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http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-25-2018-un-passes-five-anti-israel-resolutions/
UN Passes FIVE Anti-Israel Resolutions
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  MARCH 25, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
1.  UN Human Rights Council passed five Israel-bashing resolutions, including a call for an arms embargo on the Jewish state. This AP headline says it all:

UN rights council scorecard: 5 Israel resolutions, Syria 2
 Israeli officials denounced the council as did US Ambassador Nikki Haley in this statement:
When the Human Rights Council treats Israel worse than North Korea, Iran, and Syria, it is the Council itself that is foolish and unworthy of its name.
More at the Jerusalem Post.

2.  An Israeli-bound Air India flight crossed Saudi skies for the first time. Reuters notes that other airlines may soon get similar flyover rights:

Israel’s Tourism Minister on Thursday called the maiden Air India flight a diplomatic achievement and said he has been in negotiations to open similar flights with Singapore Airlines and a carrier from the Philippines, which he did not name.

3. Congress passed the Taylor Force Act as part of $1.3 trillion budget bill. The Act reduces aid to the PA as long as it continues providing stipends to imprisoned terrorists and the families of dead attackers, such as those who killed American veteran and West Point grad Taylor Force on his visit to Israel. The PA denounced the act’s passage. HR’s Daniel Pomerantz discussed the topic on i24 News:

Israel and the Palestinians
• Ahed Tamimi to serve eight months in prison as part of a plea deal. Tamimi’s mother and cousin also agreed to similar plea deals. Haaretz reports:

According to one source, the punishment in Ahed Tamimi’s case is not considered particularly lenient or particularly severe. The Israeli military felt the need to end the legal matter, the source said, as it damaged the army’s reputation in the media and internationally, which may be why the plea bargain was intensively promoted.
• The IDF confirmed carrying out Saturday night air strikes on Gaza after “four Palestinians attempted to cross the border fence between the Strip and Israeli territory and set fire to an engineering vehicle.”

 
Anna Ahronheim

@AAhronheim
Earlier today 4 #Palestinians crossed into #Israel from southern #GazaStrip & tried to set fire to some of machinery used to build #Israel’s underground barrier. All 4 fled back to #Hamas-run enclave after they were engaged by the #IDF

10:06 PM - Mar 24, 2018
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 •PA unilaterally applies for membership in eight international treaties.

 •Palestinians to press a claim on the Dead Sea scrolls through UNESCO?
 •UN demands Israel compensate it for facilities damaged during 2014 Gaza war. Israel HaYom notes:
Israel has presented ample evidence that U.N. and UNRWA facilities were used by Hamas to hide weapons and launch rockets at Israel. The Secretariat, however, has made no attempt to demand similar restitution from the terrorist group that controls Gaza.
 Around the World
•Colombian Jewish anchor told to quit after refusing to cross herself on-air.
•Austria yanks diplomat in Israel for wearing Nazi-friendly T-shirt.
•Jeremy Corbyn is at it again, with ongoing accusations of anti-Semitism and more. Take your pick of The UK
Campaign Against Anti-Semitism, JTA or The Guardian.
Commentary
– Bassam Tawil: Palestinians tortured; media silent
– Amos Harel: Israel gears up for large-scale clashes along Gaza border
– Yoni Ben-Menachem: The Hamas response to Mahmoud Abbas’ threatened sanctions
– Yaakov Katz: Imagine a world in which Syria had its nuclear reactor today
– Amos Yadlin: The Begin doctrine: The lessons of Osirak and Deir ez-Zor
– Jonathan Tobin: What Syria doesn’t teach us about Iran
– Toby Young: If Corbyn wins, emigrating to Israel is my clear escape route
– Makvan Kasheikal: Time for the West to follow Israel’s example with the Kurds
– Simon Griver: Putting BDS into perspective
– Stephen Pollard: There is only one word for Jeremy Corbyn

Israel Confirms Destroying Syrian Nuclear Reactor
http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-21-2018-syria-reactor/
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 21, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Israel finally confirmed that it destroyed the Syrian nuclear reactor in Deir al-Zor in 2007. Operation Orchard (also known as Operation Outside the Box) was suppressed by Israeli censors but Israel’s responsibility for the strike was an open secret for years thanks to hints and slips from Israeli politicians, an account of the attack in ex-president George Bush Jr.’s memoirs and occasional foreign reports.

Israeli censors lifted the ban, allowing the Israeli press to publish previously undisclosed details of the operation, including declassified footage, photos and documents so take your pick of Yossi Melman’s “inside story,” and coverage from the Jerusalem Post, Haaretz, Ynet, Israel HaYom and Times of Israel. The latter addresses why the censor’s ban was lifted now:

There was no one reason given for the decision to remove the censorship on the al-Kibar strike, but it most likely came from a variety of considerations, among them repeated legal appeals by media outlets to get rid of the ban.

It is easiest to see this announcement as a not-so-subtle threat to atomically ambitious Iran, especially given the fact that in the coming months US President Donald Trump may abandon the 2015 nuclear deal, unless significant alterations are made to it.

There’s another element to “Why Now?” Former prime ministers Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak (who was defense minister during the attack) offer conflicting versions of what happened in their memoirs.

Syrian reactor
The Israeli Air Force’s before and after images of the Syrian reactor in Deir al-Zor
2. Hoping to pressure Hamas, the PA is weighing a complete divorce from Gaza. In a nutshell, the PA would declare Gaza a “rebel district,” absolving Ramallah of its responsibilities to the Strip. A PA official told the Times of Israel:

“Declaring Gaza as a rebel district would mean that the Palestinian Authority will no longer be responsible for anything there,” the official said.

“In a way, it would be like a divorce between the West Bank and Gaza Strip. We hope that this will not happen and that Hamas will wake up and realize that its policies and actions are very harmful and destructive to the Palestinian people and their national project.”

The official acknowledged that such a move would result in a severe humanitarian and economic crisis in the Gaza Strip.

3. Fraying US-Palestinian ties became even more tense after PA President Mahmoud Abbas called US Ambassador David Friedman a “son of a dog” and a “settler,” in what the Associated Press called “an angry rant” at a PA leadership meeting in Ramallah. The US denounced the PA chief’s language while Friedman suggested Abbas is an antisemite.

Mentioning US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and his plan to move the country’s embassy in Israel to the city, Abbas said Trump “views the settlements as legitimate.”

“More than one official has said that,” he added. “The ambassador, David Friedman, said they’re building on their own land. You son of a dog, building on their own land?! You are a settler and your family are settlers!”

Further underlining the enmity and incitement, Abbas’ Fatah party tweeted a leery image of Friedman with the caption, “settler, son of a dog.” I’m posting a screengrab in case the Palestinians remove the tweet.


Israel and the Palestinians
• Israeli security forces are gearing up for Palestinian violence over Passover. March 30 is Palestinian “Land Day,” and Palestinians are expected to storm border fences amid mass marches

• According to Israeli media reports, the biggest threat to the US embassy being moved to Jerusalem isn’t international opposition or Palestinian violence but Israeli bureaucracy(!?)

• The Jerusalem Post examines how Israel foiled Hamas plans to build a rocket base in Lebanon and drag Hezbollah into a war.

• More than 12,000 Jews visited the Temple Mount since September, a 47 percent increase, according to numbers released by Temple Mount groups. Ynet adds that the actual numbers are even higher because their report didn’t include Jews who independently visited the holy site.

Israeli Air Force• Plenty more to read about Israel’s affirmation of Operation Orchard, including:

– An Ehud Olmert Q+A with Ynet.
– Ex-Mossad chief Tamir Pardo: Now wasn’t the time to declassify the attack
– The reactor’s discovery caught the Mossad off-guard.
– An intelligence official on lessons learned.
– Pilot: “To this day, my wife doesn’t know”
– US official: Air strike was “a blessing for humanity.”
– How did an Israeli journalist reach Deir al-Zor and what did he see there?
– Current IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot shared his recollections.

• While the world’s preoccupied with the Sergei Skripal affair — the Russian double agent who was poisoned with a powerful nerve agent in the UK — Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman takes a closer look at the Mossad’s possible involvement in the mysterious 2002 death of a Russian general who was in charge of Moscow’s chemical weapons program.

• Israel began clearing thousands of landmines from around Qasr al-Yahud baptism site on the Jordan River, the Times of Israel reports.

• Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom once again reveals her ignorance — this time in an interview with Sweden’s Jewish Chronicle and picked up by the Times of Israel.

 
Annika H Rothstein

@truthandfiction
Interviewed by Jewish Chronicle FM @margotwallstrom is asked her opinion on the Palestinian Authority paying families of terrorist. Her reply?
 "I don't know what is right,but are people supposed to starve? What will they do if we don't give them money?"http://judiskkronika.se/att-kallas-antisemit-kanns-fruktansvart-och-ar-direkt-felaktigt/ …

6:40 PM - Mar 19, 2018

”Att kallas antisemit känns fruktansvärt och är direkt felaktigt”
Omedelbart efter valet 2014 gjorde Sveriges nya regering en avsiktsförklaring om att erkänna Palestina, vilket blev början på en frostig relation till Israel.  När Israel kort därpå drabbades av en...

judiskkronika.se
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Also in the News
• Jerusalem Post: As widely expected Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat is going to announce that he won’t run for a third term, but seek a Knesset seat.

• “A Spanish judge granted an anti-Israel group’s motion to initiate a trial for alleged incitement to hatred and intimidation against the leader of a group that fights boycotts of the Jewish state,” the JTA reports. Angel Mas heads ACOM, which has scored a number of legal victories against BDS in various Spanish municipalities. Earlier this week, Mas shared his story in a recent guest post: BDS: The Bane in Spain.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Khaled Abu Toameh: Burning all bridges, Abbas sets himself up for continued isolation
– Amos Harel: Forget ‘son of a dog’ – Abbas’ speech was disconcerting for an entirely different reason
– Smadar Perry: The Americans, the Saudis and the irrelevant Palestinian leader
– Zvi Bar’el: With ‘son of a dog’ remark, Abbas showed he’s finished with America. And Jerusalem rejoiced
– Jerusalem Post (staff-ed): Abbas’s end game
– Dr. George Tzogopoulos: Should US aid to the Palestinians be suspended?

View image on Twitter
 
Avi Mayer

@AviMayer
LOL: Advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas minimizes his statement that U.S. Ambassador David Friedman is "a son of a dog," noting that "dogs are pets in the Arab world, and they are generally viewed positively." (GLZ)

12:42 PM - Mar 20, 2018
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– Atef Abu Saif: Why I stay in Gaza
– Alex Fishman: Decade of relative calm is behind us
– Elior Levy: An escalation waiting to happen
– Yoav Zitun: As IDF keeps destroying tunnels, Hamas rebuilds old ones

– Benjamin Weinthal, Asaf Romirowsky: Iran’s role in the boycott Israel campaign
– Jared Samilow: Academic boycotts are bad for the academy
– Justine Murray: Mindless antisemitism at Syracuse U.
– Gil Troy: Are the Jews today’s wicked witches of the West?

– Benny Avni: Germany’s shameless power play against Israel
– Josh Rogin: What happens the day after Trump pulls out of the Iran deal

Featured image: CC0 Pixabay; jet via Facebook/Israeli Air Force;

Israel Confirms Destroying Syrian Nuclear Reactor
http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-21-2018-syria-reactor/
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 21, 2018

 Share on Facebook0Tweet about this on Twitter4Print this pageEmail this to someone
Today’s Top Stories
1. Israel finally confirmed that it destroyed the Syrian nuclear reactor in Deir al-Zor in 2007. Operation Orchard (also known as Operation Outside the Box) was suppressed by Israeli censors but Israel’s responsibility for the strike was an open secret for years thanks to hints and slips from Israeli politicians, an account of the attack in ex-president George Bush Jr.’s memoirs and occasional foreign reports.

Israeli censors lifted the ban, allowing the Israeli press to publish previously undisclosed details of the operation, including declassified footage, photos and documents so take your pick of Yossi Melman’s “inside story,” and coverage from the Jerusalem Post, Haaretz, Ynet, Israel HaYom and Times of Israel. The latter addresses why the censor’s ban was lifted now:

There was no one reason given for the decision to remove the censorship on the al-Kibar strike, but it most likely came from a variety of considerations, among them repeated legal appeals by media outlets to get rid of the ban.

It is easiest to see this announcement as a not-so-subtle threat to atomically ambitious Iran, especially given the fact that in the coming months US President Donald Trump may abandon the 2015 nuclear deal, unless significant alterations are made to it.

There’s another element to “Why Now?” Former prime ministers Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak (who was defense minister during the attack) offer conflicting versions of what happened in their memoirs.

Syrian reactor
The Israeli Air Force’s before and after images of the Syrian reactor in Deir al-Zor
2. Hoping to pressure Hamas, the PA is weighing a complete divorce from Gaza. In a nutshell, the PA would declare Gaza a “rebel district,” absolving Ramallah of its responsibilities to the Strip. A PA official told the Times of Israel:

“Declaring Gaza as a rebel district would mean that the Palestinian Authority will no longer be responsible for anything there,” the official said.

“In a way, it would be like a divorce between the West Bank and Gaza Strip. We hope that this will not happen and that Hamas will wake up and realize that its policies and actions are very harmful and destructive to the Palestinian people and their national project.”

The official acknowledged that such a move would result in a severe humanitarian and economic crisis in the Gaza Strip.

3. Fraying US-Palestinian ties became even more tense after PA President Mahmoud Abbas called US Ambassador David Friedman a “son of a dog” and a “settler,” in what the Associated Press called “an angry rant” at a PA leadership meeting in Ramallah. The US denounced the PA chief’s language while Friedman suggested Abbas is an antisemite.

Mentioning US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and his plan to move the country’s embassy in Israel to the city, Abbas said Trump “views the settlements as legitimate.”

“More than one official has said that,” he added. “The ambassador, David Friedman, said they’re building on their own land. You son of a dog, building on their own land?! You are a settler and your family are settlers!”

Further underlining the enmity and incitement, Abbas’ Fatah party tweeted a leery image of Friedman with the caption, “settler, son of a dog.” I’m posting a screengrab in case the Palestinians remove the tweet.


Israel and the Palestinians
• Israeli security forces are gearing up for Palestinian violence over Passover. March 30 is Palestinian “Land Day,” and Palestinians are expected to storm border fences amid mass marches

• According to Israeli media reports, the biggest threat to the US embassy being moved to Jerusalem isn’t international opposition or Palestinian violence but Israeli bureaucracy(!?)

• The Jerusalem Post examines how Israel foiled Hamas plans to build a rocket base in Lebanon and drag Hezbollah into a war.

• More than 12,000 Jews visited the Temple Mount since September, a 47 percent increase, according to numbers released by Temple Mount groups. Ynet adds that the actual numbers are even higher because their report didn’t include Jews who independently visited the holy site.

Israeli Air Force• Plenty more to read about Israel’s affirmation of Operation Orchard, including:

– An Ehud Olmert Q+A with Ynet.
– Ex-Mossad chief Tamir Pardo: Now wasn’t the time to declassify the attack
– The reactor’s discovery caught the Mossad off-guard.
– An intelligence official on lessons learned.
– Pilot: “To this day, my wife doesn’t know”
– US official: Air strike was “a blessing for humanity.”
– How did an Israeli journalist reach Deir al-Zor and what did he see there?
– Current IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot shared his recollections.

• While the world’s preoccupied with the Sergei Skripal affair — the Russian double agent who was poisoned with a powerful nerve agent in the UK — Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman takes a closer look at the Mossad’s possible involvement in the mysterious 2002 death of a Russian general who was in charge of Moscow’s chemical weapons program.

• Israel began clearing thousands of landmines from around Qasr al-Yahud baptism site on the Jordan River, the Times of Israel reports.

• Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom once again reveals her ignorance — this time in an interview with Sweden’s Jewish Chronicle and picked up by the Times of Israel.

 
Annika H Rothstein

@truthandfiction
Interviewed by Jewish Chronicle FM @margotwallstrom is asked her opinion on the Palestinian Authority paying families of terrorist. Her reply?
 "I don't know what is right,but are people supposed to starve? What will they do if we don't give them money?"http://judiskkronika.se/att-kallas-antisemit-kanns-fruktansvart-och-ar-direkt-felaktigt/ …

6:40 PM - Mar 19, 2018

”Att kallas antisemit känns fruktansvärt och är direkt felaktigt”
Omedelbart efter valet 2014 gjorde Sveriges nya regering en avsiktsförklaring om att erkänna Palestina, vilket blev början på en frostig relation till Israel.  När Israel kort därpå drabbades av en...

judiskkronika.se
36
74 people are talking about this
Twitter Ads info and privacy
Also in the News
• Jerusalem Post: As widely expected Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat is going to announce that he won’t run for a third term, but seek a Knesset seat.

• “A Spanish judge granted an anti-Israel group’s motion to initiate a trial for alleged incitement to hatred and intimidation against the leader of a group that fights boycotts of the Jewish state,” the JTA reports. Angel Mas heads ACOM, which has scored a number of legal victories against BDS in various Spanish municipalities. Earlier this week, Mas shared his story in a recent guest post: BDS: The Bane in Spain.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Khaled Abu Toameh: Burning all bridges, Abbas sets himself up for continued isolation
– Amos Harel: Forget ‘son of a dog’ – Abbas’ speech was disconcerting for an entirely different reason
– Smadar Perry: The Americans, the Saudis and the irrelevant Palestinian leader
– Zvi Bar’el: With ‘son of a dog’ remark, Abbas showed he’s finished with America. And Jerusalem rejoiced
– Jerusalem Post (staff-ed): Abbas’s end game
– Dr. George Tzogopoulos: Should US aid to the Palestinians be suspended?

View image on Twitter
 
Avi Mayer

@AviMayer
LOL: Advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas minimizes his statement that U.S. Ambassador David Friedman is "a son of a dog," noting that "dogs are pets in the Arab world, and they are generally viewed positively." (GLZ)

12:42 PM - Mar 20, 2018
191
176 people are talking about this
Twitter Ads info and privacy
– Atef Abu Saif: Why I stay in Gaza
– Alex Fishman: Decade of relative calm is behind us
– Elior Levy: An escalation waiting to happen
– Yoav Zitun: As IDF keeps destroying tunnels, Hamas rebuilds old ones

– Benjamin Weinthal, Asaf Romirowsky: Iran’s role in the boycott Israel campaign
– Jared Samilow: Academic boycotts are bad for the academy
– Justine Murray: Mindless antisemitism at Syracuse U.
– Gil Troy: Are the Jews today’s wicked witches of the West?

– Benny Avni: Germany’s shameless power play against Israel
– Josh Rogin: What happens the day after Trump pulls out of the Iran deal

Featured image: CC0 Pixabay; jet via Facebook/Israeli Air Force;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-19-2018-french-smuggling/
French Embassy Employee Admits Smuggling Weapons
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 19, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Israel arrested two French embassy employees suspected of smuggling weapons from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. According to the Shin Bet, the guns were hidden in a consular vehicle and driven through the Erez crossing on several occasions. Because of the car’s diplomatic status, security checks were less rigorous. The driver, Romain Frank, is a French national while the security guard was identified as a Palestinian from eastern Jerusalem. Several other Gazans living illegally in the West Bank and part of the arms network were also arrested. More at the Jerusalem Post and Ynet.

According to the Shin Bet investigation, Frank received the weapons from a Palestinian resident of the Gaza Strip employed at the French Cultural Center in the Gaza Strip and he transferred the weapons to a cell in the West Bank who sold them to arms dealers.

The Shin Bet investigation clearly showed that Frank was acting in return for financial gain, of his own volition, and without the knowledge of his superiors. The investigation also found that several Palestinians arrested in relation to the case were also involved in the smuggling of money from Gaza to the West Bank.

As the investigation developed, Israeli officials kept French authorities apprised, per Haaretz. The investigation was all over the French media, but the Israeli press was under a gag order which was lifted only today.



2. Adiel Kolman, the Israeli stabbed to death in Jerusalem’s Old City yesterday was laid to rest today. The 32-year-old father of four was attacked after leaving work at the nearby City of David excavations. Initial Israeli media reports incorrectly identified Kolman as a security guard.

The terrorist, Abd al-Rahman Bani Fadel, was from the from a West Bank village near Nablus and had a work permit allowing him entry into Jerusalem for five days. Fadel was shot and killed by responding police. Some early Israeli media reports incorrectly identified Fadel as a Turkish national.

US Ambassador David Friedman criticized the Palestinian Authority for failing to denounce the attack.

Adiel Kolman
3. A Lebanese Shiite cleric is calling on Beirut to revoke Hezbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah’s citizenship over his “clear collaboration” and allegiance to Iran. More on the interview at MEMRI and the Times of Israel.

4. BDS: The Bane in Spain: A special guest post from the battlelines against BDS bigotry and bullying.

Spanish BDS

In the News
• The Trump administration recently filed a brief against legal action currently underway by victims of Palestinian terror. The New York Times takes a closer look at how that surprising brief unfolded.

• Mahmoud Abbas rolled out a warm welcome for a terrorist released from Israeli prison. Rajaei Haddad spent 20 years behind bars for his role in the 1997 murder of yeshiva student Gabriel Hirschberg in Jerusalem’s Old City.

• Anti-Israel students at UC-Santa Barbara condoned ‘armed resistance’ and shared images with an AK-47 and pistol on Facebook. Students for Justice in Palestine at UCSB subsequently removed the posts.

The Facebook post included a photo of a Palestinian woman holding a pistol, as well as a cartoon — drawn in an outline of Israel and the Palestinian territories — depicting a woman with an AK-47 assault rifle.

Another photo featured an armed Leila Khaled, who helped hijack two planes in Europe on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

• Row over pro-Israeli groups blocked from Glasgow anti-racism procession.

• Washington DC city council member Trayon White apologized for posting a video on his Facebook accusing a conspiracy of wealthy Jews of controlling the weather(!?)

Window Into Israel
Bezeq• Ynet: One of Netanyahu’s former advisers who turned states witness in the Bezeq affair told police that he ordered Bezeq’s majority shareholder, Shaul Elovitch and his wife to destroy evidence — damaging SMS messages messages from Sara Netanyahu — and to also destroy the phones. Meanwhile, Bezeq CEO Stella Handler, who was recently released from house arrest, announced she is stepping down from her position

Netanyahu is suspected of offering Bezeq regulatory benefits in exchange for positive coverage on a prominent news site owned by Bezeq’s majority shareholder, Shaul Elovitch. The PM denies the accusations.

• A military parole board approved the early release of the Hebron shooter, Elor Azaria. He’s due to be released on May 10 after serving two-thirds of his 18-month sentence.

Azaria was convicted of manslaughter for shooting a Palestinian, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif as he lay prone on the ground minutes after he had been neutralized by soldiers Sharif had attacked with a knife. Azaria’s trial polarized the country for weeks.

• Senior officials from the Education Ministry were among 18 detained on fraud suspicions.

• On a cloudless day, Israel broke its solar power production record.

sun

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Prof. Eyal Zisser: Palestinians wary of new wave of terror
– Ron Ben-Yishai: IDF vs. Hamas: A new type of war between wars
– Nadav Shragai: Bring the Jews back to Hagai St.
– Seth Frantzman: Al Jazeera, ‘free speech,’ and the future of journalism
– Ronni Shaked: The Palestinian fuse is getting shorter
– Ronald Lauder: Israel’s self-inflicted wounds
– Sally Abrams: A ‘victory’ for BDS? Looks like defeat to me

Featured image: CC0 alberthbq; sun CC BY-NC-ND Mike;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-18-2018-soldiers-killed/
Soldiers Killed in Terror Attack Laid to Rest
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 18, 2018

Israeli soldiers mourn over the fresh grave of Cpt. Ziv Daos during his funeral in Holon Cemetery on March 18, 2018. Daos was killed on Friday in a Palestinian car-ramming attack near Mevo Dotan, in the West Bank. Photo by Miriam Alster/Flash90
 Share on Facebook0Tweet about this on Twitter2Print this pageEmail this to someone
Today’s Top Stories
*** Breaking News *** Shortly after this roundup was published, a security guard in Jerusalem’s Old City was seriously wounded in what appears to be a stabbing attack.

1. Israel today laid to rest two soldiers killed in a Friday Palestinian car-ramming attack at the entrance to the northern West Bank settlement of Mevo Dotan. The two soldiers were identified as Captain Ziv Daus, 21, and Sergeant Netanel Kahalani, 20. Two other soldiers were injured. The terrorist, caught shortly after the attack, was identified as 26-year-old Alaa Kabha, a former security prisoner from the nearby village of Barta’a.

In footage released this afternoon, Palestinians were seen trying to help the injured soldiers and responding personnel.

Cpt. Ziv Daus and Sgt. Netanel Kahalani
Cpt. Ziv Daus and Sgt. Netanel Kahalani
2. The IDF destroyed two Gaza tunnels. One, an old tunnel reaching into Israeli territory, was being “rehabilitated” but was not yet operational, Israeli officials said. The second tunnel did not cross into Israel.

Tensions are rising between Israel and Gaza. On Saturday night, Israel launched retaliatory airstrikes on Hamas positions after an improvised explosive device blew up along the border fence. No soldiers were injured.
3. Israel “Apartheid” Week is underway with antisemitic incidents and controversy at campuses in South Africa and the UK. See below for details. And see HonestReporting’s video, Is Israel an Apartheid State?.

4. HR Book Review: Yoni’s Last Battle: With the new film “7 Days in Entebbe” apparently working to humanize Palestinian terrorists, this seemed the right time for a book review of “Yoni’s Last Battle.”

Israel and the Palestinians
• PA officials were living large at the 5-star Four Seasons Hotel in Baltimore, racking up a $14,250 bill, including champagne

• Facebook expands advertising map to include Israelis living beyond Green Line.

• Is the White House delaying the release of its peace plan, hoping for the emergence of a more receptive post-Abbas leadership?

• Jerusalem Post: Israel advanced plans to build a light-rail link connecting Petah Tikva and Rosh Ha’ayin with the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

Window into Israel
Yosef Shapira
Yosef Shapira
• Israel’s state comptroller, Yosef Shapira, who also serves as the government ombudsman, released his annual report examining the efficiency and ethical conduct of public institutions.  His roundup of the “warts and all” found lapses in various areas, such as:

– The IDF‘s implementation of international law.
– A police failure to take necessary steps after the 2014 abduction of Israeli teens.
– The IDF’s “Hannibal directive” during the 2014 Gaza war.
– The Defense Ministry‘s spokesmanship.
– The IDF‘s Orthodox conscription goals.
– The police department‘s response to crime against Palestinians.
– The Treasury for hiding billions of shekels in budget reserves.
–  The government’s treatment of lone soldiers.

• The Knesset approved the 2019 state budget. Ynet summarizes where the money’s going while the Jerusalem Post fills in background on the politicking. More at the Times of Israel.

• Church real estate sale rocks Jerusalem housing market.

• New Israeli bill seeks punishment for Jewish foreigners with ‘chained’ wives, reports the JTA.

• Worth watching: Vice News takes an in-depth look at how Israel has become a world leader in cybersecurity.

• The New York Times delves into  the support Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu draws on in poorer periphery towns despite the ongoing corruption probes.

• For commentary on the domestic scene, see Lahav Harkov, Moran Azulay, Sima Kadmon and Amnon Abramovich.

Around the World
• Israel “Apartheid” Week is underway. The Jerusalem Post reports a large Israeli flag with the words “Apartheid State, blood is on your hands” written in red was found outside the University of Cape Town’s main building and anti-Semitic and anti-Israel graffiti was spray painted in various areas of the Wits University campus in Johannesburg. Also at Wits U., pro-Palestinian activists put up provocative posters of Anne Frank dressed in a keffiyeh.
View image on Twitter
 
Adam Milstein

@AdamMilstein
BDS Supporters at top #SouthAfrican University manipulate image of #AnneFrank and vandalize the campus with anti-#Israel graffiti - BDS IS ANTISEMITISM! #NeverAgain http://ow.ly/BzSh30iZRyz 

3:45 AM - Mar 17, 2018
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Meanwhile, London’s King’s College postponed a pro-Israel event due to “high-risk factors.”

• PayPal shut down a BDS account, blocking Collectif 69 Palestine’s ability to collect donations through the online payment system. Already this year, Paypal closed the accounts of two other French BDS organizations, Jewish French Union for Peace (UJFP) and the France-Palestine Solidarity Association. According to the Jerusalem Post:

French banks and online payment services are largely cognizant of France’s Lellouche Law, which outlaws discrimination based on national origin and has been applied to BDS organizations and activists.

UK Labour Party• Labour-rattling (part one): The front runner for the UK party’s powerful position of general secretary, Jenny Formby, “was involved in giving work to someone who had previously been suspended by the party for antisemitism,” The Independent reports.

The controversy surrounds Vicky Kirby, who in 2016 was appointed to a senior position in Unite, Britain’s largest union, despite a raft of antisemitic tweets that should have disqualified her from even being considered. See also Jewish Chronicle followup.

Unite sources said Ms Formby would have had to approve Ms Kirby’s appointment, and would almost certainly have directly recruited her for the job . . .

• Labour-rattling (part two): Two UK Labour-affiliated municipal politicians are speaking out against their party’s antisemitism. The two shared their stories with the Times of London:

Joe Goldberg and Natan Doron said they had been repeatedly abused to their faces by pro-Corbyn Labour members — including fellow councillors — with crude allusions to their race or insulting references to the Holocaust . . .

Goldberg said he had made at least five formal complaints to local officials but got nowhere. “I complained to the Labour whip, Lorna Reith, but she told me anti-semitism was a ‘debatable term’,” he said. Yesterday Reith said: “It doesn’t sound like anything I would say.” She said she took complaints of anti-semitism “extremely seriously” and that Goldberg had not responded to her invitations to meet.

On Holocaust Memorial Day in January 2015, Reith retweeted a picture equating Israel’s military attacks on Gaza to the Holocaust.

• It’s a pity entertainment columnist Roger Friedman didn’t take advantage of an opportunity to directly ask Lorde if the New Zealand singer’s flopping US concert tour is related to her decision to boycott Israel last year. Would’ve been a nice scoop for an overly speculative column.

Lorde
Lorde
• Macedonia adopts definition of antisemitism that includes Israel-hatred.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading this weekend . . .

– Amos Harel: Destroyed tunnels and border bombs: Hamas and Israel dangerously close to another Gaza war
– Ron Ben-Yishai: Terror attack the direct result of incitement from Gaza
– Jonathan Marks: How partisan is the issue of Israel?
– Yonah Jeremy Bob: What will the ICC do with Israel’s new report on Gaza war crimes?
– Bassam Tawil: The new Palestinian jihad to obliterate Israel
– Avi Issacharoff: Something is rotten in the terrorist kingdom of Hamas
– Dr. Raz Zimmt: A Persian riddle: When Israelis misread Iran
– Mohammed Ruzgar: The fall of Ghouta threatens Israel, US interests and the West
– Colin Rubinstein: As relations with North Korea thaw, Iran poses a bigger threat
– Vivian Bercovici: Canada joins in on some one-sided Israel bashing for no apparent reason
– Qanta Ahmed: Parkland and antisemitism
– Sammy Stein: Put hatred aside and march together against racism
– The Economist: Labour’s problem with anti-Semitism

• Last but not least, Fisk’s being Fisk again.

Featured image: Miriam Alster/Flash90; Shapira via Wikimedia Commons; Lorde via YouTube/Walrus Rider;

US to Push Gaza Projects Without PA Cooperation?
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 14, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. The White House hosted a brainstorming session on ways to ease Gaza’s dire humanitarian situation yesterday. Representatives from Israel, various Arab states and several European countries discussed ways to improve the Strip’s basic infrastructure in areas such as health care, food and electricity among others. A US official noting a Palestinian boycott of the gathering told the Times of Israel that Washington is prepared to pursue projects in Gaza without PA cooperation.

“Our goal is to get the PA in control of Gaza, if that’s possible,” the official said in a media briefing. “If the PA is unwilling to, or unable to, implement the projects, then we would have to proceed without them.”

More on the confab below.

2. Israeli political leaders resolved the coalition crisis over Orthodox army conscription and the state budget. I can’t succinctly explain the agreement, but Ynet lays out the details in all their technical glory. Further coverage at the Times of Israel, Jerusalem Post and Haaretz plus a helpful timeline to help make sense of it all.


3. The Knesset’s Ethics Committee barred an Israeli lawmaker from an overseas trip sponsored by pro-boycott organization. Arab Joint List MK Yousef Jabareen was denied permission to fly abroad to give a series of lectures funded by Jewish Voice for Peace. JVP is on a government blacklist of BDS groups whose leaders are barred from entering Israel.

4. Washington Post Defends PA ‘Martyrs Fund’: One man’s terrorist is another man’s social welfare recipient.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• While Palestinians boycotted the White House gathering for assisting Gaza, Israeli officials found themselves directly discussing the situation with their counterparts from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates, the Jerusalem Post explains the significance:

The summit on Gaza, called by Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser on Middle East peace, and Jason Greenblatt, his special representative for international negotiations, marks an unprecedented moment for Israeli diplomacy, as their dialogue with officials from Arab states is publicly recognized for the first time.

Representatives from Egypt, Jordan, Canada and several European states also attended. The Jerusalem Post adds in a separate report that US officials “could not vouch for whether the Israelis and any particular Arab delegations held talks separate from the formal session on the sidelines.”

13 Mar

Barak Ravid

@BarakRavid
Replying to @BarakRavid
3 \ Israel was represented at the meeting by General Yoav (Polly) Mordechai – the most senior Israeli officer in charge of civilian and economic issues in the West Bank and Gaza. Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Egypt and Jordan also took part

 
Barak Ravid

@BarakRavid
4 \ It's very rare for Israeli and Arab officials to gather around the same table. Creating closer relations between Israel and the Arab world has been a primary goal of the Trump administration over the last year

10:41 PM - Mar 13, 2018
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• What does Mike Pompeo’s appointment mean for Israel and the peace process? That’s the question parsed at the Jerusalem Post and the JTA and Times of Israel.

• Israel seized IDF uniforms being smuggled into Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing.

• On the sidelines of the joint Israeli-US Juniper Cobra military exercises, a lot of ideas were shared on the “lost art” of tunnel warfare.

Juniper Cobra
US Marines conduct a live-fire exercise as part of Juniper Cobra exercises in Israel, March 11, 2018.
• Special comptroller report pokes holes in IDF’s Gaza war probe. Joseph Shapira’s report finds that “the IDF’s targeting and its probes of its attacks followed international law,” but criticized “a variety of aspects of the IDF’s targeting and its investigations of war crimes claims.” More on the story at the Jerusalem Post and Ynet.

Supporters of Israel will look to the report’s main headline of compliance with international law, while the UN Human Rights Council and various detractors will likely focus on the many shortcomings the report points out.

Window into Israel
• Who is Orly Levy-Abekasis and why is she emerging as “Israel’s newest political wildcard.”

• Plenty of spilled ink and burnt pixels assessing the agreement, including Raoul Wootliff, who argues that the deal merely delays the standoff to later in the year. Other commentaries that caught my eye include Gil Hoffman, David Horovitz and Yoaz Hendel. See also Shmuel Rosner.
Elor Azaria
• Military prosecutors said they will not oppose a parole request by Hebron shooter Elor Azaria to be released from prison in May. Azaria was convicted of manslaughter for shooting a Palestinian, Abdel Fattah al-Sharif as he lay prone on the ground minutes after he had been neutralized by soldiers Sharif had attacked with a knife. Azaria’s trial polarized the country for weeks.
If a parole board accepts Azaria’s request, he would be released in May after serving 10 months of his 14-month sentence.

Around the World
• South African opposition politician Mmusi Maimane takes to the Wall St. Journal to clear the air about drought-stricken Cape Town rejecting Israeli water assistance.

Cape Town is governed by South Africa’s main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA), which I lead. It may well be that South Africa’s national government, led by the African National Congress (ANC), rejected Israel’s offers of assistance with building desalination plants on ideological grounds.

But it is certainly not true that the DA-run city of Cape Town refused to meet with Israeli water professionals. On the contrary, the city has engaged a wide range of experts from a number of countries, including Australia, Spain, Saudi Arabia and Israel. As a party, we would not allow a geopolitical dispute far removed from our context to define our response to a very local crisis. We are interested in finding the best solutions for the residents we serve, no matter where they come from.

Cape Town
Water distribution in Cape Town
• Latest Gallup poll finds Americans strongly support Israel.

• US court allows expanded lawsuit against American Studies Association and lead faculty activists over BDS.

• The Miami-Dade County Chiefs of Police Association unanimously adopted the State Department’s official definition of anti-Semitism. Police forces in 34 cities located in Miami-Dade County will now use the definition “as a guide to investigating and prosecuting anti-Jewish hate crimes.” The State Dept. adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of anti-Semitism.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Khaled Abu Toameh: Blast targeting Hamdallah blows Palestinian rift wide open
– Amos Harel: Assassination attempt on Palestinian PM failed, but dealt mortal blow to reconciliation
– Prof. Eyal Zisser: Hamas can’t even protect its guests
– Seth Frantzman: Who tried to kill the Palestinian Prime Minister?
– Raphael Ahren: With anti-Iran, pro-Israel stances, Pompeo may become Jerusalem’s new darling
– Bassam Tawil: The Palestinian peace plan
– Sandra Parker: Fundamentalist terrorists benefit from ‘fundamental fairness’


Featured image: CC BY-SA Connie; Marines via US Dept. of Defense; Azaria via YouTube/BBC News; Cape Town via YouTube/CBS News;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-13-2018-hamdallah-assassination/
Palestinian PM Survives Assassination Attempt in Gaza
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 13, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. PA Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah survived an assassination attempt this morning. His convoy was rocked by a roadside bomb shortly after entering Gaza through the Erez checkpoint. Hamdallah was accompanied by PA General Intelligence chief Majed Faraj. Neither were harmed, but several security guards and bystanders were lightly injured. Details at Haaretz, Ynet and the Times of Israel.

There were no claims of responsibility for the attack; Fatah holds Hamas responsible while Hamas blamed Israel.

Hamdallah’s visit — arranged months ago — included the opening of a waste water treatment plant and meetings with Hamas leaders on reconciliation, which went on as scheduled.

Mike Pompeo
2. President Donald Trump fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, replacing him with CIA director Mike Pompeo. Take your pick of coverage from the Washington Post, New York Times, CNN and Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter).

It’s not yet clear what the shift means for the White House’s Mideast peace efforts, but Pompeo has a hawkish history on Israel and Iran. Trump also nominated CIA deputy director Gina Haspel for the top job at Spook Central.

3. According to Turkish media reports, the PA plans to file a complaint at the International Criminal Court in the Hague against Trump and Netanyahu over the president’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• The Times of Israel takes a closer look at who was responsible for triggering the violence aboard the Mavi Marmara in 2010. This is in light of Facebook comments by Free Gaza spokesperson Greta Berlin that recently surfaced blaming one of the pro-Palestinian activists, Ken O’Keefe, for sparking the melee by seizing an Israeli commando’s gun. Berlin’s comments were posted to a closed Facebook group called “Palestine Live,” which British activist David Collier unearthed.

The Mavi Marmara was part of a flotilla of ships trying to break the Israeli maritime blockade of Gaza. Ten Turks were killed clashing with Israeli naval commandos aboard the Mavi Marmara, leading to a rupture in Israeli-Turkish relations.

• Israel will broadcast the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Arabic for free, “breaking a Qatari monopoly on World Cup coverage in Arabic that has proved unaffordable for many in the Middle East.” The Jerusalem Post explains:

With Qatar’s BeIN Sports demanding that fans pay $45 per household to watch the World Cup in Arabic, a subscription proving unaffordable for many in the region, millions of Middle East soccer fans are likely to turn to Israeli coverage as a free alternative.

The tournament begins on June 14.

World Cup
Germany’s Mario Gotze scores the match-winning goal against Argentina in extra time in the 2014 World Cup Final.
• If you’re wondering about the slow pace of restoring bilateral Israeli-Jordanian ties, it’s because King Abdullah is caught between his government, his people, and regional realities, reports The Media Line.

• Worth reading: The Religion News Service takes a deeper look at the still-festering tax spat between Jerusalem’s city hall and church officials.

Window into Israel
• The Israeli coalition crisis is coming to a head, with the possibility of a Knesset vote tonight on the first draft of a compromise bill on Orthodox army conscription. The legislation is opposed by the Israel Beitenu party and its leader, Avigdor Liberman. Also in the pipeline for tonight is an opposition bill to dissolve the Knesset and go straight to new elections. More at the Times of Israel and a JTA ‘splainer.

Meanwhile, opposition leaders claim Netanyahu is “coordinating” with Liberman in order to go to early elections.

• Jerusalem’s deputy mayor arrested in a new corruption affair. Meir Turgeman, who announced plans to run for mayor in municipal elections in October, was arrested along with five other people on Monday.

Turgeman is suspected of receiving illicit benefits in exchange for promoting other people’s interests.

• For commentary on the domestic scene, see Amnon Straschnov, David Horovitz, Gil Hoffman, Zehava Galon, Herb Keinon and Moran Azulay.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Sen. Lindsey Graham: The most unnerving visit to the Middle East in a long time (click via Twitter)
– David Rothkopf: Trump’s abrupt new romance with Kim leaves Netanyahu hurting, and stranded
– Elliott Abrams: US “National Security Leaders” adopt the Palestinian narrative
– Yossi Melman: Will Israeli Arab youth be tempted to join ISIS in the Sinai?
– New York Daily News (staff-ed): No more pay-to-slay: Pass the Taylor Force Act to curb terror
– Melanie Phillips: Labour can’t see its cesspool of antisemitism

Featured image: CC BY-SA Johnny Silvercloud; Pompeo via YouTube/C-Span; World Cup CC BY Wikimedia Commons/Danilo Borges;
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-12-2018-trump-initiative/
Will Trump Peace Plan Be Dead on Arrival?
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 12, 2018
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Today’s Top Stories
1. With the Trump peace plan nearly finished, White House officials are now worried about how to roll out the initiative without it being declared dead on arrival, reports the New York Times. The Palestinians insist they won’t accept the US as a mediator and the increasing likelihood of early Israeli elections further complicates US peace efforts.
White House
2. JTA: Trump administration is backing the PLO in a terror lawsuit. Solicitor-General Noel Francisco’s argument has both baffled and angered Jewish groups:

The PLO is entitled to due process, the solicitor general argues, because it qualifies as a “person” under U.S. law. The filing also argues that the presence of two PLO offices in the United States does not meet the test of establishing the PLO as a legitimate U.S. target for litigation. It also argues that the terrorists would not have necessarily known that some of the casualties were American, which mitigates another application of U.S. law, that allows lawsuits against entities that deliberately target U.S. interests.

3. Hezbollah forces participating in Ghouta massacre.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah has been hiding the fighters’ participation in the Ghouta massacre from their families to avoid strong opposition and criticism over the decision to send Hezbollah fighters on a dangerous mission beyond Lebanon’s borders.

4. HR CEO’s Week With the Jewish National Fund: HonestReporting’s work increasingly finds partnership in communities around the world.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• According to Israeli media reports, Honduras, Paraguay and the Czech Republic are the countries now viewed as most likely to move their embassies to Jerusalem. The US is scheduled to open its embassy in Jerusalem in May to coincide with Israel’s 70 anniversary. Guatemala plans to move its embassy to Jerusalem two days afterwards.

• An Islamic Jihad terrorist accidentally blew himself up in Gaza on Saturday night while “manufacturing weapons and ammunitions.” Does the 27-year-old Ibrahim Frahat qualify for 72 virgins?

• UN Palestinian refugee aid agency called out for hypocrisy of women’s rights tweet.

Iran• The Times of London takes a closer look at what’s known about Iranian military bases operating in Syria.

Israeli military intelligence and satellite technology have identified at least ten Iranian military bases in Syria as the threat of war between the two rises.

The bases are home to tens of thousands of troops from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which conducts overseas operations, as well as missiles and transfer facilities for supporting Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based Shia militia . . .

Analysts say that at present many of the bases are little more than barracks. Israeli intelligence assesses that the Revolutionary Guard wants to build an air base, a military dock on Syria’s Mediterranean shore and sites to make missiles for the Syrian Army and Hezbollah.

Window into Israel
Avigdor Liberman
• Early elections are looking increasingly likely as efforts to resolve a coalition crisis over Orthodox army conscription still haven’t turned a corner. A Knesset committee approved a draft bill supported by Orthodox lawmakers and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but not by the secular Israel Beiteinu party.

The United Torah Judaism party refuses to support the 2019 state budget if revisions to enlistment laws aren’t made. The secular Kulanu and the Israel Home parties oppose the draft deferments sought by UTJ; Kulanu leader Moshe Kahlon has threatened to withdraw Kulanu from the coalition if a budget isn’t passed before the Knesset’s Passover recess. Should the Israel Beiteinu party, led by Avigdor Liberman, quit the the government, Netanyahu would be left with a razor-thin 61-seat coalition, a situation the PM wants to avoid.

More on the latest developments at the Jerusalem Post, Haaretz and Times of Israel.

• Kulanu’s exit from the coalition would trigger new elections. So would the failure of a budget to pass the Knesset, though the budget can be voted on anytime this year. So why the fuss now?

• Some politicians suspect the Prime Minister seeks new elections in order to survive several ongoing corruption probes.

• “Only the evidence can decide.” State prosecutor says early elections won’t affect decision on whether or not to indict Netanyahu.

• For commentary on the domestic scene, see Ben-Dror Yemini, Lahav Harkov and Gideon Allon.

Around the World
• An Argentinian TV quiz show confused about Israel’s capital. “La Tribuna de Guido” was forced to take an unscheduled break from live broadcast while it ruled on which city is Israel’s capital after asking contestants “Which country has Tel Aviv as its capital?”

One contestant, Rocío, didn’t know the answer, suggesting it was perhaps Iran. The other contestant, Lucas, wrote down “Israel” as his answer, but questioned whether it was in fact correct, given that there has been much discussion about whether Jerusalem is in fact the capital of Israel.

The host was forced to take an unscheduled break while staff considered the issue. Eventually it was decided to invalidate the question . . .

Eventually the host said that the correct answer to the Tel Aviv question should have been “none,” as Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.

The Spanish-language clip was uploaded to YouTube.

La Tribuna de Guido
A contestant on La Tribuna de Guido answering that Israel is the country whose capital is Tel Aviv.
• US court allows expanded lawsuit against American Studies Association and lead faculty activists over Israel boycott.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– James Glassman: Why did this administration back the Palestine Liberation Organization in terrorism case?
– Elliott Abrams: At long last, “the crown” will visit Israel
– Ben Sales: Jews agree that Farrakhan is anti-Semitic. After that, it gets complicated.
– Ruadhan Mac Cormaic: Anti-Semitism is on the march across Europe

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-11-2018-un-settlements/
UN Report Labels Settlement Activity a War Crime
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 11, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein
Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
1. In a report to the UN Human Rights Council, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein claimed Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank is a “war crime.” The Jerusalem Post couldn’t ignore the UN’s disproportionate fixation on Israel:
It is one of six reports on Israel that will be presented to the council on March 19.

Five charge Israel with human rights abuses in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, and the sixth focuses on Israeli actions on the Golan Heights.

One of the reports also dedicates a third of its content to charges of human rights abuses by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and by the PA and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Israel remains the only country with so many reports issued against it. The Human Rights Council, for example, has issued only a single report each on human rights issues in countries such as Syria and Iran.

The reports are expected to result in at least five resolutions condemning Israel, again more condemnations than against any other country.

2. Arab diplomats are quietly nudging Mahmoud Abbas to accept whatever peace plan offered by Donald Trump, rather than risk future regret. The Times of Israel, picking up on Egyptian media reports, writes:

Abbas, according to the Egyptian paper, told some of the Arab leaders he had met or contacted lately that he fears that he would be accused of treason if he accepted what Israel was offering the Palestinians.

However, one of the Arab leaders rejected Abbas’s argument, saying the time has come to “prepare Arab public opinion for the new phase, away from charges of treason,” the Arab diplomat added.

building campaign

3. Vladimir Putin angered a lot of Jews (and US lawmakers) when he suggested to Megyn Kelly of NBC News that meddling in US elections might have been done by Jews.

“Maybe they’re not even Russians,” he said. “Maybe they’re Ukrainians, Tatars, Jews, just with Russian citizenship. Even that needs to be checked. Maybe they have dual citizenship. Or maybe a green card. Maybe it was the Americans who paid them for this work. How do you know? I don’t know.”

4. Is US foreign aid funding terror? HR’s Daniel Pomerantz debated terror stipends on i24 News with Palestinian lawmaker Mustafa Barghouti.

Israel and the Palestinians
• The IDF arrested a pair of Palestinians who crossed the Gaza border fence on Sunday morning. One was caught with a gun and knife and is suspected of planning a terror attack. The other Palestinian was caught in a different location unarmed. The two are not believed to be associated with each other.

• For the latest on efforts to resolve Israel’s coalition crisis, see Ynet, Times of Israel reports one and two, the Jerusalem Post and Haaretz.

And for commentary on the domestic scene, see Gil Hoffman and Yaakov Katz.

Around the World
• In the fallout from the Louis Farrakhan scandal dividing Jews and feminists, one of the Women’s March leaders apologized to ‘hurt and betrayed’ members.

Louis Farrakhan
• “Security guards who were assigned to protect the world’s largest tourism trade fair in Berlin, harassed an Israeli booth on Thursday, screaming pro-Palestinian slogans.”

• Anti-Semitic vandalism in Holland rises 40% to highest level since 2007.

• CNN: Israeli trauma experts are in Parkland, Florida, meeting with “teachers, counselors, first responders, clergy and others to offer practical lessons learned from Israel’s vast experience with terrorism and war.”

• First Jewish university to open in Russia next month, the JTA reports.

• Study finds fake news spreads faster than some real news on Twitter.

Commentary
• White House peace envoy Jason Greenblatt got op-ed space in the Washington Post to call out Hamas’ misrule of and rejectionism of peace.

• Plenty of spilled ink and burnt pixels over the issues between Jews, feminists and Louis Farrakhan.

– Jesse Singal: Why won’t Women’s March leaders denounce Louis Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism?
– Emma Teitel: Jews are unwelcome on the feminist left
– Jonathan Tobin: Women’s rights and intersectionalism don’t go hand in hand

editing• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– MK Michael Oren: Getting out of the Iranian check
– Maria Polizoidou: Is Greece about to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital?
– Michael Wilner: Seoul searching: Israel’s unexplored alliance with South Korea
– Alan Dershowitz: What Is a ‘refugee’? The Jews from Morocco vs. the Palestinians from Israel
– Nadav Shragai: ISIS takes aim at the Temple Mount
– Dan Hodges: Jeremy Corbyn and his anti-Semitic pals smashed the moral compass
– Marcus Dysch: Anti-Semitism fatigue is now a normal part of British politics
– Mark Sokolow: Trump, siding with terrorists by letting PLO off the hook
– Hadley Freeman: There’s one hero of Entebbe who deserves his own film. I remember him well

Featured image: CC BY-NC-SA xeeliz; Hussein via UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferre; Farrakhan via YouTube/The Nation of Islam; writing CC BY-SA Nic McPhee;

Egypt’s Electronic Warfare in Sinai Spills Over to Israel
http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-07-2018-electronic-warfare/
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 7, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
1. According to the IDF, the Egyptian army’s electronic warfare against Sinai jihadists is having a spillover effect, causing cellular blackouts in southern Israel.

While the disruptions, which have ensued for two weeks, will likely continue, the defense establishment “is dealing with the issue with their Egyptian counterparts,” according to the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit. “We have a dialogue with them on the issue.”

2. The Palestinian Authority’s 2018 budget boosts the amount of money for terrorists and their families by $56 million. This was disclosed in the Knesset during a debate on reducing tax transfers to the Palestinians which Israel collects on behalf of the PA. The Jerusalem Post explains:

Dichter pointed out that PA President Mahmoud Abbas authorized the 2018 PA budget on Sunday, and that there is a PA law that says 7% of each budget must go to paying terrorists, or to their families, if they’re killed in the act . . .

The PA paid terrorists and their families more than $347m. in 2017. Terrorists who have been sentenced to three to five years in Israeli prisons receive the average income of a Palestinian, about $580 per month. The families of those who committed more severe crimes and were involved in killing Israelis receive five times that each month for the rest of their lives.

Terrorists receive more from the PA if they are married, for each child they have, if they live in Jerusalem or if they’re an Israeli citizen.

money

3. A lawsuit against Arizona State U. will test the legality of the state’s anti-BDS legislation and potentially set a precedent for challenges in other states with similar laws. The legal action comes after ASU said a Muslim student group wasn’t allowed to sponsor a guest speaker who promotes boycotting Israel. Details at the Arizona Daily Star and JTA.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman reportedly met with Israeli officials in Egypt to discuss normalizing relations and feel out Israeli interest in a major Saudi project:

Within that framework, Israel would take part in the unprecedented real estate venture being sponsored by the Saudis in the Gulf of Aqaba. Crown Prince Mohammed first announced plans for the 26,500-square-kilometer (10,230-square-mile) zone at an international investment conference in Riyadh last October. Officials say public and private investment in the area is expected to reach $500 billion. The mega-city would be built on Saudi territory on the eastern shore of the Red Sea near the border with Jordan , and connect to Egypt across the gulf via a bridge running through the island of Tiran . . .

The source who leaked the information about the prince’s meeting with the Israelis said that in light of the shared sea border between Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Israel, it is necessary to establish an international framework to include Israel in the Saudi project.
 
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Saudi Arabia Just Announced Plans to Build a Mega City That Will Cost $500 Billion https://bloom.bg/2z578W0  #NEOM

4:59 PM - Oct 24, 2017
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• Is Israeli agriculture near Gaza imperiled due to the Strip’s inoperative sewage treatment facilities?

• The Palestinian Authority became a full-fledged member of Interpol after completing all the necessary technical procedures. Now that the PA has access to Interpol information and the ability to request the arrest and extradition of wanted individuals, Mahmoud Abbas’ political rivals — most notably Mohammed Dahlan and former PLO moneyman Mohammed Rashid — fear the PA will use Interpol against them.

• The Times of Israel takes a closer look at Mahmoud Al-Aloul, the new would-be successor to Mahmoud Abbas.

Window into Israel
• Lawmakers are trying to resolve a coalition crisis threatening to topple the government. United Torah Judaism, an Orthodox party, is threatening to vote against the 2019 budget unless certain amendments are made to a law governing military draft exemptions for yeshiva students.

As the standoff continues, Finance Minister and Kulanu party chief Moshe Kahlon threatened to quit the governing coalition if the budget isn’t approved by Passover, with the Times of Israel adding:

The 2019 state budget can technically be passed until the end of the year, but Kahlon, backed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has been adamant that it be passed earlier, before a six-week Knesset recess beginning March 18.

New elections could be triggered by Kulanu quitting the coalition, or if the Knesset votes down a proposed budget.

Knesset
The Knesset
• NBC News examines the battle over Sabbath laws and Orthodox draft exemptions and the pressures those issues put on Israeli politics.

• A survey picked up by the Times of Israel and Ynet finds support for coexistence plunging among Jewish and Arab Israelis.

• High Court freezes compensation to owners of razed West Bank homes.

• Ynet examines what new information was disclosed by two ex-officials who turned state’s witness against the Prime Minister this week.

• For commentary on the domestic scene, see Raoul Wootliff, Moran Azulay and Mati Tuchfeld.

Around the World
• Former Argentine president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner to go on trial for allegedly covering up Iranian involvement in Jewish center bombing. No date has been set, and 11 other former government officials will also be tried.

Eighty five people were killed when a suicide bomber detonated a truckload of explosives at the headquarters of the Argentine Jewish community in Buenos Aires in 1994. Iran has been tied to attack. In 2015, prosecutor Alberto Nisman was found dead in his apartment one day before he was due to present his findings to Argentine lawmakers.

Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
• Around 400 Turkish Jews moved to Israel in 2017, “more than double the 164 who moved there the year before.” What’s behind the rising aliyah from Turkey?

This number keeps rising each year, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, a trend that contradicts the figures for diaspora Jews from all other countries except Russia. The agency cites what it says are Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s anti-Semitic policies as the cause of this rise.

With the number of Jews in Turkey estimated to be around 12,000, the 400 emigrants amounts to more than 2 percent leaving the country – a significant amount.

Commentary/Analysis
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Jennifer Rubin: Syria is the inherent weakness in Trump’s Israel pitch
– Orly Azoulay: Trump-Netanyahu meeting: That’s what friends are for
– Alan Mendoza: Netanyahu reaps benefits of treating Trump with respect, rather than contempt
– Benny Avni: Iran is pushing Israel into war
– Prof. Eyal Zisser: Syria carnage proves international community cannot be trusted to protect anyone’s security
– John Robson: Moral clarity on Israel means admitting that Jerusalem is its capital
– Amos Harel: As Mahmoud Abbas’ health deteriorates, Israel prepares for bloody succession fight
– Yoni Ben Menachem: Fatah prepares to replace Mahmoud Abbas
– Brig.-Gen. Amir Avivi (Res.): Time for Oslo to exit the stage
– Shmuel Rosner: Are US universities hiding the truth of Deir Yassin?
– Susan Shapiro: Liberal feminists for Farrakhan? Tamika Mallory is on the wrong side of a bright moral line

Featured image: CC BY-SA Michele Ursino; Knesset CC BY James Emery; Kirchner via YouTube/Unidad Ciudadana

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03062018-trumpvisit/
Trump Potential Second Visit for Embassy Opening
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  MARCH 6, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
1. President Trump made headlines by announcing he ‘may’ visit Jerusalem for the opening of the new US embassy planned later this year.

2. As the AIPAC policy conference continues, Democratic Senator Schumer states that “It’s sure not the settlements that are the blockage to peace,” rather, the Palestinian refusal to accept the Jewish state.

3.  The head of the IDF’s Southern Command says that conditions in Gaza will improve only if captive Israelis held in Gaza are released.

HR’s Daniel Pomerantz debated this topic on I24news with Fatah member Ahmed Ghoneim

4.  The Independent  and Business Insider seems to think that the Old City of Jerusalem is “endangered” due to Israeli control and won’t be around long, but that’s only due to its questionable sourcing  and unprofessional journalism.

5. The Times forgot that The Western Wall is not the holiest site in Judaism, Temple Mount is, and we prompted the appropriate correction.

Mideast Matters
• Shell has pulled out of the development of a gas field off the shore of Gaza, saying the delays were due to “internal Palestinian rivalry and conflict with Israel, as well as economic reasons.”

• The corruption scandal continues to develop, as  Nir Hefetz,  former aid to Prime Minister Netanyahu, has agreed to hand over recordings of the Prime Minister and his wife.


Around the World
• A leading Polish educator launched an anti-Semitic tirade on Facebook, blaming Jews for Soviet communism in Poland.

• The England Football Association Chief Executive is in hot water after likening the Star of David to a Swastika symbol, has apologized for offence caused, in a public statement:

I would like to apologize for any offence caused by the examples I gave when referring to political and religious symbols in football, specifically in reference to the Star of David, which is a hugely important symbol to Jewish people all over the world.

• Former Argentinian President Cristina Fernandez will face trial over accusations regarding her involvement with the 1994 terrorist bombing of a Jewish center in the capital. Fernandez denies any wrongdoing.

• The Jewish News’  Justin Cohen  writing for The Telegraph, points out that after years of the Royal family visiting some of the “world’s most authoritarian and regimes”,  they are finally heading to Israel for a tour of the region, and, he adds, its “about time.”

Commentary/Analysis 
• Israel Seeks Stricter Sanctions on Iranian Missiles – Barak Ravid
• The Threat to Israel of Iranian Entrenchment in Syria – Ron Ben Yishai

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– AIPAC Doubles Down on Two-State Solution – Steven Frank
– Cut Off Qatar – Yigal Carmon
– Do Western “Goodists” Really Care about Helping Syrians, Palestinians? – Giulio Meotti

Featured image: by Unsplash/Jean Gerber;

For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.

Today’s IDNS was produced with help from HR-intern, Sara Cowen.

http://honestreporting.com/idns-03-05-2018-abbas-successor/
Fatah Appoints Potential Successor to Abbas
BY PESACH BENSON  MARCH 5, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
1. Fatah appointed a potential successor for PA leader Mahmoud Abbas. Israel HaYom reports, “If PA President Mahmoud Abbas is incapacitated, Mahmoud al-Aloul will replace him as ‘acting president of Palestine’ for a period of three months until elections can be held.”

Further fueling speculation about his health, Abbas continued to pour cold water on Trump’s yet-to-be-released peace plan by cryptically saying he won’t end his life as a “traitor.” The 82-year-old Abbas was recently at Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins Hospital for what Palestinian officials called routine medical checks.
Mahmoud Al-Aloul
2. Huffington Post: US lawmakers seek investigation of Al Jazeera amid Israel documentary controversy.

The request, in a letter [to Attorney General Jeff Sessions] being finalized this week and shared with HuffPost by a Hill source, comes amid a controversy over Al Jazeera’s filming of a documentary on the pro-Israel lobbying community in the U.S. The network used an undercover operative to secure months of footage in 2016, revealing private interactions with various advocacy groups, lawmakers and officials. But despite promising to release the film last year after British regulators OK’d a similar project in the U.K., Al Jazeera has yet to publish the documentary.

3. The UK Labour party belly-flopped into yet another anti-Semitism row — this one over tweets by key aide to party leader Jeremy Corbyn suggesting ‘Israel is committing genocide.’

Joss MacDonald, a Labour Party speech writer, has also branded Israel an ‘apartheid’ state and insisted people excuse its behaviour ‘because of the Holocaust.’

4. Shocking Headlines Omit ‘Israel’ From Royal Visit: Too many in the UK media made a right royal mess of their headlines announcing Prince William’s planned trip to Israel, as spotted by CUFI UK.

building campaign

In the News
• IDF accused Hamas of stealing electricity from Gazans by releasing a video released a video on Sunday “allegedly showing members of the Hamas terrorist group stealing electricity from power lines leading into the southern Gaza Strip.” Coverage and video at the Times of Israel and Ynet.

• Hezbollah reportedly blocked Hamas from building a military base in Lebanon, fearing the Palestinians would drag Lebanon into war by firing rockets at Israel without Hezbollah’s knowledge.

• This bungled headline is from Reuters, where one man’s freedom fighter is another man’s motorist — or something like that. We took the liberty of fixing it cuz headlines matter.

Reuters
• Guatemala to relocate its embassy to Jerusalem in May, two days after the US. President Jimmy Morales told the Jerusalem Post he also expects more countries to follow suit.

• The IDF arrested a German national for throwing rocks at soldiers during a protest in the West Bank village of Bil’in. Police said they intend to deport the 24-year-old tourist, who confessed to the charges.

• British football chief Martin Glenn is in hot water over a comment equating the Jewish star of David with the Nazi swastika.

• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s former advisor, Nir Hefetz, is in talks with police to turn state’s witness in the Bezeq corruption investigation, reports Ynet. Netanyahu is suspected of giving telecom giant Bezeq regulatory benefits in exchange for positive coverage from a prominent news site owned by Bezeq’s majority shareholder. Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing.

• Police released the name of another suspect in the Bezeq affair. Eitan Tzafrir was the former chief of staff at the Communications Ministry while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu served as communications minister.

Commentary
typewriter• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Avi Issacharoff: When Nakba Day meets US embassy move day, expect fireworks in Gaza
– Ben Cohen: The House of Windsor’s Israel problem
– Giulio Meotti: Christians in Jerusalem, ask your brethen in Syria and Egypt
– Emanuele Ottolenghi: Trump should block Iran’s air corridor to Syria
– Moshe Arens: In Syria, force will prevail
– Jose María Aznar, Stephen Harper: The world must unite to stop Iran (click via Twitter)
Featured image: CC BY-SA Piotr Jankowski ; Aloul via YouTube/palwatch; typewriter CC0 Pixabay;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-28-2018-church-reopens/
Church of the Holy Sepulchre Reopens
BY PESACH BENSON  FEBRUARY 28, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre reopened to worshipers after Israel backed off from plans to tax church-owned commercial properties and suspended separate legislation impacting church land sales. The Jerusalem Post explains:

Netanyahu became involved after it became clear that the closure of the church had the potential to cause Israel considerable diplomatic damage, and both Jordan and the Palestinians claimed that this was an indication that Israel was “threatening the presence of Christians in the Holy Land.” . . .

Netanyahu agreed with Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat to establish a team led by Regional Cooperation Minister Tzachi Hanegbi, with the participation of all the relevant parties, to find a solution to both issues.

In the meantime, the municipality has frozen its tax collection efforts, and legislation concerning the sale of church property will be suspended.

More background and what happens next at Ynet.

Church of the Holy Sepulchre
Pilgrims lighting candles in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre
2. Satellite images indicate Iran is building a new military base in Syria, northwest of Damascus. The Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, Ynet, Haaretz and Israel HaYom all picked up on a Fox News scoop.

According to the report, Western intelligence sources estimated that the base, which contains large hangars, can store ballistic missiles capable of hitting Israel and is operated by the Quds Force – the special operations arm of Tehran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

A base similar to the one revealed in the new satellite photos was discovered last November south of Damascus and was destroyed in December by an Israeli airstrike.

Fox News

@FoxNews
New satellite photos show Iran establishing another base in Syria http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/02/27/new-satellite-photos-show-iran-establishing-another-base-in-syria.html …

12:09 AM - Feb 28, 2018

New satellite photos show Iran establishing another base in Syria
Iran has built another permanent military base outside Syria’s capital city complete with hangers used to store missiles capable of hitting all of Israel, according to Western intelligence sources.

foxnews.com
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3. A French court ruled that the brutal murder of Sarah Halimi will be prosecuted as an anti-Semitic hate crime after all. Kobili Traore, a 28 year-old Muslim, was heard calling Halimi’s daughter a “dirty Jewess” and yelling verses from the Koran before throwing the 66-year-old retired physician out of the third-floor window of her Paris apartment.

French Jews were in a uproar earlier this February when a judge dropped the hate crimes charges from Traore’s indictment. Traore has confessed to the murder and is pleading temporary insanity.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• Bungled headline of the day: Jerusalem’s Christian leaders never used the words ‘Nazi-like persecution’ in their protest against the now-suspended tax plan and legislation. While Israelis bridle at being compared to Nazis, I can’t imagine church leaders will appreciate The Independent misquoting them. The word Nazi doesn’t even appear in the article. (Here’s why headlines matter.)

Independent

Contrast that headline with this Wall St. Journal snippet (click via Twitter):

In all, the Israeli attempts to collect taxes and impose a new law had angered the Palestinian Christian community and its leaders, who in a statement Sunday likened Israeli actions to persecution of Jews during “dark periods in Europe”—an oblique reference to Nazi Germany.

• MEMRI: Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party gave an apartment to the family of Ahmad Nassar, the terrorist who murdered Rabbi Raziel Shevach in a drive-by shooting last month.

• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to visit Brazil in June, becoming the first Israeli PM to visit the South American country.

Israel Brazil

Around the World
• Dutch groups cancel speeches by Palestinian ex-terrorist Rasmea Odeh

• The British Labour Party may open a new probe of ex-London mayor Ken Livingstone, whose suspension from the party is nearing an end. Livingstone was suspended for comments claiming that Adolf Hitler supported Zionism. A number of MPs threatened to quit their seats if Livingstone is reinstated.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Jonathan Tobin: The embassy will move — and the world won’t end
– Dr. Reuven Berko: When the ‘agent of peace’ cries for jihad
– David Horovitz: The weakening of Israeli democracy
– Gil Troy: The Netanyahu hangover brings out the worst in us all

Featured image: CC0 Pixabay; pilgrims CC BY-NC scottgunn;

Jordan Thwarts ISIS Attacks on Israeli, Western Targets
http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-27-2018-jordan-isis/
BY PESACH BENSON  FEBRUARY 27, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
1. According to Jordanian media reports picked up by the Times of Israel, Jordanian security forces thwarted a terror plot targeting “Israeli businessmen, the US embassy in Jordan and other Western and Jordanian targets in Amman.” In all, 17 individuals affiliated with Islamic State were arrested

2. Israeli judoka Tohar Butbul won a bronze medal after a would-be Iranian opponent pulled out of the competition. The Jerusalem Post explains how Butbul was literally gifted the award Dusseldorf Grand Slam in Germany on Saturday.

Butbul, competing in the under-73 kilogram competition, received a bye into the second round where he was supposed to meet the winner of the bout between American Nick Delpopolo and Iran’s Mohammad Mahdi Brimanloo. However, after Delpopolo had to pull out injured, Brimanloo made sure to disqualify himself by being overweight in the weigh-in ahead of the start of the competition, sending Butbul into the last 16.

Tohar Butbul
Israeli judoka Tohar Butbul
3. Israeli security forces foiled a Temple Mount terror attack, arresting three Israeli-Arab suspects from Umm el-Fahm. The three were said to be planning a an attack similar to last year’s murder of two Israeli police officers at the holy site. The Jerusalem Post reports the three were arrested in January and February before they could acquire weapons.

Following the July attack, Israel installed metal detectors, which were then removed in the face of widespread Palestinian demonstrations.

4. HonestReporting Prompts IBT to Correct Tel Aviv Error: Tel Aviv is certainly not Israel’s capital.

building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• The Times of Israel and Jerusalem Post picked up on a poll which found that Palestinians are becoming extreme in their positions. Support for “armed resistance” rose, support for both the two-state solution and peace talks in general dropped. Trust in both Fatah and Hamas has also declined.

• Haaretz: The IDF is blocking activists from Breaking the Silence from leading tours in Hebron.

• Is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre issue being used to clobber Israel?
Church of the Holy Sepulchre
• Gazans prepared for possible war with Israel with a surprise drill.

The information and instructions to the civilian population on how to locate the nearest safe space and how to evacuate children to shelters were appropriated from the IDF’s Home Front Command’s website and from messages it issues to the Israeli public.

• Palestinians clashing with Israeli soldiers accidentally burnt down a Nablus plastic factory. A burning tire rolled at soldiers veered off course, heading straight inside the building. Israeli firefighters helped Palestinian emergency crews battle the blaze, but couldn’t save the factory.

• Hezbollah will be able to get around US financial sanctions thanks to a new clause in Lebanon’s electoral laws.

Police Probe PM
Shaul Elovitch
Israeli businessman, Shaul Elovitch arrives for extension of his remand in case 4000 at the District Court in Tel Aviv, February 22, 2018. Photo by Flash90
• Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s former chief of staff, Ari Harow, who is already a state’s witness in the Yediot-Israel HaYom affair and the gifts affair, is expected to testify against the PM in the “Bezeq affair.” Police are investigating whether Netanyahu had an understanding with Bezeq’s majority shareholder, Shaul Elovitch in which the PM gave th telecom giant regulatory benefits in exchange for favorable coverage on the Elovitch-owned Walla! News site. Elovitch, his wife and son all stepped down from Bezeq’s board of directors.
(Disclosure: Harow briefly worked for HonestReporting more than a decade ago.)

• In first, prosecution explicitly points finger at Netanyahu in the Bezeq ‘bribes’ case:

In a first official on-record statement implicating him in the so-called Case 4000 corruption investigation, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was named Tuesday as one of the people believed to have been involved in bribery as part of an illicit deal with the communications giant Bezeq.

• Israelis are in an uproar after texts showed that judge, attorney secretly coordinated in Case 4000.

– Jeff Barak: No politician is born to rule forever
– Moshe Arens: Give due process its due
– Moran Azulay: Political system entering a state of chaos
– Raoul Wootliff: A wayward judge may be the biggest blow to public trust in Netanyahu probe
– Nahum Barnea: Israel’s entire legal system has been polluted

Around the World
• Poland reportedly denied reports that it reportedly froze its controversial Holocaust law.

• Anti-Semitic images and cartoons are flooding the Polish press as the dispute over the Holocaust law drags on.

View image on Twitter
 
Adam Milstein

@AdamMilstein
#Antisemitic cartoons flood #Polish press as right-wing nationalist media becomes increasingly angry with internat'l opposition to new legislation that makes any discussion of Polish collusion with the Nazi occupation during World War II a criminal offense http://ow.ly/pWDg30iCRz1 

9:45 PM - Feb 26, 2018
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• Anti-Semitic incidents in 2017 more than double the US total from 2015, the Anti-Defamation League says.

The 2017 number includes more than 160 bomb threats sent to Jewish community centers and other institutions early that year. A Jewish teen from Israel has been arrested for making the vast majority of those threats, which were all not credible.

Discounting the JCC bomb threats, reported incidents still increased by 43 percent over 2016. Anti-Semitic incidents on schools and college campuses also doubled in 2017 for the second year in a row. Non-Jewish elementary and high schools experienced 457 anti-Semitic incidents, compared to 235 in 2016 and 114 in 2015.

• Jerusalem Post: Paypal closes second illegal French BDS account.

• Israel “Apartheid” Week is underway in London and Jewish students at one campus are taking action.

Students at King’s College London (KCL) are considering taking legal action after their elected representatives promoted “Israeli Apartheid Week” (IAW) events in a mass email to peers.

• If you’re going to use Israel to prove anything on either side of the US gun debate, please get your facts straight first: No, Israeli teachers don’t bring guns to school.

gun

• According to Nigerian media reports, Israel is giving counter-terror training to Nigerian special forces who will be deployed against Boko Haram jihadis.

• Tunisian politics took a curious turn, with Israel and Jews at the center of the latest buzz:

Tunisia’s Islamist En Nahda Party is raising eyebrows by running a Jewish candidate in the upcoming municipal elections, in what it says is a sign of its openness.

But Simon Salameh’s nomination for the council in the Monastir district by the party within the governing coalition has come under criticism, referred to as a cold political ploy by the party and a sign of normalization with Israel.

Commentary
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Yonah Jeremy Bob: Should Israel risk sharing intel with Trump after Obama admin concerns?
– Amb. Danny Danon: The Palestinian leadership is the problem, not the solution
– Zalman Shoval: The Palestinians’ failed gamble
– Bassam Tawil: Palestinians: Israel is one big settlement
– Yoni Ben Menachem: Jibril Rajoub vs. Muhammad Dahlan to replace Mahmoud Abbas
– Mordechai Kedar: Hamas: Full steam to nowhere
– Howard Feldman: It’s not easy to be a South African Jew
– Eli Lake: Iran wants to join the world order it undermines

Featured image: CC BY hobvias sudoneighm; Butbul via YouTube; Church of the Holy Sepulchre CC BY-NC-ND Christopher Chan; gun CC BY-ND vuvanhahung;

Today’s Top Stories
http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-25-2018-sepulcher-closed/
1. Leaders of Jerusalem’s Christian denominations closed the Church of Holy Sepulcher indefinitely to protest plans by the Jerusalem municipality to collect property taxes from church-owned commercial properties and businesses, and also Knesset legislation that would impact the ability of churches to sell land.

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was crucified.

Mayor Nir Barkat defended the taxes, saying that places of worship would continue not to be taxed, but that church-owned businesses didn’t get the same exemption:

Barkat says the churches owed some NIS 650 million in back taxes

“I’m not prepared for Jerusalem’s residents to have to shoulder these huge sums,” he says.

Shortly before this roundup was published, a Knesset committee delayed today’s debate on the bill on church land sales.

Church of the Holy Sepulchre
2. The US State Department confirmed that it will open a US Embassy in Jerusalem this coming May to dovetail with Israel’s 70th anniversary. The Times of Israel explains:

The official said, “The Embassy will initially be located in Arnona [in south Jerusalem], on a compound that currently houses the consular operations of Consulate General Jerusalem. At least initially, it will consist of the Ambassador and a small team.” . . .

The date of the move is seen as largely symbolic, as the logistics of a permanent relocation are expected to take much longer. Most of the embassy staff could continue to operate from Tel Aviv during the early stages.

More on the development below.

3. Russia deployed advanced stealth jets in Syria with warning aimed at Israel.

The deployment came with a covert warning to Israel by a Russian official, who said that the presence of the Su-57s will doubtlessly send a political message, serving as a deterrent “for aircraft from neighboring states, which periodically fly into Syrian airspace uninvited.”
View image on Twitter
imagesatintl
@imagesatint
#ISI reveals the first deployment of two #Russian stealth fighters #SU-57, as can be seen in Eros-B #satellite imagery from yesterday

4:33 PM - Feb 24, 2018
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Israel and the Palestinians
• Officials in Foggy Bottom are considering a $500 million offer from billionaire casino magnate and newspaper publisher Sheldon Adelson to contribute for the relocation.

• The Palestinians are especially irked with the embassy move’s timing. The ribbon-cutting ceremony will take place on May 14 (Israel’s Independence Day according to the English calendar) and not on April 18 (Israel’s Independence Day according to the Hebrew calendar). The Los Angeles Times explains the opening will coincide with the Palestinian “Naqba Day.”

For Palestinians, who mark their national days according to the Gregorian calendar, May is not a festive month. And to complicate things further, Palestinians observe the day of catastrophe on May 15, the first day of the new state’s existence rather than May 14, the day independence was declared.


Amb. Ron Dermer

@AmbDermer
May 14th 1948, President Truman recognizes Israel.

May 14th 2018, @POTUS Trump will move the US Embassy to Jerusalem.

70 years apart.Two historic decisions. One united capital.

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-22-2018-president-abbas-at-un-palestinians-are-canaanites/
Abbas at UN: Palestinians are Canaanites
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  FEBRUARY 22, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Palestinian President Abbas addressed the UN Security Council, calling for a peace conference to establish a two state solution based on 1967 borders.

The media made no mention of the critical context: that when speaking to a Palestinian audience, Abbas frequently says the opposite. For example,  in his speech of January 14 (just last month)  Abbas stood in front of a map of Israel and said, “This is our country,” stated that Jews have no connection to the land of Israel or to Jerusalem, referred the entirety of Israel as “Palestine” six separate times, and discussed the “occupation”…of 1948 (the year of Israel’s independence).

The biggest shocker at the UN was Abbas’s claim, “We are the descendants of the Canaanites that lived in the land of Palestine 5,000 years ago and continuously remained there to this day.” This claim is not supported by modern scholarship, and actually contradicts the Koran.

On all these points, the media gave Abbas a free pass: simply repeating his claims with no additional research, background or context.

See more in our video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=44&v=s0jxzC9YEog

2. The Israeli corruption scandals continue to unfold as a former aide to Benjamin Netanyahu turns state’s witness and a dramatic recording is revealed of the owner of Israel’s major telecommunications company ordering favorable coverage of the Israeli PM possibly as a quid pro quo.

3. Revealed: The IDF thwarted an attempted Islamic State bombing of a flight from Australia thanks to Military Intelligence Unit 8200.

News breaks fast. Get HonestReporting alerts by e-mail 
and never miss a thing.

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Israel and the Palestinians
• While Al Jazeera’s output can be highly problematic, at least the station is one of the few Arab ones to host Israeli spokespeople on air. An appearance by the IDF spokesperson for Arabic media has provoked a storm of criticism from those opposed to “providing a platform for the Zionist enemy” and “promoting normalization” with Israel.

• Was the return of a the body of a Palestinian terrorist who murdered three Israelis a mistake? The IDF Chief of Staff thinks so.

• Israel to issue 20,000 more work permits to Palestinians.

• The Palestinians’ envoy to the US faces silence from the White House.

Mideast Matters
• Bashar Assad is bringing a catastrophe to the hundreds of thousands of people in Eastern Ghouta while the world sits by.

• Egypt’s president says his country “scored a goal” by signing a $15 billion deal with an Israeli company to get natural gas that will help turn Egypt into a regional energy hub.

• Pro-Iranian militias in Iraq got their hands on at least nine high-tech, U.S.-made M-1 tanks as early as 2015, the U.S. government acknowledged earlier this month. Along with the belated admission, the Pentagon and the U.S. State Department say they are trying to take back the tanks.

Around the World
• What’s going on within South Africa’s ruling party when it comes to its policies towards Israel? Will a downgrade in relations be implemented? Nobody seems to know for sure.

Commentary/Analysis
• American journalist, editor, and political activist Clifford D. May writes in the Washington Times about the situation in Gaza, with historical perspective. May is the president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

• Professor Richard Landes produced this 20 minute video on how BBC and CNN covered the Middle East Conflict in the waning days of the Obama Administration, and the effect of  “pack journalism.”

Everyone Agrees: The BBC and CNN on UNSC Resolution #2334 and Kerry’s Speech from Al Durah Project on Vimeo.

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Do Arabs Back Israel in a Clash with Iran? asks Evelyn Gordon

Featured image: CC BY dulnan;

For more, see Tuesday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.

Rocket-Fire from Gaza
http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-20-2018-rocket-fire-from-gaza/
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  FEBRUARY 20, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. In response to sirens heard in southern Israeli communities, and reported rocket-fire, the Israel Air Force struck an underground network of terror tunnels in the Gaza Strip overnight on Sunday.

2. De-escalation in Gaza? In contrast to the above story about rocket-fire, Qatari envoy, Mohammed al-Emadi, told reporters in Gaza City:

We confirm through our relationship with the two sides that they are not interested in escalation or engaging in a confrontation that could ignite the entire region.

3. Did a Netanyahu aid offer the attorney general position to a judge in exchange for halting an investigation into Netanyahu’s wife Sara?

4. The UN’s World Health Organization, NGOs and much of the media primarily blame Israel for decreasing medical travel permits for Palestinians in Gaza. But it appears the decrease is actually due to the Palestinian government itself.

5. Thank you to the Sunday Times Ireland for correcting their article. Indeed, Irish FM Simon Coveney’s own press release stated that he met Netanyahu in Jerusalem, not Tel Aviv.

6. Is Bibi the “most dangerous man in the Middle East?” The online news site Salon thinks so.

7.  In this report from Sophie McNeill on ABC News Australia, it appears that video footage of Tamimi has been deliberately cut mid-sentence to alter the impression that Tamimi was inciting violence – a key allegation in her trial.

 

Mideast Matters
• Swastikas and obscenities were found drawn around the entrance to the Polish Embassy in Israel on Sunday, one day after Poland’s prime minister made comments suggesting there were “Jewish perpetrators” of atrocities during World War II.

• Hezbollah said last week it could act against Israeli oil facilities if necessary. UN chief Guterres weighed in, saying he was worried about the possibility of a direct confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah. He admitted that the latest signals from the parties do not seem to indicate this is likely but he added:

Sometimes a spark is enough to unleash this kind of a conflict.

• Israeli natural gas company announced a $15 billion export deal with Egypt. Though seemingly unrelated, this directly connects with the above story about Hezbollah as it all comes back to the tension and economic potential surrounding Israel’s natural gas resources.


Commentary/Analysis
• Marcus Sheff says in the Jerusalem Post that it’s time for UNRWA to face the truth about textbooks, pointing out:

According to the textbooks being read by half a million Palestinian children, the only solution available is victory via resistance, jihad, radical Islamism and defeating Israel once and for all.

(UNRWA is the controversial UN agency responsible for Palestinian refugees).

WATCH: HR’s Daniel Pomerantz catches UNRWA chief Chris Gunness contradicting himself on this very topic, on live television:

• Is Lebanon America’s friend? Successive US administrations believe it can be. Benny Avni believes they’re wrong.

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

–The UN’s Uncomfortable Truths about Iran – Amb. Nikki Haley
– UAE Leaders Tell Jewish Leaders of Concerns about Turkey, Iran Expansionism – Herb Keinon
– U.S. Wants Europeans to Commit to Improve Iran Deal – Arshad Mohammed, John Irish, and Robin Emmott

http://honestreporting.com/idns-2182018-hamas-ied-and-israeli-retaliation-in-gaza/
Gaza IED and Israeli Retaliation
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  FEBRUARY 18, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. After an IED on the Gaza border seriously wounded two IDF soldiers, Israel struck 18 targets in the strip: including  Hamas weapons-manufacturing sites and training infrastructures.

2. Poland just continues to shock and amaze.  The Prime Minister accused Jews (among others) of perpetrating the Holocaust (even as Poland denies any responsibility itself), while a Polish Senate leader encouraged Poles around the world to report on anyone making statements that might hurt “Poland’s good name.” (In light of Poland’s controversial new law, such reports could result in imprisonment if any of those reported on were to ever visit Poland.) Meanwhile, Polish Jews are experiencing what the AP describes as “an eruption of anti-Semitism.”

3.  PM Netanyahu, speaking at the Munich Security Conference, held a piece of wreckage from the Iranian drone intercepted over Israel and declared:

We will act if necessary not just against Iran’s proxies but against Iran itself.
Israel and the Palestinians
• Israel’s Shin Bet security service announced that it foiled a plot by Palestinian Islamic Jihad-linked cell members to assassinate the Defense Minister,  reportedly by using a roadside IED.

• As the legal proceedings surrounding Israel’s Prime Minister continue to evolve, this column from the National Post gives some interesting insight.

• Hamas is condemning a U.S. bill that sanctions them for using civilians in Gaza as “human shields.”

• A number of NFL (American football) players are touring Israel. This time last year, some NFL players cancelled a trip after the Israeli Minister of Public Diplomacy touted the trip as a PR coup, before it had even taken place.

Around the World
• Last November, Iranian wrestler Alireza Karimachiani  was banned from international competition for intentionally throwing a match in order to avoid competing against an Israeli opponent in the next round.  Iran is now contesting the ban, while thousands of Iranians on social media expressed their support for the decision of Karimachiani  and his coach.

• Continuing tension mounts between Israel and Lebanon over offshore gas.

• Rumours were flying that John Kerry might be accused of a violation of the Logan Act, due to his meetings with members of the Palestinian government. Yet it turns out the rumours are not true after all.

The Logan Act is an obscure US law that prohibits private citizens from negotiating against US international interests. Last December, rumours flew that Jared Kushner might be investigated for a violation of the Act, for helping to lobby Egypt against the anti-Israel UN Security Council resolution #2334.

Commentary/Analysis
• Could the dispute between Israel and Lebanon over gas erupt into war?

• The coming conflict between Iran and Israel – it may be more complex than you think.

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Iran’s Moves in Syria Threaten Region – Peter Brookes
– Palestinian Bid for UN Recognition of Little Value – Israel Kasnett
– Abbas Rejects Jerusalem Suburb Solution for a Palestinian Capital– Nadav Shragai

Featured image: CC0 Pxhere ;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-14-2018-criminal-charges-netanyahu/
Israeli Police Recommend Criminal Charges Against Netanyahu
BY DANIEL POMERANTZ  FEBRUARY 14, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Last night Israeli police recommended criminal charges against PM Netanyahu, as part of two investigations that go by the technical names, “Case 1000” and “Case 2000.” Allegations include bribery, fraud and breach of trust. Netanyahu called the allegations baseless as well as “biased” and “extreme,” and vowed to complete his fourth term in office.

In Israel, the police perform the preliminary investigation into a potential crime. (Times of Israel wrote an entire series of articles on the topic). Following the investigation stage, the police must choose whether to recommend that the attorney general bring criminal charges, in the form of an official indictment. For this reason, the police recommendation last night is a significant step in this process. The next step will be for Israel’s attorney general Avichai Mandelblit to decide whether or not to accept the recommendation and to issue an indictment. If he does, that will mark the beginning of a legal process likely to include a criminal trial, or possibly an out of court settlement.

Israeli law would not actually require the PM to step down until conviction, though there is no telling what political pressures might arise, as in the case of former PM Ehud Olmert in 2007-2008.

As a service to our readers we are making a variety of educational information available on this topic, however HonestReporting does not take positions on domestic Israeli political matters.

Take your pick of coverage: Times of Israel, Jerusalem Post, Haaretz, Reuters, Associated Press, LA Times, just to name a few. The Israeli Democracy Institute has some additional background on the technical legal aspects.

2. Yesterday the trial began for Ahed Tamimi, who was arrested last December for hitting soldiers in a video that went viral on the internet. In the midst of what was shaping up to be a media circus, Judge Menachem Lieberman officially announced his decision to conduct the trial “behind closed doors,”: meaning without the presence of the press, but with the presence of the defendant, her legal counsel and her family.

Amid a flurry of strong but uninformed opinions on how Israeli and international law actually work, HR’s Daniel Pomerantz clarified the situation on i24 News:

3. After Saturday’s events in Syria, in which Israel clashed with Iranian forces, Deputy Minister for Diplomacy Michael Oren concluded that Washington has “almost no leverage on the ground,” but US Secretary of State Tillerson disagrees.

4. Is denying Israeli help worth suffering drought? According to South Africa’s Rumana Akoob, writing in the Daily Vox and Mail & Guardian, the answer is (apparently): yes.

5. Newsweek presents this anti-Israel propaganda video as a history documentary. HonestReporting takes it apart.

Commentary/Analysis
• What’s it like to be a journalist in the Ahed Tamimi trial? Apparently, something of a spectacle.

• What are the people who oppose Tamimi’s arrest saying? Nour Tamimi (Ahed’s cousin) writes an opinion piece in The Washington Post.

• For an additional dissenting view, see Amnesty International, which calls for Ahed Tamimi’s immediate release.

• On the other hand, writing in Haaretz, Petra Marquardt-Bigman presents a sobering account of Ahed Tamimi’s cynical politics and her family’s rather dark backstory.

• What’s the strategic and political backstory behind the police recommendation against Netanyahu? Times of Israel’s David Horowitz weighs in.

• What were the actual events that led up to the present accusations against the PM, and what’s the “Milchan law?” Haaretz’s Allison Kaplan Sommer shares her take.

• What does the international press think of the emerging Netanyahu legal drama? The New York Times is fairly typical in that their main focus is on continuity of Israeli leadership.

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

–  Israel awards top literature prize to novelist critical of its policies (David Grossman) – Reuters
– Continued Iranian Military Expansion in Syria Will Lead to Wider Conflict – Dennis Ross
– Israel Must Prepare for War on Its Northern Border – Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Eyal Ben-Reuven

Featured image: CC BY A;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-13-2018-hezbollah-mental/
Hezbollah Sends Mentally Ill Man to Test Israeli Border Fence
BY PESACH BENSON  FEBRUARY 13, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Israel detained and subsequently repatriated a mentally unstable Lebanese man who crossed the border. The Jerusalem Post reports:

The man claimed he had been sent by two Hezbollah operatives, Mahadi and Ali Shahror, who reportedly threatened him with forced mental hospitalization.

The suspect, who was caught close to where he crossed into Israel, was under close surveillance by troops since he approached the fence.

According to subsequent reports, the Lebanese man, identified as Ali Mari, previously crossed into Israel on his volition 10 months ago.

Cemil Tekeli
2. Israel arrested and deported a Turkish national suspected of helping Hamas operatives establish themselves in Turkey. According to Ynet, many of the Hamas figures Cemil Tekeli assisted were released in the Gilad Shalit prisoner swap. A second Israeli national, Dara’am Jabarin was also arrested. He is “suspected of aiding in money laundering and transfer of funds to West Bank for terror activity.”

Tekeli’s interrogation revealed that Turkey contributes to the military strengthening of Hamas via, inter alia, the SADAT company, which was established at the behest of Adnan Basha, an adviser with close ties to Turkish administration officials . . .

During Tekeli’s interrogation, it became clear Hamas is in direct contact with Turkish authorities via terrorist Jihad Ya’amur, who was involved in the abduction of IDF soldier Nachson Waxman and was released in the Shalit deal.

3. The trial of teenage Palestinian Ahed Tamimi began today, with the judge ordering the proceedings take place behind closed doors. Tamimi was arrested after trying to provoke a soldier by slapping him in front of video cameras.

building campaign

In the News
• The PA’s escalating its opposition to US peace mediation. Abbas told Putin the PA “refuses to cooperate with the US in any form,” while chief negotiator Saeb Erekat got op-ed space in the New York Times to explain why.

• After the open Israeli-Iranian clash in Syria, the Washington Post examines the morphing internationalization of the Syrian conflict.

• Palestinians are denouncing the PA for helping a pair of IDF soldiers escape Jenin lynch mob yesterday. The two accidentally drove into the city, apparently after misusing Waze. The PA also returned weapons stolen from the soldiers.

• Knesset applies Israeli law to Ariel University in the West Bank.

• Hamas meets with Abbas rivals, including Mohammed Dahlan, as detente with Fatah crumbles.

• In first, Israeli diplomats attend UN conference in Malaysia, a majority Muslim country that has no ties with the Jewish state.

Malaysia was compelled to host the Israelis, since it was required to grant visas to all delegations in order to hold the international conference, the report added.

Kuala Lumpur
• The White House denied Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s assertion that he is in talks with the US to annex settlement areas in the West Bank. See Raphael Ahren‘s take.

• The Media Line takes a closer look at the likelihood of ties between Israel and Pakistan.

• Antwerp man filmed destroying 20 mezuzahs, harassing Jews.

• Unattended package detonated at Pittsburgh-area JCC.

cyber• If fake news doesn’t keep you up at night, fake information might. Aviv Ovadya, chief technologist at the Center for Social Media Responsibility, warns that an “information apocalypse” — a new level of misinformation and deception that makes fake news seem like child’s play. Buzzfeed caught up with Ovadya.

Technologies that can be used to enhance and distort what is real are evolving faster than our ability to understand and control or mitigate it. The stakes are high and the possible consequences more disastrous than foreign meddling in an election — an undermining or upending of core civilizational institutions, an “infocalypse.” And Ovadya says that this one is just as plausible as the last one — and worse . . .

And much in the way that foreign-sponsored, targeted misinformation campaigns didn’t feel like a plausible near-term threat until we realized that it was already happening, Ovadya cautions that fast-developing tools powered by artificial intelligence, machine learning, and augmented reality tech could be hijacked and used by bad actors to imitate humans and wage an information war.

Commentary
• Lead screed goes to South Africa Mail & Guardian writer Rumana Akoob. I don’t care if she doesn’t want Israel’s help with Cape Town’s drought, though the reasons she offers are pure lies. See our Conflict Over Water resource page.

The wall built by the Israeli government is used not just to imprison Palestinians but also cut Palestinians off from water supplies. The Israeli argument is that the wall is to to prevent terrorist activities between West Bank villages and from coming into Israel. The intentional denial of water access is a method to oppress the people of Palestine, and is a slow genocide.

water

• Gaza’s going down the tubes, and a New York Times staff-ed offers a wishy-washy take on the problem. I would’ve respected the editors more had they actually blamed Israel.

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Ronen Bergman: The Middle East’s coming war
– JE Dyer: Iranian drone, Israeli counter-strike: Probing defenses is the new normal
– Dave Sharma: Iran’s ambitions threaten to ignite the next major Middle East conflict
– Anshel Pfeffer: After years of covert proxy wars, Iran shifts to direct contact With Israel
– Melanie Phillips: The Iranian drone
– Judah Ari Gross: IDF may need to alter its Syrian air strategy, but not because of a downed F-16
– Ben Sales: Israel, Iran and Syria just traded blows. Does this mean war?
– Richard Goldberg: Iran testing Trump, not just Israel
– Abdulrahman Al-Rashed: The diplomacy of downing jets in Syria
– David Makovsky: Israel signaling a heavy price for Iranian ‘entrenchment’ in Syria

Featured image: CC BY-NC-ND Stefano Corso; Kuala Lumpur CC BY-NC-ND norsez Oh; cyber CC0 Pixabay; water CC0 Pexels;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-12-2018-putin-israel/
http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-12-2018-putin-israel/
Putin Phone Call Ended Israeli Air Strikes
BY PESACH BENSON FEBRUARY 12, 2018
Today’s Top Stories
Vladimir Putin
Russian President Vladimir Putin
1. According to Haaretz, Israel was considering further military action against the Iranians and Syrians when Russian President Vladimir Putin told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cool the guns.
The official announcement by the Russian Foreign Ministry objected to the violation of Syrian sovereignty by Israel and totally ignored the event that provoked the eruption – the infiltration of an Iranian drone into Israeli airspace. In the conversation with Netanyahu a few hours later, Putin asked him to avoid moves that could lead to “a new round of dangerous consequences for the region.”

The Russians are also concerned about the proximity of the Israeli bombings to sites where their soldiers and advisers are serving, including base T-4 near Palmyra, where the Iranian control post from which the anti-aircraft missile was fired was bombed.

2. The IDF believes its air strikes on Saturday destroyed nearly half of Syria’s air defenses.

building campaign

3. After Holocaust law, Poland moves to ban kosher slaughter.

The restrictions include a ban on exporting kosher meat from Poland, which is expected to affect many of Europe’s Jewish communities, as well as meat exports to Israel. Some of Israel’s supermarket chains import and sell kosher meat from Poland, increasing the competition in the Israeli meat market. A drop in meat exports from Poland could lead to a hike in meat prices in Israel.

The bill also seeks to ban slaughter when the animals are in an “unnatural state”—in other words, when the animal isn’t standing on all four feet, making a kosher Jewish slaughter practically impossible.

beef cattle

4. Read about the latest corrections HonestReporting prompted regarding drone confusion at the Daily Telegraph and Sydney Morning Herald.
In the News
• Israeli officials are mulling a response against Iran for this weekend’s drone infiltration.

• Iran’s stealth drone was shot down in a new way. What are the implications for tracking larger, manned, stealth aircraft?

Israel appears to have abandoned using radar-guided weapons to down the Iranian drone. Judging from the IDF supplied video, it almost certainly appears that the drone was destroyed by a missile controlled with an electro-optical sensor, allowing the helicopter pilot to track the drone and kill it. So, the lesson is that electro-optical systems are important in dealing with small platforms and against stealth targets.

• The Jerusalem Post takes a closer look at the cyber threats Iran and Hezbollah pose. Could they hack an IAF jet, missile defense systems, or turn an IDF drone against Israel?

hacking

• The drone shot down by Israel was an Iranian copy of a U.S. craft, Israel says.

• Two Israeli soldiers were attacked by a Palestinian mob after accidentally entering the West Bank City of Jenin on Monday afternoon. They were extracted by PA security forces, but not before one soldier’s rifle stolen, Ynet reports.

• Worth reading: The New York Times and Los Angeles Times take an in-depth look at Gaza’s deteriorating situation.

Around the World
• A number of Jewish leaders in the US, Europe and Israel would like to see Michael Oren succeed Natan Sharansky as head of the Jewish Agency, according to the Jerusalem Post. Sharansky is due to step down from the post in June.

• Anti-Semitic graffiti spray painted on Barcelona synagogue.

Commentary
• Plenty of broken quills and burnt pixels on Israel’s escalating conflict with Iran:

– Tony Badran, Jonathan Schanzer: The Iran-Israel war flares up (click via Twitter)
– Nahum Barnea: The Iranian game of chess: More moves are on the way
– Marc Schulman: Is this the start of an Israeli-Iran war?
– Seth Frantzman: From the Euphrates to Beit Shean: The Islamic Republic’s dangerous game
– Richard Kemp: Failure to support Israel against Iran could end in war
– Noga Tarnopolsky: Trump’s silence on Israel-Iran skirmish speaks volumes
– Daniel Shapiro: As Syria and Iran threaten Israel, America signals its ally is on its own
– Prof. Eyal Zisser: Iran’s opening shot
Anshel Pfeffer

@AnshelPfeffer
Iranian drone took off from base under Russian control. Syrians trained by Russians fired Russian missiles at Israeli planes. Israel coordinates operations over Syria with Russia and asks Russia to prevent escalation.
The US has never been less relevant.

9:45 AM - Feb 10, 2018
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– Herb Keinon: War in Syria? It’s up to the Russians
– Ben Lynfield: Can Russia defuse the confrontation with Iran?
– Yoav Fromer: From Russia with disappointment
– Reuven Ben-Shalom: Questions following a ‘day of battle’
– Yoav Limor: The Iranian dilemma
– Yossi Yehoshua: First public Israel-Iran clash was only a taste of the next war
– David Halbfinger: Israel’s clash with Iran: 5 takeaways
– Aaron David Miller: Mideast tensions get even worse

debate• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Tom Gross: Good news about Gaza you won’t hear on the BBC
– Aviva Klompas: Living with the Iran deal
– Alex Ryvchin: Abusing the Holocaust
– Robert Fulford: Law can’t obscure Poland’s anti-Semitism problem, then and now
Featured image: CC0 stevepb; Putin via YouTube/CBS This Morning; cattle CC0 MaxPixel; hacking CC0 FreeImages; debate CC0 Pixabay;
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.

Israel and Iran Openly Clash Over Syrian Border
BY PESACH BENSON FEBRUARY 11, 2018
http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-12-2018-israel-iran/
Israeli soldiers surveying from Golan Heights military post overlooking the Syrian border on February 10, 2018. Northern Israel remains on high alert after an F-16 plane crashed near Kibbutz Harduf. IAF jets were sent to Syria following the infiltration of an Iranian drone. Syrian forces fired missiles forcing the pilots of one F-16 to eject themselves. Photo by Flash90
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Today’s Top Stories
1. Violence flared up along the Israeli-Syrian border over the weekend. It started on Saturday morning when an Iranian drone entered Israeli air space and was shot down by a helicopter. Israel launched retaliatory air strikes against Iranian targets and Syrian anti-aircraft batteries. One Israeli F-16 jet was shot down in a flaming crash — caught on video which Ynet explains — into a field near Kibbutz Harduf was c. The two pilots ejected themselves from the aircraft. One is currently listed in moderate condition at Haifa’s Rambam Hospital. The second pilot was released from the hospital today.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, six people were killed in the Israeli strikes. Seth Frantzman nicely summarizes the tick-tock of what’s known.

Flights in and out of Ben Gurion Airport were halted for about an hour during the skirmish. Israel today boosted air defenses in the north. More on the story below.

HonestReporting flagged a number of faulty headlines. Iran Attack: It All Started When Israel Fired Back.

2. Mazen Adi, a former Syrian ambassador who once accused Israel of trafficking in human organs, has left a teaching position at Rutgers University. While a university spokesperson confirmed to local New Jersey media that Adi no longer teaches there, “it is not immediately clear whether he was fired or left on his own accord.”

Adi served as a diplomat for 16 years, including as ambassador to the UN, where he served as a mouthpiece for the Assad regime, justifying war crimes against civilians. He taught international law at Rutgers since 2015.


3. US Ambassador David Friedman took to Twitter to lock horns with Israel’s Haaretz daily. It has to do with the fact that A) Rabbi Itamar Ben Gal, who was stabbed to death last week by a Palestinian was a resident of the Har Bracha settlement in the northern West Bank, and B) Friedman had donated an ambulance to Har Bracha 20 years ago. Columnist Gideon Levy made his opposition to Har Bracha more than clear. Further background at the Jerusalem Post.

David M. Friedman

@USAmbIsrael
What has become of .@Haaretz ? Four young children are sitting shiva for their murdered father and this publication calls their community a “mountain of curses.” Have they no decency?

5:43 AM - Feb 9, 2018
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building campaign

Israel and the Palestinians
• Questions you’re probably asking about the Israeli-Iranian-Syrian skirmish:

– What’s known about the downed drone?
– What’s the drone threat Israel faces?
– When was the last time Israel lost a plane in combat?
– What would an extended conflict do to Israel’s economy?
– What are Syrian rebels saying about Israel now?
– Does the clash change the rules of the game? (Yes or no, depending on who you ask.)

• Tweet of the day goes to Daniel Shapiro.

Dan Shapiro

@DanielBShapiro
For those questioning whether the Iranian UAV in Israeli airspace was attacking Israel, what level of sovereignty-violation from an avowed enemy should Israel be expected to tolerate? Or maybe Israel should wait and see if the UAV has a payload? Please.

3:37 PM - Feb 10, 2018
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• Work is underway on a concrete wall along the Israeli-Lebanese border to protect from Hezbollah infiltration. Priority is being given to Israeli towns and kibbutzim. Ynet visited Rosh HaNikra, where initial work has already begun. This was written before the weekend border skirmish.

The main goal of the wall is to prevent Hezbollah’s elite “Radwan” force from infiltrating Israel during a conflict, and trying to capture an Israeli town or military outpost, an act that would deal a severe blow to Israeli morale and a boost for the terrorist group.

For their part, a UNIFIL spokesman said Wednesday that Israel had begun work south of the border line and added that the UN organization was closely monitoring the events. The spokesman, quoted in Lebanese media, said that UNIFIL was maintaining contact with officials on both sides of the border in order to solve the matter (Lebanese objections) and prevent unnecessary tension or deterioration.
• Saudi Arabia denied reports it gave Air India permission for overflights on a direct Tel Aviv-New Delhi line.

• Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah. Meanwhile, the Jerusalem Post reports that a growing number of Pakistanis are wondering if they should follow in India’s footsteps and “adopt constructive ties” with both sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Qatari• “Qatar’s leaders have assured Jewish-American organizations that Al Jazeera’s documentary on the Israel lobby in the United States will not be aired, five sources in pro-Israel circles in Washington told Haaretz,” though subsequent reports suggest the video may be aired anyway. Qatar is engaged in a charm offensive with American Jewish leaders.

Last week a number of pro-Israel organizations in the United States received letters from Al Jazeera informing them that their employees would appear in the documentary.

The film is based on the work of an undercover reporter who gained access to pro-Israel organizations in 2016 and videotaped their employees at work. The documentary is similar to one that Al Jazeera aired last year on Britain’s Israel lobby. Al Jazeera gave the organizations three weeks to reply to their quotes that will appear in the film.

• Israeli Interior Minister Aryeh Deri discussed the issue of deporting African migrants in a Washington Post Q+A.

• Israel appointed a new ambassador to Jordan as ties between the two countries continue to renormalize. Amir Weissbrod, a career diplomat, becomes Israel’s top envoy in Amman, closing the chapter on last year’s crisis over the shooting death of two Jordanians at the Israeli embassy by a security guard in an altercation that was disputed by both countries.

• The PA slammed a delegation of Arab journalists who visited Israel, calling for the Arab world to boycott them to deter other such visits, which it said “promoted normalization.” More at the Times of Israel.

View image on TwitterView image on Twitter

Israel Foreign Min.

@IsraelMFA
Hosted special guests from the Arab world in Jerusalem today - a delegation of Moroccan, Lebanese, Syrian, Kurdish & Yemeni journalists, visiting in order to get to know Israel, its history and its society from up close.
Welcome - اهلا وسهلا بكم

9:05 PM - Feb 5, 2018
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Around the World
• “Egypt’s army is bulldozing homes and olive groves to build a buffer zone around the airport in troubled North Sinai Province, but the operation will displace thousands, according to residents.” But it’s only an outrage if Israel does it. The El Arish airport buffer zone is in response to an ISIS assassination attempt on two high-level Egyptian security officials in December.

• Germany’s new governing coalition agreement denounces Israeli settlement policies and opposes American recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. But Israeli officials told the Jerusalem Post they weren’t especially perturbed.

• JTA: “A McGill University internal investigation absolved students involved in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel of outright anti-Semitism on campus but decried Jew hatred, triggering mixed reactions from the Jewish community.”
Lorde
• A Florida lawmaker is calling for venues in Miami and Tampa to call off concerts by Lorde scheduled for April. The New Zealand singer made waves in December when she caved into BDS pressure and cancelled a Tel Aviv show. The Algemeiner picked up on State Representative Randy Fine’s tweet. See also local coverage.
In letters to the Miami Sports and Exhibition Authority and the Tampa Sports Authority, Fine warned that Lorde’s April performances would violate Florida law, which bars state and local governments from conducting business exceeding $1 million with any organization engaged in a boycott of Israel . . .

“When Lorde joined the boycott in December, she and her companies became subject to that statute,” the representative continued. “The taxpayers of Miami and Tampa should not have to facilitate bigotry and antisemitism.”

• Ohio lawmakers are poised to pass anti-BDS legislation.

• Lithuanian ethics official faces call to step down after offering a cash reward for thesis pinning war crimes on Jews.

In the blog entry, Sadauskas offered 1,000 euros, or $1,221, to “a school student, a university student, a postgraduate student, a teacher or a scientist who will collect information, documents, materials and write a thesis (at least 10 printed pages) or a publication about individuals of the Jewish nationality who killed people, contributed to deportations or tortures,” the LETA news agency reported Thursday.

Commentary
Golan
An IDF soldier standing guard in the Golan Heights in 2008
• Plenty of broken quills and burnt pixels about the hot border.
– Yaakov Katz: The open war with Iran has begun
– Amos Harel: In first, Israel and Iran are engaged in a head-to-head confrontation in Syria
– Prof. Eyal Zisser: Conflict with Iran is here
– Judah Ari Gross: Freed from shroud of ‘foreign reports,’ Israel-Iran fight steps out from shadows
– Ron Ben-Yishai: Iran pushing for new northern status quo
– Avi Issacharoff: Riding high after IS defeat, Iranian axis tries its luck with Israel, US
– Dan Zaken: Northern flare-up: Iran testing Israel, Russia
– Anshel Pfeffer: Israel struggles to draw new red lines in Russia’s Syria playground
– Yoav Limor: Iran wants Putin to intervene
– Mary Dejevsky: Iran is extending its regional power in Syria – this is Israel’s worst nightmare
– Ben Lynfield: Can Russia defuse the confrontation with Iran?

• Last word, for now, goes to Amos Yadlin:

Amos Yadlin
@YadlinAmos
1.The cheers in Damascus, Beirut, and Tehran are odd. Even the commentators in Israel who explain that Israel has lost its air superiority are far off the mark. True, sometimes there are loses, or mistakes on our side, but the balance is unequivocal:

6:35 PM - Feb 10, 2018
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• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Smadar Bat Adam: Gaza water crisis the result of Hamas’ incompetence
– Fred Maroun: Arab by birth, Zionist by choice
– Abdulrahman Al-Rashed: Do we allow Air India’s request?
– Jennifer Gerber: The UK pays disproportionate attention to Palestinian child prisoners
– Bassam Tawil: The Hamas-ISIS war, corrupt leaders
– Gary Rosenblatt: Is Israel losing the Democratic Party?
– Jonathan Tobin: The sinister reason behind Qatar’s wooing of the Jews

• Last but not least, Fisk’s being Fisk again.

Featured image: CC0 bykst; Qatar CC0 Pixabay; Lorde via YouTube/Elvis Duran Show; soldier CC BY-NC Israel Defense Forces;

http://honestreporting.com/idns-02-07-2018-saudi-flights/
Saudis Approve Direct India-Israel Flights
BY PESACH BENSON FEBRUARY 7, 2018

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Today’s Top Stories
1. Saudi Arabia approved Air India to cross its airspace for direct flights between New Delhi and Tel Aviv. It’s the first time flights to Israel have been allowed through Saudi skies. Haaretz explains that the good diplomatic news also means stiff competition for Israel’s national airline, El Al:

The approval means that the duration of flights from India to Israel will be shortened by two-and-a-half hours, compared to the route currently in use. The new route will allow the airline to reduce fuel costs and sell cheaper tickers to passengers.

Right now the only carrier that flies directly to India is El Al, which flies an 8-hour route from Ben-Gurion International Airport to Mumbai. The route crosses the Red Sea south of Yemen, then turns east to India. Since New Delhi is a new destination from which there are no flights to Israel, the aviation company will be getting a 750,000 euro grant from the Tourism Ministry for operating the new line, according to a calculation of 250,000 euros per weekly flight. This grant is, among other things, the impetus for Air India to launch the line.

More at the Times of India.

Air India

2. Polish President Andrzej Duda signed into law controversial legislation which criminalizes blaming Poland for the Holocaust.


3. Syrian state media claimed Israel attacked an Iranian research base west of Damascus and that defense systems intercepted some of the missiles. There were no details offered on damage or casualties. Israeli officials didn’t comment.

building campaign

In the News
• A Palestinian was shot dead while trying to stab an Israeli security guard at the entrance to Karnei Tzur, an Israeli settlement near Hebron, this morning.

• Iran’s prospective supreme leader visited the Israel-Lebanon border in January, escorted by Hezbollah commanders and Iranian officers. More on Ayatollah Sayyed Ebrahim Raisi’s tour at the Jerusalem Post and MEMRI.

• Israeli activists are scoffing as the leader of the Norway’s leftist Red Party nominated the BDS for a Nobel Peace prize.


Arsen Ostrovsky

@Ostrov_A
What a joke! But then again, the Nobel Committee does have a track record of awarding 'non-violent' Palestinian leaders, you know, like Yasser Arafat. #BDS #Nobel https://twitter.com/Ostrov_A/status/960155375084466176 …

2:22 PM - Feb 4, 2018
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• With anti-Semitic attacks on the rise, France’s popular Jewish radio station moves into unmarked, secure studio.

• Chelsea soccer fans chant anti-Semitic songs less than a week after the team started an anti-hate campaign.

Commentary
• Ron Ben-Yishai and Avi Issacharoff suggest a new West Bank intifada is brewing. The latter writes:

Everyone knows that the Abbas era is all but over; they’re just waiting for him to actually leave. No one knows exactly what the “day after” will look like, but there is a general consensus that it will be violent and tumultuous. Abbas’s regime is viewed with open hostility, and Hamas is gaining support.

• People are still buzzing about the Polish Holocaust law.

– Slawomir Sierakowski: Restricting the phrase ‘Polish death camps’ only raises its profile
– Frida Ghitis: Poland’s Holocaust law should terrify you
– Jan Gross: Poland’s death camp law is designed to falsify history (click via Google News)
– Vivian Bercovici: On the linguistics of Polish death camps and other things anti-Semitic

Auschwitz
Auschwitz
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Ira Rifkin: Surveys say younger evangelicals and Democrats abandoning Israel. Crisis in U.S. Middle East policy?
– Einat Wilf: Anti-feminism and anti-Zionism
– MP John Mann: I’m not Jewish but whatever I talk about I receive antisemitic abuse



Featured image: CC BY Thomas8047; Air India via YouTube/San Francisco International Airport; Auschwitz via YouTube/BBC News;
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.