Sorrow and Hope

Signs of the Times

The Most Fruitful Lie

January 16, 2024

    A thrill of anticipation rippled through the crowd. They’d come in their thousands, carrying a sea of red, green, white and black. Some of them shuffled impatiently, eager to move, to fight, to push back against the injustice. Others stared straight ahead, their faces set like flint at the thought of the horrors

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The Head of the Snake

January 16, 2024

  In the aftermath of October 7, as Israel battled Hamas in the trenches of Gaza, the world went to war alongside the fighting forces, pitting Israel supporters against Palestinian sympathizers in the trenches of social media. On the ground and in public opinion, the battle lines seemed clearly drawn: Israel on the one side

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Debunking the Popular Social Media Slurs

January 16, 2024

  Israel faces unrelenting criticism born of a prevailing false narrative that casts the Jewish state as the colonizing oppressor and the Palestinians as the colonized oppressed. We offer several examples from the most widespread and influential form of disinformation in modern culture: social media, and more specifically, X, formerly Twitter. We then counter that

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The War of Language

January 16, 2024

  “The first casualty of war is truth.” This phrase has echoed throughout the ages and has been attributed to various sources. In regard to the current situation with the enemies of Israel, I would edit it to say, “Truth is conspicuous by its absence.” Unfortunately, the propensity of Palestinian leadership and their supporters to

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A History of Hate

January 16, 2024

  We’ve heard it again and again. The events of October 7 are indelibly imprinted on the minds of countless people the world over. We’ve read about the atrocities, seen the videos and heard the gut-wrenching testimonies of survivors, released hostages and the families of those who are still in captivity. And we wonder, is

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Jewish Values and Ethics in War

January 16, 2024

  We often hear Israeli leaders claim that the Israel Defense Force (IDF) is an ethical, moral army, motivated by Jewish values, while Israel’s enemy is far different. What do they mean? According to the Oxford Dictionary, ethics is defined as “moral principles that govern a person’s behavior or the conducting of an activity.” Values are

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Israel, You Are Not Alone

November 9, 2023

  Saturday morning, October 7. It’s Shabbat and the streets of Jerusalem are the kind of quiet you find only on Saturdays in the Promised Land. We are on our way out,  heading to the Dead Sea to show a friend from Namibia the white desert of Judea. But then the air raid siren screams.

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Israel, We Are with You!

November 9, 2023

We bid farewell to 2023 and step into 2024 in the shadow of the October 7 massacre. So instead of general wishes of love and joy, the Bridges for Peace volunteers want to use this opportunity to tell Israel in their own words that whatever comes, whatever happens—good or bad—we are with you. “It is

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The Right to Exist?

November 9, 2023

The nation of Israel is often misunderstood and misrepresented in the global media—many times deliberately. For example, when speaking of Israel’s efforts to bring an end to a deadly wave of terror attacks in Judea and Samaria, Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir made the comment, “The right to life precedes freedom of movement.” The

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Don’t Stray too Far from Home: Iran’s Sinister Method of Attacking Israel

November 9, 2023

For the past several years, Israel has been engaging in a shadow war with Iran. The clerics in Tehran seek to wipe the “Zionist enemy” off the map and extend their influence across the Middle East, while Jerusalem seeks to thwart Iran’s regional and nuclear ambitions. Without an outright showdown on the battlefield, the Jewish

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