APN's daily news review from Israel

Wednesday January 20, 2016
 

Quote of the day:

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Front Page:

Haaretz

• Dispute in coalition: Venomous exchanges between Netanyahu and Yaalon and between Bennett
• Bennett starts from the beginning // Yossi Verter
• UN: 3.2 million Iraqis uprooted from their homes in two years
• Private investigator spied on left-wing activists for two years at request of state-funded NGO
• 15-year-old Palestinian arrested on suspicion of murdering Dafna Meir in attack in Otniel
• State Comptroller: No evidence that Ethiopian women were forced to take birth control shot
• 20 years after they disappeared, members of Baader-Meinhoff (Red Army gang) are involved in robbery
• Researchers wonder what caused mass death of animals
• Learn from Eisenkot // Haaretz Editorial
• Really, hello?!? The incredible archaeological discovery made by US Ambassador to Israel // Zvi Bar’el
• How does Army Radio look after four years under management of Yaron Dekel

• Rupture in the government – Bennett attacked Netanyahu and Yaalon
• Bennett about Yaalon: “Failed and stuck defense minister, Bibi flows with him. In every conflict, we are bleeding.”
• Yaalon about Bennett: “Childish, lacking responsibility, chases ‘Likes’ on Facebook”
• Wanted: Kindergarten teacher // Nahum Barnea
• The terrorist who murdered Dafna Meir: 15-years-old [Photo of handcuffed boy with face blurred]
• Criminal attack in the heart of the city – Enormous bomb laid in car of criminal blew up
• From Shabbat: Cold wave comes

• Bennett vs. members of government: “They suffer from a fixated thinking” – Education Minister sharply attacked the political brass
• Attack (on Netanyahu) from home // Ben Caspit
• Government that doesn’t govern // Kalman Libskind
• Murderer of Dafna Meir: 15-year-old [Photo of boy, face not blurred]
• Criminal terror in the heart of the city
• The storm on the way: Wave of cold from Russia will reach Israel on Shabbat

• “Mom struggled, I yelled and the terrorist ran” – Terrorist caught
• They don’t want us here // Haim Shine
• Today: Attorney General to close Ashkenazi file
• Prime Minister’s associates furious at Bennett: “Like an Internet commenter in the opposition” – Bennett accuses: “Fixated thinking”
• Criminal terror in broad daylight
• Justice Hendel: “Olmert was convicted twice, why should he get a discount”
• The rain passed – the storm is on the way: Next week maybe snow

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News Summary:
Government top brass battle over policy, the IDF detains the 15-year-old suspect of the murderer of Dafni Meir – and the bereaved and the father of the alleged attacker make insightful statements, and a car blows up in broad daylight in Tel-Aviv – in an assassination attempt of gangsters making top stories in today’s Hebrew newspapers. Also in the news, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro meet to reconcile and the police arrests two more left-wing human rights activists, one Palestinian and one Jewish Israeli and a state-funded settler group sent a private eye to spy on Israeli human rights NGOs. 
 
The annual conference of the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv had a rocking day Tuesday. Education Minister Naftali Bennett, ex-minister Gideon Saar of Likud, Opposition leader MK Isaac Herzog and Yesh Atid Chairman MK Yair Lapid each made harsh attacks against the conduct and policies of the Israeli government yesterday and generals attacked generals. Most significant was Bennett’s attack, in which he slammed “stagnated thinking” in Israel’s security policy, because he is a senior coalition member. Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon accused Bennett of being reckless. Yaalon also spoke at the conference and contradicted IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot’s statement yesterday, that Hezbollah is Israel’s greatest enemy and there were “opportunities” in the Iran nuclear agreement, declaring that "Iran is our main enemy, after I heard voices saying different things."  Former general Yoav Galant also slammed Eisenkot for his “opportunities” remark, saying he should focus on “threats.” Gideon Saar said Israel was “losing Jerusalem,” as the Jewish population decreased, due to Israeli policies and stressed that Israel needs to restore its ties with the world, particularly the US. (Maariv) Lapid also said that the rift with the US was a terrible public diplomacy failure. 
Herzog surprised with a turn to the right saying that a two state solution was presently unrealistic and that Israel must focus on security not diplomacy – first and foremost by completing the separation barrier and separate from E. Jerusalem neighborhoods. He said that neither Netanyahu or Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas were partners for peace, contradicting statements by former president Shimon Peres. (Haaretz+)
 
Early Tuesday morning, Israeli forces detained 15-year-old Murad Adais from his bed as he slept in the village of Yatta, two nights after he allegedly stabbed to death Dafna Meir, a mother of six, in the adjacent settlement of Otniel. Meir’s husband, Natan, said, “We have no anger. I am not angry at anyone. We do not curse Arabs. We are not people who hate. That's not how Dafna and I educated the kids.” Their daughter, Renana, 17, saw Adais and screamed as he tried to pull the knife out of her body, after which he ran away, she said. Adais acted alone and had no previous record, thus making it extremely difficult for security forces to know of his plans in advance. He had snuck into the settlement, putting to rest rumors that he was a laborer there. 

Adais’ father, Bader, spoke with the Israeli media and told them his surprise at the arrest and how he opposed it: “At three in the morning I woke up to prepare to go out to work in Israel and I heard my children screaming to me from the floor downstairs that the army was in the house. I went downstairs and the officer asked me if I knew why they were in our house. I told him I had no idea.” Adais told Yedioth they searched the house for two hours and did not tell him why. “They took our cellular phones and one of the officers threatened that they would destroy our home and deport us to Gaza. I answered him that the honor would be mine to go and live in Gaza.” At around 5AM they left the house and took his son. In some of the interviews the father gave to the Israeli media he expressed doubt that it was his son. “He is a young boy, only 15-years-old, he doesn’t know what a Jew is, he never saw a Jew, he never did anything with a Jew and he has everything in life.” When asked if he were proud of his son’s attack, he said: “No, of course not. Why would I be proud? Can anyone be proud of murder? No one is proud of murder. If I had known he had committed the murder I would have likely turned him in myself.” Yet, Maariv and Walla News reported, that he told “Palestinian media” that he was “proud” of his son. Adais’ relatives told Channel 2 that “no one here was proud of the murder.” Maariv reported that people from his village gave the information about Murad being the killer. “This was a 15-year-old boy who apparently fought with his family and because of that he decided to do what he did,” the head of Mt. Hebron settlements, Yochai Dimri, told Yedioth. “This is a very worrying reality in which any youth who something goes wrong for him in life can take a knife and destroy a whole family.”
 
Netanyahu promised to demolish the Adais home and bar family members from working in Israel. The IDF has already mapped the Bader home for demolition, Maariv reported, as well as the home of the youth who stabbed and injured Michal Froman in Tekoa.
 
Meanwhile, Froman, 30, said she didn’t believe her attacker wanted to kill her. "He could have killed me, but he stabbed me once and ran away. I felt like someone had sent him or he had wanted to check off a task. If he'd wanted to kill me, he could have made more of an effort,” she said from hospital. Muhammad Kamel Shaalan, 15, from Bethlehem, was shot as he ran out of Tekoa settlement, but he is not dead as the media reported yesterday. He is in stable condition at Hadassah Hospital after being shot in the leg, Maan reported.  
 
Netanyahu made a condolence call at the Meir family in Otniel and told the EU it should “stop its hypocrisy” and visit Otniel “to see the truth.”  Netanyahu is angry at the EU for labeling settlement products and deciding this week that no agreements it makes with Israel will be applicable to settlements. Netanyahu said that the murder was simply because Palestinians don’t accept a Jewish state within any borders. Later in the day at a special event celebrating the Knesset's 67th birthday, he said emphasized the point saying, "The root of the conflict is the negation of the very existence of the State of Israel, the aspiration to wipe us off the face of the earth,” at which point the Arab MKs left the plenum in protest, saying the prime minister's speech was "cheap right-wing demagogy and exploitation of the event,"  Ynet reported. They returned after his speech. Other evens and activities were held throughout the Knesset building during the day, including MK Stav Shaffir playing piano and singing, some MKs doing Karate and another giving a spinning lesson.
 
Netanyahu was also angry at US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro for saying that Israel had a legal double standard for Jews and Palestinians in the West Bank and that settlement activity must stop. His former aide, Aviv Bushinsky, even called Shapiro a ‘Jew boy’ in response, Haaretz+ reported. Nevertheless, Netanyahu held a ‘sulha’ (reconciliation) meeting with Shapiro in his office, nonetheless. (Maariv) And the US stood by Shapiro’s comments and also by the EU labeling, saying the US does not see it as a boycott of Israel. And despite it all, a US delegation will arrive in Israel next week to finalize details of a new military aid package. 
 

Quick Hits:

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Features:

Avner’s version
Avner Gveriyahu of ‘Breaking the Silence’ became one of the most vilified people in Israel. He is attacked because he spoke at the UN against the State and members of his Paratroopers unit claim he lied and (the far-right-wing NGO) ‘Im Tirtzu’ turned his face into a campaign against left-wing organizations. Now, he talks about threats to his life, he deals with difficult questions and explains why he still sees himself as a Zionist patriot, why he is completely at peace with his testimonies and why he has no complaints against the soldiers themselves [who allegedly committed violations – OH], but rather against the government, which believes that it is possible to be an ‘enlightened occupier.’ He says he stands by what he said happened in his military unit and it was just the tip of the iceberg and he has video to prove it. He said that the soldiers “who don’t want to lie to their souls need to look inside and they know what I’m talking about….There is no doubt that we wanted to be good. I remember some of the guys mopping the floors after operations (inside Palestinians’ homes), and (soldiers) who left money for the Palestinian families. But you cannot ignore that the occupation has an erosive routine. And unnecessary violence towards Palestinians. And taking souvenirs from people’s homes..." (Yehuda Shochat, Yedioth’s ’24 Hours’ supplement, cover)

Commentary/Analysis:

**How he grew up into being a murderer (Merav Betito, Yedioth, p. 4) You can call him a terrorist. Possibly a psychopath, murderer, crazy. He is still a 15-year-old youth who popped out of the bushes with a knife under cover of darkness, who attacked with all the pent up anger inside of him on a woman who stood on her doorfront quietly painting the entry. Like a wild animal ambushing from a hiding place and waiting patiently for the moment of weakness that he will come and attack, to submit and kill – he thought about his chances and then returned to his home and went to bed. The human tendency looks towards explanations for phenomena of the type of the murdering teen, questions in shock what would bring an adolescent to do such a horrifying act, thinks that this is an unusual incident statistically and the overwhelming majority of the murderers are indeed adolescents, and even take into account the biblical text that “human nature is evil from youth.” But the murderer of Dafna Meir requires other explanations, it screams for a deep discussion around the question of how did a monster like this grow up? Not a philosophical discussion and definitely not a religious one and of course not a political one – because all those will do is only miss the mark and again they will deal with the horror instead of going after the footprints from where the murderer came. Again the political speculators will turn it into profit and quickly call for all power to be used, heavy punishments, house demolitions and everything that will add more to the ring of hatred of the generation (of Palestinians) who don’t know Jews. Whoever looks for the roots of the hatred will find them in every speck of dust that the murderer breathed from birth. For him – a Jew is an enemy. Even without the sermons at the mosque and the incitement at school, he hates us: For the Jewish neighborhoods (settlements) turning green in range of view from the neglected streets of Yatta [village of murderer – OH], for the armed soldiers, for the never-ending superiority. This youth lacks any consciousness connecting between “Jew” and “good,” he has no Jewish friends and also no positive memories from violent meetings with them. The village of Yatta in the Hebron district is soaked in religious spirit, which is easy to set alight mainly because of its proximity and constant friction with the settlers, and the unbridled demagoguery in the houses of prayer and on social media networks, only confirm the real life outside. Whoever thinks it is possible to heal the hatred by using force alone is raising with his own hands the next monster: a boy without hope can be 50,000 times more dangerous than adults who have come to accept the reality. 
The Incredible Archaeological Discovery Made by the U.S. Ambassador to Israel (Zvi Bar'el, Haaretz+) 'Concerned and perplexed' over Israel's double standards? You don't say, Mr. Shapiro. 
The language of security and fear has won (Sever Plocker, Yedioth/Ynet) The transition from social-economic stories to national-political ones in the public discourse is not because the former have exhausted themselves. The turning point was caused by internalization, slow but invasive, of last year's election platforms. Netanyahu put the Jewish-Arab and Israeli-Palestinian conflict at the center of his campaign publicity. Herzog put society and the economy at the center of his.
The Brave Israeli Soldiers and the Palestinian Pothole Attack (Amira Hass, Haaretz+) In the West Bank, the Israeli army strategy seems simple: Potholes for Palestinians, asphalt for the Jews. 
The general’s visit: Things you see from there are not seen in the Prime Minister’s Office (Ran Adelist, Maariv) What can be learned from the presence of former CIA director David Petraeus at the Israel National Strategic Studies Institute conference, and about the plug whose name is Benjamin Netanyahu?... The plug is Netanyahu. The main reason is because he has been labeled as an unrestrained and irresponsible provocateur, who harms the interests of the current US administration and harms the ability of Israel to rescue itself from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I guess if there is a meeting between Netanyahu and Petraeus, they will talk about “the situation" and the excellent intelligence cooperation, which is code for self-interested deals in which information is exchanged in exchange for information and try to gather diplomatic and political profit to please the bosses in Jerusalem and Washington. Overall, after two years of working in the country and abroad on the subject of relations between intelligence agencies and politicians worldwide, we (my friend and partner David Arbel and I) arrived at the problematic conclusion that, usually, the intelligence services, who are directly accountable to the politicians, adapt themselves to the political agenda of those who appointed them. In some cases this is because it is a democratic imperative, and in less democratic countries, they won’t be in places where the ruler wants to hear what is convenient for him. 
Israel's Chief-of-staff Shows More Statesmanship Than Its Elected Officials (Haaretz Editorial) In a speech to the INSS, Lt. Gen. Eisenkot made a courageous admission of the limitations facing the IDF, against a backdrop of false scenarios disseminated by politicians.
Questions of identity: most Israeli Arabs want to integrate but feel discriminated against (Amos Gilboa, Maariv) The huge investment of 15 billion shekels in the Arab population is a welcome step and because of it feelings of inequality among the country’s 1.4 million Israeli Arabs (including Druze, Circassians and Bedouin, not including E. Jerusalemites) will be lessened. About the sector: They have multiple indentities: 1/3 consider themselves Israelis and another third consider themselves Palestinians, and another third consider themselves neither of the two. The majority don’t believe Israel has right to be a Jewish-Zionist state, but accept that reality.
Another Day of Combat in the Israeli Government as Bennett Tries to Have It Both Ways (Yossi Verter, Haaretz+) The education minister feels great in the government, and doesn't for a minute consider leaving it. Instead, he’s building an internal opposition of sorts.
A message from the White House (Shimon Shiffer, Yedioth/Ynet) US Ambassador Dan Shapiro's condemnation of the Israeli government on Monday was a rarity, but no accident. It's no exaggeration to assume that Israel will no longer be able to rely on the US's veto at the UN or to enjoy the automatic support that we have been used to.
The Absurdity, Racism and Inequality of Conscription to the Israeli Army (Shoham Smith, Haaretz+) In the IDF, while one arm forcibly grabs those who don’t wish to serve, the other rejects the very people who who long to do so.
Shapiro's delegitimization speech (Ruthie Blum, Israel Hayom) U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro did his administration proud on Monday. His boss, Secretary of State John Kerry, couldn't have done a better job of twisting reality to suit fantasy.
The New Frontier for BDS: Targeting Settler Businesses (Kathleen Peratis, Haaretz+) Too many progressive Jews think criticizing Israeli policies on the occupation is enough, but it's not working. Challenging settler businesses to shut up shop is the new frontier for BDS. 
As usual, the Jews are to blame (Dror Eydar, Israel Hayom) Jewish settlement throughout our homeland is not the problem, it is the solution. 
Will Israel’s Opposition Leader Oppose Netanyahu at Last? (Guy Ziv, Haaretz+) Head of the Zionist Union Isaac Herzog has finally grasped that he needs to present the Israeli public with a proper alternative. It’s a shame he didn’t reach this epiphany earlier. 
The threat to 'national existence' (Clifford D. May, Israel Hayom) Are existential threats the only ones the U.S. needs to worry about?

 

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