APN's daily news review from Israel

Monday November 4, 2019

 

Quote of the day:

Haaretz

Yedioth Ahronoth

Maariv This Week (Hebrew links only)

Israel Hayom

Top News Summary:
The apparent murder of a woman by her husband, a well-known doctor, and court orders preventing the extradition of a Russian hacker and the deportations of two Israeli-born Filipino children were top stories in today’s Hebrew newspapers.

The High Court ordered a stay on the extradition to the US of the Russian hacker Aleksey Burkov following petitions from him and from the family of Israeli Naama Issachar, who is in jail in Russia on a drug conviction. Russia wants to exchange Issachar for Burkov. Speaking to Haaretz, Burkov said he’s not a Kremlin spy, and he wasn’t meddling in the US elections. Haaretz+ found that US Secret Service documents show that Russian hackers struck plea deals with U.S. authorities to hand over partners in cybercrime schemes. An Israeli judge also halted the deportation of two Israeli-born Filipino children, asserting that the minors' welfare wasn't taken into account.

In regards to the latest flare-up with Gaza, senior Israeli Minister Yuval Steinitz said a ground operation in Gaza may be inevitable and it will 'come at a price.’ Steinitz said Israel will have to eliminate the leaders of Hamas and then get to a long-term arrangement." But Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar said no talks are being held with Israel over the long-term ceasefire agreement or prisoner swaps because of the Israeli political deadlock. “We won't be held prisoner to Israeli elections,” they said. (Also Maariv) They also said they nor would they turn a blind eye to the Israeli retaliation strikes that took the life of one man in Gaza. Sderot residents demanded action after rockets hit their town Friday night. At the Sunday weekly cabinet meeting, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu pledged covert actions on all fronts, to its south, north and east “at sea, in the air and on the ground.”

Elections 2019 Quickees:

Quick Hits:

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Features:

"I don’t tell a boy: 'Don't be in the hills.' I say: 'No matter where you are, I'll be there with you.’”
They sleep in tents, in beds they built themselves, they learn to train dogs and make cheeses, and most importantly - they go through a process that takes them back to the frameworks they fell out of, some at age 12. At the Hebrew Shepherd Farm, which is trying to rehabilitate hilltop youth [extremist settlement youth who live in shacks they build on hilltops in the West Bank from where they attack Palestinians and sometimes soldiers - OH], the goal is to reach the end the year with zero youth. This Yedioth Ahronoth correspondent was allowed to visit the site. She talked to youth about the difficulty in accepting authority, and she heard from the program's head, Roy Simon, why no one should given up on, even if he threw stones or was in custody. Simon’s program is supported by the Education Ministry. (Yifat Ehrlich, Yedioth Hebrew Friday magazine)
LISTEN: Anti-Semitism Is Not a Jewish Problem. Israel Is.
We took our tape recorder to Haaretz’s inaugural Judaism, Israel and Diaspora conference, and heard from Anshel Pfeffer, Isaac Herzog, Natan Sharansky and others. PLUS: David Makovsky talks Trump, peace and his new podcast on U.S.-Israeli relations. (Haaretz Weekly podcast)
 
Commentary/Analysis:
Israeli Army’s Boasts of Preparedness Against Iran Have Quickly Turned to Alarm (Yaniv Kubovich, Haaretz+) It’s doubtful the picture has changed very much, so Benjamin Netanyahu may not be the only one exaggerating the seriousness of the situation for his own purposes.
The Gaza show must go on and on and on (Merav Betito, Yedioth/Ynet) Friday's rocket attack on Sderot was the latest in a string of similar incidents all prompting similar responses, but a resident of the city whose home was damaged in the barrage asks: 'Does the government think we are second class citizens?'
Putting Himself Above Rest of Us (Haaretz Editorial) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu added something of no modest proportions to his legacy this week. On Sunday, a Boeing 767 that Israel Aerospace Industries dubs “the plane of the state’s leaders” completed its first test flight. This plane is supposed to serve Israeli prime ministers and presidents for the next 50 years. But even if Benny Gantz forms a government in the next month, the plane is likely to go down in history as “Netanyahu’s plane,” after the person under whose leadership the decision to buy it was made. So far, 600 million shekels ($170 million) has been spent to buy and convert the plane – more than twice the original estimated cost…its total cost is similar to the cost of the last 10 years of prime ministerial trips abroad on leased commercial jets – and that was with a prime minister who goes overseas a lot. Moreover, the latter cost includes outlays for fuel and security, which the state will continue to have to make even with the new plane....
Inspired by Netanyahu, the records of shock, disgust, and divisions in the country were broken (Ben Caspit, Maariv) Erez Tadmor's false and sickening speech, who was the mouth of the last Likud campaign, is the prime minister's legacy and the stench that will remain after his term ends. How do you even begin to discuss his statements?
Youth guides, employment and rehabilitation activities: How to deal with hilltop youth violence (Yair Sheleg, Maariv) Due to the destructive potential of their actions, they should be responded to with the utmost severity, but also know that criminal treatment cannot be the sole means of coping.
Settler violence is part of a mechanism whose purpose is to make the lives worse of the Palestinians (Ran Edelist, Maariv) The government's policy is to Judaize the West Bank. For this to happen, the Palestinians must be removed. For that to happen, the Netanyahu government and the right-wing block have a firm policy of pressure in every field.
The Nation-state Law Strikes Again (Carolina Landsmann, Haaretz+) Justice Minister Amir Ohana announced this week that he had signed the order for the extradition of Russian hacker Aleksey Burkov to the United States, where he is wanted for cyber crimes. He will be extradited after Israel turned down a prisoner swap deal with Russia, Burkov in return for Naama Issachar, who is in prison in Russia for drug possession. Justifying his decision, Ohana said: “I wouldn’t make the connection between [Issachar] and Burkov, because if we make this connection, we would put every Israeli around the world at risk.” But this affair has another point, too. At the press conference in which Ohana announced Burkov’s extradition, he explained that the obligation to bring Issachar home “derives from the nation state of the Jewish people law.” Our nation-state law? It turns out that Section 6(a) of the law, “The Connection with the Jewish People,” states: “The state shall strive to ensure the safety of members of the Jewish people and of its citizens, who are in trouble and in captivity, due to their Jewishness or due to their citizenship.” Also in the letter Ohana sent 10 days earlier to the Issachar family’s lawyer, he noted that Israel’s obligation to act to bring Naama back home in part stems from Section 6(a), because it is clear that she is being persecuted because she is Israeli.  The question this raises is whether based on the nation-state law, any Jew – even if they are not an Israeli citizen – is entitled to protection by Israel. Is any Jew in the world who runs into trouble as a result of anti-Semitism able to sue Israel for failing in its mission to guarantee their safety?  Maybe this is the reason that in December 2018 the Mossad received over 10 million shekels ($2.83 million) to beef up security at institutions of Jewish communities around the world. In other words, Israel pays for the security of Jews living overseas, who are not Israeli citizens. Time after time the nation-state law has been revealed to be a conceptual nuclear bomb at the heart of the Zionist enterprise, a law that undermines the idea of Jewish nationhood on one hand, and the notion of Israeli sovereignty on the other…
How Rabin Conspiracy Theories Went Mainstream – and Other Bizarre Tales From Netanyahu's Israel (Allison Kaplan Sommer, Haaretz+) While Netanyahu’s aides are accused of trolling and claim the police searched their phones illegally, the prime minister’s woes are becoming increasingly bizarre – both politically and legally.
Conspiracy Theorists Conspiring? (Iris Leal, Haaretz+) Conspiracy theories flourish in a place where the plain truth and the facts don’t provide a sufficient answer. The desire for everything that happens in our lives to be clear in all its details is natural in all aspects of life, and this desire is what gives rise to alternative suggestions for unsatisfactory answers. The common basis for all these suggestions is the assumption that behind the façade of the democratically elected government are powerful forces, and they are the ones who are actually in charge of the political game – the same “deep state” that has permeated our lives since the beginning of the investigations into Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s criminal cases. That’s how we arrived at a situation in which Netanyahu is Dreyfus…
Iranian Troops Are on a Deadly Collision Course With Iraq’s Protesters as Tehran Tightens Its Grip (Zvi Bar'el, Haaretz+) To keep its grip on power in Iraq and beyond, Tehran is ready to quash its neighbor’s protests.
Trump’s Middle East shake-up led to killing of al-Baghdadi (Dr. Joseph Frager, Israel Hayom) The raid on ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was a major turning point in Trump’s presidency, and it’s a crying shame he can’t seem to get an iota of credit for it from his political opponents.
New world order: Putin strengthens his hold in the Middle East and Africa (Ksenia Svetlova, Maariv) Increasing Russian influence and weakening of the United States' position in the region creates a new reality. Israel needs to prepare for these changes if it wants to remain relevant.
Putin wants to save Syria's Jews — to keep Trump from coming back (Zvi Bar'el, Haaretz+) The Jews of Syria have become part of Russia's religious diplomacy, which partly aims to reassure American evangelicals and keep U.S. forces away
Time for US, NATO to give Turkey the boot (James Sinkinson, Israel Hayom) While removing Turkey from NATO would mark a sea-change in Washington and NATO's policy, and would surely drive Ankara closer to Moscow, it would certainly get Turkish President Erdogan's attention.
The Delusions of a Colonialist (Odeh Bisharat, Haaretz+) After many years of concealment, last week, in a few short sentences Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed the core of his ideology, which is shared by many in the dominant ideological stream in Israel. At the opening of a cabinet meeting, the outgoing prime minister said that he had begun to read Barbara Tuchman’s “The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War, 1890-1914.” “Queen Victoria’s 60th year, a great parade in London. England ruled one quarter of the world. ... Everything crumbled a few decades later. There are many reasons, but one reason is clear, and their great security collapse stemmed from them not arming themselves against their enemies. They relied on the successes of the past, and from the position of the greatest empire in the world, they declined and declined and, of course, were hit very hard.”

Elections 2019 Commentary/Analysis:
Gantz Is Rabin’s Latest Successor. But His Coronation Comes With a Warning (Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz+) For the first time since Ehud Barak lost the premiership to Ariel Sharon in 2001, the Israeli tribe feels it has a leader again, although Gantz is nowhere near forming a government.
**Preserving Israel's rule of law (Yedidia Stern, Yedioth/Ynet) While no one knows whether the attorney general will ultimately decide to indict the prime minister, this is an opportune moment to take a principled stand, free of positioning or party politics, to defend the justice system.
The Attorney General Must Put an End to the Circus (Ehud Barak, Haaretz+) The history of Israeli government contains nothing at all like these Days of Incitement. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his close circle are in a panic, and are leading with the help of indentured ministers and Knesset members, aides and fans, a campaign to undermine the status of the law enforcement authorities. They are producing shows of North Korean-style brown-nosing, trying to intimidate state witnesses and rewrite the history of the murderous incitement they led against Yitzhak Rabin exactly 24 years ago. As in similar cases in history, the gradualism blinds the public that does not notice the danger and is not acting with enough determination to remove it. Netanyahu’s strategy is transparent. He understands that it is too late for him to come up with a “deal” that would prevent his being indicted. His fear is enormous and justified.  The possibilities open to him are very limited and have given rise to unrestrained behavior. Netanyahu must remain behind the wheel to deter Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit from making the obligatory decisions, or alternatively to delay them until State Prosecutor Shai Nitzan and Liat Ben Ari, the lead prosecutor on his cases, are replaced by weaker people.
The ugly nepotism with which the justice system is infected eats every good part of it (Dr. Haim Misgav, Maariv) As High Court Chief Justice Esther Chayut said, there is nothing like what is happening in the governing system these days. But the guilty party is not where she is pointing to. The State Attorney's Office cannot, in my view, get its hands clean; And the High Court Chief Justice can't regain the public’s confidence which is waning as she seems to continue to collaborate with a host of journalists. Hundreds of leaks in the media portray her as an active player in the political game. The bad smell that comes from her seniors’ remarks about the elected echelons is far from indicating good faith.
Can Joe Biden save the day for pro-Israel Democrats? (Jonathan S. Tobin, Israel Hayom) His denunciation of threats to cut Israel aid was great, but it’s far from clear that the fading establishment champion can best his party’s increasingly dominant left wing.
 

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