• State Comptroller puts special responsibility on (ministers) Steinitz and Yishai in Carmel Disaster report
• Gal Hirsch returns to IDF despite recommendation he dismiss him
• General strike enters third day
• Looking at the white of the country's eyes (snow at Mt. Hermon)
• Lifta 'squatter' discovers that his home is rightfully his

• Where is it preferable to live at the time of an emergency? – Protected and unprotected cities
• Responsible for the failures in the Carmel Disaster: (Photo of Yishai, Aharonovitch, Netanyahu, and Steinitz)
• Strike also today

• Yishai and Steinitz in attack against State Comptroller
• Revealed: Photo documenting minute after minute of Carmel Disaster
• Strike continues, negotations to renew this afternoon
• Appears: Judge Yosef Shapira to be appointed the next State Comptroller
• Battle for the city of Homs: Some 140 killed in the most violent day

• State Comptroller: They are responsible; Steinitz: Surreal; Yishai: I won't resign
• Assad smuggled his children to Europe
• America is calling you
• Negotiations broke down: Strike also today – at least till the afternoon
• Brig. Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch returns to army: will serve as deputy commander of the (new) Depths Corps
   

News Summary:

The storm following the release of the State Comptroller's report on the Carmel Fire Disaster was today's big story. Also in the Israeli news was a report that the Mossad trained terrorists to kill Iranian nuclear scientists, that a shamed military officer has returned to the army with a special job, and that the general strike continues. Haaretz reported that lobbyists won't be able to eat in the Knesset cafeteria anymore and News Nosh has noticed a phenomenon of hunger strikes among Arabs protesting against Israel. And Maariv took a concerned look at the Home Front.

Legal affairs commentators are calling it the creation of a "new norm" in between personal and ministerial responsibility. State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss has placed "special responsiblity" on the finance and interior ministers and also laid the blame at the feet of the prime minister for the disaster that killed 44 people and destroyed the Carmel Forest and many homes. Maariv Legal Affairs commentator Noam Sharvit said it was part of Lindenstrauss' policy to "put personal responsibility and demand personal conclusions from the top of the pyramid."

All the Israeli papers reported that according to NBC News, Israel trained an Iranian terrorist group to kill Iranian nuclear scientists. Actually Mark Perry of Foreign Policy reported on this last month. More details from Ynet here.

Brig. Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch was slammed for his involvement in 2006 incident on Lebanese border in which soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev were killed. He left the army before a commission declared he should be dismissed. But now he’s back. And he was appointed to the new unit for “Deep Operations,” i.e. Iran. Details here.

That's it. Israeli lobbyists can no longer enter the Knesset members' cafeteria and other places in the Knesset where they meet MKs. Following the broadcasting of the investigative show "Uvda" (fact), which showed how lobbyists attempt to influence legislation, the Knesset Speaker made restrictions.
 
**Only Israel Hayom reported in a tiny six-line item that Peace Now offices were vandalized - again. Attackers spray-painted "No leftists, no terror attacks" on the wall outside the office. The police have opened an(other) investigation.
 
Hunger strikes seem to be the new way for Arabs to protest against the Israelis. There is Khader Adnan who is dying in an Israeli hospital on the 56th day of a hunger strike. Maan reported that Israeli doctors were concerned he would die. Adnan is protesting the abuse he says he received by an Israeli interrogator who allegedly dragged him by his beard, then used it to clean his shoes. Today, for the first time, Maariv had a small report about Adnan, but it did not give the specific reason he is striking. Ynet posted an in-depth piece by the AP. Maan reported that other Palestinian prisoners striking in solidarity were put in solitary confinement. Then there were the students at Bethelehem University protesting the economic austerity measures the Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad had made. This week he stopped them. And there was the tiny Jordan Valley village of Khirbet al-Tawil, surrounded by Jewish settlements encroaching on their land and IDF forces using it for military exercises. Haaretz’s Gideon Levy reported on the village hunger strike they made in hopes the world would notice their distress. And today Yedioth and Israel Hayom reported that the 14-year-old self-declared Zionist Druze daughter of a former South Lebanon Army officer has stopped eating to bring attention to the fact that her eight-person family cannot live off the 800 shekels a month ($215) it receives from the Israeli government. 

Maariv's Musafshabbat focuses on the lack of preparedness of the Home Front ahead of a potential (counter-)strike by Iran. It claims that Israel has not learned its lessons from the Second Lebanon War (when Israel's home front was also unprepared) and that the Jericho missile is Israeli's best answer to the Iranian nuclear threat. Commentator Nadav Eyal writes that an Israeli attack depends on its trust in the US administration. If Israel believes the US administration will ignore internal political and economic considerations and will act against Iran if need be then Israel should not attack, writes Eyal. Meanwhile, Israeli fans are asking their prime minister to hold off on an attack. A new Facebook group asks for a postponement of any plans to strike Iran's nuclear facilities until after Madonna performs in Tel-Aviv on May 29th.

Prepared for APN by Orly Halpern, independent freelance journalist based in Jerusalem.