T. Belman. The author suggests that Bennett’s plan leads Israel to an apartheid solution which forces Netanyahu to stand by his “two states for two people” solution. Ironically, just this week I posted Mike Wise’s draft “One State Plan” and a discussion between Wise and Martin Sherman who backs compensated emigration and myself who backs Bennett’s ideas. We all concluded that the worst option is the two-state solution. We also concluded that Bennett’s plan of annexing Area C is the easiest sale leaving the question of what to do with Area’s A and B for later. This would be no more apartheid than the Oslo Accords.

The choice for Israelis then would be, do they prefer absorbing 1.7 million Arabs into Israel from the river to the sea or spending $150 billion to induce Arabs to emigrate.

With radicals pushing for either a multi-national state or an apartheid one, the two-state solution might finally have its political day in the sun.

By Carolina Landsmann, HAARETZ

This time it was U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry who forced Benjamin Netanyahu to express public support for the idea of two states for two peoples: “The solution is a demilitarized Palestinian state that will recognize the Jewish state,” he claimed.

Experience teaches us that Netanyahu most likely won’t stand by his claim. But the context in which he made it – cornered into rejecting the alternative of a binational state– could indicate the evolution of the two-state solution, and signal its revival.
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Debates on Israel are important, predicated as they are on the belief that Israel can and will win its arguments in the marketplace of ideas.

By Shmuley Boteach, JPOST

On Sunday night I debated Peter Beinart in Tel Aviv at the annual Globes Business Conference. It was a night Peter won’t forget because he buried himself.
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It is perhaps possible to imagine proclamations more moronic than some made at the recent Saban Forum – but that definitely would not be easy.

By Martin Sherman, INN

By Mordechai Kedar, INN

[..]
And today, the Middle East serves as the battleground for a struggle between two coalitions which include every type of member, local, marginal and external.

The Sunni coalition is led secretly by Saudi Arabia, the country that sees itself as the leader of Sunni Islam. Members on various levels of loyalty are Turkey, Qatar, the United Emirates, Kuwait, Jordan and Islamic State which has footholds in Nigeria (Boko Haram), Sinai, Libya and Tunisia. Jordan and Islamic State are at loggerheads ever since Islamic State burned a Jordanian pilot to death and launched threats to conquer Jordan, but their dispute is currently kept on a low flame.
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Pu7blished Dec 2/15

BY DAN WILLIAMS, REUTERS

Israel’s upgraded Arrow ballistic missile shield passed a full interception test on Thursday, hitting a target in space meant to simulate the trajectory of the long-range weapons held by Iran, Syria and Hezbollah, the Defense Ministry said.

The success was a boost for “Arrow 3”, among Israeli missile defense systems that get extensive U.S. funding. Its first attempt at a full trial, held a year ago, was aborted due to what designers said was a faulty deployment of the target.

“The success of the Arrow 3 system today … is an important step towards one of the most important projects for Israel and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) becoming operational,” said Joseph Weiss, IAI’s chief executive officer.
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Bloomberg Politics Poll: Nearly Two-Thirds of Likely GOP Primary Voters Back Trump’s Muslim Ban

By David Horowitz, FPM

Presidential candidate Donald Trump has called for a moratorium on Muslim immigration until we can figure out why Islamic terrorists have been able to enter our country and devised ways to protect ourselves. This has caused the left and right establishments to dogpile on Trump.

Echoing the sentiments of virtually all Democrats and many Republicans, a Washington Post editorial has declared that Trump’s proposal disqualifies him as a candidate because in the Post’s view what he recommends is unconstitutional and therefore un-American. But President Obama has issued executive orders – as it happens orders that sabotage our borders – that he himself has called unconstitutional (“I don’t have the authority to stop deportations”). Has the Post editorialized that this is un-American and disqualifies him for the presidency? Has it called for Obama to be impeached? Have Democrats ridiculed Obama for his un-American prescriptions?
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The universities are riddled with specious teaching that produces academic idiots.

By Barry Shaw, INN

Countries are coming together in a common cause to strike ISIS in their rage, and in their fear.

The anger that wasn’t there in the past is palpable today.

It wasn’t there in sufficient force when ISIS slit the throats of Americans and Brits in the sand of Syria, and wholesale beheadings that gruesomely played on the social media. It was just a piece of awful voyeurism. Terrorist pornography.

Sure, Obama said he had forged a coalition of sixty five countries, but nobody demanded that he publicly count out for us who these nations were, or what they were doing to counter, let alone defeat, ISIS, ISIL, Islamic State, Daesh, or whatever name they call themselves.
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DEBKA

Egyptian President Abdel Fatteh El-Sisi has arrived in Athens for three days of talks with Greek Prime Minister Alex Tsipras on a plan for establishing the first ever Mediterranean consortium for the joint exploitation of Israeli, Egyptian and Cypriot off-shore gas wells. DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources disclose in an exclusive report.

Tuesday, Dec. 8, when Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu defended his government’s handling of Israel’s offshore gas bonanza in a briefing to the Knesset Economy Committee, he faced a barrage of opposition criticism, much of which focused on unfounded claims that Egypt had dropped out of a deal for the purchase of Israeli gas.
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Saving their sworn enemy: Heart-stopping footage shows Israeli commandos rescuing wounded men from Syrian warzone

• Elite Israeli troops rescue wounded Syrians from the world’s worst war almost every night
• They have saved more than 2,000 people since 2013, at a cost of 50 million shekels (£8.7million)
• Many are enemies of Israel and some may even be fighters for groups affiliated to Al Qaeda
• MailOnline embedded with Israeli commandos stationed on the border between Israel and Syria
• Dramatic video filmed by MailOnline and the Israeli army shows these operations taking place
• Israel says that the operation is purely humanitarian but analysts believe Israel also has strategic reasons
• For more of the latest news updates on the Syrian war visit www.dailymail.co.uk/syria

By JAKE WALLIS SIMONS ON THE ISRAEL-SYRIA BORDER FOR MAILONLINE

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by Rabbi Elchanan Poupko,  THEYULAMDAN

Anti-Semitic incidents, even in the relatively benign USA, have gone up more than 20%in the year 2014.

As an ancient people, we are well aware of the side effects of anti-Semitism. One of these side effects is the allegation that Jews and Judaism treat non-Jews “differently”and should therefore not be surprised when Jews are treated differently. Before addressing the content of this argument, it is important to note, that with this very allegation, the discriminatory treatment has already begun.

The fact that every religion treats believers in one way, and non-believers in another is a well-established one. The thoroughness with which this aspect of Judaism is examined, relative to other religions, is unparalleled and highly disproportionate. To scrutinize Judaism on its treatment of those who aren’t members is not only odd, but is out of place and astonishing.
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T. Belman.  What Trump said was totally appropriate. The problem is that Democrats and Republicans both, are ignoring his qualifiers, and castigating him for proposing a ban. Secondly they have taken the focus off the Obama’s horrible speech and Clinton’s bad policies.  Megyn Kelly interviewed Sen Marco Rubio last night and he said US law doesn’t allow for a religious test when in fact it does.

Refugee ‘Religious Test’ is ‘Shameful’ and ‘Not American’ says Obama… Except that Federal Law Requires It by Andrew C McCarthy.

Canada Free Press posted numerous articles in support of Trump.

Trump’s proposal to ban the entry into US of Muslims is no more racist than similar established policies which raised no outcry by US or anyone else.

By Lori Lowenthal Marcus, JP

With the country, and now, slowly parts of the rest of the world, in a state of outrage over presidential candidate Donald Trump’s controversial statement to cut off immigration and visits by foreign Muslims to the U.S., it is worth noting that Trump is not the first major figure to suggest that a certain class of humans be barred from entry into a country.

Of the following examples, however, there are two significant differences between Trump’s call and that of all the others. See if you can come up with the two differences by the end of this article.
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By Danny Hirschberg, ISRAEL HAYOM

Something has changed in Israeli society. The appointment of Yossi Cohen as head of the Mossad, with Yoram Cohen [no relation] in charge of the Shin Bet security agency and Roni Alsheikh becoming the new police commissioner a few days ago, graduates of the religious Zionist school system are now at the helm of three out of the four main branches of Israel’s security apparatus. It doesn’t matter how you view it, the change demands special examination.

The leadership in Israeli society, which in the past was made up of secular Ashkenazi men, looks completely different today, when many Sephardi and national religious (when it comes to women, there is room for improvement)people moving up, when in the past it seemed that they faced a glass ceiling. For some time now, Sephardi and Zionist religious soldiers have comprised a large percentage of the army’s elite combat troops and officer training cadets, and top-tier positions in the business sector are no longer filled by members of one particular sector. How did this happen? It appears to be a combination of a natural process society has undergone, detachment from prejudice, an understanding in Israel that change is vital, and ideological, values-based education stressing cooperation and responsibility.
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By Ted Belman

Here is the first exchange between Mike Wise and Martin Sherman pertaining to ONE STATE PLAN: Israel Sovereignty in the West Bank – DRAFT.

On 12/7/2015 1:29 PM, Martin Sherman wrote and Mike Wise responded:

Mike,

This is a blueprint for the Lebanonization of Israel.

I think it is time to drop that threat. Lebanese Maronite Christians  constitute about 22%  of the total population of Lebanon. Lebanon’s constitution was intended to guarantee political representation for each of the nation’s ethno-religious groups. Under the terms of an unwritten agreement known as the National Pact between the various political and religious leaders of Lebanon, the president of the country must be a Maronite.
^{Israel has no such agreement. Israel was created and will remain a Jewish country. civil and religious rights for all. national rights for Jews only.}

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Note: The following piece is from a symposium published in Commentary Magazine‘s November issue. Contributors were asked to respond to the following question: “What will be the condition of the Jewish community fifty years from now?”

By Evelyn Gordon, COMMENTARY

Today’s Jewish world has two main centers: America and Israel. But by 2065, if current trends hold, it will have only one—Israel.

One reason is simple demographics. Today, the two communities are of similar size. Israel, according to its Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), has 6.3 million Jews. America, according to the Jewish Virtual Library, has between 5.4 to 6.8 million, depending on whether you count only “core Jews” or the “enlarged” population, which includes “persons of Jewish parentage” and “non-Jewish household members.”

But America’s core Jewish population has barely grown over the past half-century. True, in 1960, the “enlarged” population was only 5.4 to 5.5 million. But since intermarriage was much less common then, this population—identical to today’s core Jewish figure—primarily comprised core Jews. Its subsequent increase has thus come mainly from counting non-Jews as Jews.
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The far-right National Front party made huge gains in French regional elections and could be a sign of a more pro-Israel Europe.

By Michelle Michal Grossman, JPOST

France went to the polls on Sunday in regional elections and the far-right National Front party, formerly known for its anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant stances but now known for its support of Israel and opposition to radical Islam, came out as a winner across the country.

The regional election outcomes are taken seriously since they are thought to be a bellweather for what will come when France votes in the 2017 national elections.

Though some have pinned the party’s success on its occurrence so soon after the November 13 terror attacks in Paris, one Israeli expert told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that France has been moving to the right for years and is part of an overall trend in Europe of far-right parties becoming the mainstream.
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By CAROLINE B. GLICK, JPOST

In America of December 2015, natural conclusions are considered irresponsible, at best.

How much lower will America sink before it regains its senses? Wednesday, two Muslims walked into a Christmas party at a community service center in San Bernardino, California where one worked. They were wearing body armor and video cameras and carrying automatic rifles, pipe bombs and pistols. They opened fire, killed 14, and wounded 17.

The murderers, Syed Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik were killed by police.

Speaking to the Daily News, Farook’s father said his son, “was very religious. He would go to work, come back, go to pray, come back. He’s Muslim.”

Farook’s neighbor told the paper that over the past two years, Farook exchanged his Western dress for Islamic gowns and grew a beard.
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By Jerry Gordon, NER

By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz , BREAKING ISRAEL NEWS

 In the long history of Jews in Russia, the government has rarely been an ally, and often been the source of persecution. Current Russian president Vladimir Putin, however, is a powerful exception, with Jews playing a significant role in his personal history and his inner circle.  With the Russian army a major player in the potentially explosive multi-national puzzle unfolding in Syria, this personal element could become an important, perhaps decisive, factor in how the conflict unfolds.

At the International Assembly of Chabad Representatives in 2007, Russia’s Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Berel Lazar, often referred to as “Putin’s Rabbi”, told a remarkable story about the Russian leader, which he heard from Putin himself.

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