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IDF charges Palestinian lawmaker with security offenses - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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IDF charges Palestinian lawmaker with security offenses
Khalida Jarrar indicted in Israeli military tribunal on charges of belonging to PFLP, inciting others to abduct Israeli soldiers.
By Jack Khoury

The military prosecution on Wednesday charged Palestinian lawmaker Khalida Jarrar with 12 security offenses. Earlier this month the army ordered Jarrar imprisoned without trial for six months, citing “dangerousness.”

The indictment charges Jarrar with membership in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, serving an administrative role in the organization, conducting public works for the PFLP and inciting others to abduct Israeli soldiers.

“We were surprised by the prosecution, which explicitly said last week there were no grounds to detain her until the end of proceedings,” said Jarrar’s lawyer, Sahar Francis. “The indictment strengthens our argument that the imprisonment is vindictive.”

Jarrar is a member of the Palestinian committee monitoring the International Criminal Court procedures. She was arrested just after the Palestinian Authority joined the ICC.

The military prosecution asked to keep Jarrar in prison until the end of proceedings, even though the prosecution had previously told the military tribunal that it had no evidence to justify keeping her in custody until then.

Jarrar was arrested April 1 at her home in the town of El Bireh, near Ramallah. The IDF said she had breached travel restrictions imposed in August, which banned her from leaving the Jericho area. No other security offenses were mentioned.

Jarrar’s arrest prompted sharp protests from the Palestinian Authority and international human rights groups, which demanded her release

#Khalida-Jarrar

Article très instructif.
Le directeur du ministère des Affaires étrangères israélien adresse une lettre à son ministre (Avigdor Lieberman) rappelant le « prix à payer » pour réparer les mauvaises relations avec l’administration Obama.
Fait nouveau : Israël subit des pressions sur son programme nucléaire par la Conférence des Parties chargée d’examiner le traité sur la non-prolifération des armes nucléaires (TNP) de 2015 qui débute le 27 avril prochain. Et des initiatives anti-israéliennes sont prises par l’IAEA

Foreign Ministry director : Israel may pay a heavy price for crisis with U.S. - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Coordination with the U.S. is crucial to Israel’s ability to cope with Palestinian UN bid and rearming of Hezbollah, top official says.
By Barak Ravid

The director of the Foreign Ministry on Wednesday sent a letter to Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman warning that Israel “is liable to pay a heavy price” because of the “intense, ongoing, and public” crisis in relations with the U.S. administration.

In a two-page letter obtained by Haaretz, Foreign Ministry director-general Nissim Ben-Sheetrit called on Israel to take steps to quickly repair U.S.-Israel ties or face the consequences in the diplomatic and security arenas.

Ben-Sheetrit’s letter focuses on the tense relations between the Netanyahu government and the Obama administration. He wrote that close coordination with the United States is crucial and directly connected to Israel’s ability to cope with all its diplomatic and security challenges.

Under the heading “Diplomatic Challenges and Reorganization of the Foreign Ministry,” Ben-Sheetrit details the position of the Foreign Service’s professional staff regarding several issues Israel will have to address within weeks of the new government’s establishment. He said Israel will have to contend with the following issues before the June 30 deadline for reaching a final agreement between Iran and the large powers:

The pending UN Security Council resolution initiated by France that deals with the Palestinian Authority’s request to become a full member of the United Nations. This resolution is expected to set parameters for resolving the core issues for reaching a permanent-status arrangement between Israel and the Palestinians.

Palestinian lawsuits against Israel at the International Criminal Court at The Hague.

* Pressure on Israel regarding its nuclear program by the Review Conference of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which opens later this month, and anti-Israel initiatives by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Threat from the north

One of the most serious problems Israel must address is the need to formulate a clear and firm stance on Hezbollah’s rearming and the increasing threat from the north, wrote Ben-Sheetrit. Calling this “a most urgent and critical issue for Israel,” he added: “Dealing well with this issue will be next to impossible if it is done without close coordination with the United States.”

The Foreign Ministry director also addressed the effort by Israel to improve the conditions of the nuclear agreement with Iran before June 30. In diplomatic language, Ben-Sheetrit criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s approach to the dispute with the Obama administration on this matter.

“The loud argument being conducted with the White House on the Iranian issue, beyond the other damage, is undermining Israel’s ability to persuade the U.S. administration of the need for crucial changes in the final version of the developing nuclear agreement,” Ben-Sheetrit wrote.

Given all these challenges, Foreign Ministry officials say the most important challenge facing the Israeli government is repairing relations with the United States. “We ascribe the greatest importance to leading processes that will quickly rehabilitate Israeli-American relations so as to prevent harm to many vital Israeli interests in the international arena,” Ben-Sheetrit wrote.

He does not clarify what he means by “processes that will quickly rehabilitate” these bilateral ties. However, numerous Foreign Ministry officials, as well as officials of American Jewish organizations and members of the Obama administration, say replacing Ron Dermer as Israeli ambassador to the United States is one step that must be taken to end the crisis.

So far Netanyahu has supported Dermer, who is considered one of the premier’s closest advisers, and is not considering a replacement.

Ben-Sheetrit suggests bolstering the Foreign Ministry units that handle Israeli relations with the black and Hispanic communities in the United States and with the Christian world in general, particularly “given the great harm by radical Islam against the Christian population of the Middle East and Africa.”

Ambassador Dermer cut off from Obama’s staff, White House entry logs show - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The extent of the disconnect between Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Ron Dermer and the powers-that-be in Washington has been highlighted by new data released by the Obama administration.

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Examination of the registry that details the one million entry permits issued to the White House over the last 18 months shows that Dermer had precious few meetings with President Barack Obama’s advisers in 2014.

The data do reveal other interesting Israeli visitors, however, such as Benjamin Netanyahu’s son Yair, opposition leader Isaac Herzog, retired politician Ehud Barak, TV Channel 2 anchorwoman Yonit Levy, and others.

The registry was published on March 27 by the White House, and included visits to the presidential compound and the adjacent building housing the National Security Council.

The listings constitute a database meant to be used by the White House itself, but since 2012 they have been disclosed to the public following a petition by a nongovernment group of citizens who have resolved to safeguard the ethics of governance – particularly with regard to ties between business and politics.

The registry is incomplete, however, inasmuch as it does not include secret meetings with administration officials that were held elsewhere. The list also excludes meetings removed from the registry due to their sensitive diplomatic or security nature. Furthermore, as in any government bureaucracy, in this case lack of organization and of adherence to procedures likely exist in the White House as well.

Nevertheless, the registry provides an interesting perspective on Israel-U.S. relations, which became tenser than ever in the course of 2014.

Miami-born Ron Dermer started serving as Israel’s envoy to Washington in December 2013. For years prior to that, he had been a senior adviser to Netanyahu, eventually becoming one of his closest associates. Dermer immigrated to Israel at the age of 26.

During his years in the Prime Minister’s Bureau, Dermer was a red flag, in the eyes of the administration, due to his close ties to senior Republican politicians. Recently, he became, de facto, persona non grata at the White House, for his part in organizing Netanyahu’s March 3 speech before the joint session of the Congress.

Ever since he assumed his ambassadorial role, administration officials treated him according to the principle of treat your guest with respect, but be wary. In March 2014, Israeli journalist Chico Menashe reported on Israel Radio that National Security Advisor Susan Rice was refusing to meet the ambassador. Several similar reports appeared in the following months. For a long time, the administration and Netanyahu’s bureau attempted to deny or downplay the severity of this situation.

However, looking at the new data concerning visits to the White House, one sees that Dermer has almost no ties with Obama’s senior advisers. From December 3, 2013, to the end of 2014, he visited the White House only 11 times. On only one of these occasions, on June 25, 2014, was there a business meeting with Obama’s senior Middle Eastern affairs adviser Philip Gordon.

Four other visits by Dermer coincided with visits by Netanyahu to the White House, and the rest included the presentation of his credentials and attendance at functions or receptions that included multiple guests.

The absence of an ongoing relationship between the ambassador and the president’s advisers stands out when compared to the number of visits held by his No. 2 man, Reuven Azar, deputy chief of mission to the Israeli Embassy, since assuming his job in the middle of last year. Between July and December of 2014, Azar entered the White House 10 times, eight times for business meetings with Obama’s or Vice President Joe Biden’s senior staffers. The purpose of two other meetings was unclear, based on the published information.

Even though the deputy head of mission has held several meetings with senior National Security Council staff at the White House, the new data show that very few meetings took place between any official representative of the Israeli government and senior advisers belonging to Obama’s inner circle – such as National Security Adviser Rice; her deputy, Ben Rhodes; or chief-of-staff Denis McDonough.

Left-wingers welcome

Indeed, the registry information shows that the only senior Israeli official who met Rice during the whole of 2014 was her counterpart in Jerusalem, the prime minister’s national security adviser, Yossi Cohen. Apparently there were two such encounters, in addition to three visits as part of Netanyahu’s entourage during meetings with President Obama.

Another senior Israeli who managed to meet a member of Obama’s inner circle during the period in question was opposition leader Isaac Herzog. On September 9, 2014, he met the White House chief-of-staff McDonough for just over an hour.

The registry of entries records a few more Israelis who came to the White House during that year: On March 3, 2014 at 7:05 P.M., several hours after a meeting between Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu, his son Yair entered the White House. The stated objective of the visit was to tour the grounds. His guide was Zaid Hassan, from the White House’s public relations department. After two and a half hours, he left the premises.

On May 7, 2014 at 3 P.M., former Prime Minister and Defense Minister Ehud Barak entered the White House. No longer in office for some time, he met with Vice President Biden for almost an hour.

On December 5, 2014 at 12:27 P.M., Israel TV Channel 2’s anchorwoman Yonit Levy came to see one of Obama’s inner-circle members, deputy NSC director Rhodes. Their meeting lasted for just over an hour.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman appears on the list only once: On December 5, 2013, he attended a reception given by President Obama and his wife Michelle, which was attended by many people. Lieberman was in Washington at the time while attending the Saban Forum conference.

On November 25, 2014, Deputy Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi came to the White House to meet senior Middle Eastern affairs adviser Philip Gordon.

Another Israeli visitor to the White House was Israel Defense Forces Gen. (ret.) Amos Gilad, head of the political-defense wing of the Defense Ministry. In October 2014 he met with Vice President Biden’s National Security Adviser Colin Kahl, and with the senior director for the Levant, Israel and Egypt at the NSC, Yael Lampert.

Moreover, the newly published records show that between May 2012 and August 2013, Gilad met with the president’s special assistant for Russia and Central Asian affairs at the White House, Alice Wells. It is unclear what the background for these meetings was.

Looking into the records of the entry permits reveals that several heads of leftist Israeli not-for-profit groups also visited the White House during 2014. At the end of October there was a visit by the head of the Geneva Initiative group, Gadi Baltiansky, followed the next day by a visit by the head of Friends of the Earth Gidon Bromberg. They met separately with Maher Bitar, director of Israeli-Palestinian affairs at the White House.

On December 2, left-wing activist Danny Zeidman, whose main interest is problems related to Jerusalem, met with adviser Gordon. On December 9, attorney Michael Sfard from the Yesh Din human rights group, met NSC Mideast adviser Lempert.

Les relations israélo-américaines sont décidément très étroites : le père de John Kerry aurait « trempé » dans le nucléaire israélien. Encore une fois, intéressant de savoir pourquoi cette info sort maintenant.

How Israel’s Dimona nuclear reactor was concealed from the U.S. - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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How Israel’s Dimona nuclear reactor was concealed from the U.S.
Documents revealed this week shed new light on the story of Israel’s nuclear program, and the role of John Kerry’s father in the saga.

One of the most fascinating historical turning points in the saga of nuclear development in the Middle East links Israel to Iran: the current prospect of the Iranians purchasing Russian S-300 ground-to-air missiles to protect their nuclear facilities from an Israeli or American attack shares a striking similarity to Israel’s purchase of American Hawk missiles to defend its own nuclear reactor in Dimona. Fulfilling that wish was the real aim of a deal that the government of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion sought to strike in the late 1950s and early 1960s from the Kennedy and Eisenhower administrations.

Beyond the official explanation — the need to defend Israeli air force bases, population centers and reserve recruits from Egyptian aerial bombing - there was another unseen aspect of the deal, relating to Dimona. The Hawk missiles also served to defend the nuclear reactor located there, and during the 1967 Six-Day War were deployed to bring down an Israeli plane piloted by Captain Yoram Harpaz that strayed into the airspace around the reactor after being hit over Jordan during a bombing raid.

Many of the details surrounding Israel’s nuclear story have already been revealed through research and via the declassification of secret information, including information released by the U.S. government - but there was more to be mined. Nuclear history researchers Avner Cohen and Bill Burr are releasing a new trove of old documents this week on the Website of the National Security Archive of George Washington University in Washington, providing new angles on the story. Two of them are especially eyebrow-lifting: The role played by Richard Kerry, (the father of current U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry) and the story behind the birth of the tale that the Dimona reactor was ’only’ a textile factory.

Cohen - who is a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey - and Burr document the principal effort on Israel’s part to forge atomic ties with France - a supplier of equipment and knowhow - and with Norway, which had agreed (together with Britain, which wanted to get rid of its overstocks from Norway) to sell the essential heavy water to run the reactor. Then there was the secondary goal - of hiding everything from the Americans until the Dimona reactor was an established fact. For nearly four long years, between 1957 and 1960, the effort to hide the project was crowned a success, either due to steps that Israel and France took to protect the information or due to intelligence failures in the gathering, analysis and inter-agency coordination of various professionals and political figures in Washington.

The cumulative result was that while the Americans had their suspicions and tried to sniff things out, they didn’t know for certain. As they had been in the Sinai-Suez military campaign of 1956, the Eisenhower administration was surprised by the depth of the Israeli-French cooperation. And as before, in late 1960, around the time of the U.S. presidential election, there was another surprise - although this time Eisenhower was nearing the end of his final term and could not seek re-election, instead passing the mantle to his successor, John Kennedy.

Secretary of State Kerry, who is currently up to his neck in the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program, can find dispatches in the State Department archives - or through Cohen and Burr - that his father sent from the Norwegian capital concerning Israel’s nuclear program. The elder Kerry, who served as secretary of the U.S. embassy in Norway, reported in the summer of 1959 on conversations between American and Norwegian officials from the two countries’ nuclear energy commissions, and about his subsequent efforts to look further into the issue of the sale of heavy water to Israel. The secrecy, the Norwegians explained, was designed to avoid attracting the attention of officials enforcing the Arab boycott of Israel with regard to the companies involved in the heavy water transaction. Two other reasons cited were Norwegian participation in the United Nations emergency force in Sinai (and on other Arab-Israeli cease-fire lines) and contacts with Egypt over the sale of nuclear equipment for research and medical purposes.

Official Israel continues to maintain to this day, 45 years after the disclosure of the efforts to build the facility at Dimona, that its declared purpose was “part of the national effort to develop the Negev, extensive research, study and applied activity aimed at expanding basic knowledge and to further economic development.” From the moment it was caught, Israel admitted the nuclear goal - but stressed that like the small Sorek reactor, Dimona was meant for peaceful purposes. One can assume it wasn’t all just a show of innocence. The U.S. strategic air command also boasted during the Cold War that peace was its aim, that arming itself with nuclear missiles and bombers was designed to deter war.

And when it comes to the textile factory as cover for the Dimona project, researchers from the National Security Archive dug up its origins in a helicopter ride that 35-year-old American Ambassador Ogden Reed took over the northern Negev in the summer of 1960. Reed asked Adi Cohen (no relation to Avner Cohen) of the Israeli Finance Ministry for an explanation for the extensive earthmoving work in the area. Cohen, who was a close associate of Finance Ministers Levy Eshkol and Pinhas Sapir, had worked at the Israeli embassy in Washington (where he met and married Israeli statesman Abba Eban’s secretary). Cohen was well aware of the economic pressures that Eisenhower had applied on Ben-Gurion in 1956 and was also aware of the difficulties that were being encountered at the Finance Ministry over funding for the nuclear reactor.

Cohen was also concerned (and justifiably so, according to the internal documents of the Eisenhower administration) over a loss of American aid to Israel and the prospect that the tax-deductible status of American Jewish contributions to Israel would be eliminated. He preferred to provide a half-truth over total fabrication. He knew that Jerusalem architect Rudolf Trostler was planning industrial facilities in development towns in the Negev, including “Dimona Fibers” near the beginning of the Dimona-Eilat highway. “It’s a textile factory,” Cohen told the ambassador, winging it.

And while Israel was consumed with political scandal in the so-called “Lavon Affair” and a threat of a schism in the ruling Mapai party, (predecessor to today’s Labor Party) Israel’s ambassador in Washington Avraham Harman attempted to promote a “calming” version of the Dimona project before the Kennedy administration. It was nothing but "a simple story,” Harman attempted to persuade Assistant Secretary of State Lewis Jones in February 1961, about two months after the project was uncovered. There is plenty of time and no plutonium, Harman told Jones, seeking to convince him that no reactor would be operating for at least two years. The Israelis, Harman said, could not conceive why there should be continuing interest in Dimona in the United States or anywhere else.

In addition to the memorandum of the conversation, the official papers include a summary of the position of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff after the power of the Shah of Iran was undermined. Iran was a weak link in Western defense, the new defense secretary Robert McNamara was informed, and the Shah’s regime was problematic. Any alternative to the Shah seemed worse from the standpoint of American interests, but a readiness was required to shift from support for the Shah if he was on the verge of being overthrown. That, essentially, is what the Carter administration did in the late 1970s, in the face of the revolution led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Latest leak exposes Israeli Military Intelligence’s Achilles’ heel - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The affair of the soldier to be indicted on Sunday in military court over alleged intelligence leaks to right-wing friends reflects the difficulty the Israel Defense Forces Military Intelligence has, as opposed to smaller agencies like the Shin Bet security service or the Mossad, in protecting classified information.

MI is more vulnerable to leaks because of its broader contact with the outside world. Civilians, new draftees, reserve soldiers – every year more and more people are added to the circle of those exposed to its secrets.

It seems that the case of the soldier, Ya’akov Sela, shows weaknesses in the system that might be quite common. Relatively rapid initial security vetting, which is not always sufficient to uncover potential security risks; too loose supervision of those already in the intelligence system and who are considered “one of us”; and a lack of strict compartmentalization in day to day work.

Sela was inducted into the army’s program for ultra-Orthodox soldiers, in which great efforts are made to satisfy the needs of the draftees. He was relatively old, 25, married and a father, had medical problems, and was stationed at a base a few minutes away from his home in the settlement of Bat Ayin. (The fact that a settler from an ultra-Orthodox, nationalistic background was drafted into a program designed for ultra-Orthodox full-time yeshiva students shows the broad interpretation the IDF gives to the term “ultra-Orthodox,” and the possibility that the number of “authentic” ultra-Orthodox serving in the army may be lower than the army claims.)

Ideal location for leaker

The Bat Ayin soldier’s convenient assignment to brigade headquarters placed him in an ideal location to collect intelligence information relevant to his friends, who belong to the extreme wing of settlers.

Sela was in charge of collecting intelligence about the Palestinians, but the Shin Bet and police say he spent a significant amount of time looking into investigations involving so-called “price tag” attacks – violent attacks by settlers against Palestinian, Christian, left-wing Jewish and occasionally army targets – and preparations for the dismantling of illegal settlement construction.

Because of weaknesses in compartmentalization, it seems Sela was able to obtain a good deal of information without his commanders noticing it in time. Only when police in the Judea and Samaria district became suspicious was the leak discovered and the soldier arrested.

There have been a few cases in the past of operations and intelligence sergeants in West Bank brigades who were suspected of leaking information, mainly about the evacuation of outposts. About four years ago, when the commander of the IDF forces in the West Bank, Maj. Gen. Nitzan Alon, dared hint that greater care was needed in the sharing of sensitive information of this type, a campaign was launched against him in the settlements that ended only toward the end of his term as general in charge of Central Command.

The number of settler-soldiers involved in such leaks is apparently very small, but the system is not built to find them ahead of time or monitor them during their service – just as the system had difficulty discovering the leak of documents by the soldier Anat Kam from the office of Yair Naveh, the general in charge of Central Command at the time.

Clearly the arrest of one suspect should not disqualify soldiers who live in settlements from serving in sensitive posts. But the Sela affair should certainly alert the army that convenient postings close to home should not be the only consideration in intelligence assignments. Moreover, the affair should also lead to improved monitoring so that curiosity, or worse, ideological tendencies, do not expose soldiers to information to which they are not meant to have access.

Netanyahu told cabinet: Our biggest fear is that Iran will honor nuclear deal
Netanyahu expressed concern that Iranian compliance with the agreement will lull the world into complacency over the bomb threat, according to officials.
By Barak Ravid | Apr. 12, 2015 | Haaretz
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a recent meeting of the security cabinet that if a comprehensive nuclear agreement between Iran and the six world powers is indeed signed by the June 30 deadline, the greatest concern is that Tehran will fully implement it without violations, two senior Israeli officials said.

The meeting of the security cabinet was called on short notice on April 3, a few hours before the Passover seder. The evening before, Iran and the six powers had announced at Lausanne, Switzerland that they had reached a framework agreement on Iran’s nuclear program and that negotiations over a comprehensive agreement would continue until June 30.

The security cabinet meeting was called after a harsh phone call between Netanyahu and U.S. President Barack Obama over the agreement with Tehran.

The two senior Israeli officials, who are familiar with the details of the meeting but asked to remain anonymous, said a good deal of the three-hour meeting was spent on ministers “letting off steam” over the nuclear deal and the way that the U.S. conducted itself in the negotiations with Iran.

According to the two senior officials, Netanyahu said during the meeting that he feared that the “Iranians will keep to every letter in the agreement if indeed one is signed at the end of June.”

One official said: “Netanyahu said at the meeting that it would be impossible to catch the Iranians cheating simply because they will not break the agreement.”

Netanyahu also told the ministers that in 10 to 15 years, when the main clauses of the agreement expire, most of the sanctions will be lifted and the Iranians will show that they met all their obligations. They will then receive a “kashrut certificate” from the international community, which will see Iran as a “normal” country from which there is nothing to fear.

Under such circumstances, the prime minister said, it will be very difficult if not impossible to persuade the world powers to keep up their monitoring of Iran’s nuclear program, not to mention imposing new sanctions if concerns arise that Iran has gone back to developing a secret nuclear program for military purposes.

It was decided during the security cabinet meeting to try to persuade the Obama administration to improve the agreement. However, Netanyahu and most of the ministers agreed that the only way to stop the agreement, even if it was unlikely to succeed, was through Congress. Thus, a good deal of Israeli efforts will focus on convincing members of Congress to vote for the Iran Nuclear Review Act, proposed by the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Bob Corker, that could delay implementation of a deal if one is reached.

Corker’s bill calls for a 60-day delay in implementing any signed nuclear deal, during which time Congress would scrutinize all the agreement’s details. The bill requires senior administration officials to provide Congress with detailed reports on the deal as well as attend Congressional hearings on the subject. Corker’s bill also states that American sanctions that were imposed by law would only be lifted if within the 60 days allotted for scrutiny of the agreement, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Committee on Foreign Affairs declared their support for the pact.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is to meet Tuesday for its first vote on the Corker bill, after which it will be voted on by the entire Senate. The White House is opposed to the bill and is threatening to veto it. At this point, in addition to all 54 Republican senators, nine Democratic senators have also expressed their support for the bill, leaving it four Democratic senators short, so far, of the 67-vote majority that would make the bill veto-proof.

The pro-Israeli lobby AIPAC, which coordinates its activities with the Israeli embassy in Washington and the prime minister’s bureau in Jerusalem, has begun over the past few days to exert pressure on Democratic senators – both publicly and privately – to get them to vote for the Corker bill.

AIPAC also claimed over the weekend on its official Twitter account that the framework of the current agreement would make it possible for Iran to become a threshold nuclear state within 15 years and therefore pressure should be brought to bear on Congress to vote for the Corker bill.

Netanyahu and Israel’s ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer, want to see changes inserted in the bill that will make it more binding, and even turn it into one that prevents an agreement with Tehran rather than delaying it.

One change Netanyahu is seeking is a new clause that the deal with Iran be considered a treaty; an international treaty signed by the United States must be approved by a two-thirds majority in the Senate.

The Republican senator from Wisconsin, Ron Johnson, reportedly intends to demand at Tuesday’s meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that this clause be added to the bill.

Meanwhile, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, considered one of the Republican Party’s potential candidates for the 2016 presidential campaign, wants to see an amendment to the bill adopting Netanyahu’s demand that Iranian recognition of Israel’s right to exist be part of any comprehensive agreement signed at the end of June.

However, if the Senate Foreign Relations Committee votes in favor of one or both of these amendments in its meeting Tuesday, it could lead Democratic senators, who had already agreed to support the original deal with Iran, to change their minds.

Top IDF attorney: I will never call IDF the most moral army in the world - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz

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On le savait, mais c’est bien quand c’est eux même qui le disent

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Last November, some two months after the war in the Gaza Strip ended, U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey surprised a few people. Speaking at a conference in New York, he said Israel went to “extraordinary lengths” to prevent injury to innocent people in Gaza. “The Israel Defense Forces is not interested in creating civilian casualties. They’re interested in stopping the shooting of rockets and missiles out of the Gaza Strip and into Israel,” he added.

#israël #tsahal #armée_la_plus_morale_du_monde

Qatar lending Palestinians $100m to pay salaries - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The Palestinian Authority said Wednesday it had received a $100 million loan from Qatar to help pay civil servants salaries and alleviate an economic crisis triggered by a row with Israel over taxes.

PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who is visiting the Gulf state, issued a statement thanking Qatar for the loan. There was no immediate confirmation or comment from Qatari officials.

Israel collects taxes on behalf of the Palestinian Authority but suspended payments of some $130 million a month in January to protest at moves by the Palestinians to join the International Criminal Court.

Palestinian membership of the ICC started on April 1, opening the way for possible law suits against Israel for alleged war crimes tied to its lengthy occupation of territory the Palestinians want for an independent state.

Following widespread criticism by Western allies, Israel earlier this month released some of the frozen tax revenue, but withheld a portion of the cash, saying it was money Palestinians owed for utilities and health care supplied by Israel.

Abbas said the deductions amounted to a third of the total sum that Israel owed and refused to accept any of the money, threatening to go to the ICC over the issue.

An official at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office confirmed that Israel had deducted money to cover the Palestinians’ electricity, water and health bills and was “willing to transfer back to the Palestinian Authority the sum that was returned whenever it wishes.”

For Israel, there’s good news and bad news after Iran deal -
By Amos Harel | Apr. 5, 2015 |
Haaretz
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If the significance of the understandings, which are to be enshrined in a permanent agreement by the end of June, had to be summarized in one long sentence, it would be as follows. Iran’s leaders have agreed to halt their efforts to obtain a bomb (efforts they are still careful to deny) in exchange for two key benefits: a dramatic improvement in their economy due to the lifting of international sanctions and a major upgrade in Tehran’s standing in the region.

From an Israeli perspective, the relatively good news is that Iran’s nuclear project will be monitored for at least a decade. For now, it seems that during this time Iran’s chances of developing a nuclear weapon will decline significantly.

Even if Tehran breaks the agreement, risking renewed conflict with the international community, the restoration of its production capabilities and the monitoring of its facilities, as stipulated in the agreement, are supposed to prolong the breakout time to a bomb. This period would increase from about three months, in the absence of any agreement, to nearly a year after a permanent agreement is signed.

The bad news is not only that Iran’s economy, which has taken a double-barreled blow from both sanctions and declining oil prices, is expected to recover quickly, but that Iran has also achieved recognition from the world powers for two elements it greatly needs. The powers now acknowledge, indirectly, that Iran is a nuclear threshold state, and no less importantly, they accept Iran as a force to be reckoned with throughout the Middle East.

U.S.: Deal with Iran shouldn’t include clause about recognition of Israel - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The U.S. rejected Saturday Israel’s demand that the final deal between the world powers and Iran regarding its nuclear program would include recognition of “Israel’s right to exist,” Fox News reported.

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters that the deal is “an agreement that is only about the nuclear issue,” and that it doesn’t deal with any other issues.

“Nor should it,” she added.

On Friday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded that any final agreement with Iran include the aforementioned clause, a day after negotiators in Switzerland announced a framework for a nuclear deal.

“Israel will not accept a deal that will allow a state that calls for its destruction to acquire nuclear weapons,” he said in a statement to the press.

Asked about the demand, White House spokesman Eric Schultz said he had not seen the specific request but was aware of Israel’s ongoing concerns.

“We understand his position,” Schultz told reporters aboard Air Force One, “The president would never sign onto a deal that he felt was a threat to the state of Israel.”

Meanwhile, Iranian President Hassan Rohani, in a televised speech, on Friday hailed the framework as “a first step towards productive interactions with the world.”

Report: Iran financing Hamas’ military force reconstruction efforts - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Tens of millions of dollars have been transferred to Hamas for the rebuilding of tunnels destroyed by Israel last summer, the Sunday Telegraph reports.

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Iran has allocated millions of dollars to Hamas’ military wing for the rebuilding of the tunnels destroyed by Israel during last summer’s war in Gaza, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

Citing intelligence sources, the report said Iran was also funding new missile supplies to help restock projectile weapons used by the militant organization to target Israeli civilian population during Israel’s Operation Protective Edge.

According to Arab media reports, Hamas and Iranian officials have been meeting in Tehran in recent months. The relationship began warming after the Gaza war last summer. Last month, Hamas leader Khaled Meshal met with Iran’s speaker of parliament Ali Larijani, Palestinian sources close to Hamas told Haaretz.

Ties between Hamas and Tehran were close before the group broke with Syrian President Bashar Assad during the Syrian civil war. Hamas, which belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood axis, had refused to support the Iranian-backed regime’s massacre of the Sunni opposition.

At the time, Hamas thought that this move wouldn’t exact too high an economic price, thanks to the support it received from Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood-led government. That calculation collapsed when Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi was ousted. Egypt’s new government, led by Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi, is waging war on the Brotherhood and all its branches, first and foremost Hamas.

Security forces find Israeli presumed missing in West Bank - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Security forces find Israeli presumed missing in West Bank
The case was initially being treated as a kidnapping, but it later emerged that the circumstances were linked to criminal activity. The army described the incident as a ’prank.’

IDF soldier charged with aiding enemy in ’Facebook spy’ affair - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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An Israel Defense Forces soldier has been charged with assisting an enemy, following a probe into his role in the “Facebook spy” affair, it was revealed Thursday following the lifting of a gag order.

Sudki Makat, a Druze supporter of the Assad regime in Syria and resident of the Golan town of Majdal Shams, was indicted last week with espionage and assisting the enemy during wartime, by means of image and posts on his Facebook page. Much of the affair is still under gag order.

IDF, police looking for Israeli missing in the West Bank - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The Israel Defense Forces and police were verifying a report on Thursday that an Israeli went missing in the West Bank, and that he may have been kidnapped by Palestinians.

Security forces were combing the area in Kiryat Arba, near Hebron, where the man from Be’er Sheva was feared missing.

According to reports, the man entered the village of Beit Anun, and did not come out again. A friend of the missing person phoned the police at 4:17 P.M. and told them that they had a flat tire between Kiryat Arba and Beit Anun. He told the police that his friend had entered the village to get tools for changing the tire, but never returned.

The IDF is looking into the report, and combing the area.

Le tam tam de la guerre aver le Hezbollah commence dans la presse

IDF : Thousands of rockets, high casualties in future Hezbollah attack - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Hundreds or even thousands of rockets could be fired at Israel every day in a future war with Hezbollah, causing large-scale casualties, according to a new assessment by the Home Front Command.

That scenario was revealed Tuesday by outgoing Home Front commander Maj. Gen. Eyal Eizenberg, who said that the population of Israel needed to be prepared to face the challenge of hundreds of fatalities from rocket barrages.

“We need to prepare for the possibility of a ’blitz’ which could lead to between 1,000 to 1,500 rockets falling on Israel daily,” Eizenberg said.

However, appropriate behavior by the civilian population will limit the number of casualties, Eizenberg added.

The Home Front Command recently updated its assessment of a possible attack by Hezbollah and has begun distributing it to local authorities throughout the country.

In light of the assessment, the command is preparing for the possibility of massive civilian evacuations. Official plans for civilian evacuations are being drawn up, though they won’t be made public.

In the event of a confrontation, the Home Front Command will be ready to either evacuate civilians temporarily to army camps or to implement a wide-scale national plan for the evacuation of entire communities.

According to the Home Front’s data, 27 percent of the population doesn’t have any protection at all, Eizenberg said.

The scenario of an attack on Kiryat Bialik, for example, assumes dozens of rocket landings on an average day, hundreds of civilians evacuated, a small number of fatalities, dozens of moderately to seriously wounded and hundreds of cases of panic.

Asked whether it would not have been better to evacuate the settlements on the Gaza border during last year’s war, Eizenberg said that he didn’t think it was the “place to discuss what might have been, but we learn from every operational event.”

Eizenberg is due to be replaced shortly by Maj. Gen. Yoel Strick.

Israel seeks to demolish Palestinian village on ‘archaeological’ grounds - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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The state has asked the High Court of Justice for permission to demolish the ancient Palestinian village of Sussia and relocate its residents to Yatta, near Hebron, allowing for more archaeological work at the site.

The government’s intent was noted in a response to the High Court of Justice regarding a petition filled by Sussia residents and human rights organizations about a year ago.

Before this petition was filed, an additional petition was filed by the Regavim organization, funded by settler-group Amana and regional authorities in the West Bank, calling for Palestinian “illegal outposts” in Sussia to be demolished.

The state opposed the court’s temporary injunction against demolition, despite the fact it often supports such temporary injunctions when they are made against illegal Jewish outposts.

Just last month, the government approved such a temporary injunction against the demolition of two structures in the Beit El settlement, after the High Court had already made a ruling.

The petition criticizes decisions made by the Civil Administration’s planning committee to reject an alternate plan suggested by Sussia residents, stating that the relocation to Yatta is in their best interest. The residents’ petition also seeks to cancel 64 separate demolition orders against all of the 100-or-so structures in the village. Alternatively, the residents ask that the Civil Administration offer a different solution that would allow them to continue living on the land, which they own.

Attorney Kamar Mishraki-Asad, representing the Sussia residents, told Haaretz, “It’s incredible, but with the settlements, it was already ruled that Sussia land is privately owned and thousands of dunams of land in the area are privately owned by Palestinians. Despite this, for many years the army has prohibited residents from setting up their homes in the area, and has rejected any request for construction or planning permits, in order to keep them away from the Sussia settlement and to allow the settlers to continue seizing the agricultural lands, and expel the residents to Areas A and B.

IDF playing war games, but with real Palestinians - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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A new eruption of violence could be triggered by a local incident of a religious character (involving the Temple Mount again, or a serious attack by Jewish extremists on a West Bank mosque); exacerbation of the political crisis between Israel and the PA; an economic crunch in the West Bank; or a combination of all of the above.

Israel has discerned growing difficulty on the part of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas – who celebrated his 80th birthday yesterday – to control the Tanzim (the Fatah movement’s grassroots groups). Tanzim activists are bearing arms more openly than in the past, and challenging the PA’s authority in the refugee camps. Israeli Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino said recently, in a private forum, that the defense establishment is concerned about a possible renewal of terrorist activity by the Tanzim – a phenomenon that disappeared in the past decade.

The IDF set the end of March as the target date for completing its preparations, ahead of a possible new eruption of violence in the West Bank. The confrontation could come later, or not happen at all at present, as the Palestinians focus their efforts on the international diplomatic arena.

The three terms that are most in use in internal IDF briefings are containment; restraint in the use of force; and avoidance of large-scale Palestinian casualties. But even such well-intentioned planning does not take into account the fact that it is the blue – Israeli – side that is initiating in the confrontation against the adversary, which is marked in red on the briefing maps.

The current danger of possible escalation is attributable to the actions of both sides: the Palestinians’ request, last December, to join the International Criminal Court in The Hague; Israel’s subsequent decision to freeze the transfer of 1.5 billion shekels ($380 million) of tax revenues collected for the Palestinians; and Likud’s victory in the election last week, which has aggravated the sense of pessimism in the territories.

The military effort to prepare an effective but not exaggerated response is akin to the promise of the Waze navigation application to bring a driver to his destination by the quickest possible route. What happens is that, as the app directs more and more drivers using Waze to that same quick route, it causes it to become jammed – which is to say, the behavior of the system itself wields considerable influence on the course of events and the final results.

Dress rehearsal under coercion

This week, during a visit to nighttime maneuvers by the IDF’s Territorial Brigade in the Ramallah (Binyamin) region, in preparation for a possible escalation on the ground, one could discern an effort by the commanding officers to delineate for the troops the character of the expected confrontation.

Only the brigade commander and, to a lesser degree, the battalion commanders still remember what a genuine West Bank intifada looks like. The company commanders may have fought in Gaza, but not in the West Bank. The exercise was predicated on a mix of possible events: violent mass demonstrations; shooting attacks; and use of live fire by members of the Palestinian security forces.

In practice, the sector was quiet. As the soldiers advanced on foot toward the town of Bir Zeit, next to Ramallah, the antennae of the new Palestinian city of Rawabi were visible behind them, to the north. Late last month, after multiple bureaucratic delays, Israel finally agreed to allow the city to be connected to the water-supply infrastructure. IDF officers say they are impressed by the high level of construction in the meticulously planned city, which will eventually house some 40,000 Palestinians. A four-room apartment will cost $120,000. It’s 45 minutes (and one checkpoint) by car from Tel Aviv, but at this stage Israeli investors aren’t showing an interest.

The Israeli forces raid Bir Zeit at points chosen in advance. The soldiers climb up a hill to the town through groves and fields, and then spread out on the empty streets. In one house, a drowsy male student in pajamas – a Jenin resident studying at Bir Zeit University – converses in English with a female soldier from a Home Front Command battalion. A superficial search turns up a poster in memory of the two East Jerusalem terrorists who murdered four worshipers and a policeman at a Jerusalem synagogue last November.

In the Home Front battalions, which carry out missions in the territories very similar to those of the infantry (policing, routine security, arrest of Palestinian suspects), women are full-fledged combatants, executing the same tasks as the men in mixed units. What no one on the Israeli side seems to be taking into consideration is that by sending women out on night missions into the homes of a society that remains quite conservative, Israel is sticking another finger in the eye of the Palestinians.

The exercise was planned with the goal of causing relatively little disruption to the routine of Palestinian life. The only complaint that reached the Israeli media came from the head of the regional council in the (Jewish) Beit Arye settlement: his PR man fired off an angry email about an attack helicopter landing in the settlement without prior warning. The helicopter, he wrote, “woke up children and caused panic among the inhabitants.” The army apologized and explained that the helicopter was supposed to have landed next to a nearby Palestinian village.

Still, after almost 48 years of occupation, it seems that only an outsider is taken aback by situations the IDF blithely accepts. It’s the duty of commanders to collect intelligence and prepare their troops ahead of a possible confrontation. However, within the framework of the maneuvers – and with no immediate security need – the Palestinian residents become extras who are not asked whether they want to take part in the dress rehearsal, and receive no warning of what is about to take place. Their homes are targets for night visits, searches and the family’s coerced awakening.

At best, the PA can preserve order and protect the citizens of the West Bank from manifestations of anarchy. But when the IDF enters, the PA steps aside and the inhabitants are left on their own. Shortly before the exercise began, the Israeli brigade commander phoned his Palestinian counterpart to inform him about the planned entry of the troops. According to the regular procedure, which is also applied in real operations to arrest suspects, the Palestinian commanders ordered police officers to remain inside the camps and police stations.

The first stage of the exercise ended at 3 A.M., the dark hour when prime ministers fear phone calls bearing bad news. The brigade’s units had completed the task of locating the targets.

The rest of the night also passed without any unusual drama. The events reported via radio communication – firebombs being thrown, sniper fire, an attempted suicide bombing attack – didn’t go beyond the scenarios invented by the leaders of the exercise. Bir Zeit would soon awaken to a new day.

Today and every day, about 160,000 Palestinians from the West Bank – some 40,000 of them illegally – make their living from working in Israel, the settlements and Israeli industrial zones in the West Bank. These are the same people, of course, who are theoretically carrying out acts of terror in the aforementioned scenarios. The Israeli security forces recently issued 10,000 new work permits, in an effort to offset the economic damage being caused by the freeze on tax transfers. Besides, someone has to go on building the settlements.

Autre conséquence positive des dernières élections israéliennes : Israël libère les fonds qui reviennent à l’Autorité palestinienne
Des proches de Netanyahu affirment qu’il lui était plus facile de libérer ces fonds après les élections.

Israel releases withheld tax revenues to Palestinian Authority - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Israel will allow the transfer of hundreds of millions of shekels in tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority, the prime minister’s bureau announced on Friday.

The revenues, which Israel collects on behalf of the authority, have been withheld for the past four months following the authority’s referral of Israel to the International Criminal Court in The Hague for possible war crimes.

The bureau said in its statement that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had accepted the recommendation of Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, the Israel Defense Forces, and the Shin Bet security service that the revenues be transferred.

Israel will transfer tax revenues that have accumulated since February, less payments for services provided by Israeli entities, including the Israel Electricity Corporation, the water authority and hospitals.

“The decision was made, among other things, for humanitarian reasons and out of an overall assessment of Israel’s interests at this time,” according to the statement.

In recent months, Israel has been under intense pressure from the United States and the European Union to transfer the funds, due to the precarious economic situation in the Palestinian territories and out of concern that economic collapse could lead to anarchy in the West Bank.

That same concern motivated Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot, his predecessor Lt. Gen. (ret.) Benny Gantz, Shin Bet head Yossi Cohen, the coordinator of government activities in the territories Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai and other senior security officials to pressure for the transfer of the funds.

Netanyahu hesitated to do so during the election campaign, primarily out of concern that it would harm him politically among right-wing voters and enable attacks on him by his political rivals, such as Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Economy Minister Naftali Bennett.

The prime minister’s associates indicated to several international visitors in recent weeks that releasing the funds would be easier for Netanyahu to do after the elections.

Abbas to host Arab list lawmakers to discuss Knesset agenda - Diplomacy and Defense - Israel News | Haaretz
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Some members of Arab party alliance Joint List are not pleased Palestinian Authority has publicized the meeting.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is planning to host a reception for Joint List MKs after they are sworn in and hold discussions with them on political developments in Israel and the lawmakers’ Knesset activity, an official in Abbas’ office said Wednesday.

The official said the PA does not expect the MKs to focus solely on the Palestinian issue, but said it was important for discussions of peace and ending the occupation to have a prominent place in Israeli political discourse.

Joint List officials confirmed plans for the reception, but some of the 13 MKs on the ticket, an alliance between Israel’s Arab parties and the Arab-Jewish Hadash party, were not pleased the PA had publicized the meeting. Some of the MKs are concerned that close public ties with the PA could have a negative effect on the party in Israel.

Abbas meets Joint List delegation in Ramallah HQ | Maan News Agency
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RAMALLAH (Ma’an) — President Mahmoud Abbas received a delegation from the Arab Joint List in the presidency headquarters in Ramallah Tuesday evening.

The delegation included head of Arab Joint List Ayman Odeh, and members Masoud Ghanayim, Jamal Zahalqa, and Usama al-Saadi.

Member of the Fatah movement’s central committee, Muhammad al-Madani, also attended the meeting.

Abbas congratulated the delegation on their 14-seat win in the 20th Israeli Knesset elections that took place earlier this month, and the delegation applauded the President’s efforts and his persistence to national rights.

The Joint List, an alliance formed by four Arab parties — United Arab List, Ta’al, Balad and Hadash — was the first time parties representing Palestinian citizens in Israel have joined forces.