| The COVID pandemic may have cast a dark pall across the world for another year, but it didn't manage to defang the conflicts, revelations and insights that fueled Haaretz opinions in 2021. It was the year that Israel finally broke the seemingly endless cycle of elections, and of Netanyahu governments; when Joe Biden began, post-Trumpist insurrection, establishing himself as president, when Israel-Gulf normalization deepened, but Israel-Iran tensions rocketed; when Israel and Hamas went to war again, with intensified casualties and rocket fire; while protests rose in Sheikh Jarrah, one illegal West Bank outpost was almost evacuated, and settler violence against Palestinians spiked; when Israel's cyberwar firms got their comeuppance; and when the relationship between Jews around the world and Israel redoubled. From Pegasus to the Palestinians, Trump to Tehran, Bennett to Bio-Zionists, here are the opeds that tell the story of 2021. | 