Israel Panel Today Noon ET
Our third panel event and my story with Israel
When I was back home in Alaska recently, I learned that a childhood friend had become a meth addict. A beautiful, artistic girl, she’d lost her mom in second grade and been abused as a child. Horrible things were done to her; she had gone on to do horrible things. The meth had destroyed her body; using it had destroyed her soul.
I think of her when I think of Israel.
Event Today: Cross-Sectoral Mobilization in Defense of Democracy: Insights from Israel’s Judicial Reform
12:00–1:15 PM ET, May 26
Registration Link:
https://stanford.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_s84CGbi9QfW1w4V1pZK1OQ
I have spent a lifetime avoiding becoming an Israel scholar; some things are too hard, even for me. During a doomed college love, I learned Hebrew and believed I would make a life with his mizrahi community in Jerusalem. I returned years later to work on domestic violence issues in Nazareth in an attempt to understand the Arab-Israeli community. When Israel pulled out of Lebanon that summer, carloads of Palestinians poured into the city from the West Bank. My travels to Jerusalem across Nablus and Ramallah became increasingly perilous as communities geared up for what would become the second intifada. I left after being grabbed on the street in Jenin. Months later, my favorite coffee shop, bus route, ulpan, and other haunts would all be bombed.
Each time I returned over the years, another layer of sadness. A wall went up, dividing Tel Aviv hipsters from what was happening on the other side. Sent to give speeches about John Kerry’s peace process, I was told to avoid the words “peace” and “process” – no one believed in either. The left collapsed under its own solipsism, the Netanyahu government mired itself in corruption, the destruction of public services, education, and eventually, security.
How to restore Israel’s democracy, in a country no longer dominated by its Ashkenazi elite? That is the topic of the third public panel in our backsliding democracies program.
Watch today:
Cross-Sectoral Mobilization in Defense of Democracy: Insights from Israel’s Judicial Reform
Date: May 26
Time: 12:00–1:15 PM ETPanel Description:
https://fsi.stanford.edu/events/cross-sectoral-mobilization-defense-democracy-insights-israels-judicial-reform
Speakers:
Yossi Kucik: founding member of the Protest Headquarters formed in response to the judicial reform proposal; former senior Israeli public official who later transitioned into leadership roles in the private and nonprofit sectors.
Orni Petruschka: co-founder of the Resistance Headquarters , Social entrepreneur and civic leader focused on strengthening liberal democratic institutions in Israel who now works on initiatives related to democratic reform and civic equality.
Dina Zilber: Leading jurist and former Deputy Attorney General (2012–2020), with extensive experience before Israel’s Supreme Court. She has been an active public voice on the rule of law and democratic governance.
Amichai Magen (Moderator): Senior Research Scholar at Stanford University’s CDDRL and Director of the Jan Koum Israel Studies Program.
As a bonus, Amichai’s paper on the Second Mahapach