T. Belman. DEBKA has a dubious reputation for accuracy. Recently I posted the article from DEBKA, Obama turns a smiling face to Israel. It turned out to be total bullshit.

Here we go again. Obama contradicts DEBKA.

US President Barack Obama has told associates that he intends to veto the French proposal for a UN Security Council resolution mandating the creation of a Palestinian state and an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank within two years, Channel 10 is reporting on Friday.

DEBKA, May 6/15

DEBKAfile reports exclusively from Washington: US President Barack Obama did not wait for Binyamin Netanyahu to finish building his new government coalition by its deadline at midnight Wednesday, May 6, before going into action to pay him back for forming a right-wing cabinet minus any moderate figure for resuming negotiations with the Palestinians.

Banking on Netanyahu’s assertion while campaigning for re-election that there would be no Palestinian state during his term in office, Obama is reported exclusively by our sources to have given the hitherto withheld green light to European governments to file a UN Security Council motion proclaiming an independent Palestinian state. Although Netanyahu left the foreign affairs portfolio in his charge and available to be filled by a suitably moderate figure as per the White House’s expectations did not satisfy the US President.
Read more…

By Jonathan Tobin, COMMENTARY

[..]
There is something to be said for that way of thinking on a lot of issues. But what has happened during the debate about the nuclear threat from Iran illustrates that much of what passes for bipartisanship is merely an effort by which the losers pretend they haven’t been taken to the cleaners while the winners agree to let them engage in such a charade.

That is exactly what has happened on the Iran deal bill.

It should be recalled that coming into 2015, it appeared that there was an overwhelming bipartisan majority in both Houses of Congress for increased sanctions on Iran that would strengthen the administration’s hand in the nuclear negotiations. But President Obama had no interest in getting tough with his negotiating partners and bitterly opposed the idea. Once it became clear that he would make enough concessions to the Iranians to entice them to agree to a framework deal, the focus of those seeking to respond to events was on passing a bill that would force the president to submit any agreement to Congress for ratification. The president was as opposed to that idea as he was to more sanctions arguing that he need not be trammeled by the Constitution’s requirement that any treaty receive a two-thirds positive vote in the Senate.
Read more…

Her flaw? She tells the truth.

By Jack Engelhard, INN

They used to say that oftentimes Golda Meir was “the only man in the room.” The same might be said of Ayelet Shaked.

A Member of Knesset since 2013, Shaked, 39, was recently appointed to serve as Minister of Justice for Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. The appointment has been greeted with satisfaction from many on the Right and with howls of protest from everybody on the Left.

The Left does not like her because too often she speaks her mind and tells the truth. To the Left, this is a flaw.

Shaked believes in no two-state solution and Arab MKs, including Ahmed Tibi and Haneen Zoabi often felt the lash of her rebuke. The lady is no pushover.

She is called “extreme”…an “extreme right-winger”…but that’s what they call anyone who is combative for the Jewish State.

Arabs in Israel, to her thinking, are welcome to their rights.
Read more…

INN reports:

The talk of legalizing the buildings and communities comes after the NGO Regavim presented MKs with aerial maps showing 2,026 homes in Judea and Samaria that are in danger of demolition due to anticipated petitions by radical leftist groups.

While Jewish Home’s coalition deal with Likud included establishing the team to legalize homes, it appears to have made no mention of the Jewish construction freeze, in an apparent abandonment of an earlier demand to lift the freeze.

The covert freeze on building has reportedly been in place since late 2013, and has continued since then in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, aside from a handful of building announcements in the capital, even as Jewish Home was in the last coalition government and Ariel served as housing minister.

Likud’s proposed bills wouldn’t harm judicial independence, only the court’s excess powers

By Evelyn Gordon

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his new government aspires to enact legislation to restrain the Supreme Court. But this weekend, his spokesman said Netanyahu “consistently championed the independence of Israel’s judiciary” for three terms and will “do so vigorously during his fourth term as well.”

So one of those two statements is clearly a lie – at least according to former Supreme Court President Aharon Barak, current Supreme Court President Miriam Naor, Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein and President Reuven Rivlin, all of whom last week assailed the Likud party’s proposals as undermining the court’s independence and even democracy itself.

Yet in reality, both of Netanyahu’s statements are true. The only lie is his critics’ claim that the bills would undermine either judicial independence or democracy. Read more…

T. Belman. But the pressure to engage in the peace process will come from UTJ, Shas and Kaluna in addtion to coming from the opposition and the EU and US.

By Anshel Pfeffer, HAARETZ

[..]
But despite the prime minister’s backing, proposed amendments to cut the Supreme Court down to size are extremely unlikely to pass through the Knesset. Kahlon’ coalition agreement with Netanyahu grants him power of veto over any such legislation; even if he doesn’t exercise it, he can merely abstain – along with the other nine members of the Kulanu faction – denying Shaked and Netanyahu a majority. Shaked will try and make life hell for the Supreme Court, but her chances of achieving any lasting change in the legal edifice are exceedingly slim.
Read more…

By Akiva Eldar, Al-Monitor

Avigdor Liberman’s decision to forgo the Foreign Ministry and move to the opposition benches splits the 20th Knesset almost equally between the coalition and the opposition. There are now 61 Knesset members who support the new government and 59 who oppose it. But this ratio is just one part of the story, and not necessarily the most important or interesting. The real story is the balance of power between the camp that prefers to maintain the status quo over any diplomatic arrangement that involves the creation of a Palestinian state, and the camp that supports a diplomatic arrangement that will result in the creation of such a state. In between, there is the ultra-Orthodox camp, which is more interested in initiatives for reaching some arrangement that will keep its young men out of the army than in those designed to advance a diplomatic arrangement with the Palestinians.
Read more…

T. Belman. I am glad to see that ZOA no longer supports the Corker Bill.

This conversation took place on Sunday evening, May 3, 2015, when a huge crowd of almost one thousand people attended a major public event of the Zionist Organization of America Long Island-Queens region (ZOA-LIQ),

ZOA PRESS RELEASE

[..]
Klein urged the audience to tell their Congressmen to stop the disastrous Iran deal, and to support Israel if Israel needs to take military action to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Klein stated:

“The deal with Iran is a catastrophe. The deal will immediately eliminate most if not all of the sanctions in place now, which will give Iran $50 billion to $100 billion a year of additional revenue which it will use to fund and arm Islamic terrorism, the scourge of the Western world. We are funding the Hitler of today’s world with this deal. We are giving Iran money to promote its monstrous and outrageous goals.”

Read more…

T. Belman. Liberman has more in common with Bennett and Lapid than with Netanyahu. Bib’s decision to embrace Shas and UTJ alienated Lapid, Liberman and Bennett. Together they hold 25 seats. Bib made this mistake because he wanted a more docile government. It backfired.

Many writers are lambasting Bennett for being too greedy. Bennett had every right to make the demands he made because Bibi tried to screw him. Had Bibi not stampeded Bennett’s support to himself,in the last week before the elections, Bennett would have had 12 seats and would have gotten more than he got in this deal. What goes around, comes around.

By Alex Maistrovoy

In opposition, Lieberman hopes to rebrand himself as a “hawk” and a supporter of social equality.

Lieberman’s decision not to join the coalition was a surprise to many Israelis. What prompted the leader of Yisrael Beiteinu to take such step?

1. Joining the coalition would have silenced him. During his campaign, Lieberman strongly opposed funding ultra-orthodoxy Jews. He was opposed to canceling the bill, which seeks a more equitable sharing of the burden of military service in Israel, and the reform of conversion (giur).
Read more…

By Isi Leibler,

Following weeks of unedifying horse trading, threats and extortions, compounded by personal malice, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has finally cobbled together an untenable coalition with only a single-seat majority — which any single Knesset member in the coalition could bring down. To survive, it must be broadened.

Most Israelis are disappointed that a national unity government could not be formed at a time when we are faced with daunting political and diplomatic challenges, in particular further major tensions with the Obama administration.

Yet, there is still considerable speculation that, despite public protestations to the contrary, both Netanyahu and Isaac Herzog would prefer to create a unity government and that at a later stage, the coalition will be expanded to incorporate the Zionist Union or as a last resort, even Yesh Atid.
Read more…

BY HAVIV RETTIG GUR, TOI

At approximately 10 p.m. Wednesday, after 42 days of grueling negotiations and just two hours before the final deadline, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed his name to the final coalition agreement he needs to inaugurate his fourth government.

In a rare consensus across party lines and across the even more fractious fault lines of Israel’s partisan media, everyone seemed to agree that Netanyahu’s great 30-seat victory on Election Day had ended dismally.

The last coalition deal signed Wednesday with Jewish Home saw Netanyahu handing an eight-seat faction two top ministries — education and justice — together with the Agriculture Ministry, the Diaspora Ministry, the West Bank settlement planning and budgeting body, the chairmanship of the Knesset Law Committee and the state committee that appoints judges, the post of deputy defense minister, along with countless financial and legislative promises that have yet to be fully hammered out.
Read more…

Republicans beginning to aim for new breed of Orthodox Jews, who are angry at Democrats’ policy toward Israel.

By The Forward and Nathan Guttman, HAARETZ

Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky and 2016 U.S. presidential candidate, center, during a conversation with Jewish community leaders, New York, U.S., on Monday, April 27, 2015.

Democratic and Republican presidential candidates have long appreciated the importance of tapping into the pool of Jewish donors, who are among the most generous political contributors in the nation.

But until recently, Orthodox Jews have been an elusive target.
Read more…

T. Belman. What about the Levy Report.

By Moshe Cohen, INN

The new deal between Jewish Home and the Likud that led to the establishment of Binyamin Netanyahu’s new government is a “historic achievement for Religious Zionism,” the director of Jewish Home, Nir Orbach, said Thursday. “Today, there are no winners and losers,” Orbach said. “It is the state that has won and gained great representatives who will do their work faithfully.”

The deal was due to the hard work of party activists, who were dedicated to helping the party, despite the pressures and difficulties, said Orbach. “We would not be where we are today without their help.”

Under the deal with Likud, Jewish Home chairman Naftali Bennett will be named Education Minister, while Uri Ariel will be appointed Agricultural Minister, with responsibility for the government’s settlement division, which is largely responsible for construction in Judea and Samaria.
Read more…

By Christopher S. Carson,FPM
Which is the greater cave-in—cutting a terrible nuclear deal with Iran, or letting it flout the terms of even that deal? The question is now academic.

Let’s revisit the anticipated “Comprehensive Agreement on the Iranian nuclear program,” struck in outline form back on April 2^nd and supposed to be finalized by June 30^th. Foreign Minister Zarif announced at the time, “No agreement has been reached so we do not have any obligation yet.”

We should be so lucky. Under the deal, nothing will be done to stop Iran’s exporting of terrorism and its drive to dominate the Middle East, including its giving Hamas (a Sunni terrorist group) millions of dollars to re-dig new terror-tunnels in Gaza. Hamas’ Fedayeen use the tunnels to attack Israeli citizens.
Read more…

T. Belman. Given that Netanyahu is against reducing the High Court’s power and that he gave Kahlon a veto over any such changes, its hard to see what she can accomplish. Now Bayit Yehudi was also given control over  the Settlement Division and the Knesset’s Constitution, Law and Justice Committee and one of its MKs will be appointed deputy defense minister. I believe that the latter position includes construction in J&S. Does this empower Bennett to embrace the Levy Report and its recommendations? Bennett can make a big difference in charge of Education than he could have made as Foreign Mihnister.

YNET reports on Bennett’s victory

In a last minute move on Tuesday night, Bayit Yehudi demanded Shaked be appointed as justice minister.

Netanyahu agreed to the demand, on condition that Shaked not head the committee overseeing the nomination of new judges, does not have the authority to appoint rabbinical judges and does not head the Ministerial Committee for Legislation – three roles traditionally tasked to the justice minister.

Read more…

T. Belman. I am gravely concerned for Pamela’s life. This is no idle threat. Pamela was brave, not dumb, to put herself out there. The whole world has been debating whether what she did was right or wrong and that’s a good thing.

By Gary Bauer, President, AMERICAN VALUES

Supporters of the Islamic State posted an ominous warning last night vowing to kill Pamela Geller.

“Our aim was the [swine] Pamela Geller and to show her that we don’t care what land she hides in or what sky shields her; we will send all our Lions to achieve her slaughter. . . . everyone who houses her events, gives her a platform to spill her filth are legitimate targets,” the threat reads.

Many on the left, who are quick to defend flag burning as a form of “free speech,” have condemned Geller for her free speech. Sadly, some on the right, even in conservative media, have criticized her. They are wrong.
Read more…

Ayelet Shaked

The agreements reached between the Likud and Habayit Hayehudi pave the way for Netanyahu to form his fourth government.

Likud and Habayit Hayehudi coalition negotiating teams have reached an agreement: MK Ayelet Shaked will be appointed Minister of Justice, and will head the Ministerial Committee on Legislation. Shaked will also be a member of the Security Cabinet.

This paves the way for the establishment of Netanyahu’s fourth government. The time allotted for Netanyahu to form a coalition expires tonight at midnight.

According to the agreements that are expected to be signed with Habayit Hayehudi, party head Naftali Bennett will become Minister of Education, Uri Ariel will become Minister of Agriculture, and Ayelet Shaked will be appointed Minister of Justice. In addition, the party is expected to receive the position of Deputy Minister of Defense, responsible for the Civil Administration in Judea and Samaria.

Ayelet Shaked, says Judea and Samaria settlement pioneer Daniella Weiss, is the right person in the right place at the right time to serve as Justice Minister. “There are many issues – land ownership rights, construction permits, residents,the status of communities, and more – that she will have to deal with. And I am sure she will deal with them successfully.”
Read more…

Constitution? Liberty? Not today.

By Phyllis Chesler, BREITBARTS AND INN

We are living in infamous times. Reality outpaces fiction, and the worst case scenarios keep unfolding in our daily headlines.

Critics of torturers and mass murderers are demonized as “extremists” and “provocateurs.” Israel is accused of human rights atrocities it has never committed by those very entities who themselves actually commit such atrocities; anyone who points this out is deemed an “extreme conservative” and a “racist.” Anti-infidel hate speech—as long as it is directed against America and Israel—is seen as protected by the First Amendment and by the doctrine of Free Speech; exposing the diabolical Big Lies is consideredpolitically incorrect “racist” hate speech which has no place in the Western media, on campus, at the UN, or in any international human rights organization.
Read more…