US officials quoted saying policy aimed at limiting influence of next coalition’s most hardline members; US policy on Iran, Saudi Arabia could be leveraged to pressure incoming PM

By JACOB MAGID, TOI 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) holds a joint press conference with then-US vice president Joe Biden at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, March 9, 2016. (Amit Shabi/Pool)

US President Joe Biden’s administration reportedly plans to hold expected incoming prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu personally responsible for the actions of the far-right lawmakers he is expected to soon appoint as senior ministers in his next government.

The stance, revealed in a Tuesday report by the Politico website, is a central part of the policy that the White House has been crafting as it readies to once again work with a Netanyahu government in Jerusalem after a year in which ties warmed, thanks to a more moderate coalition led by former prime minister Naftali Bennett and outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid.

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Continuing the war harms the West and endangers its battle to attain other critical strategic objectives. 

By Professor Efraim Inbar, INN

Prof. Efraim Inbar, JNSS

The Western support for Ukraine in its war against Russia is unlikely to achieve a Russian defeat. Moreover, it has become an enormous burden, putting at risk the West attaining its other critical strategic objectives.

Everybody understands that the war will not end with restoring Ukrainian territorial integrity, as its president, Volodymyr Zelensky, demands. Crimea and the Donbas region, populated by ethnic Russians, are unlikely to revert to Ukrainian rule. The staying power of Russia is more substantial than Ukraine’s, and thus despite economic difficulties and military problems, Russia will not likely submit to Ukraine’s conditions. Moscow will probably continue its war of attrition, exacting a high price on Ukraine’s infrastructure and army.

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By Randy DeSoto, REPUBLIC BRIEF  December 20, 2022

Arizona Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson ruled Monday night that two issues at the heart of Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s election challenge will go to trial.

The lawsuit filed against Maricopa County election officials and Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs challenged the validity of Hobbs’ win over Lake by just over 17,000 votes in the Nov. 8 governor’s race.

Hobbs and Maricopa County had filed a motion to dismiss the entire election challenge.

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by Con Coughlin, GATESTONE 20.12.22

The Chinese and the Saudi flags fly in Riyadh, on December 7, 2022, ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to the Saudi capital. (Photo by Fayez Nureldine/AFP via Getty Images)

Nothing better illustrates the utter ineptitude of the Biden administration’s dealings with the Middle East than Saudi Arabia’s decision to forge a strategic alliance with China.

• Biden set the tone for his strained relationship with the Saudi royal family during the 2020 presidential election contest when he denounced the kingdom as a “pariah” state over its involvement in the murder of Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul in 2018, although there has never any audible distress from the Biden administration over Iran’s 2007 abduction and presumed death of ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson.

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T. Belman. I know  Joseph Puder personally  and respect his work. Although I have been skeptical about the reports of a growing alliance, I don’t discount the possibility also. Puder is always worth reading.

The strengthening Unholy Alliance.

By Joseph Puder, FPM      20.12.22

The kamikaze drones the Ayatollahs of Iran provided Russia to aid Moscow’s war against Ukraine are merely a precursor for a full-fledged alliance. The pact between the two nations includes communist China as well. This emerging unholy alliance does worry the western world, and Israel. Iran has now permitted Moscow (for pay) to improve its drone accuracy and distance, as well as that of the Iranian provided rockets. This should concern not only the Ukrainians but Israel as well. Iran is more than likely to transfer the technologically improved drones to Hezbollah terrorists. Putin, Russia’s desperate president, may even seek to limit, if not deny, Israel’s preventive attacks in Syria against Iranian transfers of arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon. Perhaps even more worrisome is the prospect of Russia aiding the Islamic Republic to complete the weaponization of its nuclear program.

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T. Belman. I am concerned by what the Judge says she must prove. He set a criminal standard which requires intention on the part of Hobbs. Turley says the law is otherwise.

T. Belman. This article fails to mention what the US’s position is on the Iranian atomic threat. To my mind it is a huge issue and this article should have highlighted the US policy is regarding it.

“The strategy itself has a major section that discusses “out-competing China and constraining Russia” and terms climate change “the existential challenge of our time.”

The US is crazy.  First it allows China to grow so strong as to become a real economic threat to the US. Only now does it realize that it must out-compete  them. The US should be embracing Russia, not constraining it. Russia is no threat to the US but a Russian-Chinese alliance could be. The last item is misguided at best.

Nor does it mention that it is doing its utmost to constrain Israel from acting independently of the US.

by Dov S. Zakheim, JS TRBUNE     November 2022

Outlining his foreign policy objectives in 2020 in the magazine Foreign Affairs, then presidential candidate Joe Biden asserted that “it is past time to end the forever wars.” Indeed, as president, he withdrew all troops in a frenzied retreat from Afghanistan and reduced troop levels in Iraq by more than half. Ending the “forever wars” has been only a part of Biden’s longer-term strategy for the Middle East, however. Instead, his objective, like that of his two predecessors, is to downgrade the importance of the Middle East in American strategy.

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With low costs, immersion in the Start-Up Nation and antisemitism spiking, it’s no wonder students are choosing the Jewish state. Op-ed.

By Shlomo Annapolle, INN

Hi tech exhibitFlash 90

(JNS) There are many reasons why students choose to pack their bags and study in Israel. After all, there aren’t many destinations where you can get a world-class education in one of the most innovative countries in the world, while surrounded by history and basking in sunshine for (most of) the year.

This is why—according to the Israeli Council for Higher Education—approximately 12,000 foreign students each year choose to make Israel their home away from home. What’s more, in contrast to declining international student enrollment in other countries, the COVID-19 pandemic actually amplified interest in Israel as a study abroad destination.

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by David Mark. ISRAEL UNWIRED      March 7, 2022

American media has molded the current narrative about the Russia-Ukraine conflict to suit the needs of the political class in both major political parties. Across the political spectrum. Russia has become the unprovoked aggressor and Ukraine the innocent victim. Is this really the truth?

While most Americans and those living in Western Europe have adopted the Russia “bad guy” narrative, most people only tuned in days after the official conflict was said to begin – meaning when Russia invaded Ukraine. The media and the political class rely on their low informed, high distracted populace to be clueless about the actual event and the real historical record.

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A candle is a brief flare of light. A wick dipped in oil burns and goes out again. The Hanukkah light appears no different, but it is.

By Daniel Greenfield, INN  19.12.22

Out of the exile of Babylon, the handful that returned to resettle and rebuild the land faced the might of new empires. The Jews who returned from the exile of one evil empire some twenty-six hundred years ago were forced to decide whether they would be a people with their own faith and history, or the colony of another empire, with its history and beliefs.

Jerusalem’s wealthy elites threw in their lot with the empire and its ways. But out in the rural heartland where the old ways where still kept, a spark flared to life. Modi’in. Maccabee.
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T. Belman. Neither Russia nor the US is our friend. Bringing back the Quartet will achieve nothing. Israel must do what it must do and ignore the international community.

https://www.jns.org/biden-admin-demands-israel-provide-equal-allocation-of-resources-to-countering-israeli-extremists-and-palestinian-violence/

Moscow’s ambassador to United Nations slams Washington’s ‘monopoly’ over Mideast negotiations, accuses Israel of settlement expansion

by Jonathan Lis, HAARETZ  20.12.22

Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations has slammed recent efforts by the United States to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict, arguing that, since 2014, Washington’s involvement has created the stalemate that exists today.

During a Security Council meeting in New York on Monday, Vasily Nebenzya said that history has proven many times that the United States’ efforts to monopolize the Middle East peace process have been doomed to failure. He added that the U.S. only increases antagonism between Israel and the Palestinians.

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T. Belman. The public voted On Nov 1. Now its up to Netanyahu to form a government as he sees fit.

Channel 13 News poll finds 45% of the Israeli public prefers National Unity over Religious Zionist Party in the new government.

Israel National News

Aryeh DeriYonatan Sindel/Flash 90

A Channel 13 News poll conducted by Camil Fuchs and published on Monday evening shows that there is a significant majority among the Israeli public against changing the legislation in such a way that would allow Shas chairman MK Aryeh Deri to serve as a minister in the new government.

65% of the public is against changing the law and appointing Deri as a minister, with only 24% in favor of the move, the poll found.

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T. Belman. Mudar Zahran will withdraw the Jordan Wakf and give the Temple Mount back to Israel to manage.  He has suggested that Israel appoint its own Wakf from among Israeli Muslims who are loyal to Israel.

I have suggested that the Al Aksa Mosque be surrounded by a fence and that the Islamic holy site be limited to that enclosure. The rest of the Temple Mount will be declared a Jewish holy site which it is.

In the alternative, Israel and the Israel Wakf could administer it jointly.

by Alex Selsky, JNS   December 18, 2022

The great significance of the Temple Mount is beyond religious and historical. It is national. The Temple Mount is a source of strength and power.

It is also a symbol for the Palestinians and their supporters, who see themselves as its landlords, if only through the Jordanian Waqf. It is because of the symbolism of the Temple Mount that Palestinian rejectionists believe Israel is weak and temporary.
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Findings indicate that Washington could be faced with a looming crisis in the Middle East that threatens to upset nearly 30 years of stability between the two former enemies. 

By Adam Kredo, Washington Free Beacon

Israel’s decades-long peace with Jordan is unraveling, a development that threatens to upset a fragile regional stability that is being challenged by countries like Iran, Russia, and China, a think tank report warns.

“Since 2020, if not before then, the Jordanian peace has turned decidedly cold,” according to Jonathan Schanzer, a former terrorism finance analyst at the Treasury Department who now works at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

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T. Belman.  In 2005, I wrote, Particularism Before Universalism, in which  I concluded:

“I submit that a nation has not only the inherent right of self defense when its national existence is threatened, but also when its cultural essence is at risk. Israel’s enemies deny it both rights. To assert these rights is not racism. Every nation has the right to determine who can immigrate, who can become citizens and what values in its society are inviolable.”

When their numbers are large enough the Muslims will seek to dominate and instill Islamic culture. They reject universalism.

In my article, Trump calls Muslim migration “the all-time biggest Trojan Horse”. I concluded:

“Jewish Americans are very supportive of allowing such numbers into the US. They argue either we have a duty to do so or that Jews should be more welcoming given the history of America banning Jewish immigration in the thirties and forties. But this analogy doesn’t hold up at all. Jews were no threat to Americans personally and to their values, whereas Muslims are both. Furthermore Muslims are very antisemitic and very anti-Israel. The Muslims have many other countries they could go to. The Jews had no other country willing to take them in.  Jews are, in effect, welcoming their enemies into the country.”

By Andrea Widburg, AM THINKER

Image: 140,000 Muslims attend an Eid celebration in Birmingham, England. YouTube screen grab.

England, once the bastion of Western liberty, is rapidly becoming a Muslim-dominated nation, which bodes ill for all who live there. The seeds for this, believe it or not, began with America’s revolution when Parliament rejected inherent rights.

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The outgoing government is mercilessly attacking the incoming one, further eroding the standing of right-wing lawmakers in the international media even before they get their ministerial portfolios.

By Ariel Kahana, ISRAEL HAYOM    19.12.22

Otzma Yehudit leader Itamar Ben-Gvir and Religious Zionist Party leader Bezalel Smotrich in the Knesset | Photo: Oren Ben Hakoon

Far from the spotlight, contrary to the prophecies of rage, the intended ministers of the “most right-wing government in the history of the State of Israel,” have launched a diplomatic outreach effort even before taking official office. Orit Strock met with the ambassador of Germany in Israel, Steffan Seibert. The ambassador also met with the incoming minister of finance, Bezalel Smotrich, who also spoke this week with American Jewish legal scholar Professor Alan Dershowitz.

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