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Israel News for March 27, 2017

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Terror Foiled
This morning a terrorist tried to stab a soldier with a screwdriver, at a bus stop near the Samaria Territorial Brigade’s base in the Nablus area. Soldiers succeeded in overpowering the terrorist without opening fire. There were no casualties.

For further reading click here.

Pence at AIPAC
VP Pence addressed the 18,000 strong AIPAC convention in Washington yesterday, touting President Trump as the defender of Israel and the Jewish People. He also implied that the crowd supported Trump’s election, saying, “Thanks to the support of so many in this room President Trump won a historic victory. All of you helped elect a president I know will make America great again.”

Pence also said, “The United States will no longer allow the United Nations to be used as a forum for invective against Israel,” and that he was looking forward to the swearing in of David Friedman as the new ambassador to Israel.

At the same time, Pence said that Trump was “giving serious consideration” to moving the US embassy to Jerusalem — not that he would definitely fulfill his promise to move it. He also implied some sort of restrictions on settlement expansion when he said, “and undoubtedly there will have to be compromises,” in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Regarding the “disastrous” Iran nuclear deal, Pence made no indication that Trump would tear it up or renegotiate it, as promised during the campaign.

Meanwhile, several hundred Jewish protesters demonstrated outside the AIPAC conference, temporarily blocking the main entrance. The protesters, coordinated by IfNotNow, are targeting AIPAC for supporting Israel’s “occupation of the West Bank” and for not speaking out forcefully against some of Trump’s policies.

For further reading click here.

Settler Population Surge
According to statistics released yesterday, the number of Israelis living in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) has surged by more than 25% over the last five years to 420,000. The figures do not include Israelis living in any areas of east Jerusalem, where the total number is 200,000.

Settler leaders are using the latest population figures to support the case for a one-state solution. But the reality is that the overwhelming majority of Israelis in the West bank live in a few large settlement blocks which could be annexed to Israel and still allow for a potential two-state solution.

For further reading click here.

Iranian Sanctions
Iran’s Foreign Ministry has imposed cautions on 15 American companies, barring them from any agreements with Iranian firms and and prohibiting their er directors from getting visas. One of the reasons given for the sanctions is that the companies support Israel. The companies include Bent Tal, United Technologies Products. ITT Corporation, Raytheon, Re/Max Real Estate, Magnum Research Inc., Oshkosh Corporation, Kahr Arms and Elbit Systems.

For further reading click here.

Stepping Down
Remember the Trump administration’s Holocaust Remembrance Day statement that didn’t mention Jews? Well, the Jewish White House staffer who allegedly wrote the statement is leaving his post.

Boris Epshteyn will be stepping down from his job as special assistant to the president in the press office, in which he oversaw White House officials who appear on television to speak on behalf of the administration. He might still remain in the administration, in a lower profile role.

For further reading click here.

Israel News for September 20, 2016

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Terror Attacks
This morning a terrorist attempted to stab a soldier at the checkpoint at the entrance to the Arab town of Bani Na’im, east of Hebron. The soldier, a member of the 605th Engineering Battalion, managed to shoot the terrorist before he could cause any harm.

Last night a man was arrested in Hebron who was carrying a knife and planning to attack soldiers. Also last night, a bus traveling in East Jerusalem was stoned and the bus driver was lightly wounded.

All this follows two other terror attacks that we reported on yesterday. In one, two terrorists attempted to stab soldiers at The Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, and were shot and killed. In the other, two police officers were seriously wounded when they were stabbed by a terrorist near the Old City of Jerusalem.

IDF forces conducted raids in several Arab villages overnight in search of terror suspects and weapons. In total 27 suspects were arrested and numerous weapons confiscated.

For further reading click here.

Letter to Obama
Ahead of President Obama’s address to the UN General Assembly and his planned meeting with PM Netanyahu tomorrow, a group of 88 Republican and Democratic senators sent Obama a letter calling on him to veto any “one-sided” resolution brought before the UN Security Council during the remainder of his term.

The letter, initiated and sponsored by AIPAC, was spearheaded by Republican Senator Michael Rounds from South Dakota and Democratic Senator Kristen Gillibrand from New York.

The letter said, “We urge you to continue longstanding U.S. policy and make it clear that you will veto any one-sided UNSC resolution that may be offered in the coming months. Any such resolution, whether focused on settlements or other final status issues, will ultimately make it more difficult for Israelis and Palestinians to resolve the conflict.”

Israeli officials are worried that Obama might attempt to push through a UN Security Council resolution related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict after the November presidential election.

In the letter the senators supported a two-state solution and stressed that a resolution could only be reached through direct dialogue between the sides.

They wrote, “At this delicate stage the international community should both provide hope to the parties and avoid taking action that would harm the prospects for a meaningful progress. Even well-intentioned initiatives at the United Nations risk locking the parties into positions that will make it more difficult to return to the negotiation table and make the compromises necessary for peace.”

For further reading click here.

Shabbat Laws
The Jerusalem municipality indicted eight grocery shop owners for keeping their shops open on Shabbat, in violation of the city law that prohibits stores in the city center from operating on Shabbat.

Lawyers for the store owners accused Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat of caving in to ultra-orthodox pressure.

Barkat’s office responded that its decision did not stem from political pressure, but from the legal problem posed by a High Court of Justice ruling in a case involving Tel Aviv groceries that opened on Shabbat in violation of municipal bylaws. In that case, the court ruled that Tel Aviv could either enforce its bylaws or amend them, but could not simply keep allowing businesses to open in violation of the law.

For further reading click here.

Sirens Blaring
The IDF Homefront Command will test it’s early warning siren system throughout the country today. During the sirens, citizens are instructed to retreat to shelters in their homes, workplaces and schools. Sirens will be sounded in different regions between 11:05am and 11:15am, and then at 7:05pm for the entire country.

For further reading click here.

Israel News for July 13, 2016

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Terror Ramming
Three Palestinian men tried to ram their car into security forces who were dismantling an illegal weapons production facility in the village of a-Ram. Security forces shot and killed one of the men and wounded the other. The third man was arrested. No Israelis were hurt.

The IDF closed down a total of 16 weapons factories in the West Bank in a major crackdown yesterday.

For further reading click here.

Chief Rabbi Clarifies
Rabbi Col. Eval Karim, who was appointed as the next IDF Chief Rabbi, responded to critics by clarifying his positions in a meeting with the head of the Manpower Directorate Maj. Gen. Hagi Topolanski yesterday.

Karim confirmed that he in no way sanctions wartime rape by soldiers, and that the statement he once made permitting it was made exclusively in a theoretical context. He also clearly stated that he was in favor of drafting women into the IDF, as opposed to a statement he once made prohibiting women from serving.

He also claimed that he permits soldiers from being present at events where women are singing, which seems to contradict a 28 page legal opinion he offered which prohibited women singers from performing at IDF events and permitted male soldiers from being excused from such an event.

It’s still unclear whether the rabbi’s clarifications will be enough to placate his critics, as more controversial statements of his come to light. Most of those statement were made in the context of responses to questions on the website kipa.co.il.

Examples of Karim’s controversial statements include his position that soldiers may refuse an order that goes against Jewish law, that wounded suicide bombers should be killed, and that the Torah prohibits women from testifying in a Bet Din (Jewish legal court) because “a woman’s sentimental nature does not allow her to withstand a cross examination at court.”

For further reading click here.

Republican Platform
The Republican Party’s Platform Committee has unanimously agreed to omit references to a two-sate solution in its new platform.

The two-state solution has long been accepted by both the Democratic and Republican parties as well as by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). When the Republicans tried to omit the two-sate solution from their platform in 2012, AIPAC opposed the move. This time they didn’t.

The new platform says, “The U.S. seeks to assist in the establishment of comprehensive and lasting peace in the Middle East, to be negotiated among those living in the region. We oppose any measures intended to impose an agreement or to dictate borders or other terms, and call for the immediate termination of all U.S. funding of any entity that attempts to do so. Our party is proud to stand with Israel now and always.”

Other language on Israel “reject(s) the false notion that Israel is an occupier” and describes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and “indivisible,” both changes from the 2012 platform.

AIPAC spokesman Marshall Wittmann said, “We appreciate that both parties’ platforms have now included strong pro-Israel language which is reflective of the broad bipartisan consensus in support of the Jewish state.”

J Street called the new Republican platform language, “dangerous and irresponsible.” The left-leaning Jewish group said, “It breaks with over half a century of bipartisan US consensus on Middle East policy and disavows the important achievements of previous Republican presidents in seeking peace between Israel and the Palestinians. It would place the Republican Party to the right of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who continues to maintain that he supports the two-state solution.”

The Democratic platform, which was recently approved, does include the two-state solution saying, “We will continue to work toward a two-state solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict negotiated directly by the parties that guarantees Israel’s future as a secure and democratic Jewish state with recognized borders and provides the Palestinians with independence, sovereignty, and dignity.”

The Republican platform will still need to be approved by the full Republican National Committee ahead of the convention in Cleveland next week.

For further reading click here.

Hezbollah Missiles
Addressing a UN Security Council discussion relating to the security situation in Lebanon 10 years after the Second Lebanon War, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon presented evidence of how south Lebanon has turned into a Hezbollah stronghold.

Danon said the Hezbollah currently has 120,000 missiles pointed at Israel. That’s a larger missile stockpile than all of the European NATO countries combined. At the end of the Second Lebanon War Hezbollah only had 7,000.

Damon said, “Hezbollah hasn’t been stopped. They chose to establish their firing positions next to schools and other public buildings, thereby endangering the innocent civilian population. It is the responsibility of the UN security council to get Hezbollah out of south Lebanon.”

For further reading click here.

Israeli in Gaza
A bedouin Israeli citizen has crossed the border fence into Gaza yesterday and is now missing. The man is a shepherd who lives with his family a few miles from the border. He is considered to be mentally unstable.

Security forces were alerted of the breach in the fence and raced to the scene but were too late to stop the man. He is thought to have been captured by Hamas. He is the third Israeli civilian to cross the border and be held by Hamas. The other two are a bedouin and an Ethiopian, both mentally unstable.

For further reading click here.

Saudi Rankings
The Saudi Arabian based Center for World University Rankings has ranked theHebrew University of Jerusalem as the best university in the Middle East and #26th in the world (out of 25,000). Other Israeli universities to finish in the top 100 were the Weizmann Institute of Science, at 41, and Tel Aviv University, at 81.

Yes, the ratings agency is based in Saudi Arabia, and still…

For further reading click here.

Israel News for March 23, 2016

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AIPAC Apologizes
In response to Donald Trump’s comments in his speech to AIPAC referring to President Obama as the worst thing to ever happen to Israel, the President of AIPAC, Lillian Pinkus, along with other leaders of the organization, apologized to the President.

She said, “From the moment this conference began, until this moment, we have preached a message of unity. We have said, in every way we can think of: Come together. But last evening, something occurred which has the potential to drive us apart, to divide us. We say, unequivocally, that we do not countenance ad hominem attacks, and we take great offense to those that are levied against the president of the United States of America from our stage.”

Pinkus, her voice choking at points, added, “While we may have policy differences, we deeply respect the office of the President of the United States and our President Barack Obama. There are people in our AIPAC family who were deeply hurt last night and for that we are deeply sorry. We are deeply disappointed that so many people applauded a sentiment that we neither agree with nor condone.”

The people Pinkus was referring to who were “deeply hurt” seemed to be very well hidden among the thousands of AIPAC members who gave Trump several standing ovations and bursts of rousing applause during his speech.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed the conference. He said that he hoped the United States would continue to reject any move towards a UN Security Council resolution backing Palestinian statehood and that he was prepared to negotiate a two-state solutions with the Palestinians “without preconditions” but that PA President Abbas was against the idea.

For further reading click here.

UN Returns
United Nations peacekeeping forces are set to return to the Syrian side of the Israeli-Syrian border. The troops had been stationed there from 1974 until 2014, when they were forced to leave as a result of the ongoing Syrian civil war and the rebel takeover of the Syrian Golan Heights.

Since their withdrawal the forces have been stationed on the Israeli side of the border, primarily monitoring Israeli troop movements. Israel is anxious to get the UN forces back on the Syrian side. The current cease fire agreement in Syria has finally made that possible.

While the UN troops do not add anything to Israel’s defense capability, they do provide first hand reports to the Security Council regarding the conflict and the danger it poses to Israel.

For further reading click here.

Dairy Wars
Since March 10th, Israel has banned Palestinian made dairy products from entering Jerusalem. Yesterday the Palestinian Authority retaliated by banning products made by five major Israeli companies including Tnuva, Strauss, the Jafora-Tabori beverages company, Soglowek, and Tara Dairy.

Sales in the PA by Tnuva, Strauss, and Jafora-Tabori are each believed to amount to hundreds of millions of shekels, while sales there by Soglowek and Tara are fairly small.

So if the Palestinians are forced to buy Palestinian products and the Israelis, Israeli products, won’t that just leave the companies in the same revenue position they were in initially? Hmm.

For further reading click here.

Supreme Court
Last week we told you that the Tel Aviv Rabbinical Court had sentenced the father of a man who had refused to give his wife a divorce for over 11 years to 30 days in jail for supporting his son in his refusal. The court was praised by many for its bold stand against husbands refusing to grant divorces.

Yesterday the Supreme Court ruled that the father must have the opportunity to appeal to the Supreme Rabbinical Court and cannot be jailed in the interim. He is, however, still banned from leaving Israel.

For further reading click here.

Purim Begins
The holiday of Purim begins tonight with the reading of the Megillah (the Book of Esther) and continues tomorrow with a repeat performance along with more fun stuff including lots of eating, drinking, giving charity and exchanging gifts (of food). Stay tuned for our special Purim issue tomorrow.
Today is the Fast of Esther (good opportunity to drop a few extra pounds).
Happy Purim!!!

Israel News for March 22, 2016

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Breaking News
Three explosions rocked Brussels, the capital of Belgium, today killing at least 23 people and injuring dozens. One of the explosions occurred in a subway, claiming the lives of ten victims. The two other blasts occurred at the airport, killing 13 and wounding 35. Brussels is under lock down. This story is currently unfolding.

For further reading click here.

AIPAC Lovefest
Over the last couple of days all of the US Presidential candidates, except for Bernie Sanders, addressed the AIPAC conference in Washington. Guess what? They all gave rousingly pro Israel speeches full of praises and pledges to always stand with Israel. Despite claims by Trump that he is the greatest supporter of Israel ever (since he was the grand marshal of the Salute to Israel parade), all the candidates proclaimed their allegiance to Israel loud and clear. All of the Republican candidates also pledged to “tear up” the Iranian nuclear deal. Cruz and Kasich attacked Trump for saying that he would be “neutral” in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, but it was too late. Trump had already changed his position and vowed not to be neutral.

So, based on the AIPAC speeches, the next President of the US will be the best friend Israel has ever had. That’s reassuring. Unless things change.

Gaza Sewage
Construction of a new water treatment plant was completed last year in northern Gaza with international funding. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it needs electricity to operate, and the Israel Electric Company has ignored requests by Gaza to connect it to the electrical grid. As a result, tens of thousands of gallons of sewage is dumped into the sea every day by the Palestinians, and part of it ends up at the Ashkelon desalinization plant and the beaches in the area.

A month ago, the plant had to be shut down twice due to the amount of pollution in the water. The plant’s management reported this to the Water Authority and the Ministry of Health, and initial checks revealed that there was a dangerous amount of E. Coli and other harmful bacteria in the water.

Because of this, the water supply from the plant to the National Water System was cut in half. The Water Authority calls this a “significant threat” to the water supply from the plant, especially because the pollution coming from Gaza is expected only to increase.

An official from the Water Authority said, “Today, while the north is suffering from a drought, and the water supply coming from the Sea of Galilee is almost zero, it is of even greater importance to keep the desalinization plants on line.”

The Coordinator for Government Activities in the Territories responded by saying, “Israel supplies electricity to Gaza. The allocation of this electricity is decided by the Palestinians. Gaza has unused power capacity which can be allocated to power the plant. We are leading an examination of possible options in order to solve the general energy shortage in Gaza.”

Officials at the Energy Ministry, which is responsible for the energy and water supply, claim that they were only made aware of the problem in the last few days. Minister Yuval Steinitz noted that, “we suffer from this pollution almost as badly as the Palestinians, and it is in our interest that this issue be dealt with.”

So basically, until the Palestinians in Gaza get clean water, Israel will be getting their polluted water, which will harm Israel’s water supply. It seems as though Israel has the ability to solve this problem, and possibly even score some points with the people of Gaza. But even without the points, it’s a matter of Israel’s national security to solve the water problem in Gaza.

For further reading click here.

Knesset Dead Beat
Knesset Member Oren Hazan, who has drawn criticism and rebuke from his Likud party members for missing important Knesset sessions and votes, is having some serious financial problems, and he’s asking for help.

Apparently, Hazan either doesn’t read traffic signs or just ignores them. He has accumulated around 4,000 shekels ($1,036) in parking tickets in Tel Aviv, and he’s now begging the TA municipality to waive the charges, claiming that he’s “swimming in debt” and unable to come up with the money. Unsuccessful in his bid for amnesty, Hazan turned to his father, a former Likud MK, to plead his case for him.

Before you shed a tear for Hazan and break into your piggy bank to help him out, you should probably know that MKs receive an annual salary of 400,000 shekels ($124,300), a free car, two assistants, an office in Jerusalem, foreign travel expenses, free mailing, and roughly, 112,000 shekels a year ($29,000) in budgeting for everything ranging from food to clothes to telecommunications.

Still feel sorry for him? With all due respect to the MK: get your act together, pay your bills and read the parking signs. In other words, grow up.

For further reading click here.