The Palestinian Authority took control of a biblical era Jewish heritage site and started demolishing archaeological findings.

By Aryeh Savir, TPS

The Palestinian Authority (PA) has recently seized a Hasmonean-era fortress in Samaria and has converted it into “a Palestinian tourist site” as part of its campaign to seize Jewish heritage sites and transform them into “Palestinian sites” while systematically demolishing archaeological findings.

The Shomrim Al Hanetzach? (Guarding Eternity) organization discovered Sunday that the PA has installed a new massive flag mast and lighting at the fortress of Arama, an ancient Hasmonean archeological site which dominates the ancient road from Shechem (Nablus) to the Jordan Valley.

Tel Aruma, which is mentioned in the Bible as the city of Avimelech, was the northernmost fortress of the Jewish state during the Hasmonean period.
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PA seeks to place its hand on findings that preceded the beginning of Zionism to hide evidence of the existence of a political Jewish entity prior to modern Israel.

By Baruch Yedid, TPS

Ancient synagogue from 1500 years ago (Flash90/Gershon Elinson)<

A Palestinian Authority (PA) court in Hebron convened on Tuesday to discuss a claim filed by a resident demanding that the PA return to his possession a rare collection of coins, banknotes, stamps, research literature and various archaeological finds it had confiscated from him.The rare collection was confiscated by the PA’s intelligence about a year ago from Anwar Zre’ir, 80, who has devoted his life to research and has accumulated thousands of rare items over the course of 50 years.

Zre’ir, known as Abu Noor, fears that the PA will sell his collection and severely harm his research while concealing the rare historical evidence.

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By J.B. Shurk, AMERICAN THINKER

Charlie Hurt over at the Washington Times likes to say Donald Trump has the best enemies.  Before Hillary and Comey, he had Rosie and Cher.  Before Nancy Pelosi and Fake News CNN, he had Russell Brand and Mark Cuban.  Before “Fat Jerry” Nadler was creating fake impeachment charges in Congress against President Trump, an even fatter Assemblyman Nadler was preventing 1980s Donald Trump from turning an abandoned rail yard on the West Side into Trump City.  There has never been a moment in the public spotlight when Donald Trump was not brawling with somebody, and almost all of his enemies, like deer in the headlights, seem paralyzed with surprise when they find themselves on the receiving end of one of his acerbic barbs.  Like Qassem Soleimani, they just never see it coming.

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February death toll in Syria the highest in nearly 2 years as Erdogan all but declares war on Assad’s forces.

By Yochanan Visser, INN

Tulsi Gabbard, one the Democratic Party’s hopefuls in the race for the Presidency of the United States called him “one of the most dangerous dictators in the world”.

Gabbard was talking about Turkey’s autocratic leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan who’s just declared war on the regime of Syrian tyrant Bashar al-Assad after the latter’s forces killed 34 Turkish soldiers in the northern Syrian Province Idlib.

US President Donald J. Trump “needs to make it clear to NATO and Erdogan that the United States will not be dragged into a war with Russia by the aggressive, Islamist, expansionist dictator of Turkey, a so-called “NATO” ally,” Gabbard wrote on her Twitter account.
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T. Belman. This is what is wrong with Gantz and his party. He wants to consult the international community and the Democrats on the Trump plan. Rather than embrace the plan, he empowers its detractors. No good can come of that.

Let’s face it. Israel has become a partisan issue. The Republicans are our friends and want the best for us. Not so for the Democrats and the international community. They undermine us and are trying to prevent us from winning.

Under my leadership, Israel will never become a partisan issue,” Gantz said in English. “I will work effectively on both sides of the aisle.”

By LAHAV HARKOV, JPOST

Benny Gantz, leader of Blue and White party, speaks during an election campaign rally in Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv, Israel, February 25, 2020.
(photo credit: REUTERS/CORINNA KERN)

WASHINGTON – Blue and White leader Benny Gantz on Sunday vowed to work with Democrats and Republicans if he becomes prime minister.

“Under my leadership, Israel will never become a partisan issue,” he told the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington via video link. “I will work effectively on both sides of the aisle.”

The key issue on which Gantz said he plans to work with AIPAC and American politicians who support Israel is preventing Iran from attaining nuclear weapons.

“I will prevent a nuclear Iran,” he said. “I am ready to do whatever it takes with this issue.”
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A report has surfaced about Gantz’s use of army funds for building ‘palace’ at Northern Command HQ.

By Eitan Divinsky, INN 01/03/20 19:30

Gantz on day 8 of Operation Protective Edge, July 15, 2014

0404 News reported on a story they claimed has been covered up by the media to avoid hurting MK Benny Gantz’s reputation.

The incident reportedly took place when Gantz assumed the post of head of the Northern Command. According to the report, Gantz was to set up his command post at a location called the “Tzfat Command Barracks” but decided that an army general should be allotted lodgings proportionate with his “lofty status.”

The IDF lacked the funds for this and no general prior to Gantz had even considered having the bureau renovated. In those days, if extra money was found for the Northern Command, it would most likely go towards renovating the Golan Heights command center. Gantz had other plans which he began implementing instantaneously.

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T. Belman.  How does a bigger Arab turnout reduce the right wing block?

A euphoric PM thought the US deal would help ensure election victory. But a clause suggesting Arab towns could be placed in a future Palestine has galvanized some key opponents

By DAVID HOROVITZ, TOI

In its final pre-election poll on Friday night, Israel’s Channel 2 predicted 35 seats for Likud, maintaining a gradual rise in recent days for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party, and up from the 32 seats Likud won in the September elections. The poll gave the rival Blue and White party 33 seats, down from 35 seats in the same survey a month ago, and the same number as it won in September.

Assessing the poll, the station’s political analyst Amit Segal reflected the widespread assessment that momentum ahead of Monday’s elections is with Netanyahu, and that Blue and White’s Benny Gantz has been placed emphatically on the defensive in the campaign’s final weeks.

In its opening survey of the current campaign, back in December, Segal recalled, the Gantz-headed semi-alliance of centrist, left and Arab parties was polling at 58 seats, to the Netanyahu-led right-Orthodox bloc’s 54. (It’s a “semi-alliance” because while the largely Arab Joint List bitterly opposes Netanyahu, it is not really in Gantz’s corner either.) In Friday’s poll, by contrast, the Gantz-led bloc had slipped to 56 seats, and Netanyahu’s camp was up to 58, just three seats away from a Knesset majority.

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Otzma Yehudit says it’s staying in the race after PM walked back agreement to raze Bedouin hamlet, amend law barring racists from Knesset

By JACOB MAGID, TOI

Left photo: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a speach at the Likud party’s election rally in Ramat Gan on February 29, 2020. (Gili Yaari/Flash90) Right photo: Itamar Ben Gvir, head of the Otzma Yehudit party, holds a press conference in Jerusalem on February 26, 2020. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

The far-right Otzma Yehudit party claimed Sunday that it had reached a deal with the Likud party according to which it would drop out of Monday’s election, but that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu walked back the agreement.

Netanyahu has been pushing Otzma Yehudit chairman Itamar Ben Gvir to pull out of the election race for months, seeing his extremist faction as a spoiler that would siphon tens of thousands of votes away from the Likud and Yamina parties but ultimately not make it into the Knesset.

According to Otzma Yehudit, the far-reaching offer from Likud included making its No. 34 candidate, anti-immigration activist May Golan, an Otzma representative in the Knesset if a religious, right-wing coalition were to be established. It was not clear what the implications of this would be, nor how formalized the shift in her status.

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THIS IS A VERY, VERY IMPORTANT CONVERSATION.

CANDACE OWENS IS IN A CLASS BY HERSELF. SHE IS ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT, LIKEABLE AND HUMBLE.

The country holds that the ICC does not have the jurisdiction to hear such cases.

By TOVAH LAZAROFF, JPOST 

Presiding Judge Robert Fremr in the courtroom at the ICC (International Criminal Court) in the Hague, the Netherlands, 2018 
(photo credit: BAS CZERWINSKI/POOL VIA REUTERS)

Canada asked the International Criminal Court not hold hearings regarding Israeli war crimes lawsuits, its Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

The country holds that the ICC does not have the jurisdiction to hear such cases and wrote a letter stating this to the court before the February 14 deadline for such submissions.

It was one of seven countries to send a letter clearly stating that the ICC lacked jurisdiction in this matter. The other countries which did so are Hungary, the Czech Republic, Austria, Germany, Uganda and Brazil. Australia also wrote a letter on the matter, but did not state its position. Israel has said that Australia intends to weigh in on its behalf.
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The votes are there for a Religious-Right Wing government. There is no question. It was demonstrated at the first of the three elections last April.

By Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer, INN 29/02/20 22:26 | updated: 00:30

If you have forgotten, the April 2019 election resulted with Likud and Blue and White each getting 35 seats. (Sound familiar?) Shas and United Torah Judaism each got 8. The Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home) – National Union – Otzma bloc got 5 seats.  And Moshe Kachlon, running on his own party, got 4.  That totaled 60 seats for the religious-right, only one single seat short of a government.

And then the Naftali Bennett-Ayelet Shaked New Right (Yamin Chadash) party, running on its own, got 3.22 percent of the vote, falling short of the election threshold by only an infinitesimal 0.03 percent.  That was the difference between a solid religious-right coalition government of 62 or 63 seats without Avigdor Liberman — or the year-long mess that has ensued. Meanwhile, Moshe Feiglin wasted another 118,000 mostly right-wing votes, comprising 2.74 percent of the total, with his Zehut party that ultimately found it possible to cut a deal with Likud anyway for September.

In many ways, the mess has proven a terrible mixed blessing.  One election after another has cost the national budget a fortune.  The government has been in limbo for a year.  With coronavirus floating around, medical care challenged in other ways, Hezbollah and Iranian dangers in the north, incessant and continual Hamas and Islamic Jihad (which in reality are the same thing) rocket-firing and balloon-bombing in the south, disastrous winter hurricane-style flooding in the north and central regions, it would have been nice to have had a government in place.
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T. Belman. Bennett did a great job as Min. of Education. He is also doing a great job as Min. of Defense. His handling of these two portfolios recommend him highly for the Premiership.

Take a look at the facts before accusing the religious Zionist parties of ignoring Judaism.

By Haim Lev, INN

And here’s one of the better kept secrets of Israeli politics: If you repeat a lie enough times, it eventually becomes plain fact. And on election night, it takes on a life of its own.

A classic example that comes to mind is the attack on the Yamina party’s approach to matters of religion and state. When it comes to roasting someone, Defense Minister and Yamina head Naftali Bennett has been “warming up” on the grill of the haredi barbecue for some time now.

But let’s take a look at the facts – the bare facts. As Minister of Education, Bennett increased the yeshiva budget by 112% (!); the Jewish culture budget went up by 76%. Bennett’s budget for religious associations soared to NIS 190 million. But these are not Bennett’s words – it’s what Calcalist journalist Shahar Ilan attests to in data he collected upon Bennett’s departure from the Ministry of Education. Read more…

Opinion: Recent polls show Likud overtaking Blue & White for the first time in this election cycle and demonstrate how, unlike in previous ballots, this time the prime minister appears to have the upper hand

By Yuval Karni, YNET

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue & White Chairman Benny Gantz

In the last two elections, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue & White Leader Benny Gantz each served a very particular role.

Netanyahu was the underdog candidate warning that, “the rule of the right is in danger” while pushing a narrative that poor right-wing turnout would result in the left forming a government that is dangerous for Israel.

Gantz, a political rookie, twice led Blue & White to become Israel’s biggest party, radiating confidence and telling everyone “we are close to victory.”

Despite his lack of political prowess and the fact his party had been constructed almost from scratch, Gantz became the first and only candidate in the last decade to jeopardize Netanyahu’s grip on the premiership.
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By Eileen AJ Connelly, NY POST

US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad (L) and Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar (R) shake hands after signing the peace agreement between US, Taliban, in Doha.Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

The United States and Taliban signed a peace deal Saturday aimed at bringing an end to the country’s longest war.

The agreement sets the stage for the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan more than 18 years after President George W. Bush ordered bombing in response to the 9/11 attacks. The US has spent more than $750 billion fighting the war, which has cost tens of thousands of lives on all sides.

The historic deal was signed in Doha, Qatar, by US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and Taliban political chief Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was on hand to witness the ceremony.

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Jewish Electorate Institute survey finds that 91% of American Jews identify as pro-Israel, but Israel is not driving the community’s vote

By Eric Cortellessa,, TOI  >28 February 2020,

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders I-Vt., smiles during his campaign event in Carson City, Nevada on February 16, 2020. (AP/Rich Pedroncelli)

WASHINGTON — Democratic presidential frontrunner Bernie Sanders would overwhelmingly outperform US President Donald Trump with Jewish voters in a head-to-head match-up this fall, according to new polling from the non-partisan Jewish Electorate Institute (JEI).

The self-proclaimed democratic socialist would defeat Trump with the demographic group 65% to 30%, despite only 52% of American Jews having a favorable view of Sanders and 45% having an unfavorable view of him, the survey found.

Trump is far more unpopular with the US Jewish community. Sixty-six percent of the poll’s respondents disapprove of the job he’s doing in office. Read more…

Great panel on Israel starts at 1:34

Interesting panel with Larry Kudlow and Ivanka Trump at 2:08

by Marilyn Stern, Middle East Forum Radio

Martin Kramer, chair of the Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies Department at Shalem College in Jerusalem and the Koret Distinguished Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, spoke to Middle East Forum Radio host Gregg Roman on February 5 about President Trump’s “deal of the century” plan for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

According to Kramer, the importance of the Trump proposal “transcends whether either of the parties accept it” because “it’s not a peace plan, it’s a partition plan … the proposal of a third party, looking from the outside, that has some authority.” The Palestinians refused to accept partition plans put forth by the British in 1937 and by the United Nations in 1947, yet both had “historic effects,” notably culminating in the establishment of Israel. The details of these plans were largely irrelevant – it was their underlying assumptions and core principles that proved enduring.

The same is true of the “deal of the century.” Details of the plan are flexible and sure to be superseded by future negotiations. The important focus should be on the assumptions and principles of the plan.

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By Randy DeSoto, WESTERN JOURNALISM

Samuel Corum / Getty ImagesJared Kushner, senior advisor to U.S. President Donald Trump, speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference 2020 hosted by the American Conservative Union on Feb. 28, 2020 in National Harbor, Maryland. (Samuel Corum / Getty Images)

White House senior advisor Jared Kushner told the attendees at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside of Washington, D.C., on Friday that the U.S. border wall with Mexico is progressing rapidly.

“As of today, we’re at 130 miles on the wall that’s been built, and by the end of the year, we are on track to have over 400 miles,” Kushner told Matt Schlapp, the president of the American Conservative Union, which hosts CPAC.

“We’ve finished most of the contracting, and what we’re seeing now is we’re doing about five miles a week,” he continued. “We hope in about two months, we’ll be over seven miles a week.”
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This week a tragedy happened. It was not about Teck. It was about the future of Alberta and Saskatchewan within Canada

By Diane Francis, NATIONAL POST

Signage at the Teck Resources Ltd. booth, seen on Tuesday, March 6, 2012 at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada’s annual convention and trade show in Toronto.Norm Betts for Bloomberg News

Nature abhors a vacuum and so does free enterprise and democracies. And Canada is about to show why.

This week, Canada’s massive megaproject, Teck Resources’ giant oil sands mine in Alberta, was obliterated — the biggest casualty of the #ShutDownCanada movement that’s been building and hurting the economy and country’s reputation.

The significance is not so much about a single project. It is the beginning of Canada’s irreversible economic decline caused by the anti-enterprise policies of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s regime.
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