Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: a US-Israel initiative”
Straight from the Jerusalem Boardroom #192, March 21, 2014
http://bit.ly/1di3l7v

h1. The Daily Telegraph, March 12, 2014: “Bilateral UK-Israel trade is booming to an extent never before imagined.  Last year it was estimated by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) at 5.1 billion British Pounds…. Prime Minister Cameron’s meetings in Israel are primarily about business, not the Kerry Plan. Look at who is on the plane with him: the Trade Minister, the CEO of the London Stock Exchange, the UK Chief Technology Officer, the Chief Technology Officer of Talk Talk, the Europe CEO of Balfour Beatty, the Chairman of Princess Production, the President of GSK’s Pharmaceuticals R&D, the Chairman of Arup UK Division, the ASOS’ Strategy Director, the founder of Kiwi Power, the Chairman of MyOptique, CEO of Tura, the CEO of Tech City…. [Israel expands] free trade agreements with the European Union, the US, the European Free Trade Association, Turkey. Mexico, Canada, Jordan and Egypt…. [According to the] FCO, ‘Israeli innovations give British companies a global competitive edge.’” Read more…

PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas must have gotten a kick out of it on Monday when he visited the White House and President Barack Obama praised him as “somebody who has consistently renounced violence, has consistently sought a diplomatic and peaceful solution that allows for two states, side by side, in peace and security.”

By Caroline Glick,  JPOST

After all, the same day the men met, Abbas’s regime continued its week-long celebration of the deadliest Palestinian terrorist attack on Israel to date.

On March 11, 1978, PLO terrorists commandeered a passenger bus on the coastal highway and massacred 37 people, including 12 children.

Dalal Mughrabi, a female terrorist, led the raid. Ever since, she has been lionized by the PLO.

While he met with Obama, Abbas’s adviser Sultan Abu al-Einein proclaimed that Mughrabi was the ultimate role model for Palestinian women.
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Jonathan S. Tobin COMMENTARY

Supporters of tough sanctions on Iran hailed the publication of a letter from 83 members of the U.S. Senate to President Obama calling on him to negotiate a deal with the Islamist regime that would preclude any chance that it could gain a nuclear weapon. The letter said that any agreement reached with Iran must deny the it the right to uranium enrichment, dismantle its enrichment and nuclear military research facilities as well as its plutonium plant, and be subjected to the kind of inspections that would prevent it from evading detection of violations and receive no further sanctions relief until the other terms are satisfied. AIPAC praised it as an “overwhelming demonstration by the U.S. Senate of its determination to prevent Iran from achieving nuclear weapons capability.”
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By GERALD STEINBERG

Unfortunately, Ambassador Faaborg-Andersen, like his predecessors, failed to address the particulars of EU funding for radical NGOs.

One of the major points of friction in the relationship between Israel and the European Union centers on the millions of euros provided by EU taxpayers to non-governmental organizations active in demonizing Israel and opposing peace.

Therefore, the efforts made by EU Ambassador Lars Faaborg-Andersen to engage with Israelis on this issue (“Setting the record straight on EU funding of NGOs in Israel,” The Jerusalem Post, 12 March) are important in resolving this troubling conflict.
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“You don’t threaten the prime minister,” say sources close to Netanyahu after Danon threatens to resign over terrorist release.

By Elad Benari, INN

It should be remembered that the State Department was against the recognition of Israel’s Declaration of Independence and wanted to vote against it. The US also had an embargo on arms shipments to Israel from before the Declaration to after the 6 Day War. Eisenhower ordered Israel out of the Sinai after she conquered it in 1956. Ted Belman

By Rafael Medoff, ALGEMEINER

Secretary of State John Kerry, pictured here with Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat and Israeli negotiator Tzipi Livni, last week called it a “mistake” to continue to ask for Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state in efforts to reach a peace agreement. Photo: State Department.

JNS.org – Secretary of State John Kerry’s remark last week that it is a “mistake” to insist that the Palestinian Authority recognize Israel as a Jewish state brings to mind a little-known episode in the early 1950s, when the Eisenhower administration briefly embraced the notion that Israel should stop identifying itself as a Jewish state.
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By Ted Belman

When I posted on the controversy surround the conversion bill yesterday, it was not clear to me what Bayit Yehudi was upset about.

JPOST made it clear today.

Deputy Religious Services Minister Eli Ben-Dahan of Bayit Yehudi is opposed to the clauses in the bill which would end the Chief Rabbinate’s centralized control over the conversion process, which is one of the central goals of Stern’s bill.

Bayit Yehudi also opposes language used to in the bill to preserve the current status of Reform and Conservative conversions.

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[The US continues to support the Islamists and won’t help al Sisi defeat them.]

The deal would include advanced aircraft, monitoring equipment and other sophisticated weapons that would be used to fight terrorism emanating from Sinai.

By Ariel Ben Solomon, JPOST

By Ted Belman

Russia threatens to change stance on Iran because of Crimea sanctions. This could be good news for Israel. The more difficult the negotiations are with Iran, the more likely the US will give Israel to go ahead to attack.
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DEBKA

That Israel’s military chiefs have not yet come up with an answer for the attacks building up from Syrian territory – four this month – was apparent in its responses to the bomb which Tuesday, March 18 injured four paratroopers – one seriously – who were manning Post 104 near the Golan village of Majdal Shams.

Artillery and rocket fire was instantaneously directed at a Syrian army post near Quneitra. Then, before dawn Wednesday, Israeli warplanes struck Syrian posts, command centers and artillery batteries in the Quneitra region of Syrian Golan.
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Wilson is wrong to write “if one were to take an upper estimate of the number of Arabs in the West Bank (some claim over of 2.5 million people) and add it to the number of Arabs in Israel, then these people would still constitute less than a third of the overall population.” This is only true if you take the correct number of 1.6 million Arabs. Ted Belman

By Tom Wilson, COMMENTARY

Figures released today show that Israel’s demographic situation continues to move in a direction that is positive for the future of the Jewish state, quite in contravention to the prevailing wisdom about Israel’s impending demographic peril. Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics has released the birthrate figures for 2013, revealing that the Jewish birthrate is continuing to rise as the Muslim birthrate is continuing to decline. While population projections are by their nature often inaccurate on account of the myriad unforeseeable variables, it seems that this is a front on which Israelis can afford to feel some optimism. Yet, despite the growing body of evidence to the contrary, there is no shortage of voices warning Israel of imminent demographic doom. This is a central tenant of the doctrine of the Israeli left, and it is also a threat with which President Obama has increasingly been seeking to panic Israel.
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By Tricia Aven, Ph.D., CAMERA

The Telos Group is one of the primary engines driving a new movement in the Evangelical Christian world. Under the guise of being pro – everyone, pro – peace and pro – justice, this movement is moving Evangelicals away from their historic position of support for Israel toward unreflective support for the Palestinian cause.

The organization is headquartered in Washington, DC, and was co-founded in 2009 by California-born lawyer of Palestinian Christian descent Gregory Khalil and evangelical Christian and former State Department employee Todd Deatherage. On its homepage, Telos describes itself as “genuinely pro-Israeli, pro-Palestinian, pro-American, and pro- peace, all at the same time.” Likewise, the group’s vision, mission and activities sound promising on the surface. Read more…

By Ted Belman

According to Haaretz, Netanyahu orders IDF to prepare for possible strike on Iran during 2014 at a cost of $2.9 billion which is the same as last years cost.

And this is just for preparation. Netanyahu has said that he won’t be bound by the current negotiations. Therefore it would appear that Israel is putting her money where his mouth is,

By Ted Belman

MK Ayelet Shaked backed a new law that would substantially increase the penalties and punishment for thieves who steal produce and equipment from farms and agricultural facilities to help Israeli farmers.

Farm thefts have become a major plague throughout Israel, with Palestinian and Bedouin gangs stealing crops, animals, and farming equipment, often on a large scale. Just a few weeks ago, for example, alert soldiers in Samaria managed to stop a massive sheep heist that could have dealt a serious blow to a local Jewish couple’s livelihood.
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[See also: ‘Illegal Leader’ Abbas’s Life is in Danger, Says Prof Rafi Israeli]

By DAN DIKER, JPOST

Palestinian rejection of the current US framework paper may signal the end of the Palestinian statehood project for the foreseeable future.

The March 17 meeting between US President Barack Obama and PA President Mahmoud Abbas revealed little new information. There was no breakthrough.

This is little surprise; Abbas finds himself hemmed in by the US framework agreement, cornered by unprecedented dissension within the Fatah party, and left bereft of Palestinian support in the West Bank and Gaza.
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By YAAKOV LAPPIN, JPOST

IDF jeep on northern border Photo: REUTERS

At the end of February, Hezbollah broadcast its most direct threat to Israel in years via the terror organization’s Al-Manar TV station.

“This aggression won’t stand without a response,” the group said, referring to a reported Israel Air Force strike on a Hezbollah base in east Lebanon, allegedly targeting advanced weapons that arrived from Syria.
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Ted Belman This Bill proposes to reward or compensate people who serve by absolving them of VAT charges on their first home purchase. As such it is not racist. What is racist is the Arab refusal to serve.

By Moran Azulay, YNET NEWS

The attorney of Knesset Member Ahmad Tibi (Ra’am-Ta’al) issued a letter to Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein and Finance Minister Yair Lapid on Tuesday, in which he opposes the army service criterion in Lapid’s plan to grant a VAT exemption to those who seek to purchase their first apartment from a contractor.

“It is a discriminatory and unacceptable condition based on racism, because, in essence, it is aimed mainly at the Arab population, a fifth of the Israeli population, as well as the haredi sector that do not meet the requirements.”
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Defense Minister Yaalon: We will make Syria regret its actions

“We hold the Assad regime responsible for what happens in its territory and if it continues to collaborate with terrorists striving to hurt Israel then we will keep on exacting a heavy price from it and make it regret its actions,” Defense Minister Ya’alon said.

Ya’alon also added that Israel will not tolerate any violation of its sovereignty and harm its soldiers and citizens, and we will respond with determination and strength to all who will work against us”. (Yoav Zitun)

Army attacks four targets, including a training camp, an artillery battery and Syrian army headquarters.

By Yoav Zitun, Roi Kais, YNET NEWS

The Israeli Air Force attacked four Syrian army targets in southern Syria overnight Tuesday in retaliation for the attack against IDF soldiers on the Golan Heights border, that left four soldiers wounded – one of them in critical condition.

The strike targeted a training camp, an artillery battery and Syrian army headquarters in the Syrian Golan.

On Tuesday afternoon, an explosive device detonated near an IDF patrol jeep traveling along Israel’s border fence with Syria in the area south of the Druze village of Majdal Shams. Four IDF soldiers were wounded in the blast, one was in serious condition, the others were in light to moderate condition.
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