Israel

Israel is a minor character inhabiting Gilbert Hernandez's Palomar universe, the fictional Latin American town at the heart of his Love and Rockets stories. He exists among the richly drawn community of recurring townsfolk that populate Hernandez's interconnected narratives.

Emerging from the fertile, boundary-pushing pages of Love and Rockets in 1983, Israel is a Bronze Age creation of Gilbert Hernandez — one of the visionary Hernandez Brothers whose Fantagraphics landmark reshaped what alternative comics could be. A modest five appearances across Love and Rockets, Aargh!, and The Complete Love & Rockets place Israel squarely within the rich, character-dense world Hernandez was building, sharing those vivid pages with beloved figures like Maggie, Hopey, and Maricela. Small in footprint but rooted in one of the most celebrated indie comics runs of the era, Israel is a quiet thread in a tapestry that changed the medium.