Second day of meetings sees 1,323 units across West Bank okayed, including for evacuees of Migron and Amona outposts; settlers protest outside PM’s residence

By JACOB MAGID, TOI

AMICHAI, West Bank — The Defense Ministry body responsible for authorizing settlement construction advanced plans for some 1,300 West Bank homes Wednesday, capping off a week which saw the green-lighting of over 2,600 homes.

Included in the plans that gained final authorization for building by the Civil Administration’s High Planning Subcommittee were projects for the evacuees of the illegal Migron (86 units) and Amona (102 units) outposts.

The two communities were demolished in September 2012 and February 2017, respectively, after the High Court of Justice ruled they had been built on private Palestinian land.
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President Xi Jinping’s talk of giving market forces a “decisive role” is belied by his war on the internet and mainland gateways to information flows.

ASIA TIMES

Déjà vu was in the air in Washington last weekend as the keepers of the global economy convened for the annual International Monetary Fund confab.

Twenty years ago, at the same event, officials obsessed over Japan’s corporate debt bubble. It was seen as a clear and present danger to the banking system of what was then Asia’s biggest economy – and global stability. Officials urged Tokyo to get its house in order for everyone’s sake.

China now finds itself in a similarly uncomfortable spotlight.
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Gallia Lindenstrauss, Zvi Magen
INSS Insight No. 982, October 18, 2017

The recent statement by Turkish President Erdogan that Ankara had made an advance payment to Russia for the purchase of two S-400 air defense batteries, combined with Russia’s confirmation of this report, constitutes a significant development that adds to the question marks about Turkey’s future in NATO. This development also strengthens Russia’s standing in the Middle East, because it is another expression of the rapprochement between Moscow and Ankara. However, the Turkish-Russian rapprochement does not by itself reduce the leverage available to the West in its relations with Turkey, above all the defense relations in the context of NATO and the extensive trade between Turkey and the European Union. While many believe that Turkey will remain a NATO member for the foreseeable future, they note at the same time that Turkey is a problematic member of the alliance that is already suffering from quite a few internal tensions.

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In first official remark on last week’s reconciliation agreement between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, U.S. envoy Jason Greenblatt says that if Hamas wants to play a role in the Palestinian government, it must heed U.S., Israeli demands.

ISRAEL HAYOM

U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Jason Greenblatt and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Jerusalem | Photo: GPO

A week after rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah signed a reconciliation agreement, U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East said Thursday that if Hamas wants to play a role in any Palestinian government, it must renounce violence and commit to peaceful negotiations with Israel.

Jason Greenblatt’s statement Thursday was the first American comment on the advancing Palestinian reconciliation efforts and echoed Israeli demands.
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EU, Israeli diplomats at odds over mobile classrooms and solar panels, with Jerusalem insisting they amount to an effort to strengthen Palestinian claims

TOI

Eight European Union member states are demanding that Israel pay them back for the demolition and confiscation of buildings and other installations constructed for the benefit of Bedouin encampments in Area C of the West Bank by the EU’s mission in Israel.

A letter from the EU member states, led by Belgium, setting out the demand will be handed to the Israeli Foreign Ministry in the coming days, according to the Haaretz newspaper, citing an initial report in France’s Le Monde daily.

In August, Israel dismantled a structure in West Bank Bedouin Arab village of Jabal al-Baba adjacent to al-Azariya, that was slated to open as a kindergarten for 25 children and a structure being used to house a small primary school in the southern West Bank. In addition, it confiscated solar panels on another structure being used as a school in the southern West Bank.
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As US expresses concern, Iraqi forces launch major attack alongside Iranian-backed militias to take city run by Kurdistan Regional Government.

BY SETH J. FRANTZMAN, JPOST
Just after two o’clock in the morning in Baghdad the prime minister of Iraq ordered the Iraqi security forces to “secure bases and federal institutions in Kirkuk province.”

Overnight, confusion along the front line between the Iraqis and Peshmerga of the Kurdistan Regional Government led to clashes which destroyed several vehicles and a chaotic situation. By morning groups of Kurdish forces had abandoned their posts, some due to a prior local agreement. In the afternoon scenes of defeat were everywhere, with black Humvees of the Iraqi counterterrorism forces surrounding a famous statue to Peshmerga at the entrance to the city and thousands of Kurds fleeing in their cars towards Erbil and Sulaymaniyah.
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By Mordechai Ben-Menachem

This short article is to ‘report’ on this conference, which I attended,  from the stand-point of an objective observer, who arrived at the conference highly skeptical, I am still to be convinced as to the idea’s practical implementation, but found the conference well-organised and the basic idea quite sound – though somewhat thin on practicality. [Like Trump we keep our plans close to our vest.]

Basically, the conference was quite good.  As one could expect from Ted, it was reasonably well-organised.  Most speakers knew well what they were talking about and expressed themselves well.
So much for the conference technical aspects!

The conference had two types of speakers, those who spoke about the concept of “Jordon is Palestine” and those who spoke about the present government of Jordon.  The majority were of the former type (and that was well thought of).
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ALJAZEERA

Iraqi security forces have launched a “major operation” in the Kurdish-held region of Kirkuk, advancing towards oil fields and a strategic military base, according to Kurdish and Iraqi officials.

The objective of the push early on Monday is to take control of the K1 airbase, west of Kirkuk, Lieutenant Colonel Salah el-Kinani, of the Iraqi army’s 9th armoured division, told Reuters news agency.

Iraqi forces rolled into parts of the countryside outside Kirkuk city and took control of “vast areas” without facing resistance from Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, Iraq’s state TV said.
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King Salman praised Trump in a phone call for his “firm strategy” against Iran.

By Ben Lynfield, JPOST

Saudi Arabia’s reaction to US President Donald Trump’s more confrontational posture toward Tehran was strikingly similar to Israel’s, highlighting the two countries’ common desire for a more determined American effort to counter Iranian influence in the region.

On Saturday, King Salman praised Trump in a phone call for his “firm strategy” against “Iranian aggression and its support for terrorism in the region,” the Saudi Press Agency reported.

“The king praised the Trump administration, which recognizes the magnitude of these challenges and threats and the need for concerted efforts on terrorism and extremism and its primary sponsor, Iran,” the Agency added.
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By Edwin Mora, BREITBART

WASHINGTON, DC — Some experts welcomed U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to decertify the Iran nuclear deal, but they said the American leader should have gone a step further and killed the agreement, which some analysts argue has strengthened Tehran’s narco-terror proxy Hezbollah and its hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

While some analysts praised Trump for decertifying the Iran deal, others stressed that the president did not go far enough.

“The Iran deal was, as the president said, a bad deal, possibly the worse in modern history. We should kill it. That’s what I recommended the president do, but I’m happy to see him decertify it,” Dr. Sebastian Gorka, a former deputy assistant to President Trump, told Breitbart News.
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