by Steve Kramer 

Israel achieved democracy the hard way. A precursor was that one-third of all Jews were murdered in Europe in the 1930s-1940s and about 140,000 thousands survivors immigrated to Israel after its independence in 1948, after being kept in Displaced Persons camps (often former concentration camps!). 800,000 Jews were forced from their homes in Arab countries of North Africa and East Asia before and after Israel’s statehood and about three-quarters of them also made Aliyah. In addition, more than 50,000 Holocaust survivors left British internment camps in Cyprus – after being interned for the crime of fleeing Europe – to join the nascent Jewish state.
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T. Belman. Haskel, and National Unity, are to be commended for their reasonable stand. They are only asking for a week or two. If they can agree to a deal, leaving Yesh Atid in the dust, that will be good for the country. But why haven’t they made a proposal so that the prospects of a deal can be evaluated. Democracy doesn’t demand that the legislative process be stopped, just the opposite.

I suggest they make a proposal in writing. If the government thinks it has merit then and only then can it suspend the process for a week or two.

MK Sharren Haskel says her party is willing to discuss the judicial reform, even without Yesh Atid and Labor.

By Hezki Baruch, INN     3.3.23

Sharren HaskelIsrael National News

MK Sharren Haskel (National Unity Party) spoke to Israel National News on Thursday and commented on an initiative of MKs Yuli Edelstein, Gadi Eizenkot, Hili Tropper and Danny Danon, who called for the promotion of dialogue on the judicial reform that would take place at the President’s Residence.

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Going it alone.

by Hugh Fitzgerald, FPM       3.3.23

Gary Cooper in HIGH NOON

In World War II, after Germany had conquered most of Europe, and just after the Fall of France, leaving England alone in Europe to carry on against the Nazis, a cartoon by the artist Low appeared, showing a defiant Englishman shaking his fist at the sky, and underneath was the caption “Very well, then—alone.” This cartoon comes naturally to mind when we consider the threat that a nuclear-armed Iran poses to the world, and the certainty that only one country can be counted on to prevent that threat from being realizing. Tiny Israel is now having its “very well then – alone” moment. More on Israel confronting Iran alone can be found here: “Israel Must Prepare to Save the World from a Nuclear Iran,” by Richard Goldberg, FDD, February 24, 2023:

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T. Belman.  Neither of these steps will deter Israel. Even if Biden chooses to not veto an anti-Israel UNSC resolution as Obama did, Israel will not be deterred from its agenda. Passing Judicial Reform and keeping J&S are way too important.

Washington has tried to play nice with the extremist Israeli government, but as its messages seemingly fall on deaf ears, it does have tougher options at its disposal

By Ben Samuels, HAARETZ

WASHINGTON – This week’s horrific scenes in the West Bank, when settlers attacked scores of Palestinians in Hawara in response to a deadly terror attack, raise more questions about the strategy the Biden administration has adopted in the months since Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist government came to power.

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Universalism has undermined it from both inside and out. 

By Melanie Phillips

(JNS) The huge demonstrations that continue in Israel and turned violent this week are fueled by the claim that the government’s judicial reform package spells the end of Israeli democracy.

It is, of course, beyond nonsensical to try to bring down a democratically elected government with calls for “bloodshed on the streets” and “civil war” on the basis that—according to the organizers of Wednesday’s “day of disruption”—the government is a “regime” attempting a “coup” against democracy.

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BY TYLER DURDEN, ZERO HEDGE

Three years ago few of us knew the impending storm that was brewing; one that would upend the very fabric of global democracy, destroy whole communities, businesses and families and cause a vast number of children and adolescents to become unmoored and disengage from society, among many other deleterious outcomes.

Perhaps most chilling of all has been the sinister turn in those three years of what was once seemingly a force for good, “public health;” which changed into a punitive and authoritarian entity that wilfully engages in iatrogenesis and the disenfranchisement of those skeptical of the medical-industrial complex through widespread and draconian vaccine mandates.
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Top Israeli officials have all made direct threats against Iran. US-Israeli F-35 aircraft drills have helped make this option a possibility.

By YONAH JEREMY BOB, JPOST      25.2.23

PREPARING FOR a joint mission? US and Israeli fighter jets participate in the Juniper Oak drill over the Negev in January.
(photo credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON’S UNIT)

White, yellow and purple fire erupted from their engines like a volcano.

The force of the explosion in their engines was deafening, even at a distance of a couple of hundred meters, and slightly shook the entire area.

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PM reportedly was going to agree to freeze bills for up to ten days yesterday, relented when Justice Minister Levin threatened to resign.

Israel National News

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intended to announce the suspension of the legislation on the government’s planned judicial reforms during his speech last night on the widespread protests against the reforms, according to a report by Channel 13 News.

Netanyahu reportedly intended to propose that the advancement of the legislation be frozen for a week to ten days to allow for negotiations with the opposition to take place under President Isaac Herzog’s proposal.

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Rendering them completely stateless is a closer step in the right direction.

by Jason D. Hill, FPM  2.2.23

The decision on Wednesday, February 22, 2023 to pass a law to strip Arab-Israeli terrorists of their citizenship for receiving financial rewards from the Palestinian Authority is a deep moral mandate that should have been established decades ago.

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Israeli officials and the media continuously warn about the dangers of the upcoming Islamic holy month – but is this a self-fulfilling prophecy?

By Hillel Frisch, IH    3.2.23

It has become commonplace for officials, analysts, and correspondents to warn about the dangers of the upcoming month of Ramadan and the Palestinian violence that will ensue. This has especially been the case after the May 2021 Hamas campaign against Israel, and even more so since the election of the “most right-wing” government Israel has ever had.
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By Andrew Thornebrooke, EPOCH TIMES    1.3.23

U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Linda Thomas-Greenfield, speaks during a press conference at the U.N. Headquarters in New York on March 1, 2021. (Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images)

The U.N. consistently demonstrates an anti-Israel bias and is overly beholden to authoritarian regimes, including China and Russia, according to testimony during a U.S. House subcommittee hearing on March 1.

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T. Belman. The death penalty may not act as a deterrent but it certainly delivers justice and is a fitting punishment for the crime. What would act as a deterrence is the termination of all financial support given by the PA to the murderers. By financially supporting the PA, the EU and the US both support the the terror which it advocates.

Germany’s foreign minister, diplomatic official voice opposition to legislation making its way through Knesset amid spike in Palestinian terror attacks

By LAZAR BERMAN, TOI 1 March 2023, 4:57 pm

As Israel advances a bill that would allow courts to impose the death penalty for deadly terror attacks against Israeli citizens, a European diplomat warned that its successful passage would transform relations between Israel and the continent.

The Knesset plenum on Wednesday gave preliminary approval to the bill, an item that National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s far-right Otzma Yehudit party has long been pushing for. It is set to be discussed by the high-level security cabinet, which is seen as likely to insert modifications.
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Brian Berletic

by David M. Litman, ALGEMEINER

Masked Palestinian youths clash with Israeli security forces on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. Photo: Reuters/Ammar Awad

In yet another display of Christiane Amanpour’s prioritization of her disdain for Israel over journalistic integrity, the CNN anchor appears to have fabricated poll results to falsely suggest that the Palestinian side supports the two-state solution with Israel.

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The White House keeps the visit quiet around Lula’s visit to see Biden.

By The Editorial Board, WSJ

A Brazilian flag waves while the Iranian warship IRIS Makran sails on the coast of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on February 27,PHOTO: CARL DE SOUZA/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

The arrival of two Iranian warships in Brazil on Sunday is unsettling for democracies in the Western hemisphere. Worse is that the Biden Administration seems to have been complicit in trying to bury the news.

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T. Belman. Yes, the US is openly challenging this government and will not back down. This time, hopefully Israel has the strength and determination to say “no”.

Anyone who doesn’t see how President Joe Biden’s administration is quietly marching toward a Kissinger-level pressure doesn’t know US diplomacy or is willingly blind.

By  Dan Margalit, IH    03-01-2023 

America is probably the most tolerant, liberal, and democratic empire ever seen in international relations. The founding father George Washington cast it as a new world that would have nothing to do with the old ways of the corrupt Old World. He saw the ocean as the best way to protect it. Read more…

Tucker Carlson:

“The origins of Covid was never a secret. The people who knew lied about the truth.”pic.twitter.com/ttmrSfopfY

— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) February 28, 2023

Tear gas also fired at crowds blocking Ayalon Highway, with several reported wounded; police use water cannons, horses in bid to break up rally

TIMES OF ISRAEL IS LIVE BLOGGING EVENTS TODAY.

Protesters clash with Israeli security forces during a demonstration against the government’s controversial justice reform bill in Tel Aviv on March 1, 2023. (Photo by JACK GUEZ / AFP)

The protestors are doing their best t make the protests newsworthy. The more laws they violate, the more attention they get from the media.

Ben Gvir with Netanyahu’s support permitted police to use water cannon and stun grenades to quell the lawless protestors.