Canada’s PM urges Abbas to negotiate with ‘Jewish State of Israel’
Staunchly pro-Israel Stephen Harper arrives Sunday for first visit to the region by sitting Canadian premier in a decade
January 19, 2014, 9:45 am
5-The Times of Israel
Stephen Harper, the
staunchly pro-Israel Canadian prime minister, was scheduled to arrive
in Israel Sunday afternoon, marking his first official trip to the
Middle East and the first visit to the region by a sitting prime
minister from the North American country in over a decade.Harper’s
support for Israel was underlined in a press release issued by his
office about the trip, which used the “Jewish State of Israel”
formulation that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is asking the
Palestinian Authority to endorse as one of Israel’s conditions for a
peace deal. “Canada supports the Palestinian Authority’s efforts to
build the institutions and infrastructure necessary for a viable
Palestinian state established through a negotiated agreement with the
Jewish State of Israel,” the press release stated, in a section discussing Harper’s scheduled meetings with Palestinian leaders during the trip.As part of a six-day sojourn in the region,
Harper will be in Israel for four days, during which time he will meet
with Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres to discuss possibilities for
increasing trade and strengthening relations between the two countries, a
press release from Harper’s office said. The ongoing
Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the Iranian nuclear threat and
instability in Syria are also on the agenda.On Monday, Harper will become the first
Canadian prime minister to address the Knesset, and on Tuesday he will
attend a joint meeting of the Israeli and Canadian governments before
accompanying Netanyahu to Yad Vashem, the Prime Minister’s Office said
in a statement. On his final day in Israel, he plans to tour Christian
sites in Israel’s north before attending a ceremony at Tel Aviv
University, where he will receive an honorary doctorate.He will also travel to the West Bank on Monday
to meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and, on
Wednesday, embark on a three-day visit to Jordan to meet with Hashemite
King Abdullah II and Jordanian Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour.“Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is a
great friend of the State of Israel,” Netanyahu said. “He has come out
strongly against attempts to delegitimize the State of Israel and has
taken a praiseworthy moral stand against these attempts. I welcome his
arrival together with his wife and the members of his delegation. We
will work together to further enhance the important relations between
our two countries.”Harper, an evangelical Christian and one of
Israel’s most unabashedly staunch allies, announced the upcoming trip at
a Jewish National Fund dinner in December, calling Israel “a light of
freedom and democracy in what is otherwise a region of darkness” and
pledged that the Jewish state “will always have Canada as a friend.”Since his election in 2006, the Conservative prime minister has been a full-throated, unapologetic supporter of Israel.Harper was the first Western leader to cut aid
to the Palestinian Authority following Hamas’s seizure that year of
power in Gaza, and the first to withdraw from the second UN World
Conference Against Racism, known as Durban II, saying the event would
“scapegoat the Jewish people.”Canada has sided openly with Israel in every
one of its military operations since 2006. Netanyahu calls him Stephen,
and the two speak regularly. Earlier this month, Harper appointed Vivian
Bercovici, a Toronto lawyer and an outspoken Israel supporter, as
Canada’s ambassador to Israel.Harper will be accompanied on the trip by his
wife, Laureen, and a substantial delegation of leaders from the Canadian
government, including several senior ministers.
JTA contributed to this report.
Kerry said set to present framework deal at end of month
At conference in Aqaba, US secretary of state reportedly to put forward ‘vague outline’ of Israeli-Palestinian accord
January 18, 2014, 4:34 pm
8
US Secretary of State John Kerry
is reportedly set to present a memorandum of understanding between
Israel and the Palestinians at a conference in Jordan at the end of the
month, London-based Arabic daily al-Hayat reported on Saturday.Palestinian
sources told the newspaper that the document was just a vague outline
with flexible contents, as the two sides are due to discuss the
particulars of the agreement as peace talks proceed through April.According to the report, Kerry is due to present the document at a summit in Aqaba hosted by Jordanian King Abdullah.Israel’s Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon
on Saturday reiterated the report’s claim to Israel Radio in a Saturday
interview. According to Danon, Kerry will return to the region on Monday
to hold a joint meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud
Abbas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Jordan’s King Abdullah II.The deputy defense minister told the radio
station that he hopes Netanyahu will oppose a return to the 1967 lines
and not agree to any negotiations over Jerusalem, and warned that if
Netanyahu makes a left-hand turn “like [Ariel] Sharon did,” he would
face stiff opposition from his Likud party. A State Department spokesperson said in
response to inquiries by The Times of Israel about the al-Hayat report
that they had nothing new to announce, and reiterated that Washington
was “currently discussing with the parties a framework which would serve
as principles to guide the final status negotiations.” State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki on
Friday denied there was a working draft of a US framework agreement
being passed between Jerusalem and Ramallah, but said Washington was
“working with both sides on a framework for negotiations moving forward
that addresses all of the core issues.”The US Ambassador to Israel, Dan Shapiro, said
earlier this month that the Kerry framework proposal would be presented
soon. Kerry has made 10 visits to the region this year, and an eleventh
trip is expected soon.Israeli media reports claim the Palestinian
leadership has decided to reject Kerry’s proposals for an
Israeli-Palestinian peace deal and instead launch a global diplomatic
and legal assault on Israel.The Palestinian Authority is currently setting
up teams to wage diplomatic war against Israel in “every conceivable”
forum, including pushing for boycotts of Israel and seeking legal
rulings against Israel via international courts in The Hague, Israel’s
Channel 2 news reported Friday night.Unless Kerry significantly changes the current
formulation of his proposals, the report said, the Palestinians will
reject his overtures, confident that much of the international community
will consider them to be the injured party and hold Israel responsible
for the failure of peace efforts.The Palestinians are furious that Kerry is
offering them a state “with no borders, no capital, no [control over]
border crossings… and without Jerusalem,” the TV report said, quoting
Palestinian sources.On Jerusalem, rather than the complete control
that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is demanding over
all areas of the city captured by Israel in the 1967 war, including the
Old City, Kerry is merely offering the Palestinians a capital based in
one of the city’s outlying neighborhoods such as Isawiya, Abu Dis (where
construction of a Palestinian parliamentary building was begun in
2000), Beit Hanina or Shuafat.The TV report came a day after the former Palestinian
negotiator Nabil Shaath made plain the Palestinians’ anger with Kerry,
by publicly accusing the secretary of endorsing Israel’s demands on two
central issues in the peace talks: The recognition of Israel as a Jewish
state and a continued Israeli security presence in the Jordan Valley.
The PA has repeatedly rebuffed these two demands. “The two issues have never been in our agenda: the Jewishness of the state [of Israel] and the Jordan [Valley],” Shaath said.Palestinian
sources told AFP in early January that Abbas rebuffed pressure from
Kerry to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. They also said the
secretary was proposing a joint Israeli-Palestinian presence to control
the West Bank-Jordan border, where Israel has insisted on continued IDF
control. Abbas previously sought an international military presence on
the border, with no Israeli involvement.
Last month, the Palestinians reportedly
rejected a proposal by Kerry for an Israeli security presence in the
Jordan Valley for the first 10 years after the signing of a peace deal.Neither Kerry’s security proposals, nor his
evolving framework deal for ongoing talks, have been made public, but
leaked details indicate Israel and the Palestinians are at odds over
almost all key issues — notably including the status of Jerusalem,
Palestinian refugee demands, border demarcations, land-swap
arrangements, and security proposals. Current talks are set to end in
April; Kerry wants the framework deal inked in the near future, as a
basis for extending the talks.Last week, Abbas hardened his stance on the demand for a “right of return” for Palestinian refugees.
Israel’s
government, for its part, recently announced plans to build 1,400 new
homes over the pre-1967 lines, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday accused the international community of “hypocrisy” for its opposition to the expansion of existing settlements, which he said did not impede peace efforts.Netanyahu has accused the Palestinians of
being intransigent in the negotiations, while Israel has released 78
long-time Palestinian prisoners, most of them terrorists convicted of
murdering Israelis, in the course of the talks, and has agreed to free a
further group of 26 such convicts in the coming months.
Earlier this week, Israel’s Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon was quoted accusing Kerry of pursuing an accord with an “inexplicably obsessive” and “messianic” zeal,
and describing the secretary’s security proposal as “not worth the
paper it is printed on.” Ya’alon did not deny the statements, but issued an apology. Kerry, in turn, said he would not let “one set of comments” deter him from his efforts.
Temple Mount: Jewish Woman Barred Over 'Muslim' Dress Code
Police keep Jewish woman off Temple Mount for wearing modest skirt deemed 'too short' by the Waqf; 'it’s their decision'.-By Maayana Miskin-First Publish: 1/19/2014, 4:17 PM-israelnationalnews
Temple Mount-Flash 90
The officer then questioned the woman and a companion, asking whether they had tried to enter the Temple Mount as Israelis, or as foreign tourists.When the two demanded that they be allowed to visit the holy site, the officer reportedly responded, “No provocative questions.”The officer demanded that a friend of the two who was filming the exchange stop filming, but the man refused. “It’s my right,” he said.The LIBA movement, which works for Jewish religious rights on the Temple Mount, expressed outrage over the incident. “Putting the Waqf in authority over Jews is worse than leaving the cat to guard the cream,” activists charged.
“The Waqf is waging a struggle against Jews on the Temple Mount,” they explained. “Its people do everything they can to keep as many Jews as they can away from the site.”“Putting this authority into the hands of the Jordanian Waqf contradicts the law for Holy Sites, and the Basic Law: Jerusalem,” added Rabbi Yehuda Glick, the director of LIBA.Temple Mount activists have warned that the Waqf is allowing the wholesale destruction of Jewish artifacts on the Temple Mount, and is ideologically opposed to Jewish visitors. Muslim leaders in Israel - including Arab-Israeli Members of Knesset - have openly stated that they believe Jews should not be allowed to visit the site.Israeli police have instituted a ban on Jewish worship at the site in order to avoid offending Muslim worshipers, and recently went so far as to ban dried fruit for fear that Jewish visitors would use it to celebrate the holiday of Tu BiShvat.The Temple Mount was the site of the First and Second Temples, and is the holiest place on earth according to Judaism. It is also home to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, a well-known Muslim place of worship that has become a focal point of conflict as Arab leaders accuse Israel of attempting to "Judaize" Jerusalem.
Ya’alon: US and Europe ‘don’t understand’ Middle East
Days after high-profile spat over his scathing Kerry critique, defense minister rejects US proposal for security arrangements
January 19, 2014, 9:00 am
19-The times of Israel
American and European policies in the Middle East are misguided, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said over the weekend, asserting that electronic security measures proposed by Washington for the Jordan Valley, as part of a peace framework, are no substitute for Israeli boots on the ground.His
comments come days after his scathing critique of US Secretary of State
John Kerry, and US-led efforts to negotiate an Israeli-Palestinian
accord, made international headlines and set off a rare vocal spat with
the US.Although he “strongly supports” the use of
“technological developments” in Israel’s defense, “senors and drones are
no substitute for the physical presence of soldiers,” Ya’alon said
Thursday evening in a speech at the Jewish Statesmanship Center in
Jerusalem, the Hebrew daily Maariv reported on Sunday.“The Jordan Valley is vital to the security of
Israel, and we cannot assent to third parties being there in our stead.
Security in the valley must remain in our hands for an extended
period,” Ya’alon said.Continued Israeli security presence in the
strategic Jordan Valley after a peace agreement has been signed, a
condition stipulated by Israel and vehemently opposed by the
Palestinians, has been one of several sticking points in the
negotiations. The US has proposed a security arrangement consisting of
high-tech surveillance combined with the presence of international
security forces, an idea Israel has rejected.Reportedly, Jerusalem has proposed several
ideas that would entail an Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley for at
least a decade after a peace accord is reached, all of which have been
rejected by the Palestinians.On Thursday, Ya’alon said that “the US and
Europe are mistaken and don’t understand the Middle East and the
processes taking place there.”He said that the West was focused on the
Palestinian issue, even though it wasn’t the main problem facing the
region, and dismissed the US’s recent policies in Egypt vis-a-vis the
rapid political change occurring there. Ya’alon stated that the Obama
administration “promoted the rule” of the Muslim Brotherhood via
elections, but then when the Egyptian military held a
“counter-revolution,” the US refrained from helping, even though the
military was Washington’s “natural ally.”Ya’alon was quoted last Tuesday in the daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth as making scathing statements about
Kerry’s involvement in the peace negotiations, calling him “obsessive”
and “messianic,” and describing his West Bank security proposals as
worthless. The comments elicited outrage from Washington that led to an apology from the defense minister.Kerry shrugged off the
defense minister’s criticism and insisted that it had no bearing on his
or Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s commitment to pursuing peace.The peace negotiations between Israel and the
PA restarted in July and are set to continue through April. Recently,
Kerry has been trying to push a framework peace deal outlining the
contours of an agreement and touching upon all major aspects of the
dispute, with the aim of prolonging the negotiations past the April
deadline, but the gaps between the two sides remain wide.Ilan Ben Zion contributed to this report.
Netanyahu slams UNESCO for scrapping Israel exhibit
PM brushes aside UN cultural organization’s claim that show highlighting Jewish ties to Israel could harm peace talks
January 19, 2014, 4:12 pm
1
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu issued a scathing criticism of the UN’s cultural agency at his
Cabinet meeting Sunday, for indefinitely postponing an exhibit on Jewish connections to the Holy Land.
UNESCO
(the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization)
said last week it delayed the exhibition after Arab member states said
it could disrupt Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.“It would not harm the negotiations,”
Netanyahu said in a statement. “Negotiations are based on facts, on the
truth, which is never harmful. But what does harm the negotiations is
the automatic summoning of Israeli ambassadors in certain countries
regarding matters of no substance, while significant violations by the
Palestinian Authority pass without a response.The exhibit – created by the Simon Wiesenthal
Center, co-organized with UNESCO, and co-sponsored by Israel, Canada,
and Montenegro – was to have opened next Tuesday in Paris.But UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova
decided to cancel the exhibit, entitled “The People, the Book, the Land —
3,500 years of ties between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel,”
after Arab states in UNESCO protested, arguing it would harm the peace
process. “We have a responsibility in ensuring that current efforts in
this regard are not endangered,” Bokova wrote in a letter to the
Wiesenthal Center.The peace process is “at a delicate stage,”
UNESCO’s Assistant Director-General Eric Fait also wrote to the
Wiesenthal Center on Tuesday, in a letter made available to The Times of
Israel, “and UNESCO is keen to maintain an atmosphere conducive to the
negotiations.” Therefore, wrote Fait, “we will have to postpone the
exhibition to a later date.”The UN agency said it also needed extra time
to revise historical claims in the exhibit that member states could
consider “contestable.” But Rabbi Marvin Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal
Center, a US Jewish group that co-organized the exhibit, said UNESCO had
already approved the exhibit and mounted it ready for Tuesday’s
scheduled opening at UNESCO’s Paris headquarters. He also wrote a letter
responding to Bokova, accusing UNESCO of pandering to the Arab world.“We insist that you live up to your
responsibilities and commitments as the co-organizer of this exhibition
by overturning this naked political move that has no place in an
institution whose mandate is defined by education, science, and culture —
not politics,” Hier wrote. “Failure to do so would confirm to the world
that UNESCO is the official address of the Arab narrative of the Middle
East.”While the US State Department had previously
declined to co-sponsor the event, it issued a scathing statement
rebuking UNESCO for scrapping it, and US ambassador to the UN Samantha
Power called on UNESCO to reverse its position and open the exhibit as
originally planned.
Israeli company to unveil laser-based rocket interceptor
Iron Beam is designed to complement Iron Dome at very short ranges, intercepting smaller rockets, mortars and aircraft
January 19, 2014, 11:23 am
7-The times of Israel
A Grad rocket fired toward Israel from the Gaza Strip in 2009. (file photo: Jorge Novominsky/Flash90)
Israeli arms giant Rafael
Advanced Defense Systems Ltd. is to unveil a new laser defense system at
a conference in Singapore in February, Rafael said on its website.The
new system, Iron Beam, is a high-energy, laser-based defensive system
designed to knock mortar rounds, artillery shells and other projectiles
out of the sky, according to a report Saturday on the industry website Israel Defense (Hebrew).
Iron Beam is designed to complement the Iron
Dome missile defense system by focusing on smaller projectiles and
“pinpoint defense,” the report noted.The system would be most relevant to the Negev
town of Sderot, which is situated less than four kilometers from Gaza
and, therefore, largely unprotected by Iron Dome.It would also reduce the cost of intercepting
rockets from Gaza. While each Iron Dome interceptor is priced at close
to $100,000, the cost of firing a laser beam is significantly lower.The laser system, if made operational, would
represent the “lowest level” of a multitiered system of missile defense,
which, aside from Iron Beam and Iron Dome, includes David’s Sling for
medium-range rockets and the Arrow 2 and Arrow 3 systems to defend
against long-range missiles.The Iron Beam is to be presented for the first
time at the 2014 Singapore Air Show, to be held on February 11-16,
according to the Rafael website, which describes the system as a “High
Energy Laser (HEL) based system against rockets, mortar and airborne
target attacks.”
The US and Israel had, from 1996 to 2005, worked jointly on the development of a laser-based anti-rocket system called Nautilus.The program cost the two countries $300
million, according to a New York Times report, but was shelved because
of its perceived poor performance in cloudy weather and in combating
salvos of fire.Mitch Ginsburg contributed to this report.
