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An Israeli protest group is inviting strangers to debate politics in their sukkahs

JERUSALEM (JTA) — Every Saturday night, Michal Muszkat-Barkan heads out to the streets of Jerusalem to oppose the government’s effort to weaken the judiciary. As the leader of a protest group called Safeguarding Our Shared Home, she is one of many activists who have brought out hundreds of thousands of Israelis to demonstrate against the judicial overhaul.
But this week, Muszkat-Barkan’s group has been engaging people in another sort of group endeavor — aiming not to persuade or demonstrate, but to listen to differing views across the political and religious spectrum.
The initiative is tied to the weeklong fall festival of Sukkot, in which Jews traditionally eat meals with guests in sukkahs, outdoor huts constructed for the holiday. Muszkat-Barkan’s movement, abbreviated as SOS Home, has enlisted more than 250 people across Israel to open their sukkahs to strangers, inviting Israelis from all walks of life to engage in dialogue on some of the key issues plaguing the country today — including but not limited to the judicial overhaul.
“We want the public to learn and understand the issues at play here, and not just to learn how to protest,” Muszkat-Barkan, who is a Jewish education professor at Hebrew Union College, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“Sukkot is a time when we leave our safe spaces,” she added. “You feel everything more – the cold, the heat, the rain — and there’s an underlying symbolism there. There’s also the idea of… inviting guests who aren’t immediate family, and here we’re inviting people that we wouldn’t otherwise necessarily talk to.”
SOS Home organized the project with 929, an Israeli Bible study initiative that was similarly founded to engage people across demographics in a shared Jewish activity. People who sign up for the project get matched with a sukkah, where a facilitator guides the group through conversations on Israel’s political and social issues, in addition to what it means to be Jewish and Israeli.
Participants are asked to ponder what the past 10 months — during which Israeli social strife has spiked — have meant to them. If there was one guest, either living or from the past century, whom they could invite to their sukkah, who would it be? What do they think about the judicial overhaul? What does it mean for Israel to be a Jewish and democratic state?
The group has trained more than 100 facilitators to lead the discussions taking place in the sukkot, including famous Israeli musicians such as Ivri Lider and Berry Sakharof and liberal politicians and activists including Yaya Fink and Yuli Tamir. The list of facilitators also includes liberal religious Zionist Rabbi Benny Lau, who leads 929, and at least one prominent right-wing figure who supports the judicial overhaul, former Likud lawmaker Yehuda Glick. The sessions include “people calling to end the occupation alongside settlers,” Muszkat-Barkan said.
Several of the hosting sukkahs are in West Bank settlements, while others are hosted by members of cohorts of religious Jews who have moved into urban centers. Sarah Eliash, a former high school principal from the northern West Bank settlement of Kedumim and a political activist who is pushing for compromise on the judicial legislation, was a guest at one of the sukkahs.
“I certainly don’t share political ideologies with many of the others, but I will never dismiss them. We live here together and we need to find a way to straighten out our differences,” Eliash told JTA.
Muszkat-Barkan sees a continuum between the protest movement and the dialogue initiative her group is now leading. At the demonstrations, she said, the group has extended invitations to representatives of minority communities, including Ethiopian, Russian and haredi Orthodox Israelis. They have also invited Reform and Conservative Jewish leaders.
“No doubt that a lot of people won’t believe that a protest movement can also call for dialogue,” she told JTA. “But anyone who knows us knows that from the very first moment, that’s what we’ve called for.”
She added, “A lot of people say, your voice is one that we need. On the one hand, a voice of protest, of preserving democracy and a separation of powers, and on the other, a voice calling for a mechanism of broad consensus.”
She also isn’t concerned that opponents of the judicial overhaul will come to support the legislation after the dialogue sessions, though she said any participant “may arrive at different conclusions than those he entered with.”
“I’m not concerned that people who thought the reform was bad for Israel will now leave and be convinced it’s a good thing, but yes, they may leave thinking there’s a way forward for dialogue and agreement,” she said. “It’s really essential.”
Although this initiative was planned well before the start of the fall Jewish holiday season a few weeks ago, it gained added urgency for Muszkat-Barkan following Yom Kippur, when clashes broke out between secular protesters and worshipers at public prayers organized by an Orthodox outreach group in Tel Aviv. “This wasn’t a reaction to what happened on Yom Kippur because it was organized long before that, but in hindsight it stood as a kind of response,” she said.
“People are hurting badly,” she added. “They are angry at the leadership which is pushing us to hate one another. By and large, Israeli society is a very warm one but our leaders are trying to build walls between us. It’s a historical travesty.”
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The post An Israeli protest group is inviting strangers to debate politics in their sukkahs appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Lebanon Must Disarm Hezbollah to Have a Shot at Better Days, Says US Envoy

Thomas Barrack at the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse in Brooklyn, New York, U.S., November 4, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
i24 News – Lebanon’s daunting social, economic and political issues would not get resolved unless the state persists in the efforts to disarm Hezbollah, the Iranian proxy behind so much of the unrest and destruction, special US envoy Tom Barrack told The National.
“You have Israel on one side, you have Iran on the other, and now you have Syria manifesting itself so quickly that if Lebanon doesn’t move, it’s going to be Bilad Al Sham again,” he said, using the historical Arabic name for the region sometimes known as “larger Syria.”
The official stressed the need to follow through on promises to disarm the Iranian proxy, which suffered severe blows from Israel in the past year, including the elimination of its entire leadership, and is considered a weakened though still dangerous jihadist outfit.
“There are issues that we have to arm wrestle with each other over to come to a final conclusion. Remember, we have an agreement, it was a great agreement. The problem is, nobody followed it,” he told The National.
Barrack spoke on the heels of a trip to Beirut, where he proposed a diplomatic plan for the region involving the full disarmament of Hezbollah by the Lebanese state.
The post Lebanon Must Disarm Hezbollah to Have a Shot at Better Days, Says US Envoy first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Report: Putin Urges Iran to Accept ‘Zero Enrichment’ Nuclear Deal With US

Russian President Vladimir Putin meets Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of a cultural forum dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the birth of the Turkmen poet and philosopher Magtymguly Fragi, in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, Oct. 11, 2024. Photo: Sputnik/Alexander Scherbak/Pool via REUTERS
i24 News – Russian President Vladimir Putin has told Iranian leadership that he supports the idea of a nuclear deal in which Iran is unable to enrich uranium, the Axios website reported on Saturday. The Russian strongman also relayed the message to his American counterpart, President Donald Trump, the report said.
Iranian news agency Tasnim issued a denial, citing an “informed source” as saying Putin had not sent any message to Iran in this regard.
Also on Saturday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi stated that “Any negotiated solution must respect Iran’s right to enrichment. No agreement without recognizing our right to enrichment. If negotiations occur, the only topic will be the nuclear program. No other issues, especially defense or military matters, will be on the agenda.”
The post Report: Putin Urges Iran to Accept ‘Zero Enrichment’ Nuclear Deal With US first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s Al-Sharaa Attending At Least One Meeting With Israeli Officials in Azerbaijan

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, May 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/Pool
i24 News – Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa is attending at least one meeting with Israeli officials in Azerbaijan today, despite sources in Damascus claiming he wasn’t attending, a Syrian source close to President Al-Sharaa tells i24NEWS.
The Syrian source stated that this is a series of two or three meetings between the sides, with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani also in attendance, along with Ahmed Al-Dalati, the Syrian government’s liaison for security meetings with Israel.
The high-level Israeli delegation includes a special envoy of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, as well as security and military figures.
The purpose of the meetings is to discuss further details of the security agreement to be signed between Israel and Syria, the Iranian threat in Syria and Lebanon, Hezbollah’s weapons, the weapons of Palestinian militias, the Palestinians camps in Lebanon, and the future of Palestinian refugees from Gaza in the region.
The possibility of opening an Israeli coordination office in Damascus, without diplomatic status, might also be discussed.
The source stated that the decision to hold the meetings in Azerbaijan, made by Israel and the US, is intended to send a message to Iran.
The post Syria’s Al-Sharaa Attending At Least One Meeting With Israeli Officials in Azerbaijan first appeared on Algemeiner.com.