Yehezkel Dror

Israel faces the critical task of getting Obama on board during his visit here next month. Success or failure will depend mainly on Netanyahu.

There is an urgent need for halakhic innovators in order to strengthen the Jewish people's survival.

The reelection of Barack Obama offers a golden opportunity for Israel to propose to the American president a realistic draft Middle East peace initiative, to be presented, after due preparation and getting the support of major world powers, to relevant states of the region for consideration and action.

Belief in settling the entirety of the historic Land of Israel does not free the believer from a duty to balance it with other precepts, including ensuring the existence and well-being of the Jewish state and seeking peace.

It would be reckless to cut the defense budget for the purpose of electoral economics and simply to make people feel good.

It's impossible to take a serious position on the matter without full knowledge of the facts.

"To make better politicians, disgust at politics must be overcome, the takeover by apparatchik-career politicians must be prevented, and, most importantly, strenuous and stubborn efforts are essential."

Despite the quality of the Forum's makeup, its rejection of a quasi-presidential option is wrong.

The overall increase of the energy levels of Arab societies, which is a sure consequence of various forms of "street action," are very likely to hurt Israel unless we change our statecraft toward advancing a comprehensive Middle Eastern peace settlement.

The huge gap between the challenges and the actual under-performance of the current (and many past governments ) requires the urgent establishment of a new and higher-quality government.

Crises temporarily provide opportunities to make changes that are needed in any case, but are not necessarily feasible under ordinary conditions.

Transferring populated areas to another state is legitimate if most of the affected population agrees, but revoking citizenship clearly contradicts democratic norms.

The negotiations with the Palestinians can metaphorically be compared to bargaining in preparation for a wedding. This is not a romantic love match, but rather an open and also quarrelsome one in which murder occurs.

Israel urgently needs to develop and advance a new genre of leader.

In Israel, we suffer from intelligent but primitive political-security thinking that cannot deal with challenges.

It seems that more radical steps are necessary to overcome the failures of Israel's policy-making culture, including changes in structure, personnel, training and processes of decision and supervision.

The practical expression of these two aspects is the adherence to the idea of the 'Greater Land of Israel' among some and support for Israeli surrender of assets among others.

Periodically most nations face an "either/or" future-shaping choice. This is at present the situation of Israel regarding Jerusalem, as it must decide between readiness to creatively divide sovereignty and refusal of any compromise.

It is very easy, as the present public debate in Israel proves, to confuse three issues: policy, law and professionalism.

An examination of the Arab-Israeli conflict from a historical perspective and in light of current developments leads one to the clear conclusion that Israel is in need of a new diplomatic paradigm. And time is not on our side.

Adjusting to the existence of a Jewish state will take at least two or three more generations. Thus, the very meaning of being a 'Jewish, democratic state' in the 21st century and beyond is subject to a slow learning curve that cannot be accelerated by a priori reasoning.

While the new chairman of the Agency was right to halt the MASA campaign, Zionist leaders should have insisted on the validity of its main message.