In a massive defeat for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' campaign to delegitimize Israel, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has ruled that Palestine is not a "state" and it therefore does not have jurisdiction to investigate alleged "war crimes" committed by Israel in the "territory of Palestine since 1 July 2002."

Those Jews who imagine that they can advance or even retain that self-respect by denigrating Israel -- or, worse, by appeasing those who seek to destroy Israel -- are making a terrible error. There is no "post-Zionism." There is only "anti-Zionism."

The trouble is, the Iranian leadership is not Pakistani, nor Indian, nor like any other nuclear regime. If Iran has nuclear weapons, one can be assured that some terrorist organization will also get access to them. What if Hamas had an Iranian-made nuclear device?

The idea that Canada would now support an unlawful act of aggression by Israel, itself a nuclear power that has rejected the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty regime, based on arguments that Iran is violating its obligations under that same treaty, should be abhorrent to most Canadians.

As Khader Adnan, the Palestinian prisoner held in Israeli administrative detention, ends his 66-day hunger strike, the conversation during these last few days (especially on Twitter) was made all the more tense by the fact that Adnan's death seemed imminent.

This is a space for both Israeli and Arab students to coexist at school and at home. The conversations at Project Harmony in Jerusalem usually start organically because, after all, the campers were born into the conflict: sixty years of failed peace treaties, losses on both sides, destruction of lives and heartbreaking stories.

Recently on Palestinian state television, viewers could watch praise being bestowed on the convicted perpetrators of the random murder of three members of the Fogel family, in a nighttime attack on their West Bank home. The terrorists were referred to as "heroes." So far, I haven't found any newspaper outside of Israel that reported on Palestinian television's praise of the terrorists.

When we think about artistic expressions that are not directly tethered to the demands of the commercial market, something amazing can occur. As we know, in politics, hearts and minds matter, suggesting important potential links between collective longings and policy directions.

By way of bidding farewell to 2011, I'm reflecting on the people I've encountered this year. If Jewish ethics through Pirkei Avot instructs us to "make for yourself a teacher, and acquire for yourself a friend," I am all the richer because of the people I have met.

Whether to pull a seat up to the table and evoke change from within or protest and try to bring change from the outside is something we should all regularly be asking ourselves in whatever capacities we operate communally. It is also a question with which I personally and frequently grapple.

The perpetrators of these despicable acts have declared themselves and will not stop. They have perverted Zionism to suit their extremist beliefs and have been driven towards violence.

It is painful to be called an anti-Semite by a deceased saint. Yet the dead speak, even when we wish they'd keep their thoughts to themselves. There is a tremendous effort to deny that Martin Luther King ever said these words: "When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You're talking anti-Semitism." Unfortunately, he did.

In the Arab-Israeli conflict, disputes over borders, Jewish settlements and even the status of Jerusalem are all peripheral. Like their brethren in Nazi Europe, Israel's Jews are struggling for the physical survival. When the popular Arab animus against Jews is shed, all other disputes could be resolved easily.

Mahmoud Abbas are seeking UN recognition of Palestinian statehood: statehood without peace. Already they have gained one victory: acceptance as a full member of UNESCO. Yet this victory may be their last.

When "we" stop congratulating ourselves for how much we honour and value human life, so much so that we are willing to risk future soldier abductions and terrorist attacks for bringing the captured Jewish boy home, can we try to think more deeply and honestly about how best to honour those values?