Archive for January 13, 2013

Erekat defends Hamas’ right to run in Palestinian elections

In interview on Army Radio, chief PLO negotiator says of Palestinian elections, “we use ballots not bullets…everyone has a right to run.”

By JPOST.COM STAFF

 

“Hamas and Fatah have differences in opinion,” Chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat said Sunday morning, but stressed that “everyone has a right to run.”

Saeb Erekat

“We are a democracy” he told Army Radio, emphasizing that “whoever wins, wins.” This does not mean that Hamas would be “taking over” the West Bank, however, adding, “We don’t use bullets, we use ballots.”
When probed over whether Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal is expected to run in the Palestinian presidential elections, Erekat said he has not announced a decision.

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Arab cartoonists bash Israel, the U.S. & fellow Arab Countries

Arab caricaturists never held back criticism for the Jewish state.

Assault on Gaza returned Israel to media’s center stage after Arab spring stole its spotlight.

By Roi Kais

 

Political cartoonists across the Arab world have never spared criticism for Israel, but the armed conflict in the Gaza Strip this past November has spurred them to step up the satirical reproach of the Jewish state.

קריקטורה בזמן עמוד ענן. ישראל אוכלת את הפלסטינים במזלג אמריקני ובסכין שעליה כתוב "השתיקה הערבית"

Cartoon published during Gaza hostilities. Caption on knife: Arab silence

“Operation Pillar of Defense has regained Israel its traditional spot in the caricature arena, after it lost the center stage to the Arab Spring,” one prominent cartoonist, who asked to remain anonymous, told Ynet. Continue Reading »

Israel Police Forces Evacuate Illegal Arab E-1 Outpost

The Judea & Samaria District of the Israeli Police evacuated the illegal Palestinian outpost in the area known as E-1 by busing them out.
“There was no violence during the evacuation and no arrests were made” the Police reported.

By Elad Benari

 

The Judea and Samaria District of the Israeli Police evacuated on Saturday night the illegal Arab outpost that had been set up in the area known as E1.

Arab outpost at E1

Arab outpost at E-1
Arutz Sheva

Large security forces who arrived in the area boarded the Palestinian Authority Arabs who were in the outpost onto buses, which will take them back to the PA-assigned areas of Judea and Samaria. Continue Reading »

Israel to Court: Palestinian outpost aimed to trigger riots

Gov’t gears to evict Palestinians squatters who set up encampment in contested E-1 area of West Bank, stating that their presence poses security threat because it could provoke unrest.

Aviel Magnezi

 

Israeli security forces geared to evict the Palestinians staying in the Bab al-Shams outpost that was erected in the contested West Bank area of E1.

Bonfire at outpost Photo: AFP

Bonfire at outpost – Photo: AFP

“An urgent evacuation is required due to a pressing security need,” the State said in a petition filed with the High Court of Justice late on Saturday.

Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein said in the document that the State has issued orders to define the outpost as a closed military zone and to remove squatters from its land. Continue Reading »

U.S. plans to stop release of convicted Lebanese terrorist who killed Israeli & U.S. diplomats

George Ibrahim Abdallah, granted release from imprisonment by French appeals court for  the 1982 murders of an Israeli diplomat & the U.S. military attaché in Paris, as well as the attempted murder of the U.S. Consul General in Strasbourg in 1984.

By Reuters

 

 

The United States objected on Friday to a French court’s planned release of a Lebanese leftist militant, saying he may still be a threat a quarter century after he was convicted of killing an American and an Israeli diplomat.

A file picture taken on July 3, 1986 shows former Lebanese militiaman George Ibrahim Abdallah

A file picture taken on July 3, 1986 shows former Lebanese militiaman George Ibrahim Abdallah during his trial in Lyon, central-eastern France.

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Palestinian Shot Dead While Trying to Infiltrate Into Israel

21 year-old Palestinian Arab shot to death by IDF forces south of Hevron as he was trying to sneak into Israel. 

By Elad Benari

 

A 21-year-old Palestinian Authority Arab was shot to death by IDF forces south of Hevron on Saturday night, as he was trying to infiltrate into Israel through the border fence.

PA security forces march in Hevron

PA security forces march in Hevron
AFP Photo

An initial investigation has found that the Arab was shot and wounded in the lower part of his body. He was taken to the Soroka Hospital in Be’er Sheva, where he died of his wounds.

“A Palestinian attempted to infiltrate Israel through the security fence,” an IDF spokesman told AFP. Continue Reading »

Rand Paul: Israel’s building in Jerusalem is ‘none of the United States’ business’

Senator Paul says U.S. should not meddle in Israel’s decisions regarding settlement construction, but on the issue of Iran, Jerusalem’s decision could have ramifications for the entire Mideast.

 

It is “none of our business” whether Israel builds new neighborhoods in east Jerusalem or withdraws from the Golan Heights, and the US should not tell Israel how to defend itself, US Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) said Saturday night at the end of a week-long visit to the country.

zzzxPaul, a maverick libertarian senator known for his advocacy of slashing US foreign aid, said at a press briefing that the issue of cutting aid to Israel — something he advocates as part of a gradual process — did not come up during his meetings with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu or President Shimon Peres.

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What meaning is behind Abbas’ new tone?

Given the regional dangers that are on the horizon, any political arrangement with the Palestinians in the future must have a much stronger security component than what Olmert or Barak may have considered in the past.

By Dore Gold

 

Mahmoud Abbas delivered a speech on Jan. 4, on the anniversary of the founding of Fatah, that may have marked a turning point in the relations between the Palestinian Authority president and the State of Israel. Using extremist rhetoric that he has not adopted before, Abbas spoke about the need of the Palestinians “to renew an oath to the heroic martyrs and to walk in their path.”

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Court bars State from evicting Palestinian from illegal E-1 settlement

High Court issues temporary injunction to prevent police from ejecting Palestinian protesters from illegal E-1 settlement

Elior Levy

 

The High Court of Justice has issued a temporary injunction barring the State from removing an outpost erected by Palestinians in the West Bank as long as there isn’t an emergency warranting an evacuation.

200 פלסטינים ופעילי סולידריות הגיעו ל-E1 (צילום: אוהד צויגנברג)

‘Day without violence.’ Palestinians at camp – Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg

Government officials were expected to petition the court on Saturday evening to void the injunction. In the meantime, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the routes leading up to the outpost to be closed to traffic, rendering the area a closed military zone. Continue Reading »

Abbas’s Goals & Hamas’s are Identical

Moshe Yaalon, Israel’s Strategic Affairs Minister says a PLO state must never come into existence.

By Gil Ronen

 

Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Yaalon ruled out on Saturday the establishment of a “Palestinian” state next to Israel.

In a live interview panel in the Southern Sharon regional authority, Yaalon explained that it makes no difference what the “Palestinian” entity calls itself. “It can call itself the Palestinian empire for all I care,” he said. “The goals of the Authority’s head, Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas), are identical to those of Hamas.

“I began voting for Likud when I was still wearing a uniform, when I was Head of Military Intelligence, after I gained extensive familiarity with the Oslo Agreement,” Yaalon revealed. Continue Reading »

Israel Would Benefit Without U.S. Military Aid

A freed Israeli military economy, the single biggest factor in Israel’s phenomenal economic growth, would only propel its economy to new heights.

By Lawrence Solomon

 

To the delight of Israel’s enemies and the dismay of its supporters, libertarian Senator Rand Paul, a potential Republican contender for the United States presidency, argued while in Israel this week that the U.S. should phase out the $3-billion per year in aid that it provides Israel’s military. Ending this aid along with U.S. aid to all foreign countries — call it the Rand Paul Doctrine — would actually leave Israel better off, he claimed to raised eyebrows. Continue Reading »

British Munitions Survey Reports Iran Fuels African Conflicts

 

The New York Times reports: British arms researchers surveying ammunition in Africa find trail implicating the Islamic Republic

By Ynetnews

 

A British team of arms-trafficking researchers surveying ammunition used by government forces and civilian militias over recent years in conflicts plaguing Kenya, Uganda, the Ivory Coast and what is now South Sudan, has been able to link them to Iran, the New York Times reported Saturday.

 Photo: AFP

According to the findings, the ammunition bore no “headstamps” – a numeric or logo markings used in the arms industry to indicate the location and year of a cartridge’s manufacture –suggesting its producers hoped to avoid detection. Continue Reading »

Hamas Reports: 885 Palestinians killed in Syrian conflict

Lebanon’s ‘Daily Star’ reports that 20,000 Palestinian refugees from Syria fled to Lebanon.

By JPOST.COM STAFF

 

Eight hundred and eighty-five Palestinians have been killed in Syria since the uprising against President Bashar Assad erupted nearly two years ago, Lebanon’s Daily Star, citing a Hamas spokesman, reported Friday.

A Palestinian refugee camp in Syria [file photo]

A Palestinian refugee camp in Syria – Photo: Khaled Al Hariri/Reuters

According to the report, based on Hamas figures, a further 20,500 Palestinian refugees from Syria remain trapped in Lebanon, including at least 3,500 who fled last month following a fierce outbreak of violence in the Yarmouk refugee camp outside Damascus.

Syria hosts an estimated half a million Palestinian refugees, and both Assad’s government and the mainly Sunni Muslim rebels have enlisted and armed Palestinians as the uprising has developed into a civil war.

Continue Reading »

Daam party leader says she’s ‘not Zoabi’

 

Asma Agbarieh-Zahalka objects to ‘nationalistic’ discourse and promises to represent Jewish & Arab workers pitted against each other by gov’t’s ‘divide & conquer’ policy.

Hassan Shaalan

 

While many Arab Knesset members are known mostly for their harsh criticism of Israel, one Arab woman sees things quite differently.

Together with her Jewish partners, Asma Agbarieh Zahalka leads Daam, the “Workers’ Party.” She aims to direct the political discourse to a wholly different area.

“We combine a political agenda with a social one,” she said. “Our aim is to represent Jewish and Arab workers, the unemployed, women and youth who are pitted against each other by the government’s “divide and conquer” policy. Continue Reading »

Gazan Shot Dead Near Border Fence

A male Palestinian Authority Arab shot dead by IDF troops after damaging the Gaza border fence.

By Elad Benari, Canada

 

A Palestinian Authority Arab man was shot dead by IDF troops in northern Gaza on Friday, medics told the Bethlehem-based Ma’an news agency.

Gaza health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qidra told Ma’an that Anwar Muhammad al-Mamlouk, 22, was killed by Israeli fire. He said another man was seriously wounded and taken to the a local hospital by paramedics.

In response to the reports, the IDF told Channel 10 News, “In the afternoon, dozens of Palestinians gathered near the security fence in northern Gaza. Continue Reading »