APN's daily news review from Israel

Tuesday January 19, 2016
 

Quote of the day:

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Breaking News:
15-year-old from south of Hebron detained from his home on suspicion of stabbing to death Dafna Meir in Otniel settlement on Sunday. [Media showed photo of him, despite him being a minor. - OH] (Ynet, Maariv, Maan)

Front Page:

Haaretz

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News Summary:
The top stories from Israel centered around the West Bank: The funeral of the Israeli woman stabbed at the entrance to her home in Otniel, the wounding of another Israeli woman who was stabbed in Tekoa settlement, the European Union decision that agreements with Israel are inapplicable to West Bank settlements and the US Ambassador’s speech slamming Israel’s separate standards of law in the West Bank: one for Israelis and one for Palestinians. The speech by IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot also made waves, when he said the Iran nuclear agreement wasn’t all bad and that despite the terrible murders, Palestinians’ routine of life must not be made to suffer.
 
Hundreds (or thousands according to Israel Hayom) attended the funeral of Dafna Meir, a mother of six, as the search continued for her murderer. The 15-year-old killer was later detained from his bed late last night [according to radio reports today, his family turned him in – OH] The IDF reacted by banning Palestinian laborers from entering settlements to work and said the situation would be reviewed on a day to day basis.
 
Meanwhile, another Palestinian teen entered a clothing store in Tekoa settlement yesterday and stabbed Michal Fruman, the pregnant daughter-in-law of the deceased Rabbi Menachem Fruman. In a telling reaction, Michal’s husband, Shibi Fruman, said: “She says she felt that the terrorist wanted to die more than he wanted to kill her, and the two things together express how serious the situation is.” Fruman was moderately wounded. The attacker, was shot and critically injured as he ran away. He later died in Hadassah Hospital. 

Speakers at the annual Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) conference at Tel-Aviv University Monday discussed the violence and radicalization in Israel, the Palestinian Territories and on Israel’s borders, and raised some eyebrows. In his speech, US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro sharply criticized Israel for law enforcement in the West Bank that ignores the settlers acts, saying that “too much Israeli vigilantism in the West Bank goes on unchecked.” He accused Israel of adhering to 'two standards of law' in the West Bank. Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said that was “unacceptable and untrue” and blasted him for saying that on the day of a funeral and an attack on settlers.
 
Despite Israel’s attempts to stop it, the EU passed the resolution requiring that all agreements between the EU and Israel must “unequivocally and explicitly indicate their inapplicability to the territories occupied by Israel in 1967.” However, the decision was softened because several countries, with whose leaders Netanyahu spoke the night before, refused the harsher sounding resolution formulated by France, Germany, Britain, Italy and Spain. The clause requiring EU member states to draw a "distinction" between Israel and these territories – the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights – was removed. (Maariv) The EU also reinforced its position that all products made in Israeli settlements must be clearly labeled in Europe. Hamas urged the EU to adopt the draft differentiating Israel and the West Bank settlements and lauded the labeling of settlement goods at a step in the right direction, but not enough. Israeli Opposition leader, Zionist Camp chairman, MK Isaac Herzog, reacted saying Netanyahu's policy was a failure and added: "I regret the EU is lending a hand to BDS.” (Maariv)
 
IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot also made headlines at the INSS conference, and probably got the right-wing government cabinet members angry. [See Commentary/Analysis below.] He said the Iran nuclear deal has risks, but also opportunities for Israel. That Hezbollah was the IDF’s main enemy. That the IDF had no warning of any of the 101 stabbing attacks and that the mixture of settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank “creates a huge operational challenge.” He also said that Israel should react to Palestinian violence with restraint and not make collective punishment against the whole population. Unsurprisingly, Israel Hayom’s headline focused on Eisenkot’s statement that “Daesh could strike Israel and Jordan.”
 
Also at the conference, President Reuven Rivlin warned that Daesh is already inside Israel as Israeli Arabs grow more extreme. He said Israel must not “abandon the Arab community to deal alone with the threat of ISIS that is growing within it.” (Israel Hayom left that quote out.) 
 

Quick Hits:

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Features:

Poem of the Week // No, the Ancients Were Not Zionists
The noble Haim Gouri, above all a poet: He refused a prize for Zionist art because his latest work does not fit that definition. (Vivian Eden, Haaretz) 
“Daphna was like a mother for me”
This is the story of an unusual friendship: Dr. Ahmed Nasr from the (Israeli) village of Araba and Dafna Meir, who was murdered at the entrance to her home in Otniel (West Bank settlement). They worked together in Soroka Hospital, they would “talk for hours about the deepest things” and they understood each other with one glance. “It was surprising also to me that she, of all people, a settler with a head covering, connected to the fiber of my soul. Dafna fought like a lion against the brutal terrorist in order to protect her children. It burns my heart.” (Rotem Elizera, Yedioth’s ’24 Hours’ supplement, cover)
Letters to the Editor: Defecating on the Flag and Arabs in Israel (Haaretz)
 
Commentary/Analysis:

The Word 'Terrorism' Gives Monsters Too Much Credit. This Is Murder. (Bradley Burston, Haaretz+) After 18 hours in which a woman was slaughtered in her own home, and a pregnant woman stabbed, maybe it's time to call the monsters who do things like this by their proper name: murderers. 
And what about the panic? (But) Gadi Eizenkot is a job with simple definitions (Ben Caspit, Maariv) Yesterday, at the annual conference of the Institute for National Security Studies, the Chief of Staff called the nuclear agreement with Iran “a strategic turn” and that "there are risks and opportunities." In other words, there are good and bad things. Hearing his words, Netanyahu must have gnashed his teeth: Opportunities? Where did he find opportunities? What about the panic that needs to alarm the public? What about the pessimism? Where is the emerging catastrophe, the second Holocaust that we need to prevent? All these, Netanyahu knew he would not find in the current chief of staff. Lt. Gen. Eizenkot is a simple man of simple definitions and sharp decisions. He's a working man, he doesn’t deal with making accounts, he is like a soccer referee: whistling what he sees and trying to do it impartially. 
In Israel, the army chief also has to defend democracy (Amos Harel, Haaretz+) IDF chief of staff provides intelligent, balanced take on events both regional and global, unlike some of his peers in the cabinet. 
The cost of living in Israel: It’s as bad as you thought (Robert Swift, Ynet) The 'Start-Up Nation' it might be, with a high-tech economy that largely escaped the effects of the 2008 crash, but for many young families, Israel is an expensive place to call home.
The Smear Campaign Against Breaking the Silence Only Serves Israel's Enemies (Moshe Arens, Haaretz+) The kind of concern the IDF displayed to prevent unintended ‘collateral damage’ in Gaza does not seem to be a high priority in the bombardments being carried out in Iraq and Syria by U.S., French, British or Russian forces.
Hebron has become 'terror central' (Yossi Yehoshua, Yedioth/Ynet) 55 out of the 150 attacks carried out so far in the current terror wave originated in Hebron; the Otniel attack marks an escalation in the severity of the attacks, as they now are at people's doorsteps.
Hillel International's Shameful Retreat Behind the Barricades on Israel and Palestine (Stefan Krieger, Haaretz+) Three generations of my family weren't asked for loyalty oaths or litmus tests on our attitudes toward Israel to participate in Hillel on campus.
We are all targets (Dr. Haim Shine, Israel Hayom) The attack in Otniel demonstrated once again the unfathomable cruelty of Palestinian terrorists.
Israel Must Find a Solution for Asylum Seekers (Haaretz Editorial) The current government, like the two that preceded it, acts as if it can resolve the problem by implementing antidemocratic laws.
Who Needs Fascism in Israel? (Yitzhak Laor, Haaretz+) ‘The people of Israel' are behind this government. It can use democracy like it uses the Gay Pride Parade and veganism in Tel Aviv: as propaganda for the West.
The burden policy: The last thing we need is more Palestinians out of work (Alon Ben-David, Maariv) Two major forces emerge as leading this eruption of violence: viral on the Internet and copying. The atmosphere of violence is spreading online, and the attention that each attack gets spawns the copycat to make the next attack. The “success” of the terrorist in murdering a woman in Otniel settlement drove yesterday a young terrorist to try and copy him in Tekoa. Fortunately, this time there was no death. Precisely because of the two severe stabbing incidents, the chief of staff chose to clarify, with courage, that it is our interest to allow routine to continue for most of the Palestinian population, which is not taking part in terrorism. with the support of the Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, the Chief of Staff is able to lead a policy that leaves the overwhelming majority of the Palestinians outside of the events. Tens of thousands will continue to work in Israel and those who were prevented from entering settlements, will return soon. Without them – there won’t be anyone more settlements. Every week the top military brass find themselves facing a incendiary government cabinet that demands collective punishment. What was once a serious thinking forum for making decisions has turned, in this government, into a meeting of ‘Internet Commenters’, who compete who has the strongest proposal ‘to give it to them.’ With the help of the Defense Minister, the military is succeeding in pushing back time after time against those proposals to impose (on the Palestinians in the West Bank) a siege, closure, and to close (West Bank) roads and make life a burden to the (Palestinian) population. They know that the last thing Israel needs is thousands of Palestinians who are at home without work and will go vent their frustration at IDF checkpoints. Too bad that Israel continues playing with the bodies of the Palestinians. Our neighbors have always gotten the better of us in the trade of bodies and their parts - and Israel has no reason to enter into this competition. But all the heroes of the cabinet do not dare to seriously raise the only step that can discourage individual attackers - family deportation to Gaza. It's not simple from a legal point of view, it will lead to widespread condemnation throughout the world and yet - if evert terrorist knows that once he raises the knife he is sentencing his family to a miserable existence - there are likely to be fewer volunteers.
When Israel's Actions Threaten Diaspora Jews (Samuel Heilman, Haaretz+) The actions or inactions of Israel and of Diaspora Jews continue to deeply affect the other, whether they like it or not.
The Arab Spring: Five Violent Years On (Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz+) Fervent hopes of freedom of expression and democracy have all but been quashed in the Middle East, although a flicker of hope remains in Tunisia.
What Pope Francis' synagogue visit says about Jewish-Catholic relations (Ruth Ellen Gruber, Haaretz+) The pontiff's 1.5 mile journey to the towering Tempio Maggiore shows that what was once unthinkable is now the norm.
 

 

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