![Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) arrives for the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem September 17, 2013. Netanyahu will meet U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington on September 30, an Israeli official said on Tuesday, for talks expected to focus on Iran's nuclear programme. REUTERS/Ammar Awad (JERUSALEM - Tags: POLITICS) - RTX13O85](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Bibi%20%282%29.jpg/Bibi%20%282%29.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=J-c5fK29)
![Mazal Mualem](/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/2022-09/mazal%20book%202.jpg?h=55541bb6&itok=28S04G5r)
In Tel Aviv, reporting on politics
Mazal Mualem is a columnist for Al-Monitor's Israel Pulse and formerly the senior political correspondent for Maariv and Haaretz. She also presents a weekly TV show covering social issues on the Knesset channel. She is the author of "Cracking the Netanyahu Code" (published 2022). On Twitter: @mazalm3
![Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) arrives for the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem September 17, 2013. Netanyahu will meet U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington on September 30, an Israeli official said on Tuesday, for talks expected to focus on Iran's nuclear programme. REUTERS/Ammar Awad (JERUSALEM - Tags: POLITICS) - RTX13O85](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Bibi%20%282%29.jpg/Bibi%20%282%29.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=J-c5fK29)
![The Israeli High Court's 11 justices prepare to hear petitions filed by
politicians banned from participating in the January 28 general
elections in Jerusalem January 7, 2003. Among the petitioners are two
Israeli Arabs and two Jewish extremists. REUTERS/Gil Cohen Magen
GCM/FMS - RTRG6N0](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Supremeisrael.jpg/Supremeisrael.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=Ada8_Hjo)
![Mariam Aborkeek mixes plants with olive oil for her "Desert Daughter" soap in the Bedouin village of Tel Sheva, near the southern Israeli city of Beersheba, February 11, 2013. The cosmetics line, set up in 2005, is the brainchild of Aborkeek, a Bedouin. Brought up by the female members of her family, Aborkeek said she decided to share her Bedouin beauty secrets by transforming them into a variety of lotions and cosmetic products, using ingredients like desert melon, cumin, and bitter apple. Picture taken Fe](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Israel%20Job.jpg/Israel%20Job.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=lG-0SsZZ)
![Protesters hold a placard in Hebrew reading, "the People demand social justice" during a demonstration calling for social justice in Tel Aviv June 30, 2012. REUTERS/Nir Elias (ISRAEL - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST SOCIETY) - RTR34F92](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/ProtestAviv.jpg/ProtestAviv.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=ZTGnWRIl)
![Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lays a wreath during a memorial ceremony for Israeli soldiers killed in the 1973 Middle East War at Mount Herzl Military Cemetery in Jerusalem September 15, 2013. Netanyahu gave a guarded response on Sunday to a U.S.-Russian deal on Syria's chemical weapons, saying it would be judged on whether it achieved "complete destruction" of the arsenal. REUTERS/Lior Mizrahi/Pool (JERUSALEM - Tags: POLITICS ANNIVERSARY) - RTX13LZJ](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Kippur.jpg/Kippur.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=0rVRWZgx)
![THIS PICTURE IS ONE OF 30 TO ACCOMPANY PICTURE PACKAGE: THE PROTESTERS OF TEL AVIV'S TENT CITY. SEARCH IN YOUR PICTURE SYSTEM FOR KEYWORD "PROTEST" TO SEE ALL IMAGES (PXP01 - 30)
Kassa Yasso, a 22-year-old from Tel Aviv, is pictured at a tent camp on Rothschild Boulevard in south Tel Aviv, part of an ongoing protest against the high cost of living in Israel, August 15, 2011. When interviewed by Reuters, Yasso said, "I immigrated to Israel with my family from Ethiopia when I was two years old, since then I](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Israel%20Denial.jpg/Israel%20Denial.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=WQtojN8N)
![Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon speaks during a briefing to reporters in Jerusalem October 1, 2009. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday the United Nations would deal a "fatal blow" to prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace if it endorsed a report critical of Israel's January war in Gaza. Ayalon said Netanyahu's government was discussing the possibility of setting up an independent commission to look into the military's conduct of the Gaza war. REUTERS/Ammar Awad (JERUSA](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/DannyAyalon.jpg/DannyAyalon.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=l3tzUUvP)
![A woman with a price tag on her hand is displayed in the window of a store called Woman To Go in a shopping mall in Tel Aviv October 19, 2010, The store was opened for one day to raise awareness and protest against the trafficking of women. REUTERS/Nir Elias (ISRAEL - Tags: POLITICS SOCIETY) - RTXTLHD](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Trafficking%20Israel.jpg/Trafficking%20Israel.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=usoEr_df)
![Israeli Major General in the Reserves Ariel Sharon (2nd R), Lieutenant General Haim Bar Lev (3rd L) and Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Dayan (C) confer October 17, 1973 during the 1973 Middle East War in this handout photo released by the Government Press Office. Surgeons battled to keep Sharon alive on January 5, 2006 after a massive brain haemorrhage felled the Israeli prime minister in the midst of his fight for re-election on a promise to end conflict with the Palestinians. ISRAEL OUT BW ONLY REUTERS/Go](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/RTR17STO.jpg/RTR17STO.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=r020vcBI)
![Labour party candidate Stav Shaffir poses on Rothschild Avenue in Tel Aviv, the site of a 2011 protest against high housing costs, December 5, 2012. The leaders of a grassroots social protest movement that swept Israel in 2011, one of them Shaffir, have shot to the top of a rejuvenated Labour party that polls say will at least double its power in a Jan. 22 general election that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud is forecast to win. Picture taken December 5, 2012. REUTERS/Amir Cohen (ISRAE](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/Stav%20Shaffir.jpg/Stav%20Shaffir.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=ym9iRRIL)
![Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu smiles during the opening ceremony of the 19th Maccabiah Games at Teddy Stadium in Jerusalem July 18, 2013. The quadrennial games brings together some 9,000 Jewish athletes from 78 countries for 12 days of sporting events and competitions. REUTERS/Baz Ratner (JERUSALEM - Tags: POLITICS SPORT HEADSHOT) - RTX11R7V](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header/public/almpics/2013/09/RTX11R7V.jpg/RTX11R7V.jpg?h=2d235432&itok=U-dB0EIx)