Know your past, own your present, assure your future.
The top issues motivating Israeli voters two months before the October 27, 2026, election are national security, October 7 accountability and the cost of living, but other issues affect how those topics influence voting decisions.
Our Israel On Board video explains how the electoral system in Israel works. The video highlights the voting process, explains proportional representation and the electoral threshold, and describes why there are so many different parties.
An Israeli election is just the first part of the process to decide who will lead the country. Our Israel On Board video explains what happens next and how the country’s government is formed.
Three powerful Muslim countries agreed to a still-vague mutual defense pact both to constrain Iran and to increase their strategic flexibility amid regional changes and U.S. concerns.
CIE+ Audio Playlist
Speeches, source documents and analyses from the 1967 war, gathered into one playlist you can listen to end to end — from the closing of the Straits of Tiran to the aftermath.
Can a radically hateful ideology ever be neutralized by rationality and logic?
Secretary of State Marco Rubio explains the urgent need to establish the Board of Peace and the International Stabilization Force for Gaza to move from Phase 1 to Phase 2 in the ceasefire, but he also warns that the work likely will last longer than the Trump administration.
Since its inception in 1988, Hamas has been crystal clear about its total opposition to Zionism and Israel. It opposes any kind of negotiations or agreements that recognize Israel as a reality, and its more extreme spokesmen regularly incite or celebrate the killing of Jews.
Among Palestinians, Hamas popularity soars, two state solution at lowest ebb, Rise in European Anti-semitism, and Michael Mihlstein’s insightful analysis an essential read.
The Board of Peace’s high commissioner for Gaza presents and explains the 15-point plan to fully implement the 20-point ceasefire and reconstruction plan for the Strip.
The Israel Defense Forces “failed in its mission to protect the residents of Kibbutz Be’eri,” with those failures ranging from planning and communication to command and control, when Hamas overwhelmed the Negev kibbutz on Oct….
The U.N. Security Council voted 13-0 on November 17, 2025, to adopt Resolution 2803, endorsing the 20-point Trump peace plan to end the Hamas-Israel war. The precedent-setting resolution provides a pathway to stability in the Gaza Strip and offers a chance for less violence in the Palestinian-Israeli relationship.
Donald Trump takes a victory lap and lays out short- and long-term visions for Gaza, Israel and the Middle East while becoming the fourth U.S. president to address the Knesset.
Updated July 10, 2026; originally posted October 2023. By Ken Stein CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the Diaspora. $39 / year JOIN CIE+ Already…
The first meeting of the Board of Peace convened under the Trump ceasefire for Gaza offers grand plans for reconstruction and a vibrant, peaceful future for Palestinians but depends on the disarmament of Hamas.
From the end of World War I until the June 1967 war, American Jewish attitudes toward Zionism moved from lukewarm embrace to full-throated support. The debate of American rabbis in the 1940s exemplified by this letter reflects attitudinal differences. The Holocaust, Israeli statehood and Israel’s stunning military success in June 1967 established Israel as a valued element in American Jewish identities.
Loy Henderson, Director of the Office of Near Eastern and African Affairs, U.S. State Department, to U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall
Writing two months before the U.S. voted at the United Nations in favor of Palestine’s partition into Arab and Jewish states, Henderson voices profound dislike for Zionism and a Jewish state. He advocates for cultivating positive relations with Muslim and Arab states. He is one of many at the State Department at the time who saw Zionism as contrary to American national interests.
Prime Minister-elect Begin rebukes President Carter’s assertion that Israel will need to withdraw from almost all the lands Israel secured in the June 1967 war, especially Jerusalem and the West Bank. Begin is adamant opposed to dealing with the PLO. Begin refuses to relinquish Israeli decision-making to US preferences or dictates. These fundamental policy disagreements will remain unresolved between Begin and Carter for the duration of Carter’s presidency, and years after.
Using published archives, press conferences, speeches and numerous interviews, this compilation of quotations traces how official American views on Zionism and Israel have evolved over a century.
U.S. Secretary of State James Baker warns that the United States will not accept Saddam Hussein’s erasure of Kuwait a month earlier. Baker says intimidation and force will not be tolerated in the post-Cold War world.
Perspective provides valuable insights in evaluating contemporary diplomacy. Though neither the Palestinian-Israeli-U.S. summit of July 2000 nor the Egyptian-Israeli-U.S. summit of September 1978 ended discussions between Israel and its Arab adversaries, there were more differences than similarities between the two intense and highly charged meetings.
As a Democratic Party operative, Mark Siegel astutely helped Jimmy Carter win the 1976 election. He assisted in delegate selection and on the platform committee and kept Eugene MaCarthy’s name off the New York ballot. In the White House, as the administration’s liaison to the Jewish community, he abruptly resigned for being lied to by the administration. He explains Brzezinski/Carter disappointment with Sadat’s historic 1977 trip to Jerusalem because it channeled Arab-Israeli negotiations into a bilateral pathway. With that, the Brzezinski/Carter fear was realized. Any hope of Palestinian self-determination and Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank/Gaza Strip would be endlessly postponed in favor of Egyptian-Israeli national interests. He is frank in his descriptions of the ineptitude of those who worked in the Carter White House.
In four days of sharply presented testimony and debate, the House evaluated the pros and cons of whether to endorse Jewish immigration to Palestine. Pressure from the Executive Branch not to pass such a resolution was heeded. According to Chief of Staff George Marshall “such a resolution would have adverse effects on the Moslem world.” This was the same argument that the State Department used in trying but failing to persuade President Truman in 1947 not to vote in favor of Palestine’s partition into Arab and Jewish states. The debate in the Congress took place more than a year before World War II ended in Europe. Fear of Arab state retaliation against the US never materialized because the US endorsed Jewish immigration to Palestine and a two state solution.
Netanyahu praises the Obama administration for its support of Israel’s security, then roundly criticizes it for negotiating a deal with Iran that will not roll back its nuclear breakout time and for not demanding that before sanctions are lifted that Iran stop its support of terrorism and threats to wipe Israel off the map.
Facing a tough election in less than three months, Benjamin Netanyahu appeared to prioritize Israeli public opinion over pleasing ally Donald Trump in rejecting the latest implementation plan for the Gaza ceasefire.
Dr. Eli Sperling, April 15, 2025, for CIE © Center for Israel Education, 2025 CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the Diaspora. $39 / year…
In this 45-minute video recorded Jan. 11, 2023, scholars of Jewish, Zionist and Israeli art, music and culture discuss how culture not only was a fundamental part of the effort to build a safe Jewish homeland, but was for many the reason behind the modern State of Israel. Featured are Dr. Arieh Saposnik, an associate professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev; Dr. Susan Nashman Fraiman, an instructor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; and Dr. Eli Sperling, an Israel Institute teaching fellow at the University of Georgia. Moderating the conversation is Center for Israel Education President Dr. Kenneth Stein, professor emeritus of Middle Eastern history and political science and Israel studies at Emory University. This webinar is part of CIE’s Israel@75: A Yearlong Exploration project.
Contemporary Israeli music has long and varied roots. It is rich and dynamically innovative. Instrumental and vocal streams reflect Jewish and Israeli history. Engage your senses in diversely eclectic flavors. Listen wherever you are—links to free online sources; stream Israeli music from many genres and eras.
By Dr. Eli Sperling Representative of a greater resurgence of Judeo-Arabic music in Israel, the piyyut movement is continuing to spread throughout religious and secular segments of Israeli culture and society. Piyyut, the Hebrew word…
Dance along as waves of Jewish immigration mix with indigenous traditions to create a unique culture reflecting a world of Jewish and non-Jewish influences across Israel’s diverse society.
Upon its inception, Zionism needed more than political and financial solutions to actualize a Jewish home in Palestine. The architects of the Zionist enterprise evolved a cultural identity along with state structures. Its dynamism is still evolving from the diversity of its populations’ origins. see also his excellent Development of Israeli Culture (2018).
Aveva Dese, an Ethiopian-Israeli singer & songwriter, is a rising star in Israel’s music scene. Many of her songs are in Amharic (official language of Ethiopia) and represent a greater trend of Israeli musicians performing in various diasporic-Jewish languages spoken by members of their families and communities.
In a July 1, 2020, session of our annual educator workshop, CIE’s Eli Sperling programs a youthful, entertaining video playlist to bring Israel’s religious, cultural and ethnic variety into the classroom.
The reactions to Hamas’ killing of 1,200 Israelis and others and abduction of more than 240 on Oct. 7 have rippled across Israeli society and left their marks on Israeli music, art and other aspects…
The Sixth Zionist Congress, the last to be presided over by Theodor Herzl, convenes in Basel, Switzerland. It is the largest Zionist Congress held to date, with approximately 600 delegates in attendance.
The Israeli Declaration of Independence was crafted in the final month before independence but reflects a thoughtful approach to citizens, neighbors and American precedents.
The First Commonwealth: Kingdom of Israel/the United Monarchy (circa 1030-930 B.C.E.) under Kings Saul, David and Solomon. The monarchy split into two kingdoms in 930 B.C.E. The northern Kingdom of Israel endured until 722 B.C.E., when…
Dr. Eli Sperling © Center for Israel Education, 2025 CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the Diaspora. $39 / year JOIN CIE+ Already have a…
Jewish-majority self-rule existed in Eretz Yisrael during the First and Second Jewish Commonwealths, 1020 to 586 B.C.E. and 538 B.C.E. to 70 C.E., respectively. Then living for centuries as minorities throughout Europe, the Middle East…
Otherwise known as Israel’s War of Independence, or, “the nakbah” or disaster to the Arab world because a Jewish state was established, the war was fought between the newly established Jewish state of Israel opposed by Palestinian irregulars, and armies from five Arab states. Official beginning of the war is usually given as May 14, 1948, the date Israel declared itself an independent Jewish state, but the war’s first of four phases began in November 1947. Lasting for two years, the war ended with armistice agreements signed in 1949 between Israel and four Arab states.
By Ken Stein and Scott Abramson, March 23, 2025 Jewish physical growth in Mandatory Palestine in the period known as the New Yishuv was sufficient through land acquired from Arabs by 1939 for the Jewish…
The period of the New Yishuv lasted from the last 40 years of Ottoman rule in Palestine through the British Mandate until the establishment of Israel in 1948. It saw the growth of the Jewish…
Updated July 10, 2026; originally posted October 2023. By Ken Stein CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the Diaspora. $39 / year JOIN CIE+ Already…
By Ken Stein, August 1, 2025 When the British and the French decided on the borders of some modern Middle Eastern states in the Levant in the 1915-1922 period, no Palestinian, Syrian, Iraqi, Jewish, Lebanese…
From biblical times to the present, Jews and Judaism have had an unbroken connection to Zion, a reference to Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel, derived from the hill at the heart of Jerusalem. Zionism…
Two major discordant issues that vexed Israel before October 7, 2023, continue to cleave Israeli society: a possible exemption from mandatory military service for the Haredim and the Netanyahu government’s persistent effort to wrench from…
Examination of the mobilization of society for the Israeli War of Independence effort enables one to present a more extended process that began in October 1947 — some two months prior to the outbreak of the war — and ended, from the standpoint of mobilization of personnel, at the beginning of 1949, when demobilization of the first draftees from the wartime army took place, and from an economic standpoint in April 1949, when an Austerity system was declared in the State of Israel.
By Ken Stein, August 1, 2025 When the British and the French decided on the borders of some modern Middle Eastern states in the Levant in the 1915-1922 period, no Palestinian, Syrian, Iraqi, Jewish, Lebanese…
Dr. Eli Sperling, April 15, 2025, for CIE © Center for Israel Education, 2025 CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the Diaspora. $39 / year…
Iran’s move to assert sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz has short- and long-term implications for the Islamic regime and the world economy.
In pursuing its central political objective to control and lead the Palestinian Arab quest for statehood, the Palestinian Authority (PA) headed by Mahmoud Abbas is delighted to have multiple countries endorse a two-state solution. Affirming…
When Prime Minister Ehud Olmert resigned in 2008 amid allegations of bribery, Israel came within reach of a milestone in gender equality — one that was a credit to the Jewish state as much as…
Update June 9, 2026; originally posted June 2021. Compiled by Dr. Ken Stein, CIE President, June 9, 2026 CIE+ Reliable resources for deeper Israel understanding Embrace informed content on Israel, the Middle East and the…
By Scott Abramson The State of Israel lies at the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea, at the intersection of three continents: Asia, Africa and Europe. Together with its Lebanese, Syrian and Jordanian neighbors, it…
Since coming to office the first time in 1996, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has met with four presidents (Clinton, Obama, Trump and Biden) on 11 occasions. Four times he has addressed Congress, each…
With 20 maps and prose, trace the progression of Jewish physical and demographic growth toward state building from 1882 to 1948 (25,000 to 600,000), with two-thirds in place by 1940.
For more than a century, Arab and Muslim leaders have expressed hatred for Jews, Zionism and Israel, although some have pointed internally for the failures of the Palestinian Arab national movement.
Ben-Gurion recognized that Arab opposition to Zionism is a national feeling and that Palestinian Arab leadership had done little to help the majority impoverished peasant population.
The JNF estimated that up to 250,000 dunams (a dunam was a quarter of an acre) could be purchased if funds were available despite Arab opposition to sales and a steep rise in prices. By then, Jews owned 1.6 million dunams of land, with more than half of Palestine not owned by anyone.
Celebrating the creation and survival of the State of Israel, the yearbook provides a thorough history of the Zionist movement from the First Zionist Congress in 1897 to independence in 1948.
From the Israel Government Yearbook, an 11 page description of the June War.
Hamilton Jordan, Carter’s chief political adviser, warned the president to halt the administration’s anti-Israeli actions. Nonetheless, they continued to diminish Carter’s support among American Jews through the 1980 re-election campaign.
October 6, 2023, was the 50th anniversary of the outbreak of the October 1973 war. Six months prior, Egyptian President Sadat sent his national security adviser to meet with Secretary of State Kissinger to determine whether the U.S. would engage Egypt and Israel in serious mediation for a Sinai agreement, or a series of them, all focused on Israeli withdrawal and gradual acceptance of Israel. Kissinger did not take Sadat’s overtures seriously. Would American action then have avoided the October 1973 war? All informed analyses say no.
A U.S. House Intelligence subcommittee issued a scathing report on the failures of the intelligence community and policymakers as the Shah’s regime was collapsing in Iran.
Since its inception in 1988, Hamas has been crystal clear about its total opposition to Zionism and Israel. It opposes any kind of negotiations or agreements that recognize Israel as a reality, and its more extreme spokesmen regularly incite or celebrate the killing of Jews.
