News Summary:
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will be questioned over suspicions he received a large scale of perks from two business people, one foreign, one local, the latest graduates of the air force pilots' course included a woman who will be Israel’s fourth female fighter pilot, and the latest on the anti-settlement UN Security Council Resolution and US Secretary of State John Kerry’s speech. Also the latest statistics on the Israeli population.

Netanyahu received ‘surprising’ (Yedioth) support when a British government spokesperson expressed criticism of US Secretary of State John Kerry’s speech, saying that the UK does not think the settlements are the only issue in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and that the UK opposes slamming allies with democratically-elected governments. The criticism comes as a surprise because Britain was the main mover and shaker behind UN Resolution #2334, which opposed settlements. But the Israeli government is not calm, fearing what that another declaration will come out of the upcoming Paris Conference, which will take place on January 15th, the papers emphasized. “It’s hard to believe someone who stabbed you and deceived you,” one senior Israeli official told Yedioth in reference to Britain. Indeed, Parisian government officials involved in preparing the conference told Maariv’s
Gideon Kotz that the Paris conference “will determine the major principles for a settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, before we go into a period of total uncertainty.” Netanyahu is boycotting the event, but Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will come, along with another 70 foreign ministers and representatives of countries. Their goal is to determine the recipe for a two-state solution and the toughest issues are on the table: Jerusalem, refugees and borders, wrote Maariv. Nevertheless, the US will veto any attempt to put Kerry's speech to vote at the UN, key Obama aide told Haaretz+.
 
Almost not mentioned in the media was a meeting held yesterday between former Israeli ministers and MKs and Abbas at the Muqata’a Headquarters in Ramallah Thursday (in Maariv's print edition). Maariv reported that Abbas told them that UNSC Resolution 2334 “is a real victory for the peace camp” and that “if Israel agrees to stop building settlements, including in E. Jerusalem, and to fulfill its agreements, we will be willing to renew negotiations for a final agreement.” In his view, “the resolution opened the possibility for a serious and real negotiations between the sides that will bring an end to the conflict.” Abbas also gave an interview to Yedioth’s Nehama Dweik, and said that the UN Resolution “was not against Israelis, but against settlements” and that John Kerry “is a true friend of Israel.” He also said that if settlements were stopped “we will be willing to start talking without preconditions.” On Israeli Defense Minster Avigdor Lieberman he said: “He calls to freeze economic relations with us and to continue security coordination. What? Does he think we work for him?” Abbas also confirmed that a draft of the UN resolution was transferred to the US. [Why wouldn’t it be? – OH] Meanwhile, Netanyahu went on saying that the world was spending too much energy focusing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when it should be focused on massacres in the region and “not our relatively marginal conflict with the Palestinians…” And the leaders of the far right-wing pro-settler party, Habayit Hayehudi, underscored their party's support of annexation of West Bank land and their opposition to a Palestinian state. 
 
In 50 years, one-third of all Israelis will be ultra-Orthodox. On the eve of the new year, the Israeli population reached 8,630,000 according to fresh statistics. Current trends show a decrease in the number of immigrants over the past year, especially from France. Half of this year’s immigrants are from the Ukraine and Russia.