civil rights | The Blogs

Apply for a Blog

Richard Kronenfeld

Mar 29, 2023, 1:32 PM

Lamenting the Decline of Liberty

The story is told that when Benjamin Franklin left the closing session of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, passersby in the street asked him what kind of government the delegates had given us, to which he replied, “A republic,...

Mar 29, 2023, 12:37 PM

Search on suspicion, the new Israeli version

Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Recently, I heard a Palestinian man describe the experience of driving home through a checkpoint, with his family in the car. He found himself faced with a barrage of semi-automatic weapons pointed at him, and he was forced, in...

Daniel Raphael Silverstein

Mar 28, 2023, 11:05 PM

A Prayer for a Country Poised Between Demise and Rebirth

(Please read out loud if you're able and willing...) May we remember that our faces are mirrors of each other, our fears are mirrors of each other's, our hopes are mirrors of each other's, and all of our children will...

Moshe-Mordechai van Zuiden

Mar 16, 2023, 12:42 PM

“The worst thing that could happen is that Israel would become like America”

It's not the first time I think Dershowitz is talking total nonsense Professor Alan Dershowitz is a judicial giant. Yet, he lives in the US which shows in what he thinks. He doesn't understand what happens in Israel now. He...

Shermeen Yousif

Mar 11, 2023, 1:11 PM

Iraq’s new online content regulation is a big step backward

A local Iraqi boy takes photographs with a cell phone during an opening ceremony for a new vocational school facility in the Shawra Wa Um Jidir area of eastern Baghdad, Iraq on June 11, 2022. (DVIDSHUB, via Wikimedia Commons)

Freedom of expression is a basic human right, even when offensive, and blocking people from opining on social media violates it

Mar 9, 2023, 4:02 AM

When Judy Heumann schooled me about the truth

The mother of disability rights made me, a rabbi, see how traditional Judaism can be dehumanizing, in the guise of pity

Mar 7, 2023, 12:06 AM

Israel’s Civil Society – Beyond Democratic Crisis

Israel’s innovative and largely democratically and progressively-leaning civil society – non-government organizations and philanthropy – has played a historical role in driving Israel’s rocky but significant society-building progress over recent decades. Precisely the kind of progress which has contributed...

Mar 5, 2023, 10:19 AM

‘Them or Us’ = Alarming Disunity

Israelis wave national flags during protest against plans by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's new government to overhaul the judicial system, outside the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem, Monday, Feb. 13, 2023. Thousands of Israelis protested outside the country's parliament on Monday ahead of a preliminary vote on a bill that would give politicians greater power over appointing judges, part of a judicial overhaul proposed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)

I recently returned from a trip to Israel, where while visiting family and friends, my wife and I tried to make sense of the political upheaval following the government’s proposed changes to the Supreme Court appointments, the limits imposed...

Feb 26, 2023, 8:26 AM

Shut-Down Nation

"Israeli Democracy" Tel Aviv Beach, Tel Aviv, Israel, February 25, 2023 / Adar 4, 5783 (Sari Ellen)

“Democracy?” said the Likud Customer Service Rep. “You don’t need it.” “But Israel's a Parliamentary Democracy—.” “Democracy, shlock-ocracy. Here, try on radical fringe politics, it’s the best.” "You’re disrespecting our values: equal rights, morality, justice, compassion—” “Radical fringe politics will look great on...

Feb 18, 2023, 2:46 PM

He Was Known to the Police

Two young men were killed in Lod on Wednesday, one by a car bomb, the other shot. Both were “known to the police.” As the video of the burning car made the rounds, people peered at narrow road visible...

Load more