By Rachel Avraham, Jerusalem Online

MEMRI noted that Jasser Al Jasser furthermore wrote in the Saudi newspaper Al Jazirah: “Several analysts, if not all, regard Obama’s letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader as indicative of a pro-Iranian bias and as a continuation of Obama’s negative policy towards the Arabs. This because it allows Iran freedom of action in the Arab region despite all the suspicions about the Iranian regime’s complicity in terror! This American and Western bias in favor of Iran and against Arab interests refutes everything that has been said about the nature of the U.S. alliance with the Arab countries. The agreement that the Americans currently want to sign with the Iranian regime places the Arab interests ‘on the negotiating table,’ after the concerned Arab countries have been kept away from the negotiations. The absence of the Arabs from the negotiations has led to the expected results: Iranian interests may grow stronger and gain precedence in the Arab region, at the expense of Arab interests.”

Diplomats say Canada and Australia are also helping Israel exert pressure on Switzerland and other states to thwart confab on conditions in West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

By Barak Ravid, HAARETZ

Israel and the United States are trying to dissuade the nearly 200 states that are party to the Fourth Geneva Convention from convening a special session in mid-December to address conditions in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, Israeli and Western diplomats told Haaretz Wednesday.

Government officials believe that convention sponsor Switzerland has come under strong pressure from the Palestinians and Arab states, and is expected to issue invitations to the conference within days.
Read more…

With help of IDF, investigation of Hamas terror cell in West Bank yields mass arrests, uncovers series of plots to attack Israelis.

Yoav Zitun, YNET

A Shin Bet operation, with the aid of the IDF, exposed a Hamas terror cell and thwarted its foreign-trained members from executing a number of attacks on Israeli destinations, it was cleared for publication Thursday.

The terrorists were receiving orders from Hamas’ Turkey delegation. During the investigation, more than 30 suspects were arrested; explosive devices, M-16 rifles, and ammunition were confiscated.

The Hamas terrorists were ordered to undertake a number of operations against Israeli destinations in the West Bank, including infiltration attacks, kidnapping attacks, car bombings, an attack on Teddy Stadium in Jerusalem, and an attack on the light rail train in the capital.
Read more…

I JUST RECEIVED THIS EMAIL.

Your everything will be hacked
Hey fucking ted!
Be ready for a new war between you and me! I hacked your pc & other secure properties that you don’t know! If you recover I’ll hack again! You don’t know my programming power for hacking!! Be ready…

I’ll hack your everything day by day; everything! Fucking israeli bitch!

If any of you were kind enough to make a donation in the last week please make sure the money went to my Paypal account.

I had an old gmail address that I never use namely, tedbelman90@gmail.com

It was appropriated by the hacker and he then altered my Donate buttons on Israpundit but not the Daily Digest so that donations which used those buttons went to his Paypal account using my old address.

He sent the email above from that address

See also: Court Steps in to Prevent Terrorist’s House Demolition

Temporary legislation formulated by MK Yariv Levin calls for harsh punitive measures against terrorists, their families and supporters.

By Cynthia Blank, INN

Matters of Life and Death

By Michael Ordman

When the regular news is full of distressing events, such as the recent terrorist attacks in Jerusalem, I try to focus my weekly positive news feature on the many life-affirming stories from Israel that barely get any attention in the international media.

Israeli scientists at Tel Aviv University stumbled onto a discovery that can help bring new life into the world.  Whilst researching the protein Interleukin-1 (IL-1), they discovered that its genetic deletion actually improves fertility.  It could help increase the effectiveness of IVF treatment.  If a baby is born prematurely and needs to be placed on a ventilation machine, Israeli medical device manufacturer, Pneumedicare, has developed a potential lifesaver.  The Pneumonitor detects the common dangerous condition pneumothorax, in which the preemie’s tiny air sacs can over-inflate and burst.  Pneumonitor’s alarm sounds an hour before any problem arises. Read more…

Prime minister announces contentious legislation to be brought to government vote Sunday, as MKs clash during lively session debate.

Moran Azulay, YNET

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to attend a Knesset plenum on Wednesday evening, after legislators invoked the “40 signature” rule. While the scheduled debate centered on the cost of living, MKs used the opportunity to challenge the prime minister on the “Jewish nationhood” bill.

Throughout the session, members of Knesset were called to order, with several opposition legislators being directed to leave the plenum by Knesset Chairman Yuli Edelstein.

Netanyahu took to the podium towards the end of the session to defend his decisions on the controversial legislation, officially defining Israel as a Jewish state, and to present the principles of his proposal. “The bill I will present will be based on Israel being a Jewish and democratic state. Israel guarantees equality of personal rights to all its citizens without discrimination based on religion, race, and gender.”
Read more…

By Seth Mandel, COMMENTARY

Part of the coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is pretending to hold actors and institutions involved to a higher set of expectations than experience would dictate. Over the course of last summer’s war between Hamas in Gaza and the Israel Defense Forces, this meant propagating the idea that it was in any way shocking when the terrorist organization’s weapons–stockpiled for the express purpose of killing Jews in a maniacal, genocidal campaign–turned up, repeatedly, at schools run by UNRWA: the UN agency dedicated to keeping Palestinians living like refugees in perpetuity.

So now it’s unclear precisely how to react to a raft of stories demonstrating the reason it wasn’t surprising to find Hamas weapons in UNRWA schools: because UNRWA teachers and principles share Hamas’s violently anti-Semitic ideology. Yet in fact this is newsworthy, for an important reason beyond the obvious. First, though, it’s instructive to see just what American taxpayers are getting for their UNRWA money.
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Aharonovich advances bill to blacklist Hamas-linked Islamist groups who harass Jews, attack police on Judaism’s holiest site.

By Ido Ben-Porat, Ari Yashar, INN

Extremist group behind pro-BDS NGOs announces its partnership with Birthright cancelled for trying to ‘influence Israeli policy.’

By Ari Yashar, INN

The radical leftist group New Israel Fund (NIF) announced earlier this monththat its partnership with Taglit-Birthright Israel, Birthright Israel NEXT and Young Judea in which it guided trips to Israel for young American Jews has been cancelled.

NIF announced the development in a letter penned by the group’s director in the New York Tri-State area Stephanie Ives, which was obtained by Ron Torossian, CEO of the PR agency 5WPR and a regular Arutz Shevacontributor.

According to the group, they had been given three reasons for the cancellation, the first being that “Birthright Israel determined that [NIF’s] marketing of the trip was in violation of their policy because our NIF logo was slightly larger than the Birthright Israel logo.”
Read more…

By Raymond Ibrahim, FPM

Russia appears to be taking serious moves to combat the “radicalization” of Muslims within its border.

Recent pro-Islamic reports are complaining that Russia is banning the Islamic hijab—the headdress Islamic law requires Muslim women to wear—and, perhaps even more decisively, key Islamic scriptures, on the charge that they incite terrorism.

In the words of Arabic news site Elaph, “Russia is witnessing a relentless war on the hijab. It began in a limited manner but has grown in strength, prompting great concern among Russia’s Muslims.”

The report continues by saying that women wearing the hijab are being “harassed” especially in the “big cities”; that they are encountering difficulties getting jobs and being “subject to embarrassing situations in public areas and transportation. The situation has gotten to the point that even educational institutions, including universities, have issued decrees banning the wearing of the hijab altogether.”
Read more…

Israel’s ceasefire policy with Hamas is fundamentally mistaken, says the son of the Islamist group’s West Bank chief. It simply gives Hamas time to rearm, when it can and must be urgently uprooted

BY AVI ISSACHAROFF, TOI

To get to peace with the Palestinians, Israel needs to go to war against Hamas in Gaza, and fast.” That’s the view of Mosab Hasan Yousef, better known as the “Green Prince,” the son of West Bank Hamas chief Sheikh Hasan Yousef.

Mosab Yousef, who was a Shin Bet agent from 1997 to 2007, at the same time as he ran his father’s office, is well aware of the significance of what he is saying. “I know that this will sound to some people like dangerous rhetoric, a push for war, but my motivation is precisely the opposite. I’m speaking out because you can’t deal with reality by running away from it. You can’t take refuge in temporary solutions. Hamas has to be tackled at its roots, uprooted once and for all, and now is the perfect moment to deal with Hamas militarily in Gaza. The longer Israel waits,” he warned, “the more dangerous an enemy Hamas will become and the harder the battle. This is the time to initiate a war against Hamas.”

Now based in the US, Mosab Yusef is currently on a visit to Israel, and I met with him in Tel Aviv. It was five years ago that I first revealed that he was an agent assisting the Shin Bet — Israel’s most reliable source in Hamas, central to the prevention of numerous suicide bombings and attacks, and to the exposure of Hamas terror cells — and the identity of his handler, “Captain Loai,” Gonen Ben Itzhak. As we sat together near the Tel Aviv beach, his criticisms of Israeli government policy were clear and fierce.
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By Prof Abraham Ben-Zvi, ISRAEL HAYOM

U.S. President Barack Obama had a hard time disguising his delight when he announced Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s forced resignation Monday, after less than two years in office.

Hagel’s smiles were equally forced during the press conference that focused on his de facto ouster, but the artificial appearance of harmony and amicability within the administration was maintained to the very last moment, as mandated by kitschy American tradition.

This brought the current chapter in the career of the former senator (R-Neb.) to an early end, before he had the chance to make his mark on the security doctrine exercised by the American superpower, but not before he was made into a convenient patsy for “all the president’s men.”
Read more…

Gaza calls on international powers to reprimand Israel on ‘racist’ law, says it will ’cause holy war.’

By Tova Dvorin, INN

See also: AIPAC urges new sanctions in wake of Iran talks extension

Dems, Republicans promise new sanctions on Tehran, no more cooperation

BY: Adam Kredo, FREE BEACON

VIENNA—Just hours after Secretary of State John Kerry announced that talks between Iran and the West ended in failure, congressional leaders are planning to take their own action against Tehran in a legislative bid to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons, according to multiple lawmakers and senior congressional insiders familiar with the strategy.

Negotiations between the United States and Iran will resume as early as December and continue through July 2015 as the sides seek to overcome an impasse over Tehran’s demands that it be permitted to retain the most controversial aspects of its nuclear work, Kerry told reporters during a press conference Monday evening, originally the deadline for talks.

A final framework should be finished in four months, giving negotiators until July to hash out a finished framework, Kerry said, underscoring that negotiations with Tehran remain “tough” and “they’re going to stay tough.”
Read more…

Recently I took the position that we must choose our battles and that now was not the time to fight for the right to pray on the Temple Mount. A number of people wrote to me trying to get me to change my mind and sent me a number of articles in support of our right. I replied that none of these articles mention a commitment by Israel to allow the Waqf to determine who can pray there. Where upon he sent me Article 9 of the Peace Treaty between Jordan and Israel signed in 1994 which included the provision

“The parties will act together to promote interfaith relations among the three monotheistic religions with the aim of working towards religious understanding, moral commitment, freedom of religious worship, and tolerance and peace.

” So I dug further.

One lawyer wrote

:”Challenges have been brought in court against the prohibition of Jewish prayer and the courts have ruled that prayer is permissable but have allowed the police discretion to deny Jews that right in the interest of maintaining the peace. That, of course, means allowing masses of people behaving criminally to override the legal rights of others. It makes rule of law subject to the agreement of violent criminals. In any case, I know of not such formal relinquishment of Jewish right.”.

Read more…

There is a strategic Palestinian Arab plan. The pulling on Al Aqsa can lead to an unraveling of the whole Zionist enterprise. We ignore it at our peril.

Matan Peleg and Douglas Altabef, INN

In Jewish tradition, the Temple Mount, Har Habayit, is uniquely holy, special and significant.

Not only the site of the site of the First and Second Temples, the Mount, Mount Moriah, is considered to be the site of where Abraham sacrificed Isaac, Jacob dreamed of the ladder ascending to heaven, and in some interpretations, the site of Gan Eden itself.

Al Aqsa occupies a corner of the Mount, part of the Herodian extension, not considered to be of any significant stature by Jews, and frankly, a place of zero interest to us
And while our political leaders are eager to mute its significance, our adversaries have correctly perceived its importance. In true supersecessionist fashion, they have raised the Temple Mount as an existential issue in the form of mythical threats to the Al Aqsa mosque.
Read more…

By Ted Belman

The U.S. State Department said Monday evening that it expected Israel to “stick to its democratic principles,” in its first response to the Jewish nation-state bill.

“Israel is a Jewish and democratic state and all its citizens should enjoy equal rights. We expect Israel to stick to its democratic principles,” the State Department said.

First of all there is nothing undemocratic about the bill.

The US has no business telling us what laws to pass.

These criticisms are meant to discredit Zionism.  Zionism is not racism.

Paterson tells leader of Conservatives how to leave the EU.

By Richard North, 

The actual speech text is here, delivered at 11 am this morning. It is reviewed in The Times, in the Telegraph, the BBC, the New Statesman and elsewhere (140 reports and counting).

The essence of speech is that, instead of pussy-footing around, Cameron should cut to the chase and commit to invoking Article 50 the moment a Conservative government takes office after the election. With an electoral mandate, there is no need for a referendum.

Negotiations on a exit settlement should then proceed, using the “Norway option” as the base, involving joining EFTA and adopting the EEA agreement. Additionally, the entire EU body of law should be repatriated, to ensure legislative continuity, allowing for selective repeal and amendment as appropriate and necessary.
Read more…

By Vic Rosenthal

Narrative is everything in information warfare.

If you give your enemy the narrative, then the game is tilted in his favor from the start.
Read more…