ToI’s weekly deep dive: Yossi Klein Halevi on Netanyahu’s two Israels * Crash and burn: ’Wonder Woman 84’ * Israeli Deni Avdija on NBA debut * P roof of Jesus’ Gethsemane

[Times of Israel]( [Weekly Deep Dive]( Sunday, December 27, 2020 Interview [The Bible without Jesus? How two faiths can read the same text in dissonant ways]( By [Rich Tenorio]( [Amy-Jill Levine and Marc Brettler parse opposing interpretations Jews and Christians have of the same Bible, and make the argument that religion doesn’t have to be a zero-sum game]( From the blogs [Yossi Klein Halevi]( [Netanyahu’s two Israels]( [He is our most talented leader and our most destructive politician, bringing unprecedented agreements with Arab countries and scorched earth in our governance]( [On bold TV show, Palestinian-Israeli director takes apart her society’s taboos]( By [Aaron Boxerman]( Op-Ed [David Horovitz]( [Whoever wins, we’ll be a fundamentally changed Israel when this election is over]( [It’ll be Bibi. Or maybe it won’t be Bibi. But our next leadership and legislature will be unprecedentedly right-wing. Unlike in the US, our political pendulum has stopped swinging]( [Warning the public against Netanyahu, a defecting confidant lands a heavy blow]( By [David Horovitz]( [Op-ed / Ze’ev Elkin puts the first serious chink in Netanyahu’s Likud armor]( By [Haviv Rettig Gur]( [Analysis / The rivals on the right: Why the new election will be much tougher for Netanyahu]( By [Haviv Rettig Gur]( Analysis [As Santa Trump goes, will Netanyahu seek Biden rifts in place of election gifts?]( By [Jacob Magid]( [Girding for a campaign without Washington’s help, PM may be enticed to demonize Biden as he once did Obama to score points; but doing so would be costly, and might not work]( [Normalizing with Israel, Arab states look to gain powerful ally in Washington]( By [Jacob Magid]( [US begins to label settlement products as ‘Made in Israel’]( By [TOI staff and Jacob Magid]( [Hamas panned for effort to ‘limit interactions with Christmas’ by Gaza’s Muslims]( By [Aaron Boxerman]( Times of Israel Podcast [LISTEN: TOI diplomacy reporter debriefs on following Netanyahu around the world]( By [TOI staff]( [Departing diplomatic correspondent Raphael Ahren reveals what happens on the road with the prime minister, and health writer Nathan Jeffay advises on the pandemic’s final stretch]( [Behind the Headlines / Join ToI Community to catch our interview with Eurovision winner Netta Barzilai]( By [TOI staff]( [CRM]( Coronavirus crisis [Occupants of Jerusalem COVID hotel fear it’s a breeding ground for UK strain]( By [Nathan Jeffay]( [‘Come for quarantine, leave with coronavirus’: Residents decry dire hygiene standards, chaotic mismanagement of facility, say army utterly unequipped to deal with influx]( [Israel’s vaccine dash is swamping nurses, and some officials couldn’t be happier]( By [Nathan Jeffay]( [Herd immunity by Seder night? Trailblazing Israel is vaccinating faster than UK]( By [Nathan Jeffay]( [Shira Pasternak Be'eri]( [I am not throwing away my shot]( StartUp Israel [Overstocked Dubai real estate market eyes Israeli investors for rebound]( By [Shoshanna Solomon]( [Developer pitching project to new market opened by normalization says home prices can only go up after falling 30%, with yields still far outstripping anything Tel Aviv can offer]( [Social media, meet your past: This startup wants to bring back phone calls]( By [Jake Epstein]( [Family firm with Nazi past funds effort to use AI to detect online anti-Semitism]( By [Matt Lebovic]( [Israeli study shows generic anti-lipid drug may squelch COVID-19 severity]( By [Nathan Jeffay]( Film review [‘Wonder Woman 84’ isn’t the biggest let-down of 2020, but that’s not saying much]( By [Jordan Hoffman]( [It’s not easy to break the news about one of the year’s most anticipated films, starring beloved Israeli Gal Gadot, but this heroic super sequel never quite takes off]( [Athlete interview / ‘Dream come true’ as Israeli Deni Avdija makes NBA debut with Wizards]( By [Jon Marks]( Christianity [Ancient ritual bath may mark first New Testament-era find at Jesus’ Gethsemane]( By [Amanda Borschel-Dan]( [Olive grove where Jesus spent a night of agony, accepted his betrayal, and was arrested ahead of his crucifixion has until now had no physical link to Second Temple era]( [Israel travels / Where tradition says Jesus spent his last night: Guide to Mt. of Olives churches]( By [Aviva and Shmuel Bar-Am]( [Served hot / Santa Claus hits the beach for some Christmas volleyball]( By [Jessica Steinberg]( [Ancient souvenir was a pocket-sized lamb of Bethlehem for Christian pilgrims]( By [Jessica Steinberg]( Zoom out [Family brings ‘Technicolor Dreamcoat’ to life for bar mitzvah]( By [Jessica Steinberg]( [Refusing to let plans be ruined by pandemic, musical theater-crazy Jerusalem family spend 6 months planning, rehearsing and filming classic in desert for single showing]( [Arnold M. Eisen]( [Joseph and his brothers in the voting booth]( Books [75 years post-Hiroshima, Jewish ‘mother of the bomb’ inspires spy thriller novel]( By [Renee Ghert-Zand]( [Physicist Lise Meitner discovered nuclear fission soon after fleeing Nazi Germany in 1938, but Nobel Prize was given to a man as she saw her breakthrough used in ways she opposed]( [Author interview / In 2020 bestseller, journalist tracks American family plunged into schizophrenia]( By [Renee Ghert-Zand]( Archaeology [‘Globalized’ early Bronze Age Levantines consumed exotic Asian nosh, study shows]( By [Amanda Borschel-Dan]( [Analysis of dental tartar from skeletons excavated at Megiddo and Tel Erani shows first evidence in region from 2nd millennium BCE of foods such as bananas, soy beans, turmeric]( [Cutting-edge scientific analysis reveals secrets of ancient Jewish Purim scroll]( By [Stuart Winer]( [Tsunami swept Israel coast 10,000 years ago, may have erased signs of human life]( By [Stuart Winer]( From the Blogs [I volunteered to take minutes – 2020 had other plans]( By [Tamar Wyschogrod]( [As we made agonizing, life and death decisions for our community, the synagogue Covid committee I chair discovered we were on our own]( [Unsubscribe from this List]( Email not displaying correctly? 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