Haaretz Podcast

Even by the most extreme “Romeo and Juliet” standards, Sari Bashi’s romance and marriage to her partner, Osama, has overcome impossible odds.
When the two met in 2006, she related on the Haaretz Podcast, “It was very confusing for both of us, both because of the overwhelming social taboos, and the fact that it was also literally illegal for us to meet up together.”
The two met after he had been “trapped” for six years in the city of Ramallah, where he was pursuing a career in academia. Registered as a resident of Gaza, where he was born, travelling elsewhere in the West Bank – or abroad – meant that the authorities would send him back to Gaza. Bashi had recently founded the human rights organization Gisha, and was assisting him gain permission from the Israeli authorities to study for his doctorate abroad.
Bashi’s new book “Upside-Down Love” – written diary-style from both Bashi’s and Osama’s perspective – chronicles the story of the logistics of their courtship, like a date in which they took a hike in a West Bank countryside and “as we encountered more and more settlers with guns, it became apparent that I had an identity and a language that was common with the people who terrified him.”
But despite the ongoing identity and security challenges, their love persevered. Bashi, who is also the newly appointed executive director of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, talks about their life as a family in the West Bank – and the evolving complicated identities of their two Palestinian Jewish children, as she watches them “engage more in a process of trying to assert who they are. I think it'll change probably a million times before they become adults.”
Read more:
A Jewish Mom and a Palestinian Dad Raise a Family Full of Endless Contradictions
Browse the Umm Forat column (2019-2022) in Haaretz
Israeli Human Rights Groups Tell UN That Israel Increased Use of Torture During Gaza War
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Following the hastily arranged three-hour meeting between President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday, it still remains unclear whether a military attack on Iran is in the cards, but the two leaders appear “more aligned than not” on their positions, Haaretz’s Washington D.C. correspondent Ben Samuels said on the Haaretz Podcast.
“Whether or not that turns into a world war remains to be seen,” he added, in view of the “Armada in the Middle East and more military assets on their way” that the United States has positioned around Iran to keep the option of a military move on the table.
Netanyahu rushed to Washington to lobby Trump to hold firm in his negotiations with Iran to include demands beyond a halt to their nuclear program. The Israeli position is that in order to forestall an attack, Iran must be forced to limit their ballistic missile capabilities and support for regional proxy organizations – in addition to a commitment from Tehran to improve its treatment of protesters, who have been killed in the tens of thousands by the regime in since late December.
“What you're seeing from Israel is a very articulated view that any sort of negotiation at any deal has to be all inclusive,” Samuels said.
The Trump administration’s position, by contrast, he said, is far from clear.
“Part of this is intentional misdirection on Trump's part, but part of it is also very unintentional. Trump is doing diplomacy by the seat of his pants and by whatever whims are taking over him at that very moment.”
Read more:
Analysis by Ben Samuels | Trump and Netanyahu Prioritize a United Front Over Rocking the Boat on Iran
Trump Says He 'Insisted' That Negotiations With Iran Continue in Meeting With Netanyahu
Netanyahu Joins Trump's Board of Peace Set to Discuss Gaza Reconstruction, Hamas Disarmament Sidelined
Why This Iranian Revolution Scholar Won't Encourage Iranians to Topple the Regime
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The Netanyahu government may not have officially annexed the West Bank, but the ongoing settler violence expelling Palestinian communities from their land – plus the changes in regulation imposing Israeli authority and areas meant for Palestinian self-rule – is driving momentum in that direction, Haaretz West Bank correspondent Matan Golan said on the Haaretz Podcast.
Golan described the ongoing ordeal in the Bedouin community of Mukhmas on the podcast, a case study which illustrates the settlers' use of daily harassment and ongoing attacks on both residents and their property to force Palestinians to relocate into an increasingly small portion of the territory.
The settler outpost of Kol Mevaser terrorizing Mukhmas "has been depopulated and destroyed at least nine times," by Israeli authorities since its establishment in late October, when the young settlers living there engaged in their first spree of beatings, assaults and arson. "Each time, the settlers just escape to the hills below – and despite the fact that it's a closed military zone," she said, they return – and later brag of their destructive acts against Palestinians on social media.
The IDF has consistently failed to provide enough protection for Palestinian residents to remain in their homes, she said. The Israeli and international activists try to provide a protective presence, which helps prolong the Palestinians' struggles to remain, but it has proven unsuccessful: Nearly 50 communities have been forcibly displaced since summer 2023, according to B'Tselem.
On the podcast, Golan also discusses the recent announcement by Netanyahu government officials declaring that it is taking authority in areas meant to be controlled by the Palestinian Authority, in violation of the Oslo Accords. The fact that such measures are being taken to weaken the Palestinian Authority and prevent a two-state solution, she said, "are no secret."
Read more:
Out-of-control Hooded Settlers: Jewish Outpost Was Evacuated 9 Times – and Rebuilt Immediately
How Israeli Settlers Destroyed Mukhmas In Four Minutes
Israeli Settler Violence Against Palestinians in West Bank Rose 25 Percent in 2025, IDF Finds
'How Can a Father Tell Their Child That Settlers Burned Down Their House?'
Israel to Expand Law Enforcement in Palestinian-controlled West Bank Areas, Defying Oslo Accords
Israel Claims It Can't Protect Palestinians From Settler Attacks Due to IDF Personnel Shortage
Investigation: Netanyahu's Government Not Only Permits Jewish Terror in the West Bank, but Also Finances It
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This week, President Isaac Herzog declared that the record-high homicide rate in Israel’s Arab sector constitutes a “national emergency.” But according to Knesset member Aida Touma-Sliman, the organized crime groups behind the violence in Israel thrive because “this is a policy conducted by the government.”
“Crime groups are their subcontractor for the destruction of our society, making us terrorized individuals looking only to live their lives quietly. When you are struggling for the basic right to live, you forget all about struggling for other political, economic and social rights,” Touma-Sliman said.
She noted that only 10 percent of the murders of Arabs are solved – down from 40 percent under past governments – and in stark contrast with the Jewish sector, in which a vast majority of cases are closed. “A very bad message is being sent by the police to the murderers and criminals: that you can do whatever you want and nobody will touch you as long as it remains among the Arabs,” she said.
Touma-Sliman said she was convinced that if National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir believed that the stashes of deadly weapons in the hands of Arab crime organizations were to be used against Jews, “he would know exactly how to smash them down. But he is not willing to do it, as long as they are only committing crimes among the Arabs. He is enjoying the scene.”
Touma-Sliman also discussed the reunion of the Joint List, the reasons behind her decision not to run in the coming election, and her deep disappointment with Israel’s opposition parties and “so-called left.”
Opposition leaders “are not supposed to personally replace Netanyahu,” she said. “If you want to be an alternative, be courageous enough to create a different vision for how the citizens of Israel should be living and how Israel should be as a state.”
Read more:
Netanyahu Moves to Pass Off Arab Crime Task Force From PM's Office to Ben-Gvir
MK Aida Touma-Sliman: 'The Knesset Symbolizes Everything I've Fought Against. I Don't Want to Be There. I Want to Fight It'
Analysis: Israeli Arab Leaders at a Crossroads: Will Escalating Protests Fuel Right-wing Incitement?
Explained: What Part Israel's Arab Parties Can Play in Toppling Netanyahu in the 2026 Vote
Poll: Coalition Remains Stable at 51 Seats as Reunited Joint Arab List Surges to 12
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With U.S. warships in place positioned around Iran, Israelis are bracing for the regime-toppling attack that U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened against Tehran and the government that cracked down so brutally on protesters last month. In response, Iranian leaders warned they would “hit the heart of Tel Aviv” in retaliation to any American offensive.
However, noted Haaretz senior defense analyst Amos Harel, speaking on the Haaretz Podcast, it seems that Trump “has lost a little bit of his appetite for destruction” in recent days, angling to push a weakened Iran to the negotiating table.
Not only is Trump encouraging a diplomatic solution, Harel said, but “when we talk about negotiations, then there's a difference between what was on the table about a month ago, which was an American demand for more or less destroying the regime, or for the regime to step down and for the democracy to be installed in Iran. Now we're talking about something completely different” – a deal limiting Iran’s nuclear capabilities instead.
“What the president is trying to do is to force the Iranians to agree to major concessions regarding their nuclear project. But it doesn't solve the number one issue for most Iranians: getting rid of the regime.” Harel said.
Will the Iranian leadership take the deal? Judging from their statements, Harel said, “they are in panic.”
On the podcast, Harel also assesses the situation in Gaza as the U.S.-brokered Israel-Hamas cease-fire deal enters its second phase, which took a step forward this week with the opening of the Rafah crossing. The real test of the deal, however, depends on whether the international coalition Trump has built is enough to pressure Hamas to lay down its arms.
If Hamas’s military capabilities “aren’t dismantled,” Harel said, “it will be hard to proceed.”
Read more:
Report: U.S.-Iran Talks Could Begin Soon; Witkoff to Meet With Netanyahu
Iran's Supreme Leader Warns of Regional Conflict if U.S. Attacks After IDF Chief Visits Washington
Trump 'Hopeful' for Iran Deal, but Warns of 'Very Big, Powerful Ships Heading That Way'
Iran-U.S. Negotiations Are 'Fruitful', Iranian Foreign Minister Tells CNN
Analysis by Amos Harel | Trump Is Determined to Launch Phase Two of His Gaza Plan. The Israeli Government's Last Hope Is That He Fails
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