Wednesday’s “News in Review” Round-Up

 On Topic Links

PLO Official: Palestinians ‘Seriously Considering’ to Declare Failure of Peace Talks: Khaled Abu Toameh, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 9, 2013 
Technion Campus to Open in China: Karin Kloosterman, Israel21c, October 6, 2013

 
“A necessary condition to getting a true solution [to the Israeli-Palestinian] conflict was and remains clear as the sun: ending the refusal to recognize the right of the Jews to a homeland of their own in the land of their fathers. That is the most important key to solving the conflict.” — Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, in a speech  Sunday night [Oct. 6] at Bar-Ilan University. There will be no peace with the Palestinians until they recognize the Jewish right to a homeland in Israel, he said. (Jerusalem Post, Oct 6, 2013)
 
“The “Arab Spring” is now officially over. Basically it accomplished nothing. Will anyone speak these honest, obvious words? It is officially over because Tunisia, whose revolution started the whole thing, has fallen apart. Tunisia’s electoral democracy was as much a failure as Egypt’s. The governing Islamist party failed. The crisis paralyzed the county. Two moderate politicians were assassinated with Islamist involvement. The opposition walked out of parliament necessitating a caretaker government. The powerful trade unions protested. Islamist radicals created an increasing amount of violence, including the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Tunis last year and terrorist attacks. The economy has been a disaster. Egypt had a coup; Libya has the growing power of radical Islamist militias. It’s over; it didn’t work; democracy failed.” — Barry Rubin. (The Jewish Press, Oct. 2, 2013

“We (Zarif and [President] Rouhani) thought that the talks (with Kerry) and the phone call (with Obama) were within the authority given to us, but it is our understanding that Hazrat Agha (Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei) has criticized us for Dr. Rouhani’s phone conversation with Obama. He regards that as the first misstep, and my long meeting with John Kerry…he regards…as the other misstep during our trip.” — Javad Zarif, Iranian Foreign Minister, in response to a question from the chairman of the national security and foreign policy committee of the Majlis on Sunday , according to a report Tuesday in the hard-line Iranian newspaper Keyhan, who asked Zarif about actions that the Supreme Leader [Ali Khameini] had characterized as missteps. (Uskow on Iran, Oct. 8, 2013)
 
“There is a lot of suspicion and even paranoia about some secret deal between Iran and America. My concern is that the Americans will accept Iran as it is – so that the Iranians can continue their old policies of expansionism and aggression.” — Jamal Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi journalist who is close to the Saudi royal family, in an interview with the New York Times.
   “There is a lot of cynicism, and it feeds into the notion that Obama is very naïve – he was naïve with the Muslim Brotherhood, naïve with Bashar al-Assad, and he is now naïve with Iran.” —Mishaal al-Gergawi, a United Arab Emirates-based analyst. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 8, 2013)
 
“It is inconceivable that a state under Security Council sanctions for suspected WMD proliferation activities would be allowed to hold this position. Permitting Iran to serve on the UN’s leading disarmament committee is like appointing a drug lord CEO of a pharmaceutical company. How is it possible to entrust the reporting on disarmament to a country that itself is likely to be the subject of the report? Rather than provide a global stage for Iran’s defiance and deception, the UN should shine a spotlight on the regime’s ongoing pursuit of nuclear weapons and its support for terrorism across the globe.” —  Ron Prosor, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, in a letter to UN  Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon protesting the appointment of Iran as special rapporteur of the UN General Assembly’s Committee on Disarmament and International Security. (Ha’aretz, Oct. 9, 2013) 
 
“Obama’s perceived weakness called into question the credibility of America’s commitments on both the Palestinian and Iranian tracks. After all, if he sought Congressional approval and a broad international coalition for a limited strike against Syria, which had clearly used weapons of mass destruction, what would it take for him to launch a much wider operation against Iran only on the brink of developing nuclear weapons but not using them? In Netanyahu’s calculus, an indecisive America with diminished regional prestige would find it more difficult to lead peace talks and worse, if and when the time comes, might not have the stomach for military action against Iran. Netanyahu’s entire legacy strategy seemed under threat. A Palestinian peace deal seemed more remote than before, and on Iran, the prime minister began thinking in earnest once again that Israel might have to act on its own. All this could come to a head early next year. The Americans set a nine-month deadline for peace with the Palestinians due to expire next spring and the Iranians are widely expected to reach nuclear breakout at about the same time.” — Leslie Susser. (The Jerusalem Report, Sept. 23, 2013)
 
“If the Syrians stay, we will be destroyed. We will become minorities and guests in our own nation.” — Raad al-Nisah, a Bedouin East Banker, 30, who owns a small coffee stand in Marka, a neighborhood in Amman, the capital. The Bedouin are very wary of the influx of refugees from Syria as well as from Iraq. (New York Times, Oct. 6, 2013)

“If I have a feeling that the Syrian people want me to be president in the coming period, I will run for the post. If the answer is no, I will not run and I don’t see a problem in that….This [Turkish] government, represented by Erdogan, is responsible for the blood of tens of thousands of Syrians, and is responsible for the destruction of Syria’s infrastructure…[and] for endangering security of the region, not only Syria.” — Bashar al-Assad, President of Syria, in an interview with Turkey’s private Halk TV, warning Ankara that it will pay “a high price” for allowing foreign fighters to enter Syria from its territory to fight Syrian forces. (The Associated Press, Oct. 9, 2013)

“[Khairat] El-Shater [a Muslim Brotherhood leader] spoke for 45 minutes, vowing terrorist attacks, violence, killings by the Islamic groups…El-Shater pointed with his finger as if he is shooting a gun. His talk irritated me in an unprecedented way […] because it showed arrogance and tyranny. I exploded and said […] ‘What do you want? You either want to rule us or kill us?”— Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, in an interview with Al-Masry Al-Youm newspaper, his first since deposing former president Mohamed Morsi in June this year. Khairat el-Shater is a senior Muslim Brotherhood figure and strongman who was disqualified from running for the presidency, leading to Morsi’s rise.  Addressing Islamists now in the wake of Morsi’s fall, el-Sissi said, “Watch out while dealing with Egyptians. You have dealt with Egyptians as if you are right and they are wrong … [as if] you are the believer and they are the infidels. This is arrogance through faith.” (Ha’aretz, Oct. 8, 2013)

“Sinai, a lawless area that has become a bastion for terror, is being dealt with by elements that we did not necessarily expect just two years ago or less as having a genuine interest in operating there. Surprisingly, the terror that has sprouted there is being challenged every day. Gaza, which got its oxygen from the terror tunnels through Sinai, is dealing with doors now closed to it.” — Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz,  praising Egyptian [military] efforts to control terror in Sinai and along its border with Gaza. (Defense News, Oct. 9, 13)
 
“It [leaking intelligence] causes enormous damage to make public the reach and limits of GCHQ [General Command Headquarters] techniques. Such information hands the advantage to the terrorists. It is the gift they need to evade us and strike at will. Unfashionable as it might seem, that is why we must keep secrets secret, and why not doing so causes such harm.” — Andrew Parker, in his first interview since becoming the new Director General of the British Security Service, MI5. He said the details of what capabilities the spy agencies have is their “margin of advantage” over the fanatics. “That margin gives us the prospect of being able to detect their plots and stop them. But that margin is under attack. We are facing an international threat and GCHQ provides many of the intelligence leads upon which we rely.” He warned that the U.K. was facing its gravest terrorism threat, including from “several thousand” Islamist extremists who are living in Britain and want to attack the country. (The National Post, Oct. 9, 2013)
 
“Even if they do get out soon, the repercussions of this episode are far from over: Among our country’s intellectual elite, [John] Greyson [a Toronto-based filmmaker and York University professor] and [Tarek] Loubani [a doctor in London, Ont]’s saga has had a profound effect on attitudes toward the Middle East. The pressure has all been on Cairo, while the usual target, Israel, has dropped off the radar. It’s an ironic result given Greyson’s rise to fame as an opponent of Israeli policies. (The main reason he and Loubani had gone to the Middle East, in fact, was to document suffering in Gaza.) Up until now, what has been missing for local activists concerned about the situation in Egypt is an accessible human symbol of the ongoing repression. But Messrs. Greyson and Loubani now provide us with that…. Thanks to their ordeal, some measure of proportionality has been restored to our perception of human-rights abuses in the Middle East. It’s not the result Greyson and Loubani intended. But I suspect that it will be the one that endures.” —  Jonathan Kay, in a column in The National Post.  (Greyson and  Loubani were in Cairo and on their way to Gaza in August 2013 when they were arrested at a Muslim Brotherhood rally by Egyptian police. – Ed.) (The National Post, Oct. 8, 2013)

 Contents

 
DEATH OF RABBI OVADIA YOSEF IS THE END OF AN ERA — (Jerusalem) The Shas Sephardic religious leader, a controversial figure who sometimes generated animosity, changed the landscape of Israeli politics; the way ahead for Shas and religious politics in Israel is shrouded in the unknown following his death. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who died on Monday, was one of the most respected arbiters of Jewish law of this generation and the spiritual leader of the Shas movement since its inception in the 1980s. His scholarship and deep knowledge of Jewish law gave him unparalleled control over the Shas political party for almost two decades which changed the landscape of Israeli politics and gave Shas and its Sephardi voters, both haredi and and non-religious, unprecedented influence over the course of events in the country. Over 800,000 mourners, the largest such outpouring in Israeli history, attended his funeral in Jerusalem. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 7, 2013)
 
ROUHANI HAS REVEALED HIS TRUE NUCLEAR INTENTIONS — (New York) The Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, the putative moderate on whose shoulders great American hopes have been placed, is proud of the work he did to advance his country’s nuclear program – and also of his efforts to stymie Western attempts to stop that work. In May, shortly before he was elected, Rouhani appeared on state-run IRIB TV: “We halted the nuclear program?” he asked, rhetorically. “We were the ones to complete it! We completed the technology.” These are not the words of someone who wants to end Iran’s nuclear program. Rouhani’s statements sound like those of a man who is proud of the program and believes he may have devised a way to carry it to completion. (Bloomberg, Oct. 7, 2013)
 
THREE JEWISH SCIENTISTS AWARDED NOBEL PRIZE IN CHEMISTRY— (Stockholm) Three Jewish American scientists, two of whOM have Israeli citizenship, won the 2013 Nobel Prize for chemistry on Wednesday for laying the foundations for development of computers to understand complex chemical processes, from the purification of exhaust fumes to photosynthesis. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in a statement, when awarding the prize of 8 million crowns ($1.25 million), that Martin Karplus, Michael Levitt and Arieh Warshel had pioneered the use of computer models that mirror chemical reactions. The work helps in complex processes such as the development of drugs. Jerusalem Post, Oct. 9, 2013
 
BOYCOTTER OF ISRAELI ACADEMIA TO SHARE NOBEL PRIZE WITH TEL AVIV U. PHYSICIST — (Stockholm) irony from the Nobel prize committee: The prestigious Nobel prize for physics will be shared by Dr. Francois Englert (a Belgian Holocaust survivor with close research ties to Tel Aviv University) and Dr. Peter Higgs, who supports the academic boycott of Israel. The two physicists, who worked independently of each other, were honored for their subatomic theories on what’s popularly known as the God particle. (Honest Reporting, Oct. 9, 2013)
 
THE POLITICS OF PHYSICS — (New York)  British Professor Peter Higgs, after whom the ‘god particle’ is named, boycotts Israel. He refused to come to Israel in 2004 to receive the Wolf Prize “because of the occupation”, or to other science conferences in Israel to which he was invited. He shares his views on the occupation in every forum and encourages the academic boycott of Israel. (The Daily Beast, July 5, 2012)
 
REPORT: HEZBOLLAH POSSESSES CHEMICAL WEAPONS STOCKPILES  — (Beirut) A Saudi website quotes a Lebanese MP as claiming that Hezbollah possesses chemical weapons that were sent to them by Syrian President Assad. According to the report, Iran also helps the terror organization and manufactured delivery systems for them. “These devices are a threat to regional stability,” he said. “We received chemical weapons from Assad. Hezbollah has rockets that have the ability to be launched with chemical warheads on them in the long term.” Lebanese MP Khaled Daher claimed on the Saudi website Al Watan.  According to the Saudi report, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards manufactured delivery systems for the Shiite terror organization. Hezbollah opponents in Lebanon are concerned about the terror organization’s activities in Syria, especially given that Hassan Nasrallah threatened recently that “Israel will deal with something that they didn’t deal with in the past.” (Jerusalem Online, Oct 06, 2013)
 
ISOLATED HAMAS FACES MONEY CRISIS IN GAZA STRIP — (Gaza)  Hamas is struggling to meet its payroll in the Gaza Strip, where income from taxes has been badly hit since neighboring Egypt started destroying a network of tunnels used to smuggle food, fuel and weapons into the Islamist-run enclave. The crisis means that Gaza’s thousands of civil servants may not receive their full salaries in time for an important Muslim holiday next week. Egypt, which accuses Hamas of aiding Muslim militants in the lawless Sinai desert, has been waging a campaign to destroy the smuggling tunnels that delivered weapons and other goods to the Gaza Strip, which is partially blockaded by Israel. Hamas, which denies the Egyptian allegations, taxes the traffic through the tunnels – a money stream that has now virtually run dry. Last month, the Hamas government paid only 77 percent of its $25 million August payroll for Gaza’s 50,000 civil servants. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 9, 2013)
 
HAMAS AND HIZBULLAH FACE REFORM OR COLLAPSE— (Tel Aviv) Discourse on Palestinian and Lebanese social networks over the past six months indicates a surprising trend. Violent resistance against Israel by Hizbullah and Hamas has lost its legitimacy in both Lebanese and Palestinian society. There has been a shift in focus by Arab civil societies from outside to inside – from foreign policy to domestic affairs. Nationalism and Islamism have been replaced by a demand for democratization, rights, and freedom. Trend analysis of the social networks reveals that for the first time, the “enemy from within” (Hizbullah and Hamas) is regarded as more dangerous than the “enemy from without” (Israel). Civil society in Lebanon, including parts of the Shiite population, now reflects overwhelming opposition to Hizbullah’s policy in Syria and Lebanon. In Gaza, Internet discourse reveals that for the first time, a majority of the population want to overthrow the Hamas regime. (Institute for National Security Studies-Tel Aviv University, Oct. 8, 2013)
 
ISLAMIST MORSI TO GO ON TRIAL ON CHARGES OF INCITEMENT TO MURDER— (Cairo) Ousted Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi will go on trial on Nov. 4 on charges of inciting the killing of opponents while he was in office, an Egyptian court announced Wednesday. Morsi was ousted in a popularly-backed coup on July 3 and has been held incommunicado at an unknown location and has not been seen since, though he has spoken to his family twice and was visited by EU’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, and an African Union delegation. Fourteen other members of the Muslim Brotherhood will be tried along with Morsi, including top aides and leading members of the group. (Washington Post, Oct. 9, 2013)
 
INHOSPITABLE EUROPE— (Jerusalem) the Council of Europe has identified circumcision as a violation of male children’s “physical integrity,” another sign that Europe is fast becoming an inhospitable place for Jews. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, a body composed of five left-wing political organizations that include the Socialist Group, the Alliance of Liberal Democrats for Europe and the Group of the Unified European Left, has identified circumcision as a violation of male children’s “physical integrity.” Luckily, PACE, which has called “to adopt specific legal provisions to ensure that certain operations and practices will not be carried out before a child is old enough to be consulted,” is powerless to make binding laws. Nevertheless, PACE’s resolution reflects a growing trend in Europe against religious practices such as circumcisions and ritual slaughter that many Europeans deem “barbaric” or “inhumane.” (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 6, 2013)
 
MORE WHITE EVANGELICALS THAN AMERICAN JEWS SAY GOD GAVE ISRAEL TO THE JEWISH PEOPLE— (Washington) A majority of white evangelicals believe God gave the land of Israel to the Jewish people, compared with 40% of American Jews who believe the same. Israel defines itself as a Jewish state, and most Jews in the United States say that emotionally they are either very attached (30%) or somewhat attached (39%) to Israel. But on some measures, Jews’ feelings for Israel are equaled or even exceeded by those of white evangelical Protestants. For example, twice as many white evangelical Protestants as Jews say that Israel was given to the Jewish people by God (82% vs. 40%). Some of the discrepancy is attributable to Jews’ lower levels of belief in God overall; virtually all evangelicals say they believe in God, compared with 72% of Jews (23% say they do not believe in God and 5% say they don’t know or decline to answer the question). But even Jews who do believe in God are less likely than evangelicals to believe that God gave the land that is now Israel to the Jewish people (55% vs. 82%).(Pew Research, Oct. 3, 2013)

STEINITZ: IRANIAN ECONOMY 18 MONTHS AWAY FROM COLLAPSE— (Jerusalem) The Iranian economy is 18 months away from collapse, Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz said Monday. He said international sanctions have caused about $100 billion in damage to Iran’s economy. In addition, inflation in Iran is currently 40% a year and unemployment is 25-30%. The rial, Iran’s currency, has been devalued by 180%, and the country has a negative economic growth of 5.4%. (Jerusalem Post, Oct. 7, 2013)

TECHNION CAMPUS TO OPEN IN CHINA — (Shantou, China) According to Forbes magazine, the eighth richest man in the world is Li Ka-shing of China. Li has instigated a $280 million research and academic transaction between Israel and China to benefit both countries. The money pot –– $130 million from his own Li Ka-shing Foundation and $150 million from the governments of Guangdong Province and Shantou municipality — will give the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology a continued cutting edge by updating its infrastructure, and will help China learn Israel’s “secret sauce” to start-ups with a Technion-styled campus in China. Li typically puts about one-third of his profits into socially conscious projects. Sources in Israel say that this is why Li decided to invest in Israeli higher education – specifically at the Technion, whose graduates lead many of Israel’s most successful start-ups. (Israel21c, October 6, 2013)
 
PLEASE JOIN NOBEL LAUREATES KORNBERG, WEINBERG, KLEIN AND OLAH TO SIGN THIS — Dear Faculty Colleagues,  If you haven’t already done so, please sign (with your affiliation in the comments section) and circulate the petition linked above already signed by four Nobel Laureates and over 340 faculty to help secure 1000 faculty signatures from around the world to request that the European Union reconsider its guidelines on the Israeli settlements which now include a boycott. Please note that this in an independently led grass-roots petition being circulated and is not affiliated with any organization. Click here: Petition by International Faculty Requesting that European Union Reconsider Guidelines on Israeli Settlements

 
Contents

On Topic

PLO Official: Palestinians ‘Seriously Considering’ to Declare Failure of Peace Talks: Khaled Abu Toameh, Jerusalem Post, Oct. 9, 2013 —Hanna Amireh accuses Israel of seeking to “win time” to “dictate the outcome of the talks”; slams Netanyahu’s demand that Palestinians recognize Jewish right to homeland in Israel. The Palestinians are seriously considering declaring the failure of the peace talks with Israel, a senior PLO official said Wednesday.
 
Technion Campus to Open in China: Karin Kloosterman, Israel21c, October 6, 2013—Chinese billionaire puts Israeli high-tech education on his Horizons, with a commitment to the Technion’s Israel campus and a new one in Shantou.