Thursday, December 05, 2013
NYT: U.S., Stepping Up Role, Will Present West Bank Security Proposal to Israel
American officials plan to present the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, with detailed ideas about security arrangements on the West Bank under a possible peace agreement with the Palestinians, senior State Department officials said on Wednesday.Obama’s Plan Won’t Persuade Palestinians
The presentation is to be made to Mr. Netanyahu on Thursday by John R. Allen, the former American commander in Afghanistan and a retired Marine general who serves as an adviser to Secretary of State John Kerry on the Middle East peace talks.
While lamenting his lack of military leverage over Israel, Erekat stated again that despite even the Obama administration’s acceptance of the idea of territorial swaps that would accommodate Israeli settlement blocks, the PA’s idea of a two-state solution remained the “1967 border.” But aside from inflexibility on territory rooted in a desire to ethnically cleanse the West Bank and much of Jerusalem of hundreds of thousands of Jews and refusing to disavow the “right of return” for the descendants of the 1948 refugees, Erekat also signaled that any peace deal would not end the conflict: (h/t NormanF)Amman said to back Israeli demands on Jordan ValleyMr. Erekat told the diplomats that the Palestinians could never accede to Israel’s demand that they recognize it as the nation-state of the Jewish people. “I cannot change my narrative,” he said. “The essence of peace is not to convert each other’s stories.”Why is Erekat’s stance so crucial?
Palestinian apologists dismiss Israeli demands that the Palestinians simply accept that whatever territory is left to the Jews after a theoretical deal is a Jewish state as irrelevant to a deal. What difference, we are asked, does it make whether the Palestinians accept Israel as the Jewish state so long as they accept the concept of peace and take what is offered them? But it does matter so long as the Palestinian leadership continues enable a political culture that is rooted in rejection of Israel’s legitimacy.
Jordan has been pushing the United States to support Israel’s position that it needs to maintain a security presence in the Jordan Valley under any agreement with the Palestinians.Danny Danon: 'Tell Obama: No, We Can't'
Israel is expected to coordinate with Amman to drive home the message this week to the Americans — especially Secretary of State John Kerry, who was in the region Thursday for talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials — that keeping the IDF on the Jordan River is crucial to regional stability, a Thursday report in the Israeli daily Maariv said. (h/t Yoel)
"Secretary Kerry is coming to Israel again. We cannot count how many times he came already. We welcome him to Israel but we should tell him very clearly – we will not sign an interim agreement that will put the lives of Israelis in danger.Erekat: Israel is trying to sabotage the peace process
"We saw what happened in Geneva. A bad accord was signed in Geneva. We will not sign another bad accord with the Palestinians,” he said, referring to the deal reached between western powers and Iran over the latter's nuclear program. That deal has been lambasted by Israeli leaders for being too lenient on the Iranian regime as it pursues a suspected nuclear weapons program.
Danon added that Israel "cannot compromise our security" for "another ceremony in the White House".
Prosor: Palestinians 'playing games' in peace talks‘Arafat is still dead’: Guardian ‘mentions’ French report that he was NOT poisoned
Israel's ambassador to the United Nations Ron Prosor told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday that the resignation of Palestinian negotiators this week from peace talks with Israel is a "pretext to exit the talks."
Prosor called the move a strategic tactic— either to genuinely sabotage the talks, or to cajole more concessions from the Israeli government.
"Playing games is a no-no," Prosor said, especially in light of the murder of an Israeli soldier at the hands of a 16-year-old Palestinian in Afula.
The French report found that Arafat’s death in 2004 was caused by the effects of “old age following a generalised infection”, and ruled out the possibility that he was poisoned. In contrast to the paper’s saturation coverage of the Swiss findings, Sherwood’s latest story on the new report was not featured on the Guardian’s home page, and was consigned to page 19 in the print edition of the paper.BBC amplifies Hizballah propaganda yet again
Of course, the conclusions of the French team are not at all surprising in the context of many facts previously revealed about the case,
Just a couple of weeks ago the BBC was amplifying Iranian propaganda on the subject of the terror attack on the Iranian embassy in Beirut – see here and here. In this article (as well as in a separate one) it now adds Hizballah propaganda to its cocktail of unfounded accusations surrounding that incident.More Pallywood: How Palestinians turn their stone throwers into victims
The BBC clearly has a problem knowing how to relate to the streams of all too predictable propaganda regularly produced by regimes and terrorist organisations in the Middle East. Its current practice of uncritical repetition and amplification of baseless rumour, conspiracy theories and propaganda is clearly incompatible with its obligation to “build a global understanding of international issues” and its self-declared aspiration to “remain the standard-setter for international journalism”.
In the past couple of weeks there have been an increasing number of incidents involving Palestinian stone throwers. In the worst case, two-year-old Avigail Ben Zion suffered a head injury after her mother’s car was stoned in Jerusalem’s Armon Hanatziv neighborhood.Palestinian Terrorists Determined to Kidnap Israeli Soldiers
But injuring Israeli toddlers distracts from the Palestinian narrative of perpetual victimization. This might go some way to explaining this story published today (December 4) by the Palestinian Information Center: (h/t Bob Knot)
Since the beginning of 2013, terrorists have attempted dozens of kidnapping attacks, and their motivation to abduct soldiers remains high. The goal of their efforts is clear: to trade IDF soldiers – captured dead or alive – for the release of Palestinian prisoners.Police nab 6 alleged accomplices in soldier’s death
On October 18, 2011, Israelis everywhere celebrated the release of Sergeant First Class Gilad Shalit after five years in terrorist captivity. On that day, Hamas terrorists freed SFC Shalit – an IDF soldier whom they kidnapped in 2006 – in exchange for about 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. Despite the overjoyed reaction in Israel, the threat of kidnapping has remained high ever since. Until today, Palestinian terrorists view the capture of SFC Shalit as a key accomplishment, increasing their determination to kidnap Israelis and trade them for Palestinian prisoners.
Six suspects were arrested Wednesday in connection with the murder of IDF soldier Eden Atias three weeks ago, following a joint investigation by police and the Israel Security Agency.Dutch Parliament Approves Motion to Shame PA for Rewarding Terrorists
The suspects will reportedly be charged in the coming days with illegally employing, assisting, and hosting the accused killer, 16-year-old Hussein Sharif Rawarda.
The Dutch Parliament approved a motion that had been under discussion since 2011, calling on the government to pressure the Palestinian Authority to end its practice of offering financial incentives for killing Israelis in terror attacks.PMW: Released prisoner: "We'd chat, talk, eat, drink, joke and play"
The motion, passed by an overwhelming majority, noted that PA payments to convicted terrorists increase based on the length of sentence, encouraging even more heinous crimes to reap the full benefit. The wording referenced how monthly payments to Palestinians in prison can range from €282 ($208) for someone jailed for less than three years to up to €2,419 for a sentence of 30 years or more.
Israel recently released 52 of 104 imprisoned terrorists to accommodate the Palestinian Authority's precondition to return to negotiations. Palestinian Media Watch documented that the terrorists, who were all murderers, were received by the PA leadership as heroes. As part of its ongoing glorification of the terrorists, PA TV interviewed Asrar Samrin who was serving a life sentence for the murder of Israeli Tzvi Klein (Dec. 3, 1991). The murderer explained that "the first question all Israeli media ask every released prisoner is: 'Do you regret what you did or not?'" His answer was:Hamas Interior Minister Calls for Third Intifada and Declares: We Will Establish Islamic Caliphate
"Through the great PA TV, I say to the Israelis: There is no Palestinian who did something for the homeland and his nation who will regret it. We don't regret what we did and we will not regret what we did."
In a public address in Gaza on November 13, Hamas Minister of the Interior Fathi Hammad proclaimed: "We shall liberate our Al-Aqsa Mosque, and our cities and villages, as a prelude to the establishment of the future Islamic Caliphate." In the address, which was broadcast by the Hamas Al-Aqsa TV channel, Hammad called on Fatah to cease negotiations with Israel and declared: "We shall be coming with a third Intifada, an armed revolution, a Jihadi revolution," in which "Gaza and the West Bank will fuse together, along with our brothers within the 1948 borders... in order to uproot the Jews."
Kissinger, Shultz: Under Iran Deal, Previously Illegal Activity is Accepted as Baseline
For 10 years, U.N. resolutions and International Atomic Energy Agency directives called for a full halt to all of Iran’s uranium enrichment and plutonium production, and unconditional compliance with nuclear inspections, but now, what “was previously condemned as illegal and illegitimate has effectively been recognized as a baseline,” former U.S. Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Shultz wrote in an Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.Iran Arrests 16 for Helping 'Anti-Government Websites'
“And that baseline program is of strategic significance. For Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium is coupled with an infrastructure sufficient to enrich it within a few months to weapons-grade, as well as a plausible route to producing weapons-grade plutonium in the installation now being built at Arak,” the two experts in statecraft wrote of the recent agreement reached between wold powers and Iran.
The official IRNA news agency quoted Ahmad Ghorbani, a local prosecutor in Kerman in southeast Iran, as saying the 16 are facing charges of cooperating with Western and anti-Iran news networks.Former Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. and Former Intelligence Chief Prince Turki Al-Faisal to Obama: Wake Up, Sleepy One; U.S. and Saudi Arabia Experiencing Crisis of Confidence
Ghorbani did not say when the 16 were detained but said confessions obtained during interrogations prove the charges against the defendants.
The 16 were not identified by name, but were accused of providing materials to websites seeking to topple Iran's Islamic ruling system, according to AP.
IRNA's report said some of the defendants had attended training sessions in Turkey and Malaysia.
Despite Denials By Iranian Regime, Statements By Majlis Member And Reports In Iran Indicate Involvement Of Iranian Troops In Syria Fighting
Recently, the Iranian media has published numerous reports about Iran's extensive military involvement in fighting for the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, including reports on funerals of Iranian troops killed there. Nevertheless, the Iranian regime is sticking to its story that it is not involved in any way in the fighting, and rejecting Arab and Western countries' accusations that it is doing so. The Arab countries' position was reflected in statements by Saudi Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, whose country is Iran's leading critic on this issue, during a November 4, 2013 meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, where he demanded that Iran withdraw both Iranian and Hizbullah forces from Syria.IDF using life-saving new field treatment for Syrian war wounded
He did reveal, however, that dozens of Syrians have been given a new life-saving treatment that the IDF has recently introduced into the medical corps but has yet to use on an Israeli soldier. Holding a glass bottle of freeze-dried plasma, he said that blood loss, within the first hour after injury, is the primary cause of death for soldiers in the field. Ordinary plasma, known as fresh frozen plasma, must be kept at a minimum of -25 degrees Celsius and is therefore only administered at hospitals with the appropriate freezers. The FDP, made by the German Red Cross, can be kept in a simple refrigerator or even at room temperature. Mixed with IV fluid, the powdered unit of plasma can be intravenously introduced to a patient within minutes.
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