Now the NRA Wants to Arm Israeli Civilians

The gun lobby is cheering a rise in Israeli gun ownership.

<a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/gallery-70198p1.html?cr=00&pl=edit-00">Vasily Smirnov</a> / <a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/editorial?cr=00&pl=edit-00">Shutterstock.com</a>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


After a violent cycle of Palestinian attacks and Israeli military crackdowns this month, the death toll in Israel and the Occupied Territories stands at eight Israelis and 44 Palestinians. As the violence continues, Israel has sealed off East Jerusalem neighborhoods and run nightly police raids there. Plus, Israel has widened its military operations in the West Bank and Gaza.

Now, a new development has emerged. Encouraged by public officials, Israeli civilians are lining up at gun stores in droves to arm themselves, and the National Rifle Association is cheering them on.

Earlier this month, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat called on Israeli citizens who own guns to carry them at all times. Last Wednesday, Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan eased restrictions on gun permits, allowing more military officers, police officers, and civilians with weapons training to own private handguns. The next day, 8,000 Israelis filed permit requests with the Public Security Ministry—which typically processes about 200 requests per day. Uri David, an Israeli importer of Glocks, told Haaretz that demand for pistols had increased by 50 percent, while gun shop owners have reported similar trends.

The NRA is applauding the shift. On Friday, its lobbying wing, known as the Institute for Legislative Action, published an extended article celebrating Israeli citizens and their government for the relaxed policies. 

“Some seeking arms recognize that the effects of carrying go well beyond their own personal safety,” the ILA said.

The NRA has an ongoing relationship with Israel. Over the years, it has sent delegations of high-level donors on tours of the country’s religious, political, and military sites. In July, NRA donors tried out new rifle models at Israel Weapon Industries, which manufactures Uzis. In 2013, another NRA donor delegation visited the Police Intelligence and Observation Center, which conducts 24-hour surveillance on Jerusalem’s Old City. There, an Israeli police spokesman described cooperation between the NRA and Israeli police to share tips on intelligence, operations, and gun policy.

Some fear that more handguns on the streets will fuel vigilante justice. A 29-year-old Eritrean immigrant, Haftan Zarhoum, was killed on Sunday after being shot by a security guard and beaten by a mob. The guard and mob had mistaken Zarhoum for an Arab gunman who had just opened fire in a bus station.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israelis against vigilantism on Monday. “We’re a nation of laws. No one may take the law into their hands. That’s the first rule,” he said.

Greater availability of firearms may also undermine a successful effort to prevent suicide among Israeli soldiers. The Israeli Defense Forces, which conscripts 18- to 21-year-olds, barred soldiers in 2006 from taking their guns home with them on weekend leave. After the change, the IDF reported a 40 percent drop in suicide rates among young soldiers, from 28 suicides per year to 17.

It was “an achievement unparalleled by any other means of suicide prevention,” the study’s authors wrote. “This might indicate that easy access to firearms might increase rates of impulsive suicide attempts, whereas the need to plan, at least somewhat, other means of suicide might deter some from committing suicide.”

This story has been updated.

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate