Archive for January 24, 2014

Treasury marks a victory over diminishing group of Holocaust survivors

Decade-long legal battle ends with decision to not recognize the group Tehran Children, as Holocaust survivors

 

The Finance Ministry’s legal department has defeated another group of Holocaust survivors. Congratulations. It’s an achievement they can hang on their walls as a badge of shame.

This week’s courtroom victory came after a legal battle lasting more than a decade by a group of Holocaust survivors known as the “Tehran children.” The group, whose number has naturally dwindled in recent years, originally consisted of some 1,200 Jewish children from Poland who went to the Soviet Union, then to Iran and finally to pre-state Israel in 1943. Continue Reading »

Egyptian Journalist: ‘We fought for Hamas, and now, they are killing us’

 

Egyptian journalist says, Egypt needs to learn from Israel & “teach Hamas a lesson” until they learn to “respect the Egyptian shoe.”

By Elad Benari

 

Egypt should take a page from Israel’s book and “teach Hamas a lesson,” an Egyptian journalist recently said.

Egyptian Journalist: We Should Attack Hamas Terrorists in Gaza Until They Kiss Egyptian Shoes

Egyptian Journalist: We Should Attack Hamas Terrorists in Gaza Until They Kiss Egyptian Shoes

Al-Alfi said in the interview that Egypt “should discipline [Hamas] just as Israel did… We must strike them so they learn to respect the Egyptian shoe.”

“Only then will they kiss that shoe and learn what Egypt is worth,” he declared.

“Our sons were killed and our economy was ruined in wars fought for their sake. Continue Reading »

Abbas In Russia for $1Billion Energy Deal for Gaza

Report speaks of Abbas & Russian PM to sign agreement on a $1Billion Mediterranean natural gas project off the Gaza coast.

By AFP

 

Moscow  – Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas sought on Thursday to secure a billion-dollar Gaza energy deal during talks with Russian leaders aimed at restoring warmer ties between the two Soviet-era allies.

Abbas and Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev were due to sign an intergovernmental agreement that reports said included a $1.0-billion (730-million-euro) natural gas project in the Gaza section of the Mediterranean Sea.

The state ITAR-TASS news agency said Russia’s natural gas giant Gazprom hoped to produce 30 billion cubic metres of natural gas at the site. Continue Reading »

Scarlett Johansson catching slack over SodaStream ad campaign

The humanitarian group Oxfam, says that while it respects the independence of its ‘global ambassador against poverty’, it opposes ‘all trade’ from Israeli settlements.

 

Oxfam International is criticizing Scarlett Johansson over her new ad campaign for an Israeli company that operates in the West Bank.

Scarlett Johansson

Scarlett Johansson – Phot: AP

Israeli drink maker SodaStream International Ltd. recently signed the U.S. actress as its first “global brand ambassador.” She is to appear in a television ad during the Super Bowl on Feb. 2.

SodaStream has come under fire from pro-Palestinian activists for maintaining a large factory in an Israeli settlement in the West Bank. Continue Reading »

Mahmoud Abbas’ Party Continues to Incite with Threats to ‘Bomb Tel Aviv’

Palestinians Speak with ‘Forked Tongue’? Because as ‘peace talks’ continue, official Facebook page of PA Chairman’s Fatah party is AGAIN featuring calls for violence against Israel.

By Ari Soffer

 

The Fatah party of Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has posted threats to bomb Tel Aviv on its official Facebook page.

Calling us 'racist' seems empty considering the source.

The threats came in the form of a video by Fatah’s armed wing – the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade – which threatened to turn Tel Aviv “into a ball of fire”, as well as escalated rocket fire on Israeli civilians.

Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade has been declared a terrorist group by the US, EU, Israel and Canada, among others. Continue Reading »

Al Jazeera Interviewer: Why Can’t Arab Armies Be More Like Israel?

 

UNBELIEVABLE!: On the flagship Arab media,  Al Jazeera, a TV interviewer admits that Israeli soldiers are not monsters, & in fact are the most humane in the mid-East.

By Israel Today Staff

 

In a development that might shock many, Al-Jazeera has openly admitted that the Israeli army is far more humane than any Arab armed force, and far less cruel than it is typically portrayed by supposedly objective Western media.

Taken from YouTube

Composite from YouTube

Last week, the host of an Al-Jazeera (Arabic) news program publicly questioned why the Syrian army and its Hezbollah allies “don’t they learn from the Israeli army which tries, through great efforts, to avoid shelling areas populated by civilians in Lebanon and Palestine?” Continue Reading »

Israel Security Forces Uncover Palestinian Weapons Cache in Hebron

 

2 Arab residents of Hebron were arrested for possessing a variety of unregistered weapons in their home, including M-16 assault rifle, an Uzi submachine gun, a carbine rifle, assorted hand guns & some 8,000 bullets.

Weapons believed to be for terrorist attacks.

By Efrat Forsher and Israel Hayom Staff

 

 

Continue Reading »

The ‘start-up nation’ has a growing movement of corporate philanthropy

 

Israeli corporate philanthropy experienced a nearly 7-fold jump between 1998 & 2008 — from about $25 million, to $172 million — according to the Hebrew University’s Center for the Study of Philanthropy.

 

 

TEL AVIV (JTA) — When the Israeli mobile maps start-up Waze accepted a buyout from Google for more than $1 billion in June, each of the company’s 100 employees walked away with an average of $1.2 million from the sale.

Children participating in an educational activity with JVP Community, a nonprofit founded by Israeli hi-tech entrepreneur Erel Margalit. (Courtesy photo)

Children participating in an educational activity with JVP Community, a nonprofit founded by the Israeli high-tech entrepreneur Erel Margalit. – Courtesy photo

An even bigger check, though, went to Baruch Lipner, a Canadian Israeli who hasn’t worked in the high-tech or finance industries for a decade.

Continue Reading »

Jerusalem advances building plans for 642 new homes

 

Israel maintains that there is no relationship between settlement building & the peace process. Building new homes is the natural process of growth & prosperity.

 

 

Israel this week advanced plans for 642 new settler homes in the West Bank as an Israeli delegation was in Washington to discuss the peace process with US Secretary of State John Kerry.

A construction worker working on a new housing unit in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Har Homa, which the EU considers illegal [Archive] – Photo: AP

The Palestinians have insisted that continued settlement activity is destroying the peace process and the US has repeatedly said that it is not helpful. Continue Reading »

Israel’s PM to talk numbers at Davos economics conference

 

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni will hype peace talks warning that lack of agreement with Palestinians will be negative on country’s prosperity

By Yuval Karni

For the first time in 16 years, a sitting Israeli prime minister will participate in an economic conference in Davos. The last time it happened it was also Benjamin Netanyahu, during his first term as prime minister.

A protester at the Davos forum last year (Photo: AP/Archive)

A protester at the Davos forum last year – Photo: AP/Archive

But an even rarer sight will be seen at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos in the coming days – the prime minister and President Shimon Peres, together, representing Israel outside of the country’s borders. Continue Reading »

Canadian PM performs for Bibi & Sara with ‘Hey Jude’

VIDEO: PM Natanyahu & wife Sara sing along at state dinner.

 

 

Stephen Harper this week became the first Canadian prime minister to address Israel’s Knesset – and also likely the first to belt out the Beatles’ “Hey Jude” before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others at a state dinner.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper singing ‘Hey Jude’ in Israel.- Photo: YouTube screenshot

In a video posted on Netanyahu’s YouTube channel on Tuesday, Harper, who fronts a covers band called Herringbone, is seen sitting behind a keyboard and singing the classic tune.

Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, meanwhile smile and sway at their table during the performance. Continue Reading »

Australia Clamps Down on Hezbollah Money-Laundering Scam & Drug-Running

Australian daily reports how Lebanese terrorist group is working with local organized criminals, as law enforcement launches largest-ever operation.

By Ari Soffer

 

A major money-laundering operation in Australia is helping to bankroll Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Islamist group which is proscribed as a terrorist organization by Australian government, among others.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah – Reuters

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the money-laundering scam is part of a wider criminal network linked to organized drug trafficking.

The report comes amid Australia’s bigger ever money-laundering investigation, named Project Eligo, which has revealed how 40 separate operations in the country are moving hundreds of millions of dollars offshore. Continue Reading »

Germany places restrictions on science & high-tech grants on settlement funding

Foreign ministry in Jerusalem hopes to nix clause that would complicate renewal of scientific and academic research agreement.

 

 

The German government is conditioning continued grants to Israeli high-tech companies, as well as the renewal of a scientific cooperation agreement, on the inclusion of a territorial clause stating that Israeli entities located in West Bank settlements or East Jerusalem will not be eligible for funding. Israel fears the German move will lead other European Union member states to follow suit.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, near Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, January 22, 2014. – Photo by AP

The German decision represents a significant escalation in European measures against the settlements. Continue Reading »

MK Feiglin: When I become Prime Minister, Tibi Will go to Prison

“You lied, you shamed the plenum, you acted like a man without respect. You were disrespectful towards this house and towards yourself,” Feiglin told Tibi.

By Elad Benari

 

 

MK Moshe Feiglin (Likud) on Wednesday confronted MK Ahmed Tibi (Ra’am-Ta’al) at the Knesset over his behavior during Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s visit earlier this week.

Feiglin got up during a Knesset debate, which Tibi was chairing in his capacity as Deputy Knesset Speaker, and told Tibi that his outburst during Harper’s speech had shamed the Knesset.

“You lied, you shamed the plenum, you acted like a man without respect. Continue Reading »

Abbas accepts invitation to meet with Netanyahu, says INSS

 

The interview with PA President Abbas to be aired next week at annual Institute for National Security Studies conference in Tel Aviv.

By KHALED ABU TOAMEH

 

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was quoted Wednesday as saying he is prepared to meet with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu at any time.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas at a PLO meeting in Ramallah, October 2, 2013.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas at a PLO meeting in Ramallah, October 2, 2013. – Photo: REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman

The Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University also quoted Abbas as saying he does not rule out addressing the Knesset.

“I don’t reject the idea and would be prepared to discuss it,” Abbas said when asked whether he would agree to appear before the Israeli legislature. Continue Reading »