Basel Ghattas, an Arab Knesset member, participated in the recent flotilla intended to break Israel’s blockade of Hamas. In doing so, writes Khaled Abu Toameh, he only harmed the interests of those who voted for him:

In recent years, some Knesset members have devoted much of their time and efforts to helping the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip at the expense of their own constituents in Israel. The actions and rhetoric of [these] Knesset members have also caused huge damage to relations between Jews and Arabs in Israel. The biggest losers are the Israeli Arabs, whose representatives in the Knesset have done little to improve their living conditions. . . .

It was hard this week to find Arab Israelis who saw anything positive in Ghattas’s decision to sail aboard a ship to the Gaza Strip. In fact, many did not hesitate privately to criticize the decision. . . . However, most of the critics were afraid to go on the record because they feared accusations of being “traitors” for speaking out against one of their representatives in the Knesset. . . .

It is time for Arab Israelis to distance themselves from those representatives who are acting against their interests and damaging relations between Jews and Arabs. If there are some Knesset members who wish to devote their time and energy to helping the Palestinians, they should consider moving to the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In a recent article, the New York Times Magazine asserts that Benjamin Netanyahu “prolonged the war in Gaza to stay in power.” Niranjan Shankar takes the argument apart piece by piece, showing that for all its careful research, it fails to back up its basic claims. For instance: the article implies that Netanyahu torpedoed a three-point cease-fire proposal supported by the Biden administration in the spring of last year:

First of all, it’s crucial to note that Biden’s supposed “three-point plan” announced in May 2024 was originally an Israeli proposal. Of course, there was some back-and-forth and disagreement over how the Biden administration presented this initially, as Biden failed to emphasize that according to the three-point framework, a permanent cease-fire was conditional on Hamas releasing all of the hostages and stepping down. Regardless, the piece fails to mention that it was Hamas in June 2024 that rejected this framework!

It wasn’t until July 2024 that Hamas made its major concession—dropping its demand that Israel commit up front to a full end to the war, as opposed to doing so at a later stage of cease-fire/negotiations. Even then, U.S. negotiators admitted that both sides were still far from agreeing on a deal.

Even when the Times raises more credible criticisms of Israel—like when it brings up the IDF’s strategy of conducting raids rather than holding territory in the first stage of the war—it offers them in what seems like bad faith:

[W]ould the New York Times prefer that Israel instead started with a massive ground campaign with a “clear-hold-build” strategy from the get-go? Of course, if Israel had done this, there would have been endless criticism, especially under the Biden administration. But when Israel instead tried the “raid-and-clear” strategy, it gets blamed for deliberately dragging the war on.