Rifts within Benny Gantz’s Blue and White party appear to be deepening as the crisis over Israel’s budget deepens and new elections loom. If no budget is passed by late December the government will automatically dissolve. Benjamin Netanyahu is widely suspected to be stalling on the budget in order to call Read more…
Saeb Erekat, who helped negotiate the Oslo Accords, died yesterday of covid-19. He passed away at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Centre, to which he had been transferred last month after testing positive for the illness. Erekat, who was 65, underwent a lung transplant three years ago and doctors said treating him was Read more…
Reuven Rivlin led the congratulations on Joe Biden’s victory, and invited the president-elect to visit Jerusalem. In an English-language video, the Israeli president wrote: “Mr President-elect, I was pleased to welcome you to Jerusalem as vice president and I look forward to welcoming you to Jerusalem as president of the Read more…
The election of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will bring avowed friends and supporters of Israel to the White House in January. Their approach towards the Middle East is likely to be very different in both style and substance to the outgoing administration. Biden’s commitment to Israel is long-standing. One Read more…
LFI Director Michael Rubin was a guest on the Progressive Britain Podcast which discussed the EHRC report into antisemitism in the Labour Party. Michael joined in a discussion with North West Jewish Labour Movement chair, Dena Ryness, Progress director Nathan Yeowell and Progress Campaign Assistant Frankie Grant. For the last Read more…
On Tuesday 3 November LFI Chair Steve McCabe met with members of the Knesset, Oded Forer and Michal Cotler-Wunsh as part of the UK-Israel Parliamentary Friendship Group. Members of Conservative Friends of Israel and the UK-Israel Peers Group also participated in the meeting. The Friendship Group, which was founded in Read more…
Keir Starmer’s response to last week’s report from the Equality and Human Rights Commission represents an important and major step forward in the challenge of rooting out the scourge of antisemitism from the Labour party. The findings of the EHRC’s investigation were both clear and conclusive. “Our investigation has identified Read more…
Mystery surrounds the death of a top commander of the armed wing of President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party who was killed on Saturday. Hatem Abu Rizek, a leading figure in the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, died at the Balata refugee camp, near the West Bank city of Nablus. Abu Rizek is said Read more…
Benny Gantz’s Blue and White party are reportedly considering leaving Israel’s coalition government, a move that would trigger new elections. The centrist party came to an agreement with Benjamin Netanyahu earlier this year after three inconclusive general elections in which it fought Likud to a virtual draw. Under the terms Read more…
The Palestinian Authority has been ordered by Jerusalem’s District Court to pay nearly £3m to the family of a couple who died in a 2002 terror attack. Tzipi and Gadi Shemesh (pictured) and their unborn twins were murdered in central Jerusalem’s King George Street in March 2002 when suicide bomber Read more…
Sudan has become the latest Arab nation to seek to normalise its relationship with Israel. The agreement was announced during a call between Benjamin Netanyahu, President Trump and Sudan’s Sovereign Council president, General Abdel Fattah al- Burhan, and prime minister Abdalla Hamdok. The announcement – which follows the signing Read more…
A cross-party group of members of the House of Lords welcomed the UAE’s normalisation agreement during a video call with the country’s ambassador to London last week. “We believe this is an exciting time for the UAE, Israel and the region,” Ambassador Mansoor Abulhoul told two dozen members of Read more…