http://maxblumenthal.com Max Blumenthal is an award-winning journalist and blogger whose articles and video documentaries have appeared in The New York Times, The Daily Beast, The Nation, The Huffington Post, Salon.com, Al Jazeera English and many other publications. He is a senior writer for The Daily Beast and a writing fellow for the Nation Institute. His book, Republican Gomorrah: Inside The Movement That Shattered The Party, is in stores now. Tue, 22 May 2012 20:45:47 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en [caption id="attachment_2357" align="alignleft" width="179" caption="YNet's Giulio Meotti likes to cut and paste"][/caption] Update: Marc Tracy reports today that YNet and Commentary have severed their relationships with Meotti as a result of his plagiarism. Il Mondi Di Annibale, the Italian foreign policy site, has also taken Meotti to task. What will Meotti's ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/05/giulio-meotti-serial-plagiarist-or-common-hasbarist/ New York Times Jerusalem Deputy Bureau Chief Isabel Kershner is married to Hirsh Goodman, an Israeli citizen and prominent liberal Zionist intellectual. Goodman works at a military-linked Israeli think tank called the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), where he serves as a senior research fellow in a position endowed ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/05/another-major-conflict-of-interest-for-the-ny-times-jerusalem-bureau/ Tel Aviv University was built on the ruins of the Palestinian village of Sheikh Muwannis. The university's faculty lounge is the village mukhtar's former home. At the corner of Arlosoroff and Ibn Gvirol streets, where the Century Tower skyscraper stands, a Palestinian village named Sommeil used to exist. When activists ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/04/in-a-fear-society-where-some-facts-are-crimes/ The Israeli daily Maariv recently reported [in Hebrew] that BTS, a mercenary firm run by a former Israeli army colonel and veteran bodyguard, Beni Tal, proposed to Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai a plan to violently expel thousands of African migrant workers and refugees living near Tel Aviv's central bus ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/04/israeli-mercenary-firm-proposes-violent-action-to-deport-tel-avivs-african-population/ The publication of German Nobel Prize Laureate Gunter Grass's poem, "Was gesagt werden muss" (What Must Be Said), has triggered a predictable avalanche of outrage, from Benjamin Netanyahu's vitriolic condemnation of the poem to accusations by the Israeli Embassy to Germany and former Israeli prison guard Jeffrey Goldberg (the two ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/04/the-arms-sale-that-inspired-grasss-what-must-be-said-and-a-footnote-on-deir-yassin/ Update/correction: I received the following note today from Peter Beinart explaining why his East Bay appearance was cancelled: "[The East Bay JCC] pulled out because a JVP person was moderator and then when there were no sponsors who were Zionist and anti-full BDS, I pulled out. I did that sadly--cause I ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/03/after-banning-beinart-east-bay-jewish-federation-leader-vows-to-kill-muslims/ I discussed the killings of Trayvon Martin and Shaima Alawadi on RT: http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/03/travyvon-martin-shaima-alawadi-racial-profiling-and-the-normalization-of-islamophobia/ [caption id="attachment_2275" align="alignleft" width="216" caption="Members of Forsanne Alizza join Catholic rightists in protest against a supposedly "Christianophobic" theatrical production"][/caption] As I write this, the standoff continues in Toulouse, France between French police and Mohammed Merah, the alleged murderer of several Muslim French soldiers and Jews. One of the most salient facts ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/03/frances-toulouse-killings-and-the-salafist-far-right-alliance/ [caption id="attachment_2266" align="alignleft" width="372" caption="Israeli Channel 10 military anchor Alon Ben David stands beside a graphic reading, "Death toll: Gaza, 25; Israel, 0" (via Ami Kaufman at 972mag.com)"][/caption] I discussed Israel's real motives for its recent attacks on the Gaza Strip and talked about my reporting on Israel-Palestine with Citizen Radio ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/03/gazaunderattack-on-citizen-radio/ I recently spoke to Alternet's Joshua Holland about law and politics in Israel. Our conversation focused on the image of Israel as a Western style democracy coping with legitimate security concerns versus the reality of Israel as an ethnocratic state managing its demographic peril through authoritarian measures approved by the ... http://maxblumenthal.com/2012/03/israeli-democracy-or-the-lack-thereof-a-conversation-with-alternets-joshua-holland/