Terrorist Netanyahu Responds to U.S. Official: I Am Not a 'Chickensh—t'

The White House sought to tamp down controversy over an anonymous comment attributed to a top Obama administration official, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lashed out at the attack on his character.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://media.gotraffic.net/images/idiZSh1a0Yps/v2/-1x-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="http://media.gotraffic.net/images/idiZSh1a0Yps/v2/-1x-1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="background-image" style="background-image: url(http://media.gotraffic.net/images/idiZSh1a0Yps/v2/-1x-1.jpg);"></div><div class="credit">Photograph by Getty Images</div><br />Netanyahu was responding to an article in The Atlantic magazine by columnist Jeffrey Goldberg, who cited an unidentified senior U.S. official calling Netanyahu a “chickensh-t” who’s afraid to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or Sunni Arab states.<br /><br />The flap threatened to worsen already tense relations between President Barack Obama and Netanyahu amid a deepening feud with the U.S. over Israeli construction in contested east Jerusalem.<br /><br /><br /><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq"><b>“I am being attacked personally only because I am defending the state of Israel.”<br />Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu</b></blockquote><div><br /></div><div><div>Republicans today seized on it a week ahead of congressional elections to portray the Obama administration as insufficiently committed to supporting Israel, a sensitive political issue for many Jewish and evangelical Christian voters.</div><div><br /></div><div>U.S. House Speaker John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said in a Twitter message today that Obama “sets the tone” for his administration and “either condones profanity & disrespect used against Israel or he does not.”</div><div><br /></div><div>“It’s a little rich to have a lecture in profanity from the speaker of the House,” countered White House press secretary Josh Earnest. Boehner once used the same derogatory term to describe Obama in a newspaper interview and has acknowledged telling Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada to “Go F-ck yourself.”</div><div>U.S. ‘Committed’</div><div><br /></div><div>Earnest said comments in the article “do not reflect the views of the president.” He said the U.S. is “as committed as it ever has been to the security of Israel.”</div><div><br /></div><div>The two leaders “consult closely and frequently,” and Obama has met with Netanyahu more than any other foreign leader, Earnest said. He said he doesn’t know who made the comment and doesn’t know whether Obama does. “I would be surprised if he did,” he said.</div><div><br /></div><div>Netanyahu, a former commando, addressed the comments at a memorial ceremony in parliament for a cabinet minister assassinated by a Palestinian.</div><div><br /></div><div>“I risked my life for my country, and I am not willing to make concessions that will endanger our country,” the Israeli leader said.</div><div>‘Attacked Personally’</div><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxyZKRYPBZ_UbuBePg1OEb75y4zFM8re8hJbIbFmzMFC0ex07_icii0grO_EyHk67NAngDVIXW_Pn51n4IXd08beZPDMgWKxVk57DdENl59bvGesIu2yx5LN4ZyGmeSSXR4fpz9nqQjsw/s1600/obama2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxyZKRYPBZ_UbuBePg1OEb75y4zFM8re8hJbIbFmzMFC0ex07_icii0grO_EyHk67NAngDVIXW_Pn51n4IXd08beZPDMgWKxVk57DdENl59bvGesIu2yx5LN4ZyGmeSSXR4fpz9nqQjsw/s1600/obama2.jpg" /></a>“Our paramount interests, first and foremost security and the unity of Jerusalem, are not of vital importance to those same anonymous sources who attack us and me, personally,” he said. “I am being attacked personally only because I am defending the state of Israel.”</div><div><br /></div><div>Frictions between the two administrations deepened this week over Israeli plans to speed up construction of about 1,000 homes in Jewish areas of east Jerusalem, the sector of the holy city the Palestinians claim for a future capital. The U.S. State Department called the plan “incompatible with the pursuit of peace.”</div><div><br /></div><div>Israel captured east Jerusalem, along with the West Bank, from Jordan in 1967 and annexed it that year in a move that isn’t internationally recognized. It has since ringed the Arab neighborhoods of the eastern sector with Jewish areas where about 300,000 Israelis live alongside a similar number of Palestinians.</div><div><br /></div><div>“The personal relationship between the American and Israeli leaders is about as bad as it’s ever been, probably even worse than we imagine,” said Jonathan Spyer, a political scientist at the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center, an Israeli college north of Tel Aviv. Asked about polls showing Obama’s Democratic Party losing control of the Senate in next week’s midterm elections, Spyer replied, “I don’t think Netanyahu is shedding any tears over that prospect.”</div><div>‘Diplomatic Pyromaniac’</div><div><br /></div><div>One of Netanyahu’s closest political allies, Strategic Affairs and Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz, called the published comments “offensive.” They “hurt the state of Israel and its citizens,” Steinitz said, because “the prime minister is not a private figure” and “represents the attitudes” of the nation.</div><div><br /></div><div>Isaac Herzog, leader of the opposition Labor party, accused Netanyahu of acting “like a diplomatic pyromaniac” and bringing relations with the U.S. to a new low. “The political games he’s playing with the American administration on the backs of Israeli citizens have to stop,” he told Channel 2 TV Online.</div><div>Settlement Position</div><div><br /></div><div>Netanyahu’s hard line on settlement construction is welcomed by coalition partners who say Israel has the right to build in both east Jerusalem and the West Bank.</div><div><br /></div><div>Obama and Netanyahu have had testy relations during their nearly parallel administrations, disagreeing over the Palestinian issue and talks with Iran. Outspoken criticism of U.S. policy by Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon has only frayed relations further.</div><div><br /></div><div>Netanyahu has warned world powers led by the U.S. against signing a “bad” nuclear deal with Iran that would not ensure it couldn’t build bombs. Ya’alon has questioned U.S. resolve to deliver on its pledge to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear state and derided Secretary of State John Kerry’s commitment to peacemaking as “messianic.”</div><div><br /></div><div>Goldberg said the Obama administration thinks Netanyahu is bluffing with his threats to attack Iran’s nuclear program to keep it from developing the capability to produce weapons. Iran, which denies it seeks to build atomic arms, is trying to reach a deal with world powers that would curb its nuclear ambitions in exchange for lifting international sanctions.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Possible Veto?</b></div><div><br /></div><div>Goldberg also said the U.S. may not offer Israel the diplomatic cover it has given it in the past at the United Nations. The Palestinians are seeking a UN Security Council resolution setting a timetable for an Israeli withdrawal from east Jerusalem and the West Bank, a move chief negotiator Saeb Erekat has said Kerry opposes.</div><div><br /></div><div>Israeli Finance Minister Yair Lapid warned of a “crisis” in relations between the countries on Oct. 25, after Israeli media reported that Ya’alon was denied access to senior American officials during a visit to the U.S., including Kerry and Vice President Joe Biden. The withholding of access was meant to signal displeasure with Ya’alon’s criticism of U.S. policy, the Ynet website reported.</div><div><br /></div><div>In a text message today, Lapid urged the Israeli and U.S. governments to “tackle the crisis behind the scenes because the relations between the two countries are of strategic importance.”</div><div><br /></div><div>Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, who opposes Palestinian statehood, said three things should guide his country’s foreign policy: “The first is ties with the United States. The second is ties with the United States. The third, and no less important, is ties with the United States,” he told Army Radio.</div></div>

Terrorist Netanyahu Responds to U.S. Official: I Am Not a 'Chickensh—t'

The White House sought to tamp down controversy over an anonymous comment attributed to a top Obama administration official, as Prime Minist...

INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT in a war crimes case against Israel.

<h4>Did Israel's 'Hannibal directive' lead to a war crime in Gaza?.</h4><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEZ7Ho-g2wUi4pc1LzoxN2FdgNDmArwvfxXibjED34qQxjaTQuFxZN-N7fqhFLzPbOAGXw8Mw6JQryyhYxIIs0Axs41Yqzru5Ldt0QWt5uVkFfHyCsT8-kVtuYjRl65ZVrOyb9dyk1kL0/s1600/israel1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="376" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEZ7Ho-g2wUi4pc1LzoxN2FdgNDmArwvfxXibjED34qQxjaTQuFxZN-N7fqhFLzPbOAGXw8Mw6JQryyhYxIIs0Axs41Yqzru5Ldt0QWt5uVkFfHyCsT8-kVtuYjRl65ZVrOyb9dyk1kL0/s1600/israel1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />The July-August war in Gaza drew international condemnation for a number of reasons, but one episode proved more deadly than any other: an Israeli air and artillery bombardment on Aug. 1 that killed 150 people in a matter of hours.<br /><br />Six weeks on from the war, with the toll of destruction still being counted, there is deepening unease about what took place that day, especially over whether too much force was used. Some legal experts say a war crime may have been committed.<br /><br />The events unfolded just as a three-day ceasefire was supposed to come into force. Hamas militants emerged from a tunnel inside Gaza and ambushed three Israeli soldiers, killing two of them and seizing the third.<br /><br />To rescue the soldier - dead or alive - and ensure Hamas could not use him as a hostage, the Israeli army invoked what is known as the "Hannibal directive", an order compelling units to do everything they can to recover an abducted comrade.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQIAe0nqC2oio9qTlLY-xvgoM0amg3X2QRgnOVvd7XS3gaDtkQ6LcmRwDp4p6k47ruxbp0tHLptrSM5VutFenMm6xxh76_RqNl2Pl5RQItVTjZf3UQhN2hn2CcszIFRAUjhVG7FwK9R8U/s1600/israelW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="434" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQIAe0nqC2oio9qTlLY-xvgoM0amg3X2QRgnOVvd7XS3gaDtkQ6LcmRwDp4p6k47ruxbp0tHLptrSM5VutFenMm6xxh76_RqNl2Pl5RQItVTjZf3UQhN2hn2CcszIFRAUjhVG7FwK9R8U/s1600/israelW.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />What ensued was a furious assault on a confined area on the eastern edge of Rafah, the largest city in southern Gaza, home to around 200,000 people. Israeli artillery and tanks bombarded four neighborhoods for several hours - at times firing a shell a minute - while fighter jets carried out air strikes.<br /><br />As well as the 150 people killed, medics in Gaza said around 200 were wounded, the majority civilians. It was the deadliest day of the seven-week conflict, in which more than 2,100 Palestinians, again most of them civilians, were killed, as well as 67 Israeli soldiers and six civilians in Israel.<br /><br />In the weeks since, civil rights campaigners, international legal experts and some Israeli military officers have raised concerns about the assault. One specific reservation is whether the abduction of a single soldier could have justified such heavy and relentless use of force in a populated area.<br /><br />A panel set up by the United Nations' Human Rights Commission is due to start investigating potential abuses in the war by both sides shortly, with Rafah one of several incidents investigators have indicated they will examine.<br /><br />Israel's Military Advocate General, the army's chief legal body, has opened its own probe into the events and has said it could launch a criminal investigation. International legal scholars have raised red flags over the justification.<br /><br />"If it is a legitimate military target then we've got to question if the damage and death done to civilians was proportionate," said Iain Scobbie, a professor of public international law at the University of Manchester.<br /><br />"In this case the answer is clearly no, it is not proportionate," he said, adding: "If it's not a legitimate military target, it's clearly a war crime because it is an unjustified use of force with effects on the civilian population."<br /><br />The Israeli military said the advocate-general's fact-finding teams were still working to establish precisely what happened and as a result it would not comment on specifics.<br /><br />But in a statement the Israel Defence Forces said: "There is no IDF directive or procedure which allows for a violation of international law, including the law of armed conflict."<br /><br />  <br /><br /><b>AUGUST 1</b><br /><br />Mediators in Cairo had agreed with Israeli and Hamas representatives that a ceasefire would begin at 0800 local time.<br /><br />It is not clear what time Hamas attacked - Hamas at first said it was before the ceasefire started, Israel said it was after - but militants leapt out of the concealed tunnel to ambush the soldiers.<br /><br />Other Israeli soldiers from the same elite reconnaissance unit scrambled to the scene, where they found two bodies and realized that the third soldier, Second-Lieutenant Hadar Goldin, had been dragged back into the tunnel.<br /><br />The troops, all from the decorated Givati Brigade, got special permission to enter the potentially booby-trapped tunnel for an underground pursuit. They recovered some of Goldin's belongings, which allowed forensics experts to conclude later that he was killed in the ambush. Hamas has said it has the remains of Goldin and another Israeli soldier killed in the war.<br /><br />Colonel Ofer Winter, the Givati Brigade commander, said he was informed about the ambush at around 0900 and about half an hour later got word that a soldier was unaccounted for.<br /><br />"I declared over the radio the word that no one wants to utter - "Hannibal" - which means abduction," he told the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth on Aug. 15.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuoB6E6qjEcroMbwC8MM4z26oDa8f4gVh75Z9nkq0vuzWimnmA1rvRVj3F9sHOGQ2gnxvaqEv6vYFP4ra4oKgM__CAcJTRiiemny4vRCSjmFI49Jqav4ftidUFpazXI_MSdUXXp6Jx5KQ/s1600/israel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuoB6E6qjEcroMbwC8MM4z26oDa8f4gVh75Z9nkq0vuzWimnmA1rvRVj3F9sHOGQ2gnxvaqEv6vYFP4ra4oKgM__CAcJTRiiemny4vRCSjmFI49Jqav4ftidUFpazXI_MSdUXXp6Jx5KQ/s1600/israel.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />"I began to plan an assault towards Rafah. I instructed all forces to move forward, seize the area, so that the kidnappers would not be able to move."<br /><br />Intense artillery shelling, tank fire and air strikes followed, according to accounts from local reporters, residents and medics. At one point, the artillery fired at a rate of one shell a minute, with six cannons firing explosive and non-lethal smoke shells, according to a Reuters photographer.<br /><br />Abdel-Hakim Lafi, 57, had returned to his house in the area that morning in anticipation of the ceasefire. No sooner had he and his two sons got home than the bombardment began.<br /><br />"We ran out of the house and down a sandy road and as I was running shells were falling," he told Reuters. "One hit two women in front of me, I saw them, they were blown up, they were killed in front of my eyes."<br /><br />One of his sons, running just behind him, was also killed.<br /><br />"Everything west of the area where they said the soldier was taken was hit from the air and from the ground," said Hani Hammad, 28, a Palestinian journalist based in Rafah.<br /><br />In his comments to Yedioth Ahronoth, Colonel Winter defended the decision to use so much firepower. "Everything we did stemmed from the understanding that we could bring Hadar Goldin back alive," he said.<br /><br />"That is why we used all the force. Anyone who kidnaps has to know he will pay a price. It was not revenge, they just messed with the wrong brigade."<br /><br />  <br /><br /><b>FALLOUT</b><br /><b><br /></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvZYFlgGENju3P77xkJnQ-U3HToKb2W-G1n_Ur9qBOrLby84rAnoNrqT8K8L0sY52-4iAlGbhj5UkxFzUl0B7OeXMwVLJ_ETY9snQzIw55ASkluZpHSLxpJdr5jcfhRP5d8JheXBt3L78/s1600/123.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="354" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvZYFlgGENju3P77xkJnQ-U3HToKb2W-G1n_Ur9qBOrLby84rAnoNrqT8K8L0sY52-4iAlGbhj5UkxFzUl0B7OeXMwVLJ_ETY9snQzIw55ASkluZpHSLxpJdr5jcfhRP5d8JheXBt3L78/s1600/123.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />In the days that followed, international attention focused on getting a durable ceasefire in place. But questions soon started to be raised about the Rafah bombardment.<br /><br />The Association for Civil Rights in Israel called for an investigation into why the Hannibal directive was employed in a populated, urban area, saying it "fundamentally violated the principle of distinction in international law".<br /><br />In an interview with Reuters, Brigadier-General Roy Riftin, the head of the IDF artillery, drew a distinction between Rafah and two other incidents in which heavy artillery was used.<br /><br />"When a force is in jeopardy or under severe threat, we carry out rescue fire," he explained, adding that in the other two cases, residents had been warned to leave the area prior to troops moving in and before artillery was used.<br /><br />"The Hannibal protocol declared for Hadar Goldin is completely different," he said. "It should be examined at completely different levels."<br /><br />It remains unclear how high up the chain of command the declaration of the directive went. Yet regardless of who gave the green light, one central question remains: was it proportionate? Marco Sassoli, a professor at the University of Geneva and a leading authority on international law, said it appeared not to be.<br /><br />"They may not simply bomb a whole area if they don't know where the person is, just to make sure that the soldier cannot be evacuated," he said. "It is an advantage not to lose one soldier but it is not such a great advantage that it would justify risking to kill hundreds of civilians."<br /><br />Other experts underscored the importance of recovering a soldier, while saying that did not justify carte blanche.<br /><br />"It's more than just a simple mathematical calculation," said Michael Schmitt, a professor of international law at the U.S. Naval War College's Stockton Center, who would comment on the principles involved but not the specific Rafah case.<br /><br />"All militaries rate the protection of their forces as very high and for very good reason. You want morale among the troops, you want troops to know you will come to their assistance if they get in a tight spot and so forth," Schmitt said.<br /><br />"Although if someone has been captured this does not mean you can completely take off the gloves," he added.<br /><br />   <br /><br /><b>INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT</b><br /><br />Part of Israel's rationale for responding so intensely in such cases is that it has paid heavily for captured soldiers in the past. In 2006, Gilad Shalit was seized near Gaza and spent five years in Hamas captivity. He was released in exchange for more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners.<br /><br />The Hannibal directive was drafted in 1986 after three soldiers from the Givati Brigade were captured in Lebanon. Their comrades saw the vehicle getting away and did not open fire. The directive aims to ensure that does not happen again.<br /><br />Critics say it is misinterpreted on the ground as implying that it is better to have a dead soldier than a captured one.<br /><br />The military has declined to define it precisely in public, only emphasizing the need to prevent a soldier being taken. The debate has at times prompted army chiefs to stress that while risking the captive's life was allowed, targeting him was not.<br /><br />Israel, having fought many wars since its founding in 1948, has been accused of war crimes many times, and has leveled similar accusations against its enemies, including Hamas.<br /><br />What could be different now is that the Palestinians are on the brink of joining the International Criminal Court, a move that would allow them to take action against Israel, but could also open the door to criminal proceedings against Hamas.<br /><br />The head of the U.N. Human Rights Commission panel investigating the Gaza war has said any evidence it gathers could be used by the ICC in a war crimes case against Israel.<br /><br />The panel's final report is due by March next year. The next few months - including whether Israel decides to cooperate with the investigation - will prove critical in determining if war crimes charges are eventually leveled.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://s2.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20141013&t=2&i=983030400&w=&fh=&fw=&ll=700&pl=378&r=LYNXNPEA9C08F" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="http://s2.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20141013&t=2&i=983030400&w=&fh=&fw=&ll=700&pl=378&r=LYNXNPEA9C08F" width="640" /></a></div><br /><h4>1,500 Palestinian kids killed by Israel since 2000.</h4><br />source http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/13/us-mideast-gaza-warcrime-insight-idUSKCN0I20FN20141013

INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT in a war crimes case against Israel.

Did Israel's 'Hannibal directive' lead to a war crime in Gaza?. The July-August war in Gaza drew international condemnation for ...

A Pay Strike in Israel Stalls Premier’s Trip to Mexico

JERUSALEM — Employees of Israel’s Foreign Ministry announced an open-ended general strike on Sunday over pay and working conditions, an unprecedented step involving a complete shutdown of the ministry’s office here and the country’s 103 diplomatic missions abroad.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqUM5nmmKXVRbXpYiNizbc7V4DCb2azkokkgMJnp-cBfpTnaZ7TKc-qsD_jRIKFkwNzFZTjwzjozy7vy8xBAtk1HPKrw-veGFPpOyx1j-CCqNApbpYphKsK4V1ghf03rIENb3AIQYbbYQ/s1600/012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqUM5nmmKXVRbXpYiNizbc7V4DCb2azkokkgMJnp-cBfpTnaZ7TKc-qsD_jRIKFkwNzFZTjwzjozy7vy8xBAtk1HPKrw-veGFPpOyx1j-CCqNApbpYphKsK4V1ghf03rIENb3AIQYbbYQ/s1600/012.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Disgruntled ministry employees have already been engaging in partial work stoppages or slowdowns over the past three weeks as part of a longstanding labor dispute, actions that have included refusing to coordinate visits to Israel by foreign dignitaries or visits of Israeli officials abroad.<br /><br />One immediate consequence is that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Mexico, Panama and Colombia, scheduled for early April, has been postponed.<br /><br />A visit to Israel by Pope Francis, planned for May, also hangs in the balance because the intricate preparations, which the Foreign Ministry would usually handle together with the Vatican, have been delayed.<br /><br />The work actions and the subsequent decision to bring all diplomatic and administrative activity to a standstill were taken after talks with the Finance Ministry broke down after seven months.<br /><br />“They gave us the cold shoulder,” Yigal Palmor, the Foreign Ministry spokesman, said of the Finance Ministry. “Enough is enough.”<br /><br />Mr. Palmor, who is usually at the vanguard of the sometimes fraught efforts to explain Israel’s policies to the world, said he was answering his phone in an official capacity only to speak about issues related to the strike.<br /><br />The full work stoppage means that no diplomatic business is being carried out and that no diplomatic cables are being sent. The doors of the ministry here have been closed to all, including the foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman. The overseas diplomatic missions have been instructed not to open on Monday. There has been no consular service for the public for weeks, other than in life-or-death cases approved by an exceptions committee, and hundreds of Israelis with passport problems are stranded abroad.<br /><br />Israel’s Foreign Ministry has already lost some prestige in recent years, with the country’s most strategic and delicate relationships often being handled at least in part by other offices.<br /><br />The strike, however, is over what ministry officials describe as the “extreme” financial degradation of the 1,200 employees at home and abroad. Foreign Ministry wages have been calculated on a scale different from those used for other public servants over the past 17 years, under an agreement that ministry employees say only worsened their conditions.<br /><br />A post on a Facebook page created to support the strike showed a photograph of what was said to be the salary slip of a diplomat of 13 years. It showed a monthly wage of about $2,500 before taxes and other deductions.<br /><br />Yacov Livneh, a spokesman for the ministry’s employees’ union, said that a third of the ministry’s employees had left the service over the past decade, adding, “They felt they could no longer fund Israel’s diplomacy from their own pockets.”<br /><br />But the Finance Ministry said in a statement on Sunday that union officials had refused its proposed solutions and walked out of the arbitration process unilaterally. Noting that foreign service employees had received a 20 percent pay increase only two years ago, the Finance Ministry accused the union of “holding Israeli citizens hostage and harming the country’s vital interests.”<br /><br />A two-day visit to Israel by Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain this month was arranged with the help of Mr. Netanyahu’s office. The Foreign Ministry employees’ union sent a letter to the British ambassador to Israel, Matthew Gould, protesting that he did not try to postpone Mr. Cameron’s visit in solidarity with the Israeli diplomats.

A Pay Strike in Israel Stalls Premier’s Trip to Mexico

JERUSALEM — Employees of Israel’s Foreign Ministry announced an open-ended general strike on Sunday over pay and working conditions, an unpr...

Former Israeli PM Ariel Sharon in 'critical condition'

<h4>The director of the hospital where the comatosed Ariel Sharon is being treated says the former Israeli Prime Minister has "critical malfunction of some of his organs"</h4><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOgFPMJg57f_PXdQLcOxiKUtyDhiTs3UGYZxK7AzRP3D6ZaClJicBxFe_73TvGZvKRy-UOEkyE0HiXGYtZPKYNydiYV4UeOCF-OH9lI1JcX5U7n6tBfrOWW4PPYR02Bd7_APBp9SnUQo0/s1600/311.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOgFPMJg57f_PXdQLcOxiKUtyDhiTs3UGYZxK7AzRP3D6ZaClJicBxFe_73TvGZvKRy-UOEkyE0HiXGYtZPKYNydiYV4UeOCF-OH9lI1JcX5U7n6tBfrOWW4PPYR02Bd7_APBp9SnUQo0/s1600/311.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Israel's former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon </td></tr></tbody></table><br />The director of the hospital where the comatose former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is being treated said he was in critical condition and his life was in danger.<br /><br />Professor Zeev Rotstein of Tel Hashomer Hospital said today that there was "some critical malfunction of some of his organs, including his kidneys".<br /><br />"He is getting the regular treatment which includes of course all the support that is needed, including antibiotics in case that the problem is a kind of infection," said Professor Rotstein.<br /><br />The 85-year-old Sharon has been in a coma since 2006 when a devastating stroke incapacitated him at the height of his political power.<br /><br />Mr Sharon was one of Israel's most iconic and controversial figures.<br /><br />A prominent hard-line voice over the decades, he was elected prime minister in 2001.<br />In 2005 he directed a unilateral withdrawal of Israeli troops and settlers from Gaza, ending 38-years of military control of the territory.<br /><br />It was a sharp turnaround for a man who had been a leading player in building Jewish settlements in Palestinian territories.<br /><br />Mr Sharon appeared on his way to an easy re-election when he suffered the stroke in January 2006.<br />His deputy, Ehud Olmert, took over and was elected prime minister a few months later.

Former Israeli PM Ariel Sharon in 'critical condition'

The director of the hospital where the comatosed Ariel Sharon is being treated says the former Israeli Prime Minister has "critical mal...

Israel Terrorist Defense Forces Manhandling Diplomats In The West Bank

<h3>Wild Photos Show Israel Defense Forces Manhandling Diplomats In The West Bank</h3><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEismiuUPTVXqCRLA60hbXV9VarCl6YC6HnhaZ0SAzc56H2wyw9CvOfh4pPBZxzoBdo4wvuh2AA08zJ9rcnMaXrXS-5VS47ifY8psBzX2KzKZo1U3AkhYHmFPYOQQ7TBhc2E26BHNwcg2kQ/s1600/rtx13sh0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEismiuUPTVXqCRLA60hbXV9VarCl6YC6HnhaZ0SAzc56H2wyw9CvOfh4pPBZxzoBdo4wvuh2AA08zJ9rcnMaXrXS-5VS47ifY8psBzX2KzKZo1U3AkhYHmFPYOQQ7TBhc2E26BHNwcg2kQ/s1600/rtx13sh0.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">French diplomat Marion Castaing</td></tr></tbody></table><br />As Israeli soldiers approached the truck, French diplomat Marion Castaing climbed atop the supplies in order to prevent their confiscation, Philip Weiss of Mondoweiss reports.<br /><br />Diplomats were attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to a razed village in the West Bank Friday when IDF soldiers descended on them.<br /><br /><h3>The photos say it all.</h3><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9EX5IGTZxngtto3BTFOU4iTFpCCDUhy7Bjf2T_I77mPzXhnh5i4t-DFiy2-KeQVShLqfmlGq-dLfBhJUEA7M4ZYj0z5GAUQHUoGTD7-vFVI2uUNVJRl0vfxTzrG5JJFAg6IpLgCIUA9I/s1600/r3sgp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="424" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9EX5IGTZxngtto3BTFOU4iTFpCCDUhy7Bjf2T_I77mPzXhnh5i4t-DFiy2-KeQVShLqfmlGq-dLfBhJUEA7M4ZYj0z5GAUQHUoGTD7-vFVI2uUNVJRl0vfxTzrG5JJFAg6IpLgCIUA9I/s1600/r3sgp.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">French diplomat Marion Castaing</td></tr></tbody></table><br />“They dragged me out of the truck and forced me to the ground with no regard for my diplomatic immunity,” French diplomat Marion Castaing told Reuters.<br /><br />“This is how international law is being respected here,” she said, covered with dust.<br /><br />The Israeli Defense Force claims that their anti-riot tactics were in response to a hail of stones throne at them as they approached the supply trucks, according to the Jerusalem Post.<br /><br />“Foreign diplomats abused their diplomatic privileges are currently being reviewed, and if required, complaints will be filed with the relevant authorities,” said an IDF spokesman.<br /><br /> Israel’s High Court had ruled that the Palestinians lacked the proper building permits, according to Haaretz.<br /><h3>The photos say it all.</h3><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUVw7eNMY0E8-T9ycDPx3j9fKYR_15MmpUkMKyT_Dq7u-XIR0xwNNVZHeIuD6dsMombKxbq6FI7bStNHKpVQl7S9E1398ozd0QySWrpPoD9PTtuS-o0rmC77Pq3lsztka2AhUbYWGmjqQ/s1600/israeli-defense-force-manhandling.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUVw7eNMY0E8-T9ycDPx3j9fKYR_15MmpUkMKyT_Dq7u-XIR0xwNNVZHeIuD6dsMombKxbq6FI7bStNHKpVQl7S9E1398ozd0QySWrpPoD9PTtuS-o0rmC77Pq3lsztka2AhUbYWGmjqQ/s1600/israeli-defense-force-manhandling.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">French diplomat Marion Castaing</td></tr></tbody></table><div><img alt="attached image" height="407" src="http://static5.businessinsider.com/image/523d909feab8ea736f7d14bb-3500-2228/israeli-defense-force-manhandling.jpg" width="640" /><br /><br /><img alt="attached image" height="426" src="http://static1.businessinsider.com/image/523d90a16bb3f7bc0c7f9af3-3500-2333/israeli-defense-force-manhandling.jpg" width="640" /><br /><br /><img alt="attached image" height="426" src="http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/523d90a0eab8ea896f7d14bd-3500-2333/israeli-defense-force-manhandling.jpg" width="640" /></div>

Israel Terrorist Defense Forces Manhandling Diplomats In The West Bank

Wild Photos Show Israel Defense Forces Manhandling Diplomats In The West Bank French diplomat Marion Castaing As Israeli soldiers approached...

NSA 'routinely' shares Americans' data with Israel

NSA shares raw intelligence including Americans' data with Israel.<br /><br />• Secret deal places no legal limits on use of data by Israelis<br />• Only official US government communications protected<br />• Agency insists it complies with rules governing privacy<br /><br />The NSA regularly shares raw US intelligence data with Israel without even removing information about American citizens, according to the latest revelation published by the Guardian. The report is based on a document leaked by Edward Snowden.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1SdS5biSE2tgh59zORwmoVuaWi8LNdNdd6mkoQGSlxdFKympwnfQQpXX0g5yp0tYg8tCVNPzcqQxGNH8xy2nSiGE-zJMQYqRJyjLznZ7tripmnXUYZlmzd5Ie7c8BIxmnoB7Rg4LoOfE/s1600/Israeli-and-American.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1SdS5biSE2tgh59zORwmoVuaWi8LNdNdd6mkoQGSlxdFKympwnfQQpXX0g5yp0tYg8tCVNPzcqQxGNH8xy2nSiGE-zJMQYqRJyjLznZ7tripmnXUYZlmzd5Ie7c8BIxmnoB7Rg4LoOfE/s1600/Israeli-and-American.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />On Tuesday, September 11, the Guardian published a previously undisclosed document which revealed top-secret policies in place since 2009 that are used to share personal phone and Internet data pertaining to United States citizens with American ally Israel.<br /><br />The document, a five-page memorandum authorized by the National Security Agency near the beginning of US President Barack Obama’s first administration, outlines a deal between the NSA and Israel’s SIGINT National Unit, or ISNU.<br /><br />“This agreement,” the memo begins, “prescribes procedures and responsibilities for ensuring” privacy safeguards are implemented to protect the Fourth Amendment rights of US citizens with regards to the direct sharing of raw intelligence collected by the NSA with its Israeli counterpart.<br /><br />That data, the document later explains, includes raw traffic picked up by the American spy office such as “unevaluated and unminimized transcripts, gists, facsimiles, telex, voice and Digital Network Intelligence (DNI) metadata and content” which is never necessarily scrutinized by US officials before sent to Israeli agents.<br /><br />“Seems the only info actually being ‘minimized’ is the info #NSA shares with the American public,” American Civil Liberties Union Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer tweeted following publication of the Guardian piece. “NSA is really good at minimizing that.”<br /><br />But while the contents of emails and phone calls involving most US persons are fair game to be collected by Israeli intelligence, a select group of Americans are sparred from international surveillance: elected officials. The memo mandates that the Israelis must "destroy upon recognition" any communication "that is either to or from an official of the US government.” That pool of exempt persons is defined as "officials of the executive branch (including the White House, cabinet departments, and independent agencies), the US House of Representatives and Senate (member and staff) and the US federal court system (including, but not limited to, the Supreme Court)."<br /><br />The Guardian notes, however, that other leaked documents uncovered as of late indicate that the US intelligence community may have reservations nonetheless with sharing info with even an ally as tried and true as Israel.<br /><br />"On the one hand, the Israelis are extraordinarily good Sigint partners for us, but on the other, they target us to learn our positions on Middle East problems," a senior NSA official says in a 2008 NSA document seen by the Guardian but not published in Wednesday’s piece. "A NIE [National Intelligence Estimate] ranked them as the third most aggressive intelligence service against the US."<br /><br />"One of NSA's biggest threats is actually from friendly intelligence services, like Israel. There are parameters on what NSA shares with them, but the exchange is so robust, we sometimes share more than we intended,” the Guardian quotes from the ’08 document.<br /><br />According to Guardian journalists Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras and Ewen MacAskill, a NSA spokesperson pressed for comment wouldn’t deny the validity of the leaked document’s contents, but assured the British newspaper that "Any US person information that is acquired as a result of NSA's surveillance activities is handled under procedures that are designed to protect privacy rights.”<br /><br />The latest leak comes on the 12-year anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that many high-ranking US officials have used to justify the surveillance measures enacted in the decade-plus since. It also marks just more than three months since the Guardian first began published leaked NSA documents attributed to Snowden, a 30-year-old former intelligence contractor who has since relocated to Russia where he was granted asylum while avoiding espionage charges in the US.<br /><br /><br /><div style="-x-system-font: none; display: block; font-family: Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: 14px; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 12px auto 6px auto;"><a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/167350230" style="text-decoration: underline;" title="View doc1 on Scribd">doc1</a></div><iframe class="scribd_iframe_embed" data-aspect-ratio="undefined" data-auto-height="false" frameborder="0" height="600" id="doc_75237" scrolling="no" src="//www.scribd.com/embeds/167350230/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&show_recommendations=true" width="100%"></iframe>

NSA 'routinely' shares Americans' data with Israel

NSA shares raw intelligence including Americans' data with Israel. • Secret deal places no legal limits on use of data by Israelis • Onl...

Israel to Give 4 Million to Ex-Agent’s Family

<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px;">Four million shekels compensation to family of ex-Mossad agent Ben Zygier, who died in jail.</span><br /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMl9-IFNFWXeNRtX3DRCBRImJ4n_th4UmLOsR4bsgEYB5YRMZchZ9FFbqZ9VVJ1ByBaC9a487u7SL-darWK6jfZwNlSYRIz75N8zYWkNEh042eWDwcOLNOpoyO1ONSnobkKpfnzYG5BeE/s1600/zygier.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMl9-IFNFWXeNRtX3DRCBRImJ4n_th4UmLOsR4bsgEYB5YRMZchZ9FFbqZ9VVJ1ByBaC9a487u7SL-darWK6jfZwNlSYRIz75N8zYWkNEh042eWDwcOLNOpoyO1ONSnobkKpfnzYG5BeE/s1600/zygier.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Israel has signed an agreement with the family of former Mossad agent Ben Zygier, Channel 2 reports. The state will pay 4 million shekels in compensation to the family for Zygier’s death in an Israeli prison in December 2010.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Zygier managed to commit suicide in a solitary confinement cell, despite being under supervision.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">According to the report, 2,400,000 shekels will be paid this year, and another 400,000 will be given per year for the four years that follow.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">The agreement did not hold the state responsible for Zygier’s death, whether through negligence, lack of supervision, improper screening of prison guards, or failure to report suicidal tendencies.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">In April 2013 State Attorney Moshe Lador determined that there were serious mistakes made in the supervision over Zygier, but that there was not enough evidence to bring charges.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">“It cannot be established that the evidence proves, with the certainty required in a criminal trial, that Israel Prisons Services people or others negligently caused the deceased’s death,” he stated.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Zygier’s death became public knowledge in Israel only in early 2013, more than two years after his suicide. The case was originally revealed in the Australian media.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">It has not been revealed why Zygier, who held both Australian and Israeli citizenship, had been imprisoned. Australian officials guessed that Zygier was arrested for something “more serious” than simply sharing information with Australia; media speculation included suggestions that the ex-agent had unwittingly sabotaged a secret operation, or had planned to disclose details of Israel’s use of foreign passports for Mossad agents, or had leaked sensitive information to Hezbollah.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white;"></span></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;">Israel sources suggested that Zygier’s regret for his actions – whatever they were – was the motive for his suicide.</span>

Israel to Give 4 Million to Ex-Agent’s Family

Four million shekels compensation to family of ex-Mossad agent Ben Zygier, who died in jail. Israel has signed an agreement with the family ...

Israeli Drone Strike Kills 5 in Egypt.

<h4>Israeli Drone Strike Kills 5 in Egypt, Officials Say.</h4><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDhKFo6DQj4nLVt77iGbY6fBBu6FhNbV5UVAJbB3UqKCuzlvrrClDjD5Y2-Y0WoAm9XBpimkWsOXVRvEO8cjPqWFS-3sBUH4-0ukphmbWe7u4aV0HJ0NZ098J4z5X0t_J7eKQ4BXKaqg8/s1600/pir.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDhKFo6DQj4nLVt77iGbY6fBBu6FhNbV5UVAJbB3UqKCuzlvrrClDjD5Y2-Y0WoAm9XBpimkWsOXVRvEO8cjPqWFS-3sBUH4-0ukphmbWe7u4aV0HJ0NZ098J4z5X0t_J7eKQ4BXKaqg8/s1600/pir.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />EL-ARISH, Egypt — An Israeli drone strike inside Egypt killed five suspected Islamic militants and destroyed a rocket launcher Friday, two senior Egyptian security officials said, marking a rare Israeli operation carried out in its Arab neighbor's territory.<br /><br />The strike, coming after a warning from Egypt caused Israel to briefly close an airport Thursday, potentially signals a significant new level of cooperation between the two former foes over security matters in the largely lawless Sinai Peninsula after a military coup ousted Egypt's president. Egypt long has maintained that it wouldn't allow other countries to use its territories as hotbed to launch attacks against other countries.<br /><br />Residents heard a large explosion Friday in el-Agra, an area in the northern region of the Sinai close to Egypt's border with Israel. The officials said the Israeli attack was in cooperation with Egyptian authorities.<br /><br />The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press because they were not authorized to speak to journalists. The Israeli military said it was looking into the report after being contacted by the AP.<br /><br />A statement later posted on the official Facebook page of Col. Ahmed Mohammed Ali, an Egyptian military spokesman, said there had been two explosions in el-Agra, south of Rafah, and that security forces were investigating. Egypt's official MENA news agency said an explosion destroyed a rocket launcher set near the border to launch attacks against Israel. The agency said at least five jihadis were killed.<br /><br />The Egyptian officials told AP that the drone had been flying over the site of the attack since early Friday morning.<br /><br />Egypt's military and security forces are engaged in long battle against Islamic jihadis in the largely lawless peninsula. Islamic militants also have been stepping up attacks against security forces on the peninsula, raising fears that extremists could exploit the anger over the July 3 ouster of President Mohammed Morsi to spread their insurgency.<br /><br />The drone strike comes after Israel briefly prevented landings at an airport in the Red Sea resort of Eilat on Thursday. While Israeli officials would only say the closure came out of unspecified security concerns, an Egyptian security official told the AP that officials warned Israel about the possibility of rocket strikes.<br /><br />The official said Egyptian authorities received intelligence suggesting terrorist groups planned to fire missiles Friday at Israel, as well as at locations in northern Sinai and the Suez Canal.<br /><br />That official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak with journalists. He also said that Egyptian authorities planned to start air patrols Thursday night over the Naqab desert in the Egyptian Sinai, where officials believe the militants are based.<br /><br />While Egypt signed a peace deal with Israel in 1979, the country has long been suspicious of the Jewish state's intentions while annually celebrating its own military exploits against Israel in the Sinai. Allowing an Israeli drone strike inside its own territory represents military cooperation otherwise never seen before.<br /><div><br /></div>

Israeli Drone Strike Kills 5 in Egypt.

Israeli Drone Strike Kills 5 in Egypt, Officials Say. EL-ARISH, Egypt — An Israeli drone strike inside Egypt killed five suspected Islamic m...

Lebanese army:"Israeli soldiers wounded in Lebanon"

BEIRUT — The Lebanese military said a group of Israeli soldiers crossed the border into Lebanon and were wounded in an unspecified explosion early Wednesday — a rare incident along the heavily guarded and volatile frontier.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd69IvXmVy4rWAAIOshyontbX0vvJXm_tDeqzJlxifSdYAbbY5MD6t8_v-WqwfPugRLGLnySp6FyhcoayuzSjGfsSgBt-p8LDZigfYGagFcwO9uOgApgfguYm9woXC6Q2OQHEPn6vfV1M/s1600/2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="422" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd69IvXmVy4rWAAIOshyontbX0vvJXm_tDeqzJlxifSdYAbbY5MD6t8_v-WqwfPugRLGLnySp6FyhcoayuzSjGfsSgBt-p8LDZigfYGagFcwO9uOgApgfguYm9woXC6Q2OQHEPn6vfV1M/s640/2013.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />The Israeli side appeared to dispute the location of the incident, saying four soldiers were wounded while carrying out routine activities along the border with Lebanon.<br /><br />The Lebanese military called the incident a "new violation of Lebanese sovereignty," and said in a statement that it was investigating the nature of the pre-dawn blast. It gave no specifics as to the number of soldiers who were wounded or how many had allegedly infiltrated into Lebanon.<br /><br />The statement said the Israeli troops reached as far as 400 meters (yards) inside Lebanon in the Labbouneh area near the coastal town of Naqoura.<br /><br />But in Israel, Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said a blast wounded four soldiers, some lightly, others moderately, "in operational activity along the Lebanon border."<br /><br />He said the troops were carrying out routine activities "aimed at providing quiet to the residents of the north in particular and the residents of Israel in general."<br /><br />"During the operational activity, the force came upon an explosive," he said, adding that the military was investigating whether the blast was caused by an old or new explosive.<br /><br />"But this activity was done and will be done again responsibly and in consideration for the security of the people of Israel," Yaalon added.<br /><br />It was not immediately clear why Israeli soldiers would have been on Lebanese soil — a rare occurrence since Israel withdrew its troops from the country in 2000, ending an 18-year military occupation there.<br /><div><br /></div><div><div>Israel fought a war against Lebanon's Hezbollah in 2006, which broke out after the Iranian-backed militant group's guerrillas crossed into Israel and captured two Israeli soldiers. The ensuing month-long conflict killed about 1,200 Lebanese and 160 Israelis.</div><div><br /></div><div>The last serious clashes along the frontier took place in 2010 when Lebanese and Israeli troops exchanged fire across the border, killing at least three people.</div><div><br /></div><div><a href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/static/Resizer.ashx/news/250/168/426044.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Soldiers in Golan Heights" border="0" height="168" src="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/static/Resizer.ashx/news/250/168/426044.jpg" width="250" /></a>Meanwhile, Lebanon's state-run news agency gave a slightly different account, saying the Israeli soldiers wounded Wednesday were hit by a land mine about 150 meters (yards) inside Lebanon.</div><div><br /></div><div></div><div>The U.N. peacekeeping force in the area, UNIFIL, was investigating the reports and a team of peacekeepers has traveled to the location where the Lebanese army said the blast occurred, mission spokesman Andrea Tenenti said.</div><div><br /></div><div>Lebanon's foreign minister, Adnan Mansour, said Beirut will file a complaint to the U.N. over the incident, describing it as a violation of the Security Council resolution that ended the 2006 war and saying it "reveals again the Israeli enemy's hidden intensions through its infiltration of Lebanese territory."</div><div><br /></div><div>Israel borders both Lebanon and Syria to its north, and the Israeli military did not specify where along the northern frontier its soldiers were wounded.</div><div><br /></div><div>Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wished the troops a speedy recovery while on a tour of a military base in the south of the country, and said "we will continue to act responsibly in order to defend Israel's borders."</div></div><div><br /></div>

Lebanese army:"Israeli soldiers wounded in Lebanon"

BEIRUT — The Lebanese military said a group of Israeli soldiers crossed the border into Lebanon and were wounded in an unspecified explosion...

Israel behind mystery attack on Syrian port–U.S. sources.

<h3>U.S. officials have revealed that explosions reported at a key Syrian port on July 5 were likely the result of an Israeli airstrike.</h3><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQxKelXFZwocVsA6uaFeASmLt8T36oh55c-BUpqpFGhP5ZvFqmz0XPelZaiDq8DeTHPvIePdyK4b9jkJc1PF_qs5AEF6F_9I7OqdCGp-xrQzl7HqEM-WgVPN6tNVqEEsG914QzV7mgmRE/s1600/city+of+Latakia.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="359" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQxKelXFZwocVsA6uaFeASmLt8T36oh55c-BUpqpFGhP5ZvFqmz0XPelZaiDq8DeTHPvIePdyK4b9jkJc1PF_qs5AEF6F_9I7OqdCGp-xrQzl7HqEM-WgVPN6tNVqEEsG914QzV7mgmRE/s1600/city+of+Latakia.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />Three officials spoke to CNN on condition of anonymity, referring to the pre-dawn explosions in the city of Latakia as an Israeli operation which allegedly targeted Russian-made Yakhont anti-ship missiles.<br /><br />The Yakhont is a cruise missile with a range of 300 kilometers, capable of delivering a warhead weighing in at 250 kilograms. Russia supplied Syria’s armed forces with a Yakhont missile battery in 2011.<br /><br />Shortly after the July 5 incident, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that "huge explosions shook the area where a large Syrian army base and weapons depots are located."<br /><br />According to reports by the SOHR published by Haaretz, fighter jets were seen in the skies around the city of Al-Haffah, which lies east of Latakia. Several troops were reported as having been killed or wounded in the ensuing explosions.<br /><br />Syrian rebels said on Tuesday that “foreign forces” had destroyed advanced anti-ship missiles in Latakia, but only hinted that Israel had been behind the attack, Arutz Sheva reported.<br /><br />Qassem Saadeddine, spokesman for the Free Syrian Army's Supreme Military Council, reported that the rebels' intelligence network had identified missiles being stored in the depots which were hit.<br /><br />"It was not the FSA that targeted this," Saadeddine told Reuters. "It is not an attack that was carried out by rebels. This attack was either by air raid or long-range missiles fired from boats in the Mediterranean," he said.<br /><br />Syrian rebels described hearing and seeing huge blasts, the ferocity of which was beyond the firepower available to the FSA.<br /><br />So far the Israeli government has declined to confirm or comment on allegations that it was behind the July 5 attack on Latakia. If the claims are true, the attack would mark the fourth Israeli strike on Syria within the past six months.<br /><br />In May, Israel launched two airstrikes on Syrian territory. One of the strikes was thought to be on the country’s Scientific Studies and Research Center, which was previously attacked by the Israeli Air Force in January. Another attack, which took place on May 3, targeted Fateh-110 surface-to-surface missiles provided by Iran and based at Damascus International Airport.<br /><br />"We have set red lines in regards to our own interests, and we keep them. There is an attack here, an explosion there, various versions - in any event, in the Middle East it is usually we who are blamed for most," Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon told reporters on Tuesday.<br /><br />"There is an explosion here or an attack there, somewhere in the Middle East, most of the time they accuse us," he added.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9UwLToQD_Ih1VAput_8BbH-5wJJNHzflvlE7yqNJoxmKRfoudeTtvAi_bduo0uk2txHdrWsfxh7AiGDwRYO5085sFCJ0g7mqLA9pSkI_e7neo-7dZNosOFWDkFecxGz1JUtYjD54Aic4/s1600/Israeli+F-15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9UwLToQD_Ih1VAput_8BbH-5wJJNHzflvlE7yqNJoxmKRfoudeTtvAi_bduo0uk2txHdrWsfxh7AiGDwRYO5085sFCJ0g7mqLA9pSkI_e7neo-7dZNosOFWDkFecxGz1JUtYjD54Aic4/s1600/Israeli+F-15.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />Israel previously stated that the acquisition of sophisticated weaponry by Hezbollah in Lebanon, which is supported by both Syria and Iran, would represent a red line and merit a response.<br /><br />In all prior instances of strikes linked to Israel’s armed forces, officials have not gone on record to take responsibility for the incursions.<br /><br />At the same time,Tel Aviv has made clear that the country is prepared to go into Syria if it means preventing Hezbollah or other militant groups from obtaining additional weaponry.<br /><br />Israel considers advanced missile systems such as the Yakhont to be a threat to vital infrastructure on the country's coast, including gas reservoirs and a power station in Hadera, Haaretz reported.

Israel behind mystery attack on Syrian port–U.S. sources.

U.S. officials have revealed that explosions reported at a key Syrian port on July 5 were likely the result of an Israeli airstrike. Three o...

Saudi Arabia 'targeting Iran and Israel with ballistic missiles'

<h3>Saudi Arabia is targeting both Israel and Iran with powerful ballistic missiles, new satellite photography shown by military experts to <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/saudiarabia/10172463/Saudi-Arabia-targeting-Iran-and-Israel-with-ballistic-missiles.html" target="_blank">The Telegraph</a> suggests. </h3><div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Al Watah missile complex" src="http://s.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/Lightbox/published/14/images/THUMB.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="100%" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image showing two circular launch pads, #1 pointing in direction of Israel, and #2 pointing in direction of Iran. A vehicle-mounted ballistic launcher drives to the launch pads and directs itself along thick dark line pointing at ten o'clock. At the bottom of the image an underground bunker built into the hillside with two entrances, one 12 metres wide and the other 15 metres wide, can be seen, where missiles and their warheads are stored. Administrative and residential buildings are shown at the centre of the image.Jane's/DigitalGlobe</td></tr></tbody></table>Images analysed by experts at <i><a href="http://www.ihs.com/products/janes/security/news/intelligence-review.aspx" jquery1502970055280648891="50">IHS Jane's Intelligence Review</a></i> has revealed a hitherto undisclosed surface-to-surface missile base deep in the <strong><a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/saudiarabia" jquery1502970055280648891="51">Saudi</a></strong> desert, with capabilities for hitting both countries.<br /><br /> Analysts who examined the photos spotted two launch pads with markings pointing north-west towards Tel Aviv and north-east towards Tehran.<br /><br />They are designed for Saudi Arabia's arsenal of lorry-launched DF 3 missiles, which have a range of 1,500-2,500 miles and can carry a two-ton payload.<br /><br />The base, believed to have been built within the last five years, gives an insight into Saudi strategic thinking at a time of heightened tensions in the Gulf.<br /><br />While Saudi Arabia does not have formal diplomatic relations with Israel, it has long maintained discreet back channel communications as part of attempts to promote stability in the region.<br /><br />The two countries also have a mutual enemy in Iran, though, which has long seen Saudi Arabia as a rival power in the Gulf. Experts fear that if Iran obtains a nuclear weapon, Saudi Arabia would seek to follow suit.<br /><div><div>Analysts at IHS Jane's believe that the kingdom is currently in the process of upgrading its missiles, although even the DF3, which dates back to the 1980s, is itself potentially big enough to carry a nuclear device. </div><div><br /></div><div>The missile base, which is at al-Watah, around 125 miles south-west of the Saudi capital, Riyadh, was discovered during a project by IHS Jane's to update their assessment of Saudi Arabia's military capabilities. </div></div><div><div>It serves as both a training and launch facility, with the missiles stored in an underground silo built into a rocky hillside. </div><div><br /></div><div>To the north of the facility are two circle-shaped launch pads, both with compass-style markings showing the precise direction that the launchers should fire in. </div><div><br /></div><div>The Chinese-made missiles, which date back to the 1980s, are not remotely-guided and therefore have to be positioned in the direction of their target before firing. </div><div><br /></div><div>"One appears to be aligned on a bearing of approximately 301 degrees and suggesting a potential Israeli target, and the other is oriented along an azimuth (bearing) of approximately 10 degrees, ostensibly situated to target Iranian locations," said the IHS Jane's article, which is published on Thursday. </div><div><br /></div><div>While the lorry-launched missiles can theoretically be fired from any location, the idea of having pre-planned directional markers is to ensure that they can be deployed in accurate fashion as quickly as possible, said Allison Puccioni, an image expert at IHS Jane's. </div><div><br /></div><div>"There is a marked out spot for the launch truck to park in, which will facilitate an expedited launch," she said. </div><div><br /></div><div><img caption="" declared-caption="" height="640" name="Picture-53" photographer="" refid="2614311" src="http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02614/Picture-53_2614311c.jpg" version="c" width="636" /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Robert Munks, deputy editor of IHS Jane's Intelligence Review, said: "Our assessment suggests that this base is either partly or fully operational, with the launch pads pointing in the directions of Israel and Iran respectively. </div><div><br /></div><div>We cannot be certain that the missiles are pointed specifically at Tel Aviv and Tehran themselves, but if they were to be launched, you would expect them to be targeting major cities. </div><div><br /></div><div>"We do not want to make too many inferences about the Saudi strategy, but clearly Saudi Arabia does not enjoy good relations with either Iran or Israel." </div><div><br /></div><div>Officials at the Saudi Embassy in London did not get back with a response when contacted by The Telegraph. The Israeli Embassy in London said: "We have no comment on this matter." </div><div><br /></div><div>David Butter, an associate fellow with the Middle East and North Africa program at Chatham House, the London-based foreign affairs think-tank, said there was "little surprise" that the Saudis had the missiles in place. </div><div><br /></div><div>"It would seem that they are looking towards some sort of deterrent capability, which is an obvious thing for them to be doing, given that Iran too is developing its own ballistic missiles," he said. </div><div><br /></div><div>He added, though, that the Saudis would know that the site would come to the attention of foreign intelligence agencies, and that the missile pad pointed in the direction of Israel could be partly just for "for show". </div><div><br /></div><div>"It would give the Iranians the impression that they were not being exclusively targeted, and would also allow the Saudis to suggest to the rest of the Arab world that they still consider Israel a threat." </div><div><br /></div><div>Oil-rich Saudi Arabia considers itself one of the pre-eminent powers in the Gulf region, but its Sunni Islam leadership has long been at loggerheads with the Shia mullahs of Iran. </div><div><br /></div><div>The ongoing conflict in Syria, which Saudi Arabia has backed the Sunni-dominated rebels and Iran has backed the Shia-dominated regime of President Bashar al-Assad, has heightened fears of a wider sectarian conflict. </div><div><br /></div><h3>A confidential diplomatic cable revealed in the "WikiLeaks" disclosures of 2010 said that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia repeatedly exhorted the United States to launch military strikes against Iran's nuclear programme and "cut off the head of the snake" </h3></div><div><br /></div>

Saudi Arabia 'targeting Iran and Israel with ballistic missiles'

Saudi Arabia is targeting both Israel and Iran with powerful ballistic missiles, new satellite photography shown by military experts to The ...

Israel Army Kill American woman activist.

<h3>Play about dead American activist staged in Israel.</h3><br />Rachel Corrie was killed 10 years ago when she tried to block an Israeli bulldozer she believed was razing homes in the southern Gaza Strip.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Israel play: American activist Rachel Corrie." class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/46/27e1c3f288228d7eaad79c5f84ee1/_h353_w628_m6_otrue_lfalse.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">American activist Rachel Corrie.</td></tr></tbody></table>JERUSALEM — A one-woman play about an American activist who was crushed to death by an Israeli military bulldozer in Gaza is being performed for Hebrew-speaking audiences for the first time.<br /><br />Producers hope the show will force Israelis to confront an issue that, 10 years later, is still stirring passions.<br /><br /><h3>Rachel Corrie was killed in 2003 as she attempted to block a bulldozer she believed was razing homes in the southern Gaza Strip. </h3><h3>She has become a divisive figure since her death.</h3><br />For pro-Palestinian activists, Corrie became a rallying cry and vivid image of what they say is Israel's harsh repression of the Palestinians.<br /><br />Corrie belonged to the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement, whose activists enter conflict zones and try to interfere with activities of Israel's military in the West Bank and Gaza, territories the Palestinians claim for their future state.<br /><br />Many of the areas where they operate have been declared off-limits for civilians by the Israeli military, and most Israelis consider ISM activists like Corrie to be misguided, biased troublemakers and thrill seekers.<br /><br />Israel captured the Gaza Strip, along with the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, in the 1967 Mideast war. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, two years after Corrie died.<br /><br /><br />"My Name is Rachel Corrie" was first staged in London in 2005 and has since courted controversy.<br /><br />A New York off-Broadway theater backed out of plans to stage the play in 2006, drawing charges of censorship from its creators. Performances in Toronto and Florida were canceled, reportedly after pressure from pro-Israel groups.<br /><br />That drama has followed the play to Israel.<br /><br />The Hebrew version premiered briefly in March at a festival in Tel Aviv. On Sunday night, it opened at Jerusalem's Khan Theater.<br /><br />Both performances drew threats from politicians to cut the budgets of venues that stage the play.<br /><br />Such opposition has not deterred the producers.<br /><br />They hope the Hebrew version will stimulate some introspection among audience members about Israel's activities in the Palestinian territories.<br /><br />"(Israel) is the most natural place to hold the play.<br /><br />It's the most appropriate place, where the audience member gets an opportunity to ask himself how he leads his life and how the society he lives in makes decisions," said Ari Remez, the play's director.<br /><br />Remez said he hoped opening in Jerusalem, a city considered less open-minded than Tel Aviv, Israel's liberal cultural hub, would grant the play reach to a more diverse audience.<br /><br />The play, a 90-minute monologue, was crafted from sections of diaries, letters and emails from Corrie's time in Gaza, along with childhood journals, to create a picture of a passionate and idealistic activist.<br /><br />The play opened to a full house at the small theater in Jerusalem Sunday night.<br /><br />Sivane Kretchner, the Israeli actress playing Corrie, flung a keffiyeh, a traditional Palestinian headscarf, around her neck as she delivered Corrie's mundane musings on daily life and grand epiphanies about the injustice she saw.<br /><br />As the theater lights dimmed, the crackly voice of the bulldozer driver was heard communicating the incident over a military radio to his commander — actual material that was used as evidence in a failed lawsuit by her family against the army.<br /><br />The case has continued to attract attention in Israel through a civil suit her parents filed, two years after an internal army investigation ruled the death an accident and cleared the driver and other military personnel of any wrongdoing.<br /><br />Last year, the court sided with the military.<br /><br />Kretchner said she was moved by the English script and wanted to be part of the Hebrew version.<br /><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">"I don't see Rachel Corrie as a controversial person," said Kretchner. </blockquote><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">"She had a beautiful soul, and she was able to look at something and say, this is right and this is wrong."</blockquote><br />Corrie, who was 23, died during a Palestinian uprising, a time of heavy fighting between Israel and Palestinian militants.<br /><br />The Israeli army was undertaking systematic house demolitions in the densely populated, violent area along the Egyptian border, where Palestinian militants were using houses as end points for weapons smuggling tunnels.<br /><br />While witnesses and pro-Palestinian activists said Corrie was trying to block the bulldozer from flattening homes, an Israeli court said it was clearing rubble at the time of her death.<br /><br />Since her death, Palestinians in the West Bank have named a street and a restaurant after her. An Arabic version of the play opened in 2008 and toured Israel and the West Bank.<br /><br />Corrie's parents, Cindy and Craig, who have seen the play in Icelandic, French and Turkish, welcomed the Hebrew version.<br /><br />"To have it shown in Hebrew in Jerusalem brings Rachel's story full circle," said Cindy Corrie from her home in Olympia,Wash.<br /><br />"It brings it to an audience that needs to hear Rachel's words, to hear what she had to say." Craig Corrie called it "moving."<br /><br />Opponents of the performance said they didn't want public money to fund such an event.<br /><br />"(Corrie) was a self-professed Israel hater, and I don't think we need to glorify her name and to make a play based on her and if we do, then it should be done with private funds," David Hadari, deputy mayor of Jerusalem, told The Associated Press.<br /><br />The theater is partly funded by the municipality.<br /><br />Despite Hadari's appeal, the Jerusalem municipality approved the theater's funding last week. In a statement, Mayor Nir Barkat said, "The municipality of Jerusalem does not censor content shown in any artistic performance."<br /><br />Those who attended the opening said it left a strong impression.<br /><br />"This play shatters a mythos that we didn't want to see," said Moshe Levy, an audience member who lives in a West Bank settlement outside Jerusalem.<br /><br />"It breaks that glass through which we hide reality, this painful reality that we need to deal with."<img alt="AP" class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/c4/dfec30414be47bbbe7b7b4d34d4019/_h17_w0_m6_otrue_lfalse.jpg" /><br /><div><br /></div>

Israel Army Kill American woman activist.

Play about dead American activist staged in Israel. Rachel Corrie was killed 10 years ago when she tried to block an Israeli bulldozer she b...

Israel confirms holding Gaza man suspected of security offenses

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjckOrX-jgE-cTM1obfemsedQiujYqpwAa_h7UJDUYKgMRa6ujeYW1kouiIduzaQ-lJ8nzU6rOyuxZr82GaohcpxBE9b-qJr3YRBYNHYKC26Gt99xrtVvP3HO5HnShFGAk9h0-Ab_j6R68/s1600/icon_dbpftt67798f5ed84a9rl3ee70.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjckOrX-jgE-cTM1obfemsedQiujYqpwAa_h7UJDUYKgMRa6ujeYW1kouiIduzaQ-lJ8nzU6rOyuxZr82GaohcpxBE9b-qJr3YRBYNHYKC26Gt99xrtVvP3HO5HnShFGAk9h0-Ab_j6R68/s1600/icon_dbpftt67798f5ed84a9rl3ee70.png" /></a>JERUSALEM, July 10- A Palestinian from the Gaza Strip is being detained in Israel for his alleged involvement in security-related offenses, a court in southern Israel revealed Wednesday after a gag order was partially lifted.<br /><br />The Beersheba Magistrate's Court said the Shin Bet security service and police arrested Wael Abu Reda, 35 years old, on suspicion of having committed "security crimes."<br /><br />No details of the alleged offenses were made available. The court extended the suspect's remand by eight days.<br /><br />The confirmation of Abu Reda's arrest comes three weeks after he had mysteriously disappeared from the Egyptian side of Rafah, a town on the Gaza-Sinai border where he was due to meet a friend. Prior to his disappearance, he arrived at a town near Cairo to seek medical treatment for his son.<br /><br />Abu Reda's wife, Amani, told foreign media at the time she was "clueless" with regard to the circumstances of his disappearance. Relatives said they were not aware of any ties he may have had with Gaza militants.<br /><br />Israel's Public Defender's Office said it had been assigned Abu Rida's case on June 22 and appointed him a lawyer.<br /><br />It remained unclear how Abu Rida, who previously worked as a policeman for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza, ended up in Israel.<br /><br /><h3>In 2011, Dirar Abu Sisi, a Palestinian engineer from Gaza, went missing under similar circumstances during a train ride in the Ukraine. Israel confirmed it was holding him weeks later, saying he was part of Islamist group Hamas' missile and rocket development program in Gaza. </h3><div><br /></div>

Israel confirms holding Gaza man suspected of security offenses

JERUSALEM, July 10- A Palestinian from the Gaza Strip is being detained in Israel for his alleged involvement in security-related offenses, ...

U.S. targets money laundering network operating out of Colombia

<h3>WASHINGTON, July 9 -The Obama administration on Tuesday hit with sanctions 31 persons and entities for their involvement in laundering of proceeds from drug trafficking through a network operating out of Colombia.</h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBoztndZwCFFNSFsfYhb-CC6h2fZ3i8ZBRHDnrEg8ryL8ycHC_hA4J8A74rKGCLhrPJyxiiZP8H4AGFrenW-89zTyyjr5ZBKMFW35y-BfB06lQoW60g5puxkY_KQ2B-zpcjlXxYWONIuIq/s1600/fbi.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBoztndZwCFFNSFsfYhb-CC6h2fZ3i8ZBRHDnrEg8ryL8ycHC_hA4J8A74rKGCLhrPJyxiiZP8H4AGFrenW-89zTyyjr5ZBKMFW35y-BfB06lQoW60g5puxkY_KQ2B-zpcjlXxYWONIuIq/s1600/fbi.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />The Department of Treasury said the individuals, seven of them Colombian nationals and two others holding a dual citizenship of Colombia and Israel, and 22 companies located in Colombia, Panama and Israel, form the network that launders hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars in drug money connected to drug trafficking organizations, including Ayman Saied Joumaa and Linares Castillo who were already put under U.S. sanctions.<br /><br />For one, Ayman Saied Joumaa's trafficking activities have stretched from South America to Africa and benefited terrorist groups such as Hezbollah, a Shiite militant group in Lebanon, the Treasury said.<br /><br />"By designating the individuals and entities behind this money laundering organization, the Treasury Department is taking another step to protect the international financing system from abuse by narcotics traffickers, money launderers and terrorists," the agency said in a statement.<br /><br />The move bars American citizens from doing business with those targeted and freezes all of their assets under U.S. jurisdiction.<br /><br />In a separate action, U.S. authorities announced the filing of criminal charges against four defendants, including Isaac Perez Guberek Ravinovicz and his son, Henry Guberek Grimberg, leaders of the money laundering network based in Bogota, capital of Colombia.<br /><br />The Treasury has blacklisted more than 1,200 individuals and entities linked to 103 drug kingpins worldwide since June 2000.<br /><div><br /></div>

U.S. targets money laundering network operating out of Colombia

WASHINGTON, July 9 -The Obama administration on Tuesday hit with sanctions 31 persons and entities for their involvement in laundering of pr...

Israel Urges U.S. Not to Freeze its annual $1.3 billion Egypt Aid.

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFM-YJgIMgJWcyPyt_Jt6eXJwZctvqwAl_9sg93e-cQkh9Cq1Ipvx7fyXVVRHfO6118iihIAkuwFBNwzz3_MOruiw5hoQ8bUFKafmTLLBkcZw3V8IHLgZhtUAwFQJNI1fLDXTvsS_MSUA/s1600/USD.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFM-YJgIMgJWcyPyt_Jt6eXJwZctvqwAl_9sg93e-cQkh9Cq1Ipvx7fyXVVRHfO6118iihIAkuwFBNwzz3_MOruiw5hoQ8bUFKafmTLLBkcZw3V8IHLgZhtUAwFQJNI1fLDXTvsS_MSUA/s1600/USD.jpg" width="320" /></a>JERUSALEM - Israel has urged Washington not to suspend its annual $1.3 billion in aid to Cairo in the wake of the ouster of Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi by the military, news reports said Tuesday.<br /><br />Under U.S. law, all military and economic aid must be suspended to any country where the government is overthrown by the military, although Washington has not yet determined whether it considers the June 30 removal of Morsi was actually a coup — a claim made by the Muslim Brotherhood, to which the ousted president belongs.<br /><br />According to a senior U.S. official quoted by Haaretz newspaper, Israel's top political echelon had engaged in "marathon phone calls" with Washington over the weekend, warning that any suspension of aid could impact on Israel's security and even undermine its 1979 peace treaty with Egypt.<br /><br />Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu phoned Secretary of State John Kerry, Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon spoke with Pentagon chief Chuck Hagel, and Israel's National Security Adviser Yaakov Amidror consulted with his U.S. counterpart, Susan Rice, he said.<br /><br />"The Israelis warned that cutting military aid to Egypt would likely impact negatively on Israel's security, especially given the possibility of further security deterioration in Sinai. They also warned that halting the aid could undermine Israel's peace treaty with Egypt," the paper said.<br /><br />U.S. aid to Egypt, which began as a direct result of the treaty, has continued uninterrupted since 1979, and Israel fears any chance in U.S. policy could undermine the Egyptian army's commitment to the treaty.<br /><br />A senior official in Netanyahu's office refused to confirm or deny the report.<br /><br />The Sinai Peninsula, which borders Israel and the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, has seen a rise in Islamist militancy since the overthrow of former president Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, that has resulted in a rise in attacks on the Jewish state as well as on Egypt's own forces stationed there.<br /><br />Last week, the Israeli army confirmed it had "authorized" the deployment of Egyptian military reinforcements in the peninsula "in order to contend with security threats in Sinai that pose a threat to both Israel and Egypt." The 1979 treaty imposes strict controls on the numbers of troops permitted to operate there.<br /><br />Israel's public radio ran a similar report on Israeli efforts to dissuade Washington from halting aid to Cairo. Speaking to the station, an Israeli official said Egypt was likely to go through "a period of chronic instability."<br /><br />"The Muslim Brotherhood will not easily give up power, we must expect more violence and perhaps more changes in the leadership," he said.<br /><br />Since Morsi's ouster, Netanyahu has ordered his ministers to stay silent on the unfolding political crisis in Egypt.

Israel Urges U.S. Not to Freeze its annual $1.3 billion Egypt Aid.

JERUSALEM - Israel has urged Washington not to suspend its annual $1.3 billion in aid to Cairo in the wake of the ouster of Egyptian preside...

Israeli cabinet approves ultra-Orthodox conscription law

<h3>Most Israeli men and women are called up for military service when they turn 18, but ultra-Orthodox members usually receive exemptions.</h3><br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Exemptions for Israeli military service: An ultra-Orthodox Jewish man" class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/ea/f636cd2aabac66fac6620a1537df3/_h353_w628_m6_otrue_lfalse.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ultra-Orthodox Jewish men are currently exempted from military duty.</td></tr></tbody></table>JERUSALEM — Israel's cabinet approved a draft law on Sunday to abolish wholesale exemptions from military duty granted to Jewish seminary students, stoking ultra-Orthodox anger over the break with tradition.<br /><br />Many Israelis have long bridled over state privileges handed to the conservative believers or "Haredim" — a Hebrew term meaning "those who tremble before God".<br /><br />The debate heated up when elections in January saw strong performances for two parties who campaigned against the exemptions and created the first cabinet in a decade without ultra-Orthodox members.<br /><br />Most Israeli men and women are called up for military service for up to three years when they turn 18, and often see active service in the occupied West Bank and other flashpoints.<br /><br />But ultra-Orthodox men studying in seminaries, religious women and Arab citizens of Israel have been exempted since the Jewish state was formed in 1948.<br /><br />Under the proposed law, only 1,800 of those students, designated "outstanding biblical scholars", would get an exemption, out of the estimated 8,000 who become eligible for the draft every year.<br /><br />"The government's abuse of the haredi minority verges on persecution and cruelty," Meir Porush, an ultra-Orthodox legislator from the opposition United Torah Judaism party, said about the cabinet's decision.<br /><br />Ultra-Orthodox rabbis say the study of the holy scriptures is a foundation of Jewish life and scholars have a right to devote themselves full time to the task.<br /><br />"This is a stain on the State of Israel, which has become the only country in the world to determine that studying the Scriptures is not legitimate," another United Torah Judaism legislator, Moshe Gafni, told reporters.<br /><br />PROTESTS<br /><br />Changing the so-called secular-religious status quo in Israel has carried significant political risk in the past for its coalition governments, which have often relied on the support of ultra-Orthodox partners.<br /><br />Two months ago, some 30,000 Haredim in traditional black garb rallied to rabbis' calls against conscription reform and protested outside a military recruitment centre in Jerusalem.<br /><br />But while leaders of the Haredim community have pledged more mass demonstrations against the legislation, an ultra-Orthodox backlash currently poses little danger to the government's survival, given its composition.<br /><br />Hoping to avoid any immediate confrontation, the government agreed to delay any sanctions against draft-dodgers by imposing a four-year interim period in which the military will encourage young Bible scholars to enlist.<br /><br />"We will make this change gradually through consideration for the special needs of the ultra-Orthodox community," Netanyahu said in public remarks at the cabinet meeting, where ministers voted 14-0, with four abstentions, to approve the proposed law.<br /><br />Some 3,500 Haredim already serve in the military, and a recent study by the Economy Ministry found that 70 percent of ultra-Orthodox soldiers entered the workforce after they completed their service. By contrast, only 45 percent of all Haredi men were employed, according to the central bank.<br /><br />Haredim make up 10 percent of Israel's eight million population and they are expanding rapidly, with families of 10 children not uncommon.<br /><br />The draft legislation, which will be brought to parliament for ratification, would be implemented fully in four years' time.<img alt="Reuters" class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/99/6a6e1e9d2013e8fe84e6814a7d491/_h17_w0_m6_otrue_lfalse.gif" /><br /><div><br /></div>

Israeli cabinet approves ultra-Orthodox conscription law

Most Israeli men and women are called up for military service when they turn 18, but ultra-Orthodox members usually receive exemptions. Ultr...

Focus:Sinai is where the complicated shades of Egypt's grey become blacker and whiter.

<h3>Out in the desert, things are heating up again </h3><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNFPt7jrK8jsgE4om9qZ4An2Kcc9Gc5PBJhiZtPqhVSIRbLJTaGhOctCf8xMYpRcShNyDfmCduSiAmZCBr-g-M3KN-jk99EI952rvYFBC6GhPpEQUH32zxXLdFsURI9uoc_m3LocK1KbE/s1600/Sinai+Egyptian+Forces+May+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNFPt7jrK8jsgE4om9qZ4An2Kcc9Gc5PBJhiZtPqhVSIRbLJTaGhOctCf8xMYpRcShNyDfmCduSiAmZCBr-g-M3KN-jk99EI952rvYFBC6GhPpEQUH32zxXLdFsURI9uoc_m3LocK1KbE/s1600/Sinai+Egyptian+Forces+May+2013.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />The Sinai desert that separates Israel from the power and control center of Egypt is a kind of danger-early-warning mechanism that highlights in generally brutal ways what's ahead.<br /><br /> The peninsula has become more and more an outlaw domain where the long arm of Cairo's law and order fails to reach.<br /><br />The result is chaos when it's not too serious; death and destruction when more so.<br /><br /><h3> For the moment, the events in Cairo are on the minds of news reporters and analysts,but Sinai is where the complicated shades of Egypt's grey become blacker and whiter.</h3><br />This morning, there are (largely ignored) reports from multiple Sinai locations of coordinated rocket and machine gun attacks by militants on army checkpoints and a police base in the restive Sinai... Hardcore militants have used the sparsely populated north of the peninsula as a launching pad for attacks on security forces and neighbouring Israel.<br /><br /><span style="font-family: inherit;">This, according to <a href="http://dawn.com/news/1022892/egyptian-soldier-killed-in-militant-attack-medics">AFP</a>. Over at the <a href="http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Egyptian-state-TV-Islamist-gunmen-attack-Sinai-airport-318832">Jerusalem Post</a>, they have some additional details:</span><br /><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><blockquote class="tr_bq"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Islamist gunmen staged multi</span>ple attacks on security forces in Egypt's troubled Sinai Peninsula early on Friday, two days after the army overthrew elected Islamist President Mohamed Morsi, security sources and state television reported.</blockquote><div><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">The security sources said a soldier was killed and two were wounded when a police station in Rafah on the border with the Gaza Strip came under rocket fire. The police post is close to the local headquarters of military intelligence.</blockquote></div><div><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Earlier, attackers fired rocket-propelled grenades at army checkpoints guarding El-Arish airport, close to the border with the Gaza Strip and Israel, in the latest of a string of security incidents in the lawless region, the sources said. [<a href="http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Egyptian-state-TV-Islamist-gunmen-attack-Sinai-airport-318832">Jerusalem Post</a>]</blockquote><ul></ul>It may be even worse. <a href="http://blogs.aljazeera.com/topic/egypt/gunfights-north-sinai" style="background-color: white; border: 0px currentColor; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Al-Jazeera </a>is reporting that <span style="background-color: white; line-height: 21px;">gunmen attacked no fewer than five military checkpoints in el-Arish and Sheik Zweid in the early hours of this morning. </span><br /><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGsAPlurKgXO3ap-0UsJ4VHGCgub32Vr6MCJiX_WNSiKSsomA8CZVCO2qGWUhssdWw82WMa-BIzycTJXpE-MrUwHwj1dfugQKhXaMnmlX-riCO2cM4zCa6spI3o0mJk0MlUr3j3DyPlDM/s1600/12.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGsAPlurKgXO3ap-0UsJ4VHGCgub32Vr6MCJiX_WNSiKSsomA8CZVCO2qGWUhssdWw82WMa-BIzycTJXpE-MrUwHwj1dfugQKhXaMnmlX-riCO2cM4zCa6spI3o0mJk0MlUr3j3DyPlDM/s1600/12.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><blockquote class="tr_bq">Egyptian army soldiers stand guard on the border with Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on July 5.</blockquote><div><br /></div>Israeli alarm bells are, of course, ringing. Around 9:30 last night (Thursday) there <a href="http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4401116,00.html">were reports in Israel </a>(as far as we can tell, nowhere else) of explosions heard in Eilat, the Israeli city closest to Sinai and Egypt.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyiVnFggYkZWNgJyS9oyN_f9imtDzrHCIur26ktS0Bpt1JbzyzV8_ZpVlSuSXCdv6fVShsbj8u2HSzsdgAM1JHT96fBZHSQxdwvA9kdVgGUF7xrVTlXtFIu28znRhlrPYUeagInEmtS0o/s1600/Assad_and_fellow_terrorists_2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyiVnFggYkZWNgJyS9oyN_f9imtDzrHCIur26ktS0Bpt1JbzyzV8_ZpVlSuSXCdv6fVShsbj8u2HSzsdgAM1JHT96fBZHSQxdwvA9kdVgGUF7xrVTlXtFIu28znRhlrPYUeagInEmtS0o/s1600/Assad_and_fellow_terrorists_2010.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />While there is no evidence at this point of a rocket attack (and although some second-tier news sources claimed to know that is what it was), the police have still not identified either the source or any evidence of incoming rockets.<br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">Two blasts were heard at around 9:30 p.m. throughout the southern city, according to witnesses, but the red alert rocket warning siren was not triggered nor were there any reports of injuries or damage. Security forces launched a search of the area but said they could not confirm what caused the blast.... Former IDF chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi said earlier on Thursday that while he does not envision Morsi's ouster posing a security threat to Israel, <b>risk could come from Sinai, where decreased presence of the Egyptian army could present an opportunity for Islamist militants to act from the peninsula against Israel</b>. [<a href="http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Egyptian-state-TV-Islamist-gunmen-attack-Sinai-airport-318832">Jerusalem Post</a>]</blockquote>As we wrote, a hot summer appears to be ahead.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiucx7_-knnilA3_rQsv-1fyWO9ixEFCvK73ah0uNIScNqZ-gFxcPTZGX5SyTTQJIQJuqKI9VnzrOHW01bUWClrMfzVCN7LKVvwVSK33cYpPMKjBTJ_pOT4JBDWNw_oWO4k9YFAVCHQ5dU/s1600/index.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiucx7_-knnilA3_rQsv-1fyWO9ixEFCvK73ah0uNIScNqZ-gFxcPTZGX5SyTTQJIQJuqKI9VnzrOHW01bUWClrMfzVCN7LKVvwVSK33cYpPMKjBTJ_pOT4JBDWNw_oWO4k9YFAVCHQ5dU/s1600/index.png" /></a></div><br /></div>

Focus:Sinai is where the complicated shades of Egypt's grey become blacker and whiter.

Out in the desert, things are heating up again  The Sinai desert that separates Israel from the power and control center of Egypt is a kind ...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry pushes effort to restart peace talks.

<blockquote class="tr_bq">RAMALLAH, West Bank — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is in the West Bank to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the third time in three days, trying to press the restart button on talks between Israel and the Palestinians to end their long-running conflict.</blockquote><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMGX5nRp0qMkDCsx_QOgDwHb5d9nX9gCKS8st4lh0GFBV3ZRMvu5eYPTE1t3OZ7qLPjXJRxHzuBzp-GCwP-OERLwEOM-Oup68yZDVtMtfl8HQav0sC0oBFQDZ-o_xVJL1x1QH72kpTd_o/s330/XJK1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="311" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMGX5nRp0qMkDCsx_QOgDwHb5d9nX9gCKS8st4lh0GFBV3ZRMvu5eYPTE1t3OZ7qLPjXJRxHzuBzp-GCwP-OERLwEOM-Oup68yZDVtMtfl8HQav0sC0oBFQDZ-o_xVJL1x1QH72kpTd_o/s330/XJK1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Escorted by security, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, left, walks with Frank Lowenstein, senior advisor to the secretary on Middle East issues, through the streets of Jerusalem just after 4 a.m. on Sunday, June 30, 2013 after finishing a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that took over six hours. After the marathon meeting, Kerry decided to get some air by walking to a park near the hotel where he is staying and the meeting was held. Kerry is shuttling between Palestinian and Israeli leaders in hopes of restarting peace talks. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, Pool)</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Sunday is the fourth day of Mideast shuttle diplomacy for Kerry.<br /><br />He met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his advisers until after 3 a.m. Sunday in a hotel suite in Jerusalem.<br /><br />There is deep skepticism that Kerry can get the two sides to agree on a two-state solution.<br /><br />It's something that's eluded presidents and diplomats for years.<br /><br />But the flurry of meetings has heightened expectations the two sides can be persuaded to restart talks, which broke down in 2008.<br /><div><br /></div>

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry pushes effort to restart peace talks.

RAMALLAH, West Bank — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is in the West Bank to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the third time ...

Talks between Netanyahu & US Secretary of State John Kerry might lead to breakthrough:Israeli source.

<blockquote class="tr_bq">JERUSALEM, June 29 - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry embarked on their third meeting in 48 hours on Saturday evening amid intense talks' marathon in Israel and Jordan.</blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj46d_QpEqDpxBIdEHsqB4hxfkYA-Zu5MHHHnEV3dLDW7MLqIRi2ut1m5C-CsdZ0zTWDYFacgRLnG9hv4yrosjhiOsRqH8TIEHURijiksqLP6E1B3nHg_h7P_XX2Ensgensr_xrVdhBs9g/s350/1163.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj46d_QpEqDpxBIdEHsqB4hxfkYA-Zu5MHHHnEV3dLDW7MLqIRi2ut1m5C-CsdZ0zTWDYFacgRLnG9hv4yrosjhiOsRqH8TIEHURijiksqLP6E1B3nHg_h7P_XX2Ensgensr_xrVdhBs9g/s350/1163.jpg" /></a></div>A diplomatic source in Jerusalem told  prior to the meeting that the meeting "might lead to a breakthrough and the resumption of the peace talks."<br /><br />"Kerry is set to deliver a statement tomorrow and it's hard to believe that he would have postponed the planned press conference (supposed to take place in Jordan on Saturday noon) if he didn't expect to deliver good news at the end of his visit," the source added.<br /><br />Kerry, who has been on a back and forth shuttle of talks with Israeli leaders in Jerusalem and Palestinian leaders in Amman, Jordan in the past 48 hours, postponed a planned trip to the United Arab Emirates, which was supposed to start on Saturday night.<br /><br />This is Kerry's fifth visit in the region since he took office as secretary of state, in a continuing effort to get both parties back to the negotiations table. Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down in 2010 over Israel's growing construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.<br /><br />Kerry is supposedly pushing both sides to hold a diplomatic summit next week in Jordan, according to reports in both Israeli and Jordanian media.<br /><br />A diplomatic source told the Walla! news website Saturday that Israel is willing to release prisoners on a gradual basis, and not to build in the settlements, but is reluctant to publicly declare it.<br /><br />Despite the signs of a possible breakthrough, there have also been also reports to the contrary.<br /><br />A Palestinian official told Xinhua reporters in Ramallah that there are "still no results that may actually bring to the renewal of the negotiations among both parties."<br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEics_tjdLRHEvw7-fjiDpSGbFhLO8tGdicp3iGhWL2nG5RLwsK3_LtC2ea14BwZfUgef8FvGt78KMDJQoMx1X_VI-2L3zyZDvqGjw9wTReOPLW3dzB5E9DK6v8uuRTI1Wxm3Bjd4S_ToYw/s900/1324.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEics_tjdLRHEvw7-fjiDpSGbFhLO8tGdicp3iGhWL2nG5RLwsK3_LtC2ea14BwZfUgef8FvGt78KMDJQoMx1X_VI-2L3zyZDvqGjw9wTReOPLW3dzB5E9DK6v8uuRTI1Wxm3Bjd4S_ToYw/s900/1324.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US Secretary of State John Kerry (1st R) meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (2nd L) during a dinner in Jerusalem, on June 29, 2013.</td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div>

Talks between Netanyahu & US Secretary of State John Kerry might lead to breakthrough:Israeli source.

JERUSALEM, June 29 - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry embarked on their third meeting in 48 ...

No Big Macs for Jewish settlement

McDonald's is the latest international company to spurn business in the West Bank, a boycott target of pro-Palestinian activists.<br /><br /><br /><br /><img alt="McDonald's restaurant boycott: Chain refuses to open in West Bank Jewish settlement" class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/a4/92cb3af46d3fa64d4546c98f55d84c/_h353_w628_m6_otrue_lfalse.jpg" /><br /><br />JERUSALEM — The McDonald's restaurant chain has refused to open a branch in a West Bank Jewish settlement, the company said Thursday, adding a prominent name to an international movement to boycott Israel's settlements.<br /><br />Irina Shalmor, spokeswoman for McDonald's Israel, said the owners of a planned mall in the Ariel settlement asked McDonald's to open a branch there about six months ago. Shalmor said the chain refused because the owner of McDonald's Israel has a policy of staying out of the occupied territories. The decision was not coordinated with McDonald's headquarters in the United States, she said. The headquarters was not immediately available for comment.<br /><br />The Israeli branch's owner and franchisee, Omri Padan, is a founder of the dovish group Peace Now, which opposes all settlements and views them as obstacles to peace. The group said Padan is no longer a member.<br /><br />The decision by such a well-known multinational company to boycott the West Bank deals settlers an unwelcome blow. It also adds the name of an important international brand to a movement that has urged businesses to stay out of the West Bank. International companies like Caterpillar, France's Veolia and others have faced pressure from a global network of pro-Palestinian activists to sever links with the settlements.<br /><br />The activists have also pushed consumers to shun products made in settlements. Israeli academics and unions have also been boycotted because of Israel's settlement policies, and European countries are considering stepping up efforts to label settlement-made products sold in Europe.<br /><br />The Palestinians want the West Bank, along with the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, as part of their future state. Israel captured those areas, along with the Golan Heights, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians and most of the international community consider Israel's West Bank settlements illegal or illegitimate.<br /><br />The mall's owners, settlers and politicians who back them chided McDonald's for its decision.<br /><br />"McDonald's has gone from being a for-profit company to an organization with an anti-Israeli political agenda," said Yigal Dilmoni, a leader of the Yesha Council, a settler umbrella group. He urged Israelis to think twice before they buy a meal at McDonald's following its decision. Pro-settler lawmaker Ayelet Shaked said she would boycott the fast food chain.<br /><br />Tzahi Nehimias, a co-owner of the Ariel mall, said an Israeli burger chain, Burger Ranch, had offered to take McDonald's spot. He also said Burger King had shown interest, but Miguel Piedra, a spokesman for Burger King Worldwide, said the company has no plans to re-enter Israel. The company closed its restaurants in Israel in 2010 and turned them over to Burger Ranch.<br /><br />Nehimias said other international companies that were asked to open a branch at the mall also declined, but none cited the mall's location in a settlement as a reason. He declined to identify the other companies. Some 19,000 Jewish settlers live in Ariel, and it has a large student population.<br /><br />Peace Now welcomed McDonald's decision.<br /><br />"We totally understand and support people who think settlements are bad for Israel's interests," said Yariv Oppenheimer, who heads Peace Now. "They don't want to take an active role by opening a business there and helping to expand and to contribute to the settlement idea."<br /><br />Rafeef Ziadah of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement said McDonald's move "will encourage other corporations to end their complicity in Israel's occupation."<br /><br />This is not the first time McDonald's has stirred controversy in Israel. The company didn't open a branch in Israel until 1993 due to the Arab League boycott of the country.<br /><br />A year later, McDonald's built a branch near a memorial to Israel's Golani military brigade, and Israelis objected to the large double-arches sign there, saying it desecrated the site. The sign was later made smaller. In 2004, McDonald's was criticized for telling its Arabic and Russian speaking staff not to speak those languages at work.<img alt="AP" class="image" src="http://newsbcpcol.stb.s-msn.com/amnews/i/e3/12e7ff08bf55a6d7449b766b4e23c/_h17_w0_m6_otrue_lfalse.jpg" /><br /><br /><em class="ywp-page-play-pause ywp-page-video ywp-link-hover" id="yui_3_5_1_5_1372373571471_946"><em class="ywp-page-btn ywp-page-btn-play" title="Play Video"></em><a class="yltnofollow" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i56XeM0-b8Y" id="yui_3_5_1_5_1372373571471_389" target="_blank">Zoetrope (YouTube link)</a></em><br /><div><br /></div>

No Big Macs for Jewish settlement

McDonald's is the latest international company to spurn business in the West Bank, a boycott target of pro-Palestinian activists. JERUSA...