Rabbi Steve Gutow

President and Chief Executive Officer of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs

I feel sad for the innocent sufferers on both sides of this battle. I want this to end and want the Gazan Palestinians and the Israelis to know calm and security, even if the region is not yet ready for a total peace.

Erel Margalit

Knesset member (Labor); Founder, Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP)

I wanted to write a short note and share our feelings here in Israel, now that over 550 rockets have been fired towards our cities. Just a few moments ago, the air raid sirens in Jerusalem began to ring yet again.

David Mednicoff

Director, Middle Eastern Studies, UMass-Amherst

Just because Israelis and Palestinians have different versions of the same history doesn't mean that we can compare (and then judge, and even dehumanize) them fairly on particular measures where one side doesn't measure up.

Dan Raviv

CBS News correspondent based in Washington; author of 'Spies Against Armageddon'

The prime minister's political foes still hope that Obama will wreak revenge. Perhaps, they say, the Gaza crisis will motivate America's leader to announce a bid for Israeli-Palestinian peace that would expose Netanyahu as an opponent of peace.

Joshua Gleis

Analyst, Consultant, Author

The recent flare up of violence between Israel and the Hamas has highlighted three specific game changes from wars past.

Danielle Tumminio

Author, 'God and Harry Potter at Yale'

Many thought Hamas didn't have the technological ability to send missiles to Jerusalem. Many others believed that Hamas would never fire missiles on the city because it houses Islam's third most holy site. But those assumptions can no longer be assumed.

Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Founder and director, Shalom Center

The article says that although they knew about the discussions, the Israeli government "nevertheless" approved the assassination. The question I think we need to ask is whether the Israeli government ordered the assassination not "nevertheless" but "therefore."

Dena Takruri

HuffPost Live Producer

The producers of Up With Chris deserve praise for breaking from the conventional model of a fleeting segment featuring side-by-side talking heads that reduce the complex situation to two parties who are incapable of transcending their hatred for one another.

Daoud Kuttab

Palestinian journalist

Once again we are witnessing a sharp escalation of violence without any pretense of looking for a political horizon. Israel is shelling Gaza from land, sea and air without even thinking about a political perspective.

Jim Sleeper

Lecturer in Political Science, Yale University

In 1965, Singapore's first prime-minister Lee Kuan Yew asked Israel to design, set up, and supervise its military machine. Israel did precisely that. How successfully? Just this month, Israel was ranked the world's most militarized nation -- and Singapore the second-most.

James Zogby

President, Arab American Institute; author, 'Arab Voices'

Since no one will win in the latest Middle East clash and everyone will lose, it might be assumed that sanity will prevail, and the current clashes will stop short of full-scale war. But given the record of the participants, that might be hoping for too much.

Anav Silverman

International Correspondent in Jerusalem

As I make my way back down the heavily damaged building, an elderly man leaves his apartment and walks slowly down the blood-stained stairs. He looks sadly at the memorial candles at the bottom, and whispers a few words, and then continues on to the synagogue to pray.

Ahmed Shihab-Eldin

Emmy-Nominated Producer/Host, @HuffPostLive

Aside from recalling its ambassador to Israel, Egypt's President Morsi has come to the defense of Palestinians and opened the border-crossing at Rafah on Wednesday.

Khaled Diab

Journalist

Regardless of whether or not art can really be divorced from politics, Palestinian art is intimately and inseparably linked to the Palestinian cause. Once the Palestinian people gain their freedom, then their art, too, can be liberated from politics.

Elisabeth Braw

Senior Reporter, Metro International

Israel's leaders don't want a Palestinian state, Carter tells me in an exclusive interview. Carter, who still conducts international negotiations and is now a member The Elders, won the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize. He just returned from a visit to the Middle East.

Dr. Josef Olmert

Adjunct Professor, University of South Carolina

While the fighting is raging in Gaza and southern and central Israel, it is also in Tehran and Beirut where there are many sleepless military and strategic planners who watch the situation with keen interest and most likely with a growing sense of concern.