Archive for June 24, 2016

Photo Essay: Having Completed IDF Course, Muslims swear allegiance to Israel

 

Consisting largely of Muslim Bedouins, along with Christians and Muslim Arabs, who all volunteered for IDF service, the March 2016 induction of Desert Reconnaissance Battalion soldiers were sworn in on Thursday, having completed their rigorous basic training.

By Yoav Zitun

 

The swearing-in ceremony for the March 2016 cycle of Desert Reconnaissance Battalion soldiers was held on Thursday at the Memorial Monument to the Bedouin Warriors with the majority of the sworn-in soldiers being Muslim. Before their commanders and families, the soldiers, mostly Bedouins with some Muslim and Christian Arabs who volunteered to join the IDF, swore allegiance to the State of Israel and its defense. Continue Reading »

Israeli NGO Thanks the UK for choosing Brexit

 

The Israeli NGO Regavim praises and congratulates the Brits for voting to leave the EU, who has for years conspired and engaged in covert, illegal interference in Israeli internal affairs, at a cost (waste) of hundreds of millions of Euros.

By Arutz Sheva Staff

 

Regavim has offered its congratulations to the UK for voting in favor of leaving the European Union.

Regavim is  an NGO focused on “ensuring responsible, legal, accountable and environmentally friendly use of Israel’s national lands and the return of the rule of law to all areas and aspects of the land and its preservation.” It has strongly criticized the EU for funding illegal Palestinian construction. Continue Reading »

Harretz: Trump admin wouldn’t oppose Israel annexing parts of West Bank

 

view videoA senior Trump campaign official: “I think there are parts of the West Bank that will stay part of Israel in any peace deal. I am sure he [Trump] wouldn’t have any problem with that at all,” besides, “Nobody really knows how many Palestinians actually live there.”

By i24news

 

A senior official in the Donald Trump campaign has said that if elected president, Trump would back Israel annexing portions of the West Bank, the Israeli daily Haaretz reports.

IDF forces hold position near the Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arba in the West Bank – Photo: HAZEM BADER/AFP/FILE

In an interview with Haaretz, Trump’s co-adviser on Israeli affairs, David Friedman, addressed issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and how the presumptive republican nominee would handle them if elected in November.

Continue Reading »

Jordan official worried Eilat’s new Ramon Int’l Airport will hurt its tourism

Israel assures Jordan that its concerns that the new Eilat area airport may cause disruptions to its air corridors, due to close proximity to King Hussein Int’l Airport north of Aqaba, pose no safety risks, since Israel will abide by ICAO regulations.

By Reuters & Israel Hayom Staff

 

A new airport planned by Israel near its border with Jordan is clouding the usually businesslike relationship the two neighbors have built since making peace in 1994.

Due to open next April, Ilan and Assaf Ramon Airport at Timna will be 10 kilometers (6 miles) from Jordan’s King Hussein International Airport. They will serve Eilat and Aqaba, the adjacent Israeli and Jordanian resort cities on the Red Sea. Continue Reading »

#BDSfail: NYU Graduate Student Union’s pro-BDS resolution nullified as illicit

 

The student group’s BDS resolution is indeed “contrary to the position of the International Union” and is void of “force or effect,” said the group’s parent union.

 

NEW YORK – Two months after the Graduate Student Union at New York University voted to join the Boycott Divest and Sanction movement against Israel, the decision was repealed this week by the group’s parent union, the United Auto Workers (UAW). The decision came after some members of the student union (GSOC) had filed an official appeal asking to reverse the resolution for violating the UWA constitution’s own bylaws. Continue Reading »

Abbas rejects European invitation to meet with Israeli President in Brussels

 

European Parliament President Martin Schulz, offered to mediate between Israel’s President Rivlin & PA Chairman Abbas since both are currently in Brussels, but Abbas refused to meet with Israel’s President Rivlin.

By Itamar Eichner

 

Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas refused to meet with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin while the two are in Brussels it was reported on Thursday. The proposed meeting with Rivlin was to be held at the invitation of President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz.

Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin and Mahmoud Abbas – Photo: Alex Kolomoisky, EPA

During a joint press conference held between Rivlin and Schulz on Wednesday at the European Parliament, Schultz was asked if he could be a mediator and conduct a meeting between Abbas and Rivlin.

Continue Reading »

WATCH: Israeli Minister Katz Proposes Plan to Build Gaza Airport/Seaport Island

 

view videoThe ambitious Israeli project, originally proposed in 2011, would greatly ease Gaza’s economic situation, while maintaining Israel’s security with NATO, or an alternative foreign force.

By Israel Today Staff

 

Israeli Minister of Transportation Israel Katz (Likud) this week presented to foreign media outlets his ambitious plan to create an artificial island just off the coast of the Gaza Strip to provide the area’s residents with a modern airport and seaport.

Israeli plan for a Gaza offshore seaport-airport – Drawing: Ministry of Transportation and Israel Ports

Katz noted that the project would significantly ease the difficult economic situation in which Gaza finds itself without harming Israel’s security. Continue Reading »

MIT Tech Review: Israel’s Mobileye ranked 6th, on a list of the world’s top 50

 

view videoIsrael’s Mobileye technology company, which makes vision systems for mobile vehicles, was ranked 6th on list of the world’s 50 “smartest” companies, by the prestigious MIT Technology Review.

By Ilan Gattegno and Israel Hayom Staff

 

Israel’s Mobileye technology company was ranked sixth on a list of the world’s 50 “smartest” companies published on Tuesday by MIT Technology Review.

The Mobileye logo – Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The first five spots were taken by Amazon, Baidu, Illumina, Tesla Motors, and Aquion Energy.

Describing Mobileye, MIT Technology Review wrote: “How can automakers compete with companies developing self-driving vehicles, such as Google parent Alphabet? Continue Reading »

Hamas: ‘Normalization with Israel serves Turkey’s interest, Gaza siege doesn’t’

 

Hamas official tells an Arab London-based newspaper: “Erdoğan told the leadership that he must make progress on the normalization deal with Israel in order to serve Turkey’s interests, …but the Israeli gov’t stubbornly rejected his attempts,” to lift the siege.

By MAAYAN GROISMAN

 

Amid reports about an approaching normalization deal between Israel and Turkey, Hamas claims that Turkey has renounced the condition that Israel lift the siege on Gaza that it has defined as a prerequisite for reconciliation.

Erdoğan and Mashaal – Photo: REUTERS

In a conversation with the daily-Arab London-based newspaper Rai al-Youm, unnamed Hamas officials said: “Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced to Hamas’s leadership that he has done everything possible to lift the siege or ameliorate it, but the Israeli government stubbornly rejected his attempts.” Continue Reading »

Israel turns to Putin to assist in halting publication of Quartet report

 

The political report, intended to be published in the coming days, will place inequitable blame for the moribund peace process unfairly on Israel, where it is then expected to be endorsed by the UN Security Council.

By Itamar Eichner

 

Israel has launched diplomatic efforts aimed at halting the publication of a report by the Quartet (an international diplomatic body comprised of the United Nations, the European Union, the United States, and Russia. Its purpose is to oversee the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and attempt to end the conflict), which is expected to blame Israel for the current impasse in the peace process with the Palestinians.
Continue Reading »

HISTORIC EVENT: Israel receives first F-35 Lightning II fighter jet

 

view videoIDF will not only take possession of the first F-35 exported from the US, but all classified communications systems used in the jets will be produced in Israel, and the IAF will use its own electronic warfare systems, making the fighter-jet uniquely ‘Jewish’.

By Kobi Finkler

 

The IDF will become the first country outside of the United States to possess the groundbreaking F-35 Lightning II fighter jet, which it will call the Adir.

F-35 Lightning II – US Air Force

The first two planes will reach Israel in about six months, with another 17 arriving by the end of 2017.
Continue Reading »

BDS, more smoke that fire, US Jews still maintain connection to Israel

 

REPORT: Contrary to Israeli perception, two professors asserted that BDS is only present on certain campuses & does not deter Jewish students from engaging with Israel.

By LIDAR GRAVÉ-LAZI

 

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement is not widespread and is only a major issue on some campuses in the US, according to prof. Theodore Sasson and prof. Leonard Saxe from Brandeis University.

BDS logo – Photo: BDS

Speaking about the changing demographics and politics of American Jewry during a session at the Knesset Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs Committee, the two professors aimed to dispel common perceptions about US Jews and their relationship with Israel. Continue Reading »

Private security firm employs drones to retrieve stolen cars

 

After Israel Police allowed Ituran, a local car tracking & security company, to use drones to track stolen cars, the firm successfully carried out an operation to locate & retrieve a stolen Israeli car in Tulkarem, a major Palestinian city.

By Udi Etzion

 

Authorities have now permitted private security companies to operate drones. Mamon, Ynet’s sister publication, learned that Ituran, a company that provides tracking and protection services for vehicles, has successfully employed drones to locate stolen car in the past few weeks.

Drones are now providing the largest stolen car tracking companies in Israel with capabilities that had been previously limited to the security forces. Continue Reading »

UK PM Cameron: ‘Brexit’ would be bad for Israel, ‘we need to be in the room’

 

view videoWATCH: Prime Minister Cameron tells Jewish constituents the UK won’t be able to push back against anti-Israel sentiment in the EU if voters decide to leave this week.

By Ari Soffer

 

As the United Kingdom’s fateful referendum on whether to leave the European Union draws nearer, Prime Minister David Cameron is making his final push to convince voters to reject a “Brexit” – or British exit from the EU.

While the most prominent arguments for and against have centered on the economy, as well as questions of British sovereignty and the EU’s eye-watering (and expensive) bureaucracy, some within the Jewish community – particularly in Israel but also in the UK itself – have been weighing what a Brexit would mean for Israel. Continue Reading »

WATCH Iraqi cleric: ‘Netanyahu, gives orders to ISIS, rulers of America, Europe’

 

view videoIn a TV interview translated by MEMRI, Sunni cleric Sheikh Ahmad Al-Kubeisi said Netanyahu “holds the remote control” and “gives orders to all the rulers of America, Europe, and elsewhere.”

By JPOST.COM STAFF

 

A prominent Iraqi cleric has accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of being the driving force behind the Islamic State (ISIS) terror group.

In a recent TV interview translated by MEMRI, Sunni cleric Sheikh Ahmad Al-Kubeisi said that ISIS was an asset in the hands of Netanyahu, who “holds the remote control” and “gives orders to all the rulers of America, Europe, and elsewhere.”

He also said that the Jews are the masters of the land today and that none of the ISIS fighters “are even circumcised.” Continue Reading »