Bill Kristol isn’t a “renegade Jew,” just a sorehead throwing a public tantrum

BY DAVID P. GOLDMAN, PJ MEDIA

No-one in the conservative Commentariat has beaten up on poor Bill Kristol more than I during the past dozen years. I read David Horowitz’ excoriation of Kristol as a “renegade Jew” with chagrin; I respect David Horowitz (and have spoken at his conferences on several occasions), and reviewed admiringly his book A Point in Time. But his choice of words was churlish; Kristol devotes considerable time to Jewish causes and genuinely identifies as a Jew, although his level of religious observance is low (as is David’s). Kristol certainly doesn’t think that he has reneged on his Jewish identity. But he is so absorbed in the cultish self-adoration of the neo-conservative clique, and so insecure about the perception of his manifold policy blunders (for example his naive endorsement of the Arab Spring as a near-equivalent to the American Founding) that his judgment of late has been dreadful. His third party proposal will go nowhere.
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T. Belman. Did Bibi go along with the Blair initiative while at the same time working toward the Liberman deal instead? Or did he really want the Herzog deal? I think the former.

Former British PM and Quartet envoy reportedly led the failed move add the Zionist Union to the coalition.

By Ben Ariel, INN

Former British Prime Minister and Quartet envoy Tony Blair was one on a list of several international figures behind the failed move designed to legitimize the addition of the Zionist Union to the coalition, Haaretz and Channel 10 News revealed on Wednesday.

Following his displeasure with Ya’alon’s status as the media’s darling, the prime minister backtracks on his refusal to appoint Lieberman as the head of the Defense Ministry. His ultimate goal: To diminish and restrain the military brass.

By Yossi Verter, HAARETZ

Even from the perspective of Israeli politics, which have always lacked dignity, morality and ethics, Wednesday’s events, which began with talk of a regional peace conference headed by Isaac “Bougie” Herzog and ended with a suggestion to appoint neighborhood bully Avigdor Lieberman as defense minister, were among the most insane and unpredictable ever.

The ouster of Moshe Ya’alon could have only one logical explanation: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s growing fear of the imaginary axis of Ya’alon, Chief of General Staff Gadi Eisenkot, Deputy Chief of Staff Yair Golan and the other senior generals who are all, each in their own way, emitting sane, democratic and moral tones that the Prime Minister’s Office and official residence perceive as threatening, defiant, and a challenge to the rule of the imperial family.
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T. Belman . Bibi has been fighting with the whole military/intelligence community for the last 6 years. Don’t forget that they prevented him from attacking Iran, or from being more aggressive on Hamas or Fatah. They also collaborated with the Obama Administration. This has been a long time in coming. Now this government can focus on the legal establishment. and bringing them to heel. They consider this autocratic rule, not democracy. The left enjoyed the separation of powers because they controlled the media, the judiciary and the military. But the separation of powers was not mandated by a constitution as it is in the US. Israel has a parliamentary system where the PM is king subject to what passes for a constitution. Bibi is just righting the balance, pardon the pun.

Even if the prime minister doesn’t end up making his old ally-rival defense minister, he will have sent a clear message to the Israeli military, to the Likud and to the United States

By Anshel Pfeffer, HAARETZ

No one on the Israeli political scene knows Benjamin Netanyahu better than Avigdor Lieberman. Netanyahu knows that – and that’s exactly why he would have preferred Isaac Herzog as his new coalition partner.

Ultimately, however, Netanyahu opted to go with Lieberman after reaching the conclusion that Herzog can barely promise to deliver his own vote in the Knesset and no longer commands the loyalty or obedience of Zionist Union lawmakers. The chairman of the Labor Party has gone – in the space of 14 months – from the great hope, the man who could finally topple Netanyahu, to a leader without a party.
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DEFENCE AVIATION

With Israel looking to maintain its aerial superiority and technological advantage in the region, the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II, the most advanced fighter jet in the world today, is the perfect plane to fortify their defences and augment their forces. The F-35 will give the Israeli Air Force better capabilities, both near and far, to help strengthen its national security. Syria, South Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt and the Islamic State are a constant threat to Israel’s security and they are facing increasingly crowded skies in the neighborhood.
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Senior officials say coalition agreement could come as early as Thursday.

By David Rosenberg, INN

Former Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman has accepted Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s offer to join the coalition in return for the Defense and Immigration ministries, senior Yisrael Beytenu officials said on Wendesday.

According to senior officials, the Prime Minister’s meeting Wednesday afternoon with Liberman has already laid the groundwork for Yisrael Beytenu’s entry into the government. Shortly after the meeting, Netanyahu reportedly called Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, informing him that Liberman had requested the Defense Ministry in exchange for his support of the Likud government.
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T. Belman. Hold your breath. Lieberman as Min of Defense means Yaalon out.  Bibi may consider Yaalon a liability.  On the other hand Lieberman would then be in charge of managing the territories. He favours construction in settlement blocs including Maalot Adumin and Ariel.  I hope Bibi makes the deal.

INN reports late this afternoon “Netanyahu put Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon on notice that he may soon have to vacate his position.”

Defense ministry, death penalty for terrorists, pensions reforms: Yisrael Beytenu demands major concessions to join gov’t.

By Ari Sofer, INN

At the same time, however, Liberman for the first time publicly declared his openness to joining Binyamin Netanyahu’s government – as long as three key conditions would be met.

Those conditions, he told reporters at a press conference Wednesday morning, are: the defense ministry, the imposition of the death penalty for terrorist murderers, and pension reforms.

Liberman also struck back at claims he was staying in the opposition purely in order to harm his political rival Netanyahu.
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T. Belman. Very interesting. While our vaunted military leaders call for ethics and morality and purity of arms, these esteemed Rabbis know better and call for the death of all terrorists. They also rule against giving away Judea and Samaria. They also called for ending all discussions about a two-state solution.  What strikes me as strange is that both Shas and UTJ don’t hold these views.

JEWISH PRESS

Several dozen rabbis, many of them Haredi and Hasidic, on Sunday attended an emergency conference at the study hall of the Bostoner Rebbe, Rabbi Meir Alter Horowitz, in the neighborhood of Har Nof in Jerusalem, Kippa reported. Dubbed “emergency conference for the security of Israel in the Holy Land,” the assembly ended with a uniform call against a national unity government with the Zionist Camp (Labor) or with any other politicians who declare openly that they want to hand over areas of historic Israel.
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DEBKA

On Tuesday, May 17, the US expanded its involvement in the war in Syria, and for the first time since the war began in 2011, US F-16 fighter-bombers bombed radical Syrian rebels fighting Iranian, Syrian and Hizballah forces near Aleppo, DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources say in an exclusive report.

According to the sources, the targets were mainly troops, positions, and transportation routes of rebel groups such as ISIS and the Nusra Front that also threaten moderate Syrian rebel groups in the area. But there is no doubt that the American airstrikes will help Syrian President Bashar Assad, just like the Russian bombings have done.
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T. Belman. This is an absolutely brilliant article. I totally agree with its thesis. The lies that Ben Rhodes bragged about to get the Iran Deal passed remind me of the lies told by Obama to get Obamacare passed. It all fits a pattern.

By Joan Swirsky, Canada Free Press

[..] The coup d’état of 2008! Before that fateful year, America had experienced just about everything (see above) but not a coup. The term itself is defined as a sudden and often violent overthrow of an existing government by a small group. If you never heard or read about the Obama coup d’état, it is because this coup was anything but typical, and also because the leftwing media, which largely shills for every leftwing scheme, failed utterly to report the truth of this attempt to overthrow the America they loathe but most of the rest of us love and cherish.

Not convinced? See last week’s headlines about how the traitorous Ben Rhodes and his boss in the Oval Office purposely lied to the American public about the catastrophic deal with genocidal Iran, jihad capital of the world, and relied upon the craven media to perpetuate those lies, which they did.
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By Ellen Nakashima and William Booth, WaPo

BEERSHEBA, Israel — Here in the middle of the Negev Desert, a cyber-city is rising to cement Israel’s place as a major digital power. The new development, an outcropping of glass and steel, will concentrate some of the country’s top talent from the military, academia and business in an area of just a few square miles.

No other country is so purposefully integrating its private, scholarly, government and military ­cyber-expertise.
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PM: ‘No reason that an entire sector of the population which contributes to the state shouldn’t get support in education, infrastructure’.

By Hezki Baruch, INN

A ministerial committee charged with handling government policy vis-à-vis the country’s Arab population approved on Tuesday a massive spending plan targeting the Bedouin sector.

The committee, headed by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, voted to spend some 900 million shekels ($240 million) to develop and strengthen Bedouin communities in northern Israel over the next four years.
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Prince Mohammed is overseeing the most dramatic changes his country has seen in the past half century.

BY NOGA TARNOPOLSKY, JPOST

Saudi Deputy Crown Prince and Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman is 31-years-old, charismatic, full of verve and very single-minded.

Following in the footsteps of the French philosopher-cum-Svengali Bernard-Henri Lévy, who is commonly referred to as BHL, the young prince styles himself MBS.

He picks up titles like other young men pick up dates. Nominally second in line to the throne, behind his cousin Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, he has already been put in charge of many of the Gulf kingdom’s diplomatic initiatives including a new cooperation council with Jordan and is, de facto, the man charged with steering Saudi Arabia into a new economic reality over the next fifteen years.
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Nationalist camp surges in latest poll as Labor loses nearly half its seats. Likud led by Yaalon would face massive losses.

By David Rosenberg, INN

A new poll published Tuesday is bad news for Zionist Union chief Isaac Herzog – and very good news for Israel’s nationalist camp.

According to the poll, which was conducted by Panels Politics on behalf of Maariv, the Zionist Union party – a joint ticket of the Labor and HaTnua factions – would plummet from the 24 seats it current holds to a mere 13 if new elections were held today.

The Likud dips slightly, falling from its current 30 seats to 26.
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By Rachel Ehrenfeld, American Center for Democracy

Since 1987, the Gaza-based terror group has kept itself in the international spotlight through acts of violence against the Jewish State of Israel. It was designated as terrorist by the Unites States in 1997. In 2006, under the guise of the “Change and Reform” party, it won the elections for the Palestinian Authority and 2007, after violent confrontations with Fatah, took over the Gaza Strip. Since then, it has escalated its attacks against Israel.

Who helps finance Hamas ongoing terrorism against the ‘Zionist entity?’
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Coalition source: Herzog asked for significant improvement in the ministries he’d receive upon joining the government.

By Ben Ariel, INN

More details are emerging about Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Zionist Union chairman Yitzhak Herzog’s meeting on Sunday night on the possible formation of a unity government.

According to Haaretz, despite the fact that Herzog’s associates claimed that the talks hadn’t made progress, Netanyahu, in various conversations he had on Monday, expressed optimism about being able to wrap up the process in the near future.

The meeting, which was first reported by Channel 2, was long and came after weeks during which the two hadn’t met face to face, according to the newspaper.
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A reckless plan to derail the election.

BY DAVID HOROWITZ, BREITBART

Update by David Horowitz: My article “Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew” has created something of a firestorm on social media (#Renegade Jew) and inspired some illiterate and unjust attacks on Breitbart.com and also me. Breitbart is not responsible for the headline or the phrase “Renegade Jew.” I am. Some illiterate anti-Semites have picked up on the phrase without understanding it. Some neo-conservatives have called me names as well, displaying their own brand of inarticulate hate without bothering to respond to the actual argument of my piece.
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DEBKAfile Special Report May 16, 2016,

Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer is the closest thing to actually having the prime minister in Washington.

By Herb Kienon, JPOST

Its an answer strikingly characteristic of Israel’s ambassador to the US Ron Dermer: unapologetic, unexpected, articulate and completely faithful to his boss, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Asked in an email interview with The Jerusalem Post what have been the highlights and lowlights of his two and a half years so far in Washington, one might have expected Dermer to say that the lowest point was Netanyahu’s controversial speech to Congress in March 2015.
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by RICHARD POLLOCK, Daily Caller News Foundation

A Daily Caller News Foundation investigation reveals that Bill and Hillary Clinton received at least $100 million from autocratic Persian Gulf states and their leaders, potentially undermining Democratic presidential candidate Hillary’s claim she can carry out independent Middle East policies.

As a presidential candidate, the amount of foreign cash the Clintons have amassed from the Persian Gulf states is “simply unprecedented,” says national security analyst Patrick Poole.

“These regimes are buying access. You’ve got the Saudis. You’ve got the Kuwaitis, Oman, Qatar and the UAE. There are massive conflicts of interest. It’s beyond comprehension,” Poole told TheDCNF in an interview.
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