serve only the radicals in this region who do not want either peace or coexistence. The time has come for the emergence of a genuine pro-Palestinian camp in the West that would focus less on Israel and more on helping the Palestinians.

Recent warnings by President Obama to Israel against an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities are reminiscent of the period prior to the 1967 Six-Day War. Then, as now, Israel was faced with an existential threat. Then, as now, the U.S. pressured Israel not to take action.