Henriette Chacar

Recent Articles

Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine Director at Human Rights Watch (Courtesy of Omar Shakir).

Supreme Court rules Israel can expel top Human Rights Watch director

Israel’s top court says Omar Shakir can be deported, escalating the government’s efforts to silence criticism of its policies. His case has been described as a watershed moment for human rights advocacy and free speech in Israel. Israel’s Supreme Court upheld the deportation of the Israel and Palestine Director of Human Rights Watch Omar Shakir…

By Henriette Chacar November 5, 2019

Tens of thousands of Palestinian citizens of Israel protest against gun violence and under-policing in the Arab town of Majd al-Krum, northern Israel, on October 3, 2019. (David Cohen/Flash90)

Protests against gun violence trigger a political awakening for Palestinians in Israel

A wave of demonstrations against gun violence and police negligence has inspired a renewed sense of solidarity among Palestinian citizens of Israel, according to veteran activist Fida Tabony. After years of division, ‘we’re acting like a people,’ she says. Fida Tabony remembers leaving her office in Nazareth around 2 p.m. one day, about two months ago, as…

By Henriette Chacar October 23, 2019

An Arab woman casts her vote at a polling station in the city of Lyd on October 22, 2013. (Yossi Zeliger/Flash90)

Israeli elections c’tee hasn’t taken any steps to stop Arab voter intimidation

Four months after the ruling Likud party led a voter intimidation campaign against Palestinian voters, the government body responsible for ensuring free and fair elections says it hasn’t made any changes to its process. With just a few weeks before Israeli citizens head back to the polls for the second time this year, the government body responsible for…

By Henriette Chacar August 7, 2019

Palestinian citizens of Israel and Jewish Israeli activists protest against the Jewish Nation-State law in Rabin Square, Tel Aviv on August 11, 2018 (Tomer Neuberg/Flash90).

‘When the constitution becomes racist, it’s difficult to define what racism is’

One year ago, Israel passed a constitutional amendment declaring that Israel belongs only to its Jewish citizens. The head of Israel’s premier Palestinian rights group discusses what has changed in Israeli courts, but also overseas. ‘The debate soon will be whether Israel is apartheid.’ In the year since the Israeli parliament passed the Jewish Nation-State Law,…

By Henriette Chacar July 26, 2019

Palestinian women cross the Qalandiya checkpoint outside Ramallah, West Bank, into Jerusalem to attend the first Friday of Ramadan prayers in the Al-Aqsa Mosque, July 12, 2013. (photo: Activestills.org)

Not just toxic masculinity: Militarism also feeds gender-based violence

In a society dominated by male hierarchies, violence is not only a pervasive symptom but a defining feature — especially for Palestinian women. The Israeli media has been awash with reports over the past week about the case of a dozen Israeli male teenagers, some minors, accused of gang-raping a 19-year-old female British tourist in…

By Henriette Chacar July 23, 2019

Illustrative photo of Arab students. (Miriam Alster/Flash90)

‘To ask an Arab student to internalize this is a way of humiliating him’

Israel requires all high school students who want to travel abroad on school-sponsored trips to pass an online course that promotes far-right and often racist ideas about Palestinians. One Arab school in northern Israel has had enough of it. Before a high school student in Israel can participate in a school-sponsored trip overseas they must…

By Henriette Chacar July 14, 2019

Israeli security forces guard as Jewish Israelis tour the Palestinian side of the old city market in the West Bank city of Hebron, June 15, 2019. (Wisam Hashlamoun/Flash90)

Confederation can’t answer the most important issue in Israel-Palestine

Any framework that comes to replace the two-state solution must aspire toward decolonization, and accept that Zionism and full civic equality are irreconcilable. Changes on the ground over the past decade have allowed Israel to consolidate its rule between the river and the sea. While the final nail in the two-state coffin was hammered long…

By Henriette Chacar July 2, 2019

Palestinian Christians hold candles lit by the holy fire, which was delivered from the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, at the Church of Saint Porphyrius in Gaza City, on April 20, 2014. (Wissam Nassar/Flash90)

Israel bars hundreds of Palestinian Christians from traveling on Easter

In an unprecedented decision, Israeli authorities are denying hundreds of Palestinian Christians the right to travel to Jerusalem for the holiday, while barring all movement between the West Bank and Gaza. Thousands of Christian pilgrims from all over the world are expected to travel to Jerusalem for Easter celebrations. For Christian Palestinians who live no more than hours…

By Henriette Chacar April 19, 2019

A Palestinian man checks the damage following an Israeli air strike in the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Yunis, March 10, 2019. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)

LISTEN: Suffering in Gaza isn’t a humanitarian issue, it’s an Israeli political decision

Recent rockets fired into central Israel by armed groups in Gaza were not ‘mistakes,’ as both Hamas and Israel claim. The counter-intuitive context, Tareq Baconi explains, is a Hamas attempt to get Israel back onboard with a cease-fire agreement. Excerpts from The +972 Podcast. Hamas and Israel reached a cease-fire agreement last November following months…

By Henriette Chacar March 29, 2019

Sahar Francis, Director of Addameer, seen at the organization’s offices in Ramallah, the West Bank on February 19, 2019. (Photo: Mohannad Darabee for +972 Magazine)

‘Change doesn’t come from the courthouses alone’

Addameer director Sahar Francis talks about the pervasiveness of incarceration in Palestinian society, how she and her organization have been targeted by Israeli forces for their work, and what it means if the international community can’t hold Israel accountable for the occupation. There is one legal case Sahar Francis says she’ll never forget. It was…

By Henriette Chacar February 21, 2019