APN's daily news review from Israel
Thursday April 03, 2014
Quote of the day:
“Although Netanyahu is genuinely concerned about isolation and demography, he believes that the current
status quo is the best option.”
--Molad director Avner Inbar shares the view held by many at a conference of security and foreign policy experts
this week in Jerusalem.**
APN's daily news review from Israel
Wednesday April 02, 2014
Number of the day:
708.
Number of tenders Israel issued yesterday for housing units over the Green Line, while it still
thought it had a deal to get the peace talks extended and the spy, Jonathan Pollard, released. But then it got a
surprise.**
Haaretz - March 24, 2014
APN's Ori Nir op-ed: Two-staters, unite behind Kerry
http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.581723
Each year at Passover, Jews read this line in the haggadah, "In every generation a person is obligated to see themselves as if they had left Egypt." Why? Because each of us should understand that in our generation, just as in our ancestors' generation, the status quo is not inevitable. Societies founded on inequality, on domination of others, on ruling those who do not wish to be ruled cannot, in the arc of history, last. In every generation there is a wrong to be righted. Today, it is in our hands to right it.
This year, you can add flavor to your seder by sharing this thoughtful reflection by Rabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb. Rabbi Dobb, who has written previously for Americans for Peace Now, has graciously contributed our 13th haggadah insert. In it, he asks us to make peace with the idea of limits.
Since 2001, Americans for Peace Now has asked rabbis from the extended APN family to contribute reflections on the haggada: that story which has for centuries been understood as the archetype of liberation. Many of us have made these reflections a permanent part of our seder - we hope you will, too. You can find them here.
May we all enjoy a sweet and liberating Passover,
Debra DeLee
President and CEO,
Americans for Peace Now
Submitted by Rabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb (2014)
To be read after the meal, just before the search for the afikomen. (Tzafun)
Secretary of State John Kerry cut short a tour to Europe Monday to rush to Israel and the West Bank to salvage the US-brokered peace process from collapse.
The reason for the current crisis, the most severe since the beginning the so-called Kerry initiative eight months ago, is the Israeli government’s balking at the release of Palestinian security prisoners, convicted terrorists who Israel has committed to releasing as a gesture to the Palestinians.
This week, Alpher discusses what Olmert's conviction for receiving bribes means for the peace process; why Netanyahu refuses to release veteran terrorist prisoners who are Arab citizens of Israel; how this issue jibes with a new Israel Foreign Ministry document that appears to find legal justification for Avigdor Lieberman's proposal to transfer Arab-populated parts of Israel to Palestinian sovereignty under a two-state redrawing of borders.
Unlike Israel's unilateral insistence on the 'Jewish state', Israeli and Palestinian leaders need to find a recognition formula that reconciles two opposing national narratives.
By now everyone has realized that there’s a new issue on the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations agenda that’s not going away: The demand that the Palestinians not only recognize Israel - something they have done repeatedly, starting in 1993 - but that they recognize Israel as "a Jewish state," or some similar wording. No such “recognition-plus” demand was made of Egypt or Jordan, nor was it mentioned in the Oslo agreement or subsequent Israeli-Palestinian documents. It made a brief appearance in the Annapolis talks of 2007, but only as a marginal issue. Only In 2009 did it truly come into play, courtesy of Benjamin Netanyahu.