Jordan slams Israel for barring Muslims from praying on Temple Mount after deadly attack; Jerusalem officials: Jordan should stop inflaming the situation

By Barak Raivd, HAARETZ

The tension between Israel and Jordan escalated on Friday in the wake of a deadly shooting attack on Temple Mount. After a spokesman for the Jordanian government accused Israel of violating the status quo by barring Muslim worshippers from praying on the Mount, senior officials in Jerusalem called on Jordan to stop inflaming the situation.

Two Israeli police officers were killed and another was wounded in the shooting on Friday morning. The three Israeli Arab assailants were killed. Following the attack, Israel closed access to the Mount.

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by Ruthie Blum, GATESTONE INSTITUTE

In this still image taken from a video found in the rubble of the compound where Omar Khadr was captured on July 27, 2002, a 15-year-old Khadr constructs an improvised explosive device. (Courtesy U.S. Defense Operations/Wikimedia Commons)

by Alan M. Dershowitz, GATESTONE INSTITUTE

Western Wall In Israel. (Photo from PublicDomainPictures.net)

Shoshana Bryen • July 14, 2017 The Washington Times

(AP)

BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 528, July 14, 2017

By Adi Schwartz

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: In a surprising change of policy, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has called for the dismantling of UNRWA. Such a move could benefit both Israel and the peace process. The new US administration might change its decades-old policy as well.

Last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stunned many by declaring that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) should be dismantled.

Speaking at a weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu charged that “in various UNRWA institutions, there is a lot of incitement against Israel, and therefore the existence of UNRWA – and unfortunately its work from time to time – perpetuates the Palestinian refugee problem rather than solves it. … Therefore, the time has come to dismantle UNRWA and merge its components with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR].”

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BRILLIANT TOUR DE FORCE

VIDEO

By Seth Seigel, NYT

The Trump administration has yet to broker the “toughest deal of all” — that between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Chances seem slim. But Jason Greenblatt, the president’s Middle East envoy, did announce some welcome news at a press conference Thursday in Jerusalem: The Israelis, Jordanians and Palestinians will be cooperating on a large water infrastructure project, which will provide billions of gallons of new water supplies for each of the three parties.

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By Nadav Shragai, ISRAEL HAYOM
Is Israel treating Jordan with kid gloves? Does Israel cut the Hashemite Kingdom too much slack even though Amman is now spearheading anti-Israel efforts on the world stage, alongside the Palestinians?

Jordan’s Minister of State for Media Affairs Mohammad Al Momani recently boasted that the kingdom was the driving force behind UNESCO’s decision to declare Hebron’s old city an endangered Palestinian world heritage site. Over the past several years, Jordan has repeatedly besmirched Israel with falsehoods and libelous allegations, resulting in a growing number of anti-Israeli U.N. resolutions.

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MEMRI

Tillerson with the Emir of Qatar (Image: Al-Watan, Qatar, July 12, 2017)

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, and Bahrain, the four countries that have been blockading and making demands of Qatar for the past month because, they say, of its support for terrorism and for Iran, are also waging a diplomatic campaign aimed at persuading the world, primarily its purported allies in the West and first and foremost the U.S., that they are in the right in the current Gulf crisis. These diplomatic efforts, however, do not seem to be succeeding.

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New desalination project is part of wider plan to run water through pipeline from Red Sea down to Dead Sea; US envoy Greenblatt hopes it’s a ‘harbinger of things to come’

By Raphael Ahren and Melanie Lidman>TOI

Israel and the Palestinian Authority on Thursday announced an agreement that will provide millions of cubic meters of drinking water to the Palestinians from a desalination process.

While the Palestinians made plain that the deal, brokered by US President Donald Trump’s envoy Jason Greenblatt, has no impact on final-status issues in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, Greenblatt hailed it as a “harbinger of things to come.” At a joint press conference in Jerusalem, however, Greenblatt refused to take any questions regarding his bid to relaunch peace negotiations

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TRUDEAU IS WORSE THAN OBAMA

Ruling singles out 2 settlement wineries, also blacklists Golan and East Jerusalem vintages; Jewish group calls decision ‘disturbing’

By Sue Surkes and Jacob Magid, TOI

Canadian food inspectors have ordered liquor stores to stop selling wines made in the West Bank, saying their label identifying them as Israeli contravenes Ottawa’s policy on the territory.

Settlers and at least one Canadian Jewish advocacy group reacted with anger to the ruling, which singles out the Psagot and Shiloh wineries, made in settlements outside Ramallah.

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DEBKA

Russian troops stepped into southern Syria for the first time Wednesday, July 13, when they entered the embattled town of Daraa to start enforcing the partial ceasefire agreed by Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Hamburg on July 7.  DEBKAfile’s military sources report this exclusively.

The Russians, including military police and Chechen paratroopers, were sighted getting out of the vehicles of their convoy and taking up positions in the center of Daraa. As they moved into the town, our sources report that tank units of the pro-regime Syrian army’s 5^th Armored Division were seen driving out, along with Hizballah.

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By Robert Romano

So, wait, the whole supposed Russian collusion effort with the Trump campaign had nothing to do with the Democratic National Committee (DNC) or John Podesta emails or Wikileaks at all, but actually centered on a June 2016 meeting with Donald Trump, Jr. and a Russian attorney over supposed dirt she had on Hillary Clinton about her dealings with Russia?

And then the attorney used the meeting as an opportunity to instead talk about U.S. sanctions against 18 Russian individuals and Russia blocking U.S. adoption of Russian children in response?

That’s the collusion? The conspiracy? The treason?
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by Steve Kramer

On July 7, UNESCO declared the old city in Hebron as a Palestinian world heritage site, outraging Israelis who say the move attempts to erase the deep Jewish ties to the biblical town and its ancient shrine. So, is Hebron no longer incredibly significant to the Jews because the UN says so? Of course not! Most people are not even aware of the ridiculous UNESCO decision. But this insult is but one more reason that Israel must change its public diplomacy (hasbara) from reactive to proactive, from conciliatory to aggressive. The Israel Victory Project intends to do just that.

Devised by the Middle East Forum, a venerable pro-Israel NGO founded by Dr. Daniel Pipes, the project includes the Congressional Israel Victory Caucus (CIVC), which the Forum helped launch in Washington, D.C. in April and the Knesset Israel Victory Caucus, inaugurated this July. Both caucuses will advocate a new strategy to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, centered on Israel’s defeat of enemies who seek its destruction and equally important, ending the emphasis by Israel on making ‘painful concessions.’ Instead, the onus will be placed on Palestinians to recognize Israel as the Jewish state. Read more…

T. Belman. I watched last night’s Fox News and was disappointed to hear some of the hosts acknowledging that Trump’s administration is in disarray. They recommended bringing in better people. Nonsense. Considering all the flack Trump is forced to endure, his productivity is remarkable. And the GOP is piling on for the most part doing its part to slow him down.

By Roger Stone, STONE COLD TRUTH

The old saying that goes; “give ’em enough rope and they’ll hang themselves” has never been more accurate than in the lynching that CNN and other fake news media has inflicted upon itself. They bet their whole pot on the Trump/Russia collusion story which has after an entire year has come up with zero. So, what now? An apology perhaps?  Maybe a mass firing of those “news” announcers who set a new all-time low for truth in reporting? We should be so lucky. No, they just change the angle of fire. Trump is still the target but the charge now is sexism.

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Liberals prefer to put their heads in the sand

By Evan Barrett Algemeiner

American options for constraining the Islamic Republic of Iran are limited and problematic.

Sanctions inevitably hurt regular Iranians more than their government, because the regime uses its access to illicit markets to insulate the ruling class from the impacts of economic exile. In the military sphere, targeted airstrikes on particular facilities are unlikely to significantly impede Iran’s ability to develop nuclear technology — and an actual invasion of the Islamic Republic would come at unthinkable cost.

Nevertheless, the specter of war with Iran has caused many “responsible” liberals to actively seek a different sort of constraint: limits on the discussion or coverage of Iranian crimes. This deeply anti-democratic impulse — that an honest account of Iranian behavior would only lead to war — was a basic assumption of Obama-era Iran policy.

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