Short answers, pulled from the story.
Haaretz was first published in 1918 under British military sponsorship, then formally established on the 18th of June 1919 by a group of businessmen including the philanthropist Isaac Leib Goldberg. It was originally called Hadashot Ha'aretz, meaning "News of the Land," before the name was shortened.
Haaretz is majority-owned by the Schocken family, who hold a 75% stake, with the remaining 25% owned by Russian-Israeli businessman Leonid Nevzlin. Salman Schocken bought the paper in December 1935; the family sold a 25% stake to German publisher M. DuMont Schauberg in August 2006 before buying those shares back in December 2019.
Haaretz describes itself as broadly liberal on both domestic and international affairs. It opposes the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, supports peace initiatives, and has been called "Israel's most liberal newspaper" and "Israel's most vehemently anti-settlement daily paper" by editors at The New Yorker and The Jewish Daily Forward respectively.
A 2022 TGI survey gave Haaretz a readership exposure rate of 4.7%, placing it third among Israeli newspapers. In 2008 the paper reported daily sales of 72,000 copies, 100,000 on weekends, and a paid subscribership of 65,000, with the English edition carrying 15,000 subscribers.
On the 24th of November 2024, the Israeli government ordered a boycott banning government officials and government-funded employees from cooperating with Haaretz and prohibiting government advertising with the paper. The move followed remarks by publisher Amos Schocken at a conference in London on the 31st of October 2024 and a series of Haaretz investigations into alleged official wrongdoing and military abuses.
The Center for Research Libraries describes Haaretz as "the most influential and respected" of Israel's daily newspapers for both news coverage and commentary, despite its relatively small circulation. Its readership has historically been concentrated among highly educated and economically prominent Israelis, and some observers compare its national role to that of The New York Times in the United States.