• Greens get bulldozed as reforms look to end Israeli housing crisis
• Israel to US: Warnings against strike serve Iran(‘s interests)
• Upon return to Israel, Druze students say Syria crisis isn't all that it seems
• Tel-Aviv municipality approves buses on Shabbat
• Fear of double assassination in Rishon Litzion: two men shot to death in car
• Top anchorman Yaakov Eilon to quit Channel 10 news

• City that never stops – Tel-Aviv decided: Public transportation on Shabbat
• Father is free – Father of twins suspected of killing son released from house arrest
• Assassination outside his house – In hear of residential neighborhood in Rishon Litzion two men shot to death.
• “Netanyahu wants to appoint Eshel to a high post in the Likud”

• Double assassination in Rishon Litzion: Two criminals murdered in shooting – In one year 7 assassinations in center of country
• A-G Weinstein opposes [settlement] outpost committee (Hebrew)
• Shalom Yaakov – Channel 10 anchorman leaves

• “We won’t agree to buses on Shabbat in Tel-Aviv” – Will the battle over public transportation on the day of rest renew?
• “Twist Iran’s arm – immediately” – That’s what Israel demanded of the US
• Double assassination in Rishon Litzion
• After Miki: Yaakov Eilon also leaves (Channel 10)
• Revolution: From December – waiting times through service centers under three minutes
• Train crisis: Workers declared war on Labor Union Chairwoman Gila Edri
• Aharon Barak: I never said everything is justiciable

News Summary:
Buses on Shabbat, assassinations in residential neighborhoods and the latest US-Israel tension on Iran were the main stories in today’s papers. On the sidelines, bad news for settlers, despite lots of Likud support, an update on hunger-striking detainee Khader Adnan and some embarassment for the President during a visit to Nazareth.
 
If the visit of top US officials to Israel this week to coordinate with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was not enough, US President Barack Obama has now set-up a meeting between himself and Netanyahu in the White House for March 5th. Maariv’s political commentator Ben Caspit writes that “the two can’t stand each other, but need each other like air for breathing.” Caspit claims that an Israeli strike would make chaos in the region and ruin Obama’s chances for another term, but that Netanyahu knows that the “key to stopping the Iranian nuclear project is not in his pocket,” but in Obama’s.
Meanwhile, Iran has launched an aerial defense drill which Ynet asks if it is ‘Preparing for strike on nuke sites?’ Both Maariv and Yedioth ran aerial maps based on yesterday’s New York Time’s article showing what the papers called “an operation difficult to carry out” and a “logistical nightmare.”

**Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein informed Netanyahu that recommendations by the ‘outpost committee’ are not legally binding, Maariv learned. “The committee’s work will not serve as a rationale to change the state’s position before the court,” wrote Weinstein. Last week Netanyahu set up the committee, headed by retired justice Edmund Levy, with finding ways to ‘legalize’ outposts built on privately-owned Palestinian land in the West Bank. According to Maariv's reporter Mazal Muallem, Weinstein’s letter is ‘a slap in the face’ for the settlers who hoped the committee would be an answer to Talia Sasson’s outpost report of 2005.
Speaking of outposts, dozens of heads of local Likud branches will be arriving at the biggest outpost – Migron – today to show their solidarity, Maariv reported. According to the paper this is a “signal to Netanyahu” that they won’t accept the evacuation of the outpost. At the end of the visit, the leaders will attend a panel at the Binyamin (settler) Council tourist center on “The strategy of the Likud movement in Judea and Samaria.” On the panel will be Speaker of the Knesset Rubi Rivlin, leader of the coalition MK Zeev Elkin and other Likud MKs.

Khader Adnan Update: A High Court statement said Khader Adnan's appeal would be held Tuesday instead of Thursday. No explanation was given as to why it had been brought forward, but it may be because he could die by Thursday. Adnan is appealing the legality of his detention since he says he has not been charged and does not know what he is suspected of doing. Maariv ran a large article titled “Family of administrative detainee fears: “He will hunger-strike till death.” The article, written by the paper’s excellent Palestinian affairs correspondent, Reemon Marjiyeh, spoke to Israeli audiences. Adnan’s father said his son is innocent and he is sure the detention was an Israeli effort to prevent an internal Palestinian reconciliation.  His wife said he was never involved in ‘military acts’ against Israel. Yedioth ran a medium-sized article titled “What will be the fate of the hunger-striker.” A number of Arab MKs visited Adnan, including MK Ahmed Tibi, who said he 'doesn't understand the rationale' behind keeping Adnan shackled to his hospital bed. Meanwhile, Palestinians have been protesting in Gaza and the West Bank for his release.

A question by two Arab pupils in Nazareth yesterday appeared to cause stress to visiting Israeli President Shimon Peres, Maariv reported. The students protested that the state’s Arab academic program did not include modern Palestinian poets such as Mahmoud Darwish and Samih Alqasem. Peres, who visited the city to hear the troubles of its residents, answered: “I don’t see any reason not to learn modern poetry. But then added, “I give less importance to history than others. The past does not really need to be remembered. Napoleon’s wars? Who cares? I feel the Arab and Jewish youth wants to build a new future and is less interested in the past. Learn what will be and not what was.” During Peres' tour of the city, dozens of Nazareth residents held signs calling him a murderer, claiming he was responsible for the Kafr Kana massacre in Lebanon.
 

Quick Hits:

• Netanyahu wants Eshel in high position in Likud" - Senior Likud officials claim PM wants to give job to his former chief of staff who was forced to leave for misconduct. (Yedioth, p. 1)
• Jerusalem Christians are latest targets in recent spate of 'price tag' attacks (Haaretz)
• ACRI files petition against biometric database (Ynet)
• Judge Yosef Shapira to be next state comptroller (Ynet)
• Israeli cable readies to launch Arabic channel (Ynet)
• Rabbi behind Gaza museum suspected of bribing soldiers (Haaretz)
• Itamar constructs new religious center in memory of Fogel family - Next week will mark the first anniversary of the terrorist attack that killed Ehud and Ruth Fogel and three of their children in their home. (Israel Hayom)
• Egyptians claim Israeli goods cause disease, infertility (Ynet)
• Anti-Semitism in France down 16.5% to 10-year low (Haaretz)
• Polish prisons teaching Jewish studies to inmates (Haaretz)
• Poll: Americans like Israel more than last year - A new Gallup poll indicates that Americans like Canada best, Iran worst, and Israel in eighth place. (Israel Hayom)
• Jordan sets up refugee camp near northern border with Syria - Aid officials estimate more than 10,000 Syrian refugees already live in Jordan. (Israel Hayom)
• Red Cross negotiates Syria humanitarian ceasefire with Assad regime (Agencies)

Features:

Israel demolishes West Bank villages as Jewish outposts remains untouched Israel's eagerness to demolish renewable energy installations in a West Bank village is seen as an ugly riposte to the European Union. (Haaretz)

A green school of thought - The architect behind a UN plan to build 20 eco-friendly schools in Gaza discusses the challenges of sustainable development in the Strip. (Haaretz)

Commentary/Analysis:

Hurting Ahmadinejad (Yossi Beilin, Israel Hayom) Even without cooperation from Russia and China, the recent sanctions imposed on Iran can bring it to its knees.

Eshel affair revealed Netanyahu's distorted values (Haaretz Editorial) The bureau chief's departure won't have negative repercussions on the governing of the country, but it did reveal Netanyahu's distorted values.
 
Netanyahu mustn't demolish the strategic alliance with U.S. (Sefi Rachlevsky, Haaretz) The Netanyahu government had 20 months to set up an excellent firefighting service in advance of the planned war, but did nothing.

Only two countries are able to attack Iran: U.S. and Israel (Moshe Arens, Haaretz) There are only two countries in the world with the military capability to carry out an effective military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities: the U.S. and Israel.

Iran’s theater of the absurd (Boaz Bismuth, Israel Hayom) Sometimes it is hard to figure who the superpower is in this story: Iran or the West.

Shrinking Israeliness (Uri Misgav, Haaretz) In the face of this national gallop toward kippot and prayer, Israeliness is withering, silent and paralyzed.

Syrians sense war in Damascus while Assad tries to score points (Zvi Bar'el, Haaretz) Syrians report electricity shortages in Homs and Damascus, as Syrian President Bashar Assad tries minimizing pressure by a referendum on changes to the constitution that do not satisfy the opposition.

Good intentions gone bad (Dan Margalit, Israel Hayom) None of the actors in the Eshel sexual harassment scandal intended for things to become so complicated.

A week after New Delhi attacks, India tries to play down Iran link (Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz) Indian pundits, officials say the country leadership is trying to save its energy ties with Iran, while making sure not to upset its strategic alliance with Israel.

Menachem Begin's social justice (MK Ofir Akunis, Israel Hayom) Twenty years after the death of Menachem Begin, the Likud government is following in his footsteps.

Good old Golani values (Dr. Haim Shine, Israel Hayom) The Golani Brigade commander wants to dilute the number of religious soldiers among his ranks. Hopefully he’ll succeed – the right to serve in the military belongs to all Israelis.

With a beard and a shtreimel, Santorum would be perfect for an Israeli ultra-Orthodox party (Chemi Shalev, Haaretz) The battle over contraception and other 'culture wars' now raging in American presidential politics can make an Israeli feel right at home.

When the former Mossad chief meets Israel's rising political star (Barak Ravid, Haaretz) Meir Dagan and Yair Lapid have, according to the former Mossad chief, only ever met once. But at a gala dinner taking place at the Beverly Hills hotel, the two may just meet again.

Returning to roots (Talia Sasson and David Harel, Maariv) "Bad spirits are shaking the Israeli ship of democracy in a dangerous way. It is expressed in a flood of legislation aimed at hurting anything not identified with the right...In light of this, many citizens from the silent majority found themselves concerned about the new and bad image of Israel...This is not the
So they got up and joined the public council of the New Israel Fund. All with the goal of declaring that they don't intend to stand and watch the explosion of democracy.

 

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