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A torched bicycle shop, an arrested singer: Arab-Israelis face precarious landscape during Gaza war

TAYIBE, Israel (JTA) – In the days following Hamas’ bloody invasion of Israel, singer and influencer Dalal Abu Amneh posted a Palestinian flag to social media along with the words “There is no victor but God.”
By Tuesday, the post was gone, and Abu Amneh, who is also a brain researcher, was in Israeli prison — arrested for voicing support for Hamas. The musical artist and influencer, who lives in the Arab-Israeli city of Nazareth, is one of a growing number of Arab-Israelis, also known as Palestinian-Israelis, to be arrested in recent days for appearing to support the massacre.
“They tried to strip me of my humanity, silence my voice, and humiliate me in every way,” Abu Amneh posted on Instagram on Wednesday, writing that she was placed in solitary confinement and went on a hunger strike. “They insulted me and handcuffed my hands and feet, but they made me more proud and dignified. My voice will remain a messenger of love, defending the truth in this world.”
Meanwhile, stories have also emerged of Arab-Israelis rushing to save Jewish victims and volunteering to help the stricken communities of southern Israel in the wake of the attacks. A bicycle-shop owner in this central Arab-Israeli city of Tayibe donated 50 children’s bicycles to evacuees from the south and, days later, his shop was burned down. A crowdfunding campaign on his behalf, conducted in Hebrew and English, has since raised more than $150,000.
Indeed, the vast majority of Israel’s approximately 2 million Arab citizens don’t support the attacks. A poll conducted by the Agam Institute in Israel found that 80% of Arab-Israelis opposed Hamas’ attack, which killed more than 1,400 Israelis, while just 5% supported it, reported the publication Ynet.
Arab-Israelis say the attack, and Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza, has placed their community in a precarious position. Many are mourning Hamas’ attack — which killed at least 15 Arab-Israelis, according to the Arab-Israeli nonprofit Mossawa — while also opposing Israel’s airstrikes on Gaza, where many have family and friends. Those strikes have killed more than 3,200 people, per the Hamas-run Health Ministry.
“The majority are against all the casualties, it doesn’t matter which side, because we are all against the killing of innocent women, children and elderly,” said Murad, an engineer from Tayibe. “If someone says something pro-Hamas all of the Arabs are attacked as ‘They are against us!’ But if 100 or even 1,000 people are against Hamas, nobody notices.”
Murad was sitting with friends on Tuesday in the city’s Two Brothers Cafe, discussing the ongoing war over coffee. Like his friends, Murad declined to give his last name, fearful of repercussions for openly sharing his opinion. Israeli-Arab politicians have also denounced the Hamas massacre, along with the killing of civilians in Gaza.
“We should say here and now that the murder of women and children and the elderly, and atrocities against civilians in the south, are worthy of unstinting denunciation,” Arab-Israeli lawmaker Ahmad Tibi said in a speech last week in Israel’s parliament, the Knesset. “Human morality is not selective. There is no half-morality. Murder of children is murder of children.”
Previous Israeli wars in Gaza have seen friction, conflict and arrests in Arab-Israeli communities and so-called “mixed cities.” In 2021, Arab-Jewish cities in Israel saw fierce interethnic clashes before and during Israel’s conflict that year with Hamas. In 2014, the last time Israeli ground forces invaded Gaza, 1,500 Israeli-Arabs were arrested for protesting the military operation.
Figures provided by the Israel Police say 63 people have been arrested for supporting Hamas or the massacre, and 40 Arab-Israeli students have been suspended or expelled from universities, according to the Arab-Israeli legal nonprofit Adalah.
Shlomo Karhi, the Communication Minister, recently pushed for emergency legislation that would grant the police power to shut off the broadcasts and close the offices of media outlets that “significantly harm national security.” Karhi has taken aim specifically at the Qatar-based Al Jazeera network, which has a bureau in Israel and which he called a “terror-supporting station.”
“We are at war!” Karhi posted to social media on Monday along with a copy of the draft regulations. “Whoever wants can petition the Supreme Court afterward, but this station must close now!”
In light of that atmosphere, Murad said he had advised his adult son not to post anything about the conflict to social media.
“There is no space to protest,” he said. “I told my son, who is 27 and an engineer, ‘do not say anything, not even a humanitarian message.’”
Harel Chorev-Halewa, a historian of the Middle East at Tel Aviv University, said that protests have not broken out in Arab-Israeli or mixed cities during the current conflict due to a mix of fear from what will ensue and shock from Hamas’ massacre.
Groups that would foment unrest, Chorev-Halewa said, “know that nobody, including the security forces and the civilians, will wait around for any manifestation of force or things that we saw in May, 2021. People are openly saying, ‘If you will come to my house, if you will come to my street, I will shoot you.’”
Chorev-Halewa said Arab-Israeli repudiation of Hamas’ attack is also “a failure of Hamas’ strategy” to incite Arab-Israelis to rebel.
That calm atmosphere is present in Tayibe, said Abed, the barista at Two Brothers. He said locals are less personally affected by the war because “more than half of Gazans are from the coastal region of Jaffa, Ashkelon, Ramle and Lod,” rather than the center of Israel. Accordingly, life is unfolding relatively normally in the city, save for nationwide school closures, which have kept Tayibe’s children at home as well.
Arab-Israeli grievance toward the government is far from limited to the military operation in Gaza. This year, Arab-Israelis have protested a spike in murders in their communities, with more than 180 Arab citizens killed in violent incidents this year. Arab leaders and activists have long castigated the state for discriminating against Arab-Israelis in a variety of ways — from disparities in funding to policing.
“The Israeli press always asks the Israeli-Arab, ‘What side are you on?’” Murad said. “I ask, what side are you on when they kill 200 of our sons here and no criminal is arrested?” He added that he is also worried about an eruption of violence in the West Bank, where clashes have been escalating this year and where more than 50 Palestinians have been killed since the Oct. 7 invasion.
“It cannot work like that, when you see 700 to 800 babies killed in Gaza,” Murad said. “There are children on both the Israeli and Palestinian side that are both victims.”
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As Gaza War Continues, Hamas Calls for Global Protests While Israel Marks Breakthroughs in Medical Innovation

A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
As the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas calls for global protests amid stalled Gaza ceasefire talks, Israel has broken new ground despite the ongoing conflict, achieving a major medical breakthrough in synthetic human kidney development.
The contrast illustrates a stark contrast between the priorities of Hamas, an international designated terrorist group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and Israel, the lone democracy in the Middle East that has long been a leader in tech and medical innovation.
On Wednesday, Hamas urged worldwide protests in support of Palestinians, calling on the international community “to denounce Israel’s genocidal war and starvation policy in Gaza.”
“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in all cities and squares on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday … through rallies, demonstrations and sit-ins outside the embassies of the Israeli regime and its allies, particularly in the US,” the statement read.
The Palestinian terrorist group also called to expose what it described as “the terrorism of the Zio-Nazi occupation against defenseless civilians.”
Hamas’s latest move against Israel comes amid stalled indirect negotiations over a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, which collapsed last month after the group vowed it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established — rejecting a key Israeli demand to end the war in Gaza.
In its statement, Hamas demanded the opening of all border crossings to allow immediate aid into the war-torn enclave and urged a global condemnation of “the international community’s inaction on the Israeli crimes.”
Amid mounting international pressure to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel announced new measures to facilitate the delivery of aid, including temporary pauses in fighting in certain areas and the creation of protected routes for aid convoys.
Israeli officials have previously accused Hamas of diverting aid for terrorist activities and selling supplies at inflated prices to civilians, while also blaming the United Nations and other foreign organizations for enabling this diversion.
Hamas’s statement also emphasized that the “global resistance movement must continue until Israeli aggression on Gaza ends and the siege on the coastal strip is lifted.”
Meanwhile, as Israel faces escalating hostilities and the heavy toll of war, the Jewish state continues to push the boundaries of innovation and resilience, achieving new medical breakthroughs while confronting ongoing challenges.
In a major medical breakthrough, scientists at Sheba Medical Center and Tel Aviv University have successfully grown a synthetic 3D miniature human kidney in a lab using specialized stem cells derived from kidney tissue — one of the most promising advances in regenerative medicine.
Dr. Dror Harats, chairman of Sheba’s Research Authority, described this achievement as a reflection of Israel’s leading role in global medical innovation.
“Despite growing efforts to isolate Israel from international science, breakthroughs like this prove our impact is both lasting and essential,” he said.
In a landmark study, a team from Sheba’s Safra Children’s Hospital and Tel Aviv University’s Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine created synthetic kidney organs that matured and remained stable for 34 weeks — the longest-lasting and most refined kidney organoids developed to date.
Nearly a decade ago, the research team became the first to successfully isolate human kidney tissue stem cells — the cells responsible for the organ’s development and growth.
Previous attempts to grow kidneys in a lab using general-purpose stem cells were short-lived, typically lasting only a few weeks and often producing unwanted cell types that compromised research accuracy.
However, this Israeli research team used stem cells taken directly from kidney tissue — cells that naturally develop into kidney parts — allowing them to create a much purer and more stable model with key features found in real kidneys.
This medical breakthrough could have far-reaching implications, redefining the current understanding of kidney diseases and advancing the development of innovative treatments.
Researchers believe the model could help assess how medications impact fetal kidneys during pregnancy and move science closer to repairing or replacing damaged kidney tissue with lab-grown cells.
The discovery came days after researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and international partners discovered a way to boost the immune system’s cancer-fighting ability by reprogramming how T cells, which are white blood cells critical to the immune system, produce energy.
The researchers explained in a study published in the peer-reviewed Nature Communications that disabling a protein known as Ant2 in T cells greatly enhances their effectiveness against tumors.
“By disabling Ant2, we triggered a complete shift in how T cells produce and use energy,” Prof. Michael Berger of Hebrew University’s Faculty of Medicine, who co-led the study with doctorate student Omri Yosef, told the Tazpit Press Service. “This reprogramming made them significantly better at recognizing and killing cancer cells.”
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Netherlands to Push EU to Suspend Israel Trade Deal but Won’t Recognize Palestinian State ‘At This Time’

Netherlands Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp addresses a press conference, in New Delhi on April 1, 2025. Photo: ANI Photo/Sanjay Sharma via Reuters Connect
The Netherlands is spearheading efforts to suspend the European Union-Israel trade agreement amid rising EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, while simultaneously refusing to recognize a Palestinian state, contrasting with other member states as international pressure mounts.
On Thursday, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp announced that the Netherlands will push the EU to suspend the trade component of the EU-Israel Association Agreement — a pact governing the EU’s political and economic ties with the Jewish state.
This latest anti-Israel initiative follows a recent EU-commissioned report accusing Israel of committing “indiscriminate attacks … starvation … torture … [and] apartheid” against Palestinians in Gaza during its military campaign against Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist group.
Following calls from a majority of EU member states for a formal investigation, this report built on Belgium’s recent decision to review Israel’s compliance with the trade agreement, a process initiated by the Netherlands and led by EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas.
According to the report, “there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations” under the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.
While the document acknowledges the reality of violence by Hamas, it states that this issue lies outside its scope — failing to address the Palestinian terrorist group’s role in sparking the current war with its bloody rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli officials have slammed the report as factually incorrect and morally flawed, noting that Hamas embeds its military infrastructure within civilian targets and Israel’s army takes extensive precautions to try and avoid civilian casualties.
In a Dutch parliamentary debate on Gaza on Thursday, Veldkamp also announced that the government would not recognize a Palestinian state for now — a position that stands in sharp contrast to the recent moves by several other EU member states to extend recognition.
“The Netherlands is not planning to recognize a Palestinian state at this time,” the Dutch diplomat said.
“This war has ceased to be a just war and is now leading to the erosion of Israel’s own security and identity,” he continued.
This latest decision goes against the position of several EU member states, including France, which has committed to recognizing Palestinian statehood in September.
The United Kingdom has likewise indicated it will do so unless Israel acts to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and agrees to a ceasefire.
For its part, Germany said it was not planning to recognize a Palestinian state in the short term, and Italy argued that recognition must occur simultaneously with the recognition of Israel by the new entity.
Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Slovenia all recognized a Palestinian state last year.
Israel has been facing growing pressure from several EU member states seeking to undermine its defensive campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
On Thursday, European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera strongly condemned Israel’s actions in the war-torn enclave, describing the situation as a “grave violation of human dignity.”
“What we are seeing is a concrete population being targeted, killed and condemned to starve to death,” Ribera told Politico. “If it is not genocide, it looks very much like the definition used to express its meaning.”
Until now, the European Commission has refrained from accusing Israel of genocide, but Ribera’s comments mark one of the strongest European condemnations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
She also called on the EU to take decisive action by considering the suspension of its trade agreement with Israel and the implementation of sanctions, while emphasizing that such measures would require unanimous approval from all member states.
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Graduate Student Unions Promoting Antisemitism, Reform Group Says

Students listen to a speech at a protest encampment at Stanford University in Stanford, California US, on April 26, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect.
Higher-education-based unions controlled by United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) are rife with antisemitism and anti-Zionist discrimination, according to a new letter imploring the US Congress’s House Committee on Education and the Workforce to address the matter.
“Tracing its roots to communism in the 1930s, the UE is a radical, pro-Hamas labor union that has a long history of antisemitism,” the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW), one of the US’s leading labor reform groups, wrote on July 30 in a message obtained by The Algemeiner. “The UE openly supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which is designed to cripple and destroy Israel economically. Today, the UE furthers its antisemitic agenda by unionizing graduate students on college campuses and using its exclusive representation powers to create a hostile environment for Jewish students. The hostile environment includes demanding compulsory dues to fund the UE’s abhorrent activities.”
NRTW went on to describe a litany of alleged injustices to which UE members subject Jewish student-employees in the US’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to Cornell University. At MIT, the letter said, “union officers” aided a riotous group which illegally occupied a section of campus with a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” participating in the demonstration and even denying access to campus buildings. UE members at Stanford University, meanwhile, allegedly denied religious accommodations to Jewish students who requested exemption from union dues over that branch’s supporting the BDS movement. And Cornell University UE was accused of denying religious exemptions in several cases as well and followed up the rejection with an intrusive “questionnaire” which probed Jewish students for “legally-irrelevant information.”
The situation requires federal oversight and intervention, NRTW said, including Congress’s possibly clarifying that student-employees are not traditional employees and are therefore afforded protections under sections of the Civil Rights Act which apply to the campus.
“These continuing patterns of antisemitism are illegal, immoral, and must be stopped,” the letter continued. “We encourage you to do all that is in your power to investigate and help bring an end to the UE and its affiliates’ nonstop harassment and intimidation of Jewish students … The Trump administration can also use tools available to it under Title VI and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act against colleges who work with unions to create a hostile environment for Jewish students.”
July’s letter is not the first time NRTW has publicized alleged antisemitic abuse in unions representing higher education employees.
In 2024, it represented a group of six City University of New York (CUNY) professors, five of whom are Jewish, who sued to be “freed” from CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) over its passing a resolution during Israel’s May 2021 war with Hamas which declared solidarity with Palestinians and accused the Jewish state of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and crimes against humanity. The group contested New York State’s “Taylor Law,” which it said chained the professors to the union’s “bargaining unit” and denied their right to freedom of speech and association by forcing them to be represented in negotiations by an organization they claim holds antisemitic views.
That same year, NRTW prevailed in a discrimination suit filed to exempt another cohort of Jewish MIT students from paying dues to the Graduate Student Union (GSU). The students had attempted to resist financially supporting GSU’s anti-Zionism, but the union bosses attempted to coerce their compliance, telling them that “no principles, teachings, or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees” to the union.
“All Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason,” NRTW said at the time.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.