IMRA translation of the Hebrew Facebook message posted by MK Naftali Bennett on 20 October 2019

My friends in the right-wing camp, Let’s be clear: If the judicial system succeeds in bringing down Netanyahu because of cigars and articles on the Walla website, it will be a grave blow to the entire national camp.

The right-wing leader to follow will be castrated and frightened by the media and the legal system.
**
“Why are you protecting Bibi?”  I am asked every day. My friends, I am not only defending Netanyahu , but the entire national camp and our State of Israel.
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Jewish state ranks 23rd worldwide in total number of wealthy people, and Israelis gained more assets in the past year than the citizens of almost any other country

By Luke Tress, TOI

Israel has about 131,000 millionaires, and its population is getting wealthier quickly, according to a Monday report from the Swiss banking firm Credit Suisse.

Israel ranks 23rd worldwide in its total number of millionaires, and by 2024 is expected to have 173,000 millionaires, representing a growth rate of 32 percent, the annual Global Wealth Report found.

The total number of Israeli millionaires is relatively high, placing the Jewish state slightly below more populous countries including Brazil and Poland, although some states with fewer people, including Norway, Switzerland and Hong Kong, had more millionaires.
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BRILLIANT — (STARTS AT 12:30)

The Kurds’ deal with the Assad regime means that the future of Turkey’s operation is dependent on the say-so of Moscow, not Washington

THE NATIONAL

Ankara’s attempt to carve out a so-called safe zone deep inside Kurdish-held territory in north-east Syria has left Turkey alone, strategically weak and on the precipice of an economic meltdown. Even last week’s US-brokered truce was no victory for Turkey’s firebrand president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Sure, under the terms of the ceasefire, the White House agreed to practically everything Ankara wanted. US President Donald Trump froze sanctions and accepted Ankara’s demand for a safe zone and its calls for forces from the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) to retreat. More ominously, there was nothing said about the hundreds of thousands of Kurds who fled the area, nor of Turkey’s odious intention to resettle millions of Arab Syrian refugees in the proposed safe zone – such a deliberate policy of demographic tampering being tantamount to ethnic cleansing. Instead, Mr Trump declared the Kurds were “no angels”. By yesterday, four days into the ceasefire, Kurdish troops had withdrawn entirely from the key border town of Ras Al Ain in north-eastern Syria.
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This address is utterly fantastic —

Attorney General William P. Barr Delivers Remarks to the Law School and the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture at the University of Notre Dame South Bend, 

Friday, October 11, 2019

Remarks as prepared for delivery

Thank you, Tom, for your kind introduction. Bill and Roger, it’s great to be with you.

Thank you to the Notre Dame Law School and the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture for graciously extending an invitation to address you today. I’d also like to express gratitude to Tony de Nicola, whose generous support has shaped – and continues to shape – countless minds through examination of the Catholic moral and intellectual tradition.

Today, I would like to share some thoughts with you about religious liberty in America. It’s an important priority in this Administration and for this Department of Justice.

We have set up a task force within the Department with different components that have equities in this area, including the Solicitor General’s Office, the Civil Division, the Office of Legal Counsel, and other offices. We have regular meetings. We keep an eye out for cases or events around the country where states are misapplying the Establishment Clause in a way that discriminates against people of faith, or cases where states adopt laws that impinge upon the free exercise of religion.
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At rallies where he warms crowds up , cries of ‘2024’ underscore his rising stardom; ‘He’s the future,’ says one rally goer, ‘and I can’t wait to vote for him someday too’

By JONATHAN LEMIRE, TOI

In this June 18, 2019, file photo, Donald Trump Jr. throws hats to supporters at a campaign rally for President Donald Trump in Orlando, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

The shout of “2024!” from the crowd was unmistakable. It stopped Donald Trump Jr. cold.

President Donald Trump’s eldest son had been in the midst of a humor-laced screed in which he decried Joe Biden as too old and Elizabeth Warren as too liberal and insisted his father’s 2016 campaign was too disorganized to possibly collude with the Russians. As many in the crowd of several hundred laughed, Trump Jr. held a dramatic pause before exclaiming his response:

“Let’s worry about 2020 first!” he yelled.
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In 4th day of demonstrations over crumbling economy, protesters call for ‘the fall of the regime’; Druze party leader threatens to quit cabinet if reforms not enacted

By AGENCIES20 October 2019, 6:06 pm  0

Lebanese demonstrators wave national flags as they take part in a rally in the capital Beirut’s downtown district on October 20, 2019. (Patrick Baz/AFP)

BEIRUT — Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese took to the streets to condemn political stasis and corruption Sunday, the largest in four days of demonstrations that have crippled the country and threatened the coalition government.

The capital Beirut, second city Tripoli in the north and the southern port of Tyre came to a standstill, with streets filled with protesters waving the national flag, chanting “revolution” or “the people demand the fall of the regime” — a common refrain of demonstrations in other parts of the Arab world.

The protests, Lebanon’s largest in five years, have grown steadily across the Mediterranean country since public anger first spilled onto the streets Thursday evening in response to a proposed tax on calls via WhatsApp and other messaging services.
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T. Belman.  Just as I forecast,Trump and Putin have cut a deal. Russia is now responsible to rein in Turkey and to protect the Kurds. Exactly what Putin has agreed to with respect to Iran, will soon be evident.  Trump is now focused on pushing back Iran in Iraq.

DEBKA  
Oct 21, 2019 @ 10:07

At $0.06 per kilowatt, the cost of solar energy is now less than the cost of natural gas.

BY TARA KAVALER/THE MEDIA LINE

Solar panels at one of the projects of Enlight Renewable Energy. (photo credit: RACHAF PRO DRONE)

The Arava region of southern Israel, which includes the city of Eilat, will reach its goal of being 100-percent reliant on solar energy during the daytime by next year, placing the area light years ahead of the rest of the country.

The team responsible for the achievement, along with other experts, is now lobbying for legislation that would make the entire country 100% solar-energy-reliant during daytime hours by 2030. At present, fossil fuels provide 95% of Israel’s electricity.

The Arava achievement is the result of a partnership between Yosef Abramowitz, CEO of Energiya Global, and Dorit Banet, CEO of Eilat-Eilot Renewable Energy.
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By Diane Bederman

The enemy of your enemy is not your friend. He may use and abuse you for a period of time, but then will throw you over.

The West is involved in the Middle East – not by design, but by acts of war. Sept 11, 2001 began the latest march. And what we need to learn from our actions there is that honour/shame cultures are dangerous. The ethic of all Muslim countries rests on vengeance; not justice and mercy. And vengeance is never ending. Aristotle wrote that memory is the scribe of the soul. Muslim memory calls for revenge. There are few real Muslim nation states. Most are tribes, not living well together. There is no sense of loyalty up the chain from family, clan, tribe to nation.

In the Muslim world, the Shia and Sunni do not get along at all. And that is putting it mildly.There are Hashemites and Alawites, Ibadi and Suffis who don’t agree on much of anything: except vengeance.
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T. Belman. Because of the Russian Hoax, any rapprochment between Russia and the US has been hidden from view. I believe that Trump is coordinating his moves in Syria with Putin.  Putin has joined Trump as a protector of the Kurds and will ultimately, together with Syria, push Turkey out of Syria.  But what does the US get in the deal? Time will tell.

By Emil Avdaliani, BESA

BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 1,316, October 22, 2019

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: There have been hints over recent months of improvement in Russian-Western relations that could have major implications for the balance of power in the Eurasian landmass.

The Ukraine crisis of 2014 was a watershed moment in modern Russian-Western relations as it marked the critical divide between the powers. Anti-Russian sanctions imposed by the West, though not working perfectly, have succeeded in limiting Russian advances in eastern Ukraine.

Over the past several months, however, hints in the European media as well as practical foreign policy moves point to a new scenario: a rapprochement between Europe and Russia.

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With Wednesday’s deadline looming to form a government, New Right leader calls on allies to stand with PM to increase his negotiating power.

ISRAEL HAYOM

MK Naftali Bennett (center) and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (right) in the Knesst plenum | Photo: Oren Ben Hakoon

New Right leader Naftali Bennett called on right-wing and haredi factions to stand by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, warning that if he was forced out of office just because of looming indictments this would inflict major damage on Israel.

“My fellow friends on the Right,” Bennett wrote on Facebook. “One thing must be clear: If law-enforcement officials take down Netanyahu just because of cigars and positive press online, this will be a deadly blow to our entire ideological bloc. Any leader on the Right that would follow Netanyahu would be too scared of confronting the media and law enforcement.”
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T. Belman. When Esper says that the mission is to “defend Iraq”, what he meant was from Iran who has Shiite mititias operating in Iraq and has huge influence there.  If effect, Trump is leaving it to Russia to defend Syia which includes pushing Turkey and Iran out. The US can now focus on liberating Iraq from Iranian clutches.

Remember Iran doesn’t share a border with Syria. They get to syria through Iraq.

REUTERS

ABOARD A U.S. MILITARY AIRCRAFT (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said on Saturday that all of the nearly 1,000 troops withdrawing from northern Syria are expected to move to western Iraq to continue the campaign against Islamic State militants and “to help defend Iraq.”

On Thursday, Turkey agreed in talks with U.S. Vice President Mike Pence to a five-day pause in an offensive into northeastern Syria to allow time for the Kurdish fighters to withdraw from a “safe zone” Ankara aims to establish near the Turkish border with Syria.
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By Kenneth R. Timmerman, NY POST

Critics blasted Trump for allowing Turkey to invade Kurdish-ruled northern Syria, but Kurdish fighters are more realistic about US military support.AFP via Getty Images

The national media blasted President Trump’s withdrawal of 50 US military advisors from the Syrian border with Turkey as a “sellout,” a “betrayal” and a “huge strategic blunder.”

Let’s be clear: None of them truly care about the Kurds. Otherwise, they would have been sending correspondents and camera crews to Rojava, as the Kurds call northern Syria, on a regular basis.

Let’s also be clear about the goals of Turkish president Tayyip Recep Erdogan. While he attempted to stylize his military invasion of Rojava as a counterterrorism operation, few international observers bought into it. Why? Because there have been no terror attacks against Turkey from Syrian territory since the Syrian Kurds established their self-governing entity in 2012. None.
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