T. Belman. Kushner’s the man. He is on the right path. This is the end of UNRWA.  After that it will be the end of the PA. But even if all US aid is stopped, the PA won’t agree to his plan. That’s why they will be bypassed. My guess is that the deal will seek the approval of the “Palestinians”. They don’t care about getting a state. They just want to continue to live where they are with various rights and benefits short of Israeli citizenship. If they get what they want, they will accept Israel from the River to the Sea. Kushner knows what he is doing. He is not a neophyte in the Israeli/Arab conflict. He and his family have been following events for decades.

Notice the sub-title says that he seeks the approval of Palestinians rather than the PA. The PA has shot themselves in the foot for the last time.

Kushner hopes cuts will pressure Palestinians to accept a U.S. peace plan.

By COLUM LYNCH, IBN – August 16, 2018

[Startling development: After an orchestrated six month UNRWA campaign which proclaimed that US cutbacks had caused irreparable humanitarian crisis, UNRWA spokesman admits that at least five nations immediately replaced US cutbacks. Did Chris Gunness suddenly swallow truth serum?] –David Bedein

The White House is seeking to withhold up to $200 million in relief aid for Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the West Bank, severing a vital humanitarian lifeline at a time of rising political and security tensions in the area, according to three diplomatic sources.

The amount represents nearly all of the humanitarian aid the United States provides directly to the Palestinians. Washington also contributes to the budget of a United Nations agency that helps Palestinian refugees known as UNRWA, but the administration has slashed that aid and appears to have no immediate plans to provide more.
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By Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, THE HILL

August 17, 2018 – 12:30 PM EDT

A few months ago, a professor at San Francisco State University posted to her program’s Facebook page that welcoming Zionists to campus is “a declaration of war against Arabs, Muslims, [and] Palestinians.” Soon after, graffiti and flyers showed up all over campus stating, “Zionists Are Not Welcome On This Campus.”

At a University of Illinois rally against white supremacy, a member of Students for Justice in Palestine led a large crowd in chanting, “No Zionists, no KKK, resisting fascism all the way!”

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By Jeff Crouere, CFP

The liberal mainstream news media have a narrative about Donald Trump and they do not deviate. The constant refrain is that the President is unhinged, idiotic, tyrannical and especially racist. Recently, the President was labeled a racist when he criticized CNN’s Don Lemon and NBA star LeBron James. Their latest obsession is the new book written by fired White House staffer Omarosa Manigault Newman.

In the book, Omarosa accuses the President of being a racist and using the “N-word” while hosting The Apprentice on NBC-TV. The President’s inflammatory language was supposedly captured on a tape that has been withheld from the public. Nevertheless, the show’s former producer, Mark Burnett, denied that such a tape exists. The President also tweeted that he doesn’t “have that word in my vocabulary, and never have.”
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By Neda Amin, Head of the Iranian News Department, Israel Resource News Aegncy – translated by William Mehrvarz

August 17, 2018

Following the recent clashes between Hamas in Gaza with the Israeli army, the Islamic Republic has not only dispatched large amounts of arms, financial support and operative forces for the Palestinians: The Iranans they have also sent over 37 Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Rangers who were were transferred by the Iranian Navy to Israel’s borders.

According to a report from Iran, the Government of the Islamic Republic has sent 37 IRGC Rangers, who had recently returned from Syria, through water routes between Israel and its Arab neighbors who are allies with Iran, in north and southwest, to plan combat operations.

These rangers belong to “Al-Mahdi” brigade, one of the IRGC battalions in Syria, with experience in planning operations in Iraqi and Syrian Kurdistan. Ordered by the Iranian authorities to support terrorist groups, they are sent to infiltrate Israel’s borders.
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Two leaders reportedly agreed on issue during July meeting in Helsinki • U.S. administration official tells Bloomberg that Russian leadership believes securing Iran’s withdrawal will be difficult • Leaders also said they would ensure Israel’s security.

Israel Hayom Staff

U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, Finland, in July

U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly agreed in principle that Iranian forces should exit Syria when they met in Helsinki in July, according to a U.S. administration official familiar with the meeting.

However, the official told Bloomberg that the Russian leadership said securing Iran’s withdrawal from Syria would be difficult.
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By Dr. Eric R. Mandel, JPOST

U.S. President Donald Trump meets with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey during the U.N. General Assembly in New York, U.S., September. (photo credit: KEVIN LAMARQUE)

Last year, American Enterprise Institute scholar Ken Pollack testified before the House Foreign Relations Committee, saying: “Every year since 2003, knowledgeable Americans have been warning that the current year is absolutely critical in Iraq. They have been right every time and 2018 will be no exception.”

With Turkish-American relations at an all-time low; President Erdogan in power until at least 2029; and Iranian expansionism extending into critical American areas of interest throughout the Middle East, the new reality requires an American effort to improve its problematic and fragile relationship with Iraq.

The aftermath of the Iraqi elections this spring were a punch in the face to American interests, especially after so much blood and treasure have been lost. America’s favored party, that of current Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s came in third, while the anti-American Sadrist Party of Muqtada al Sadr and the Iranian supported Fatah Party gained the lion’s share of votes.
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At the denomination’s General Convention in July, Bishop Gayle Harris alleged that she was on the scene when Israeli soldiers shot a Palestinian teenager 10 times in the back.

jns

In New York Times op-ed, diaspora affairs minister pushes back against WJC head’s ‘audacious’ claim that Israeli government poses threat to future of Jewish people

By TOI STAFF and JTA

Diaspora Affairs Minister Naftali Bennett on Wednesday hit back at scathing criticism of the nation-state law by an American Jewish leader, branding Ron Lauder’s admonishment of the Israeli government over recent legislation “audacious and preposterous.”

World Jewish Congress president Lauder on Monday excoriated the Israeli government, saying that recent policies pose a threat to the future of the Jewish people.
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T. Belman. I believe similarly. Both Putin and Trump want good relations. So I don’t think the sanctions tell the whole story.

By Evgenia Pismennaya and Ilya Arkhipov, BLOOMBERG

Even after the U.S. announced new sanctions against Russia last week that sent the ruble into a tailspin, the Kremlin isn’t holding it against Donald Trump.

Instead, top Russian officials are hoping the U.S. president may yet be able to deliver on his promises of improving relations — or at least head off pressure growing in Congress for even more draconian sanctions, according to officials and others close to the leadership.

“The Kremlin understands Trump’s logic and that the reaction of the markets and the public is excessive because nothing terrible has happened,” said Andrey Kortunov, head of the Russian International Affairs Council, a research group set up by the presidential administration. “Everybody understands that Trump had to respond to the congressional move and that it’s important for him to put the brakes on it.”
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T. Belman. Turkey’s currency is not the only one suffering from Trump’s policies. So is China’s and Iran’s.

Lira falls as much as 10%, shaking emerging markets world-wide

By Georgi Kantchev, Yeliz Candemir and Saumya Vaishampayan, WSJ

Turkey’s currency plunged again Monday, rattling other vulnerable emerging markets, as a defiant speech from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and policy moves from the nation’s central bank failed to assuage investors about the country’s perilous financial condition.

The lira dropped 8.2% to 7.01 against the U.S. dollar, after falling as much as 10% in Asian morning trading. The country’s debt and stock markets were also swept up in the turmoil.

The lira is down more than 40% this year, battered by concerns about the NATO member’s political and economic stability and a continuing trade spat with the U.S.
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By By Ellen Barry and Martin Selsoe Sorensen, NYT

An intersection near Mjolnerparken, a housing project in Copenhagen that is classified as a ghetto by the Danish government.Mauricio Lima for The New York Times

COPENHAGEN — When Rokhaia Naassan gives birth in the coming days, she and her baby boy will enter a new category in the eyes of Danish law. Because she lives in a low-income immigrant neighborhood described by the government as a “ghetto,” Rokhaia will be what the Danish newspapers call a “ghetto parent” and he will be a “ghetto child.”

Starting at the age of 1, “ghetto children” must be separated from their families for at least 25 hours a week, not including nap time, for mandatory instruction in “Danish values,” including the traditions of Christmas and Easter, and Danish language. Noncompliance could result in a stoppage of welfare payments. Other Danish citizens are free to choose whether to enroll children in preschool up to the age of six.
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PA to file complaint against Israel’s intention to expand cellular access in Judea and Samaria.

By Dalit Halevi, INN

The Palestinian Authority will send memos to international institutions in response to the announcement by the Israeli Ministry of Communications of its intention to invest 40 million shekels in expanding the cellular coverage of the Israeli communications companies in Judea and Samaria.

Alam Moussa, the PA official in charge of communications, told the PA Wafa news agency on Monday that the Israeli move violates Palestinian sovereignty and harms the Palestinian companies operating in “Palestine”.
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T. Belman. I am against this deal.  It is a reward for terrorism. Its one thing to construct a seaport in the Egyptian city of Ismailia and an airport in Sinai, its another thing to allow allow unrestricted import and export into and out of Gaza, and increase the amount of Israeli electricity given to Gaza. 

What’s all that about? Will these facilities be made available to the PA Arabs as well?

Israeli official says five-year peace agreement giving Hamas airport, seaport, is ‘virtually’ ready.

Arutz Sheva Staff,

Hamas rally in Gaza

A senior Israeli official involved in the details of the contacts for a five-year agreement for calm in Gaza has told the Los Angeles Times that the agreement with Hamas is “virtually done.”

The Egyptian-brokered deal between Israel and Hamas is expected to include improvement in the humanitarian conditions in Gaza, as well as the construction of a seaport in the Egyptian city of Ismailia and an airport in Sinai.
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The $717 billion National Defense Authorization Act includes a bipartisan measure honoring a decade-long memorandum of understanding between America and Israel, giving $3.8 billion annually to the Jewish state, while also also temporarily blocking the U.S. delivery of the F-35 fighter jets to Turkey.

BY JACKSON RICHMAN, JNS

By Liora Cohen