Israel is concerned about an incident in Jerusalem, and it could be planning a “major operation in a sensitive area near al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem,” Iran’s Tasnim News Agency reported.

Iran termed this an “unexpected event.” This is language coming from senior Iranian media sources close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The IRGC backs Hamas.

Hamas and other extremist groups have encouraged Palestinian tensions with Israel in Jerusalem during Ramadan. There were clashes and Palestinian media incitement against Israel’s foreign minister and other leaders on Sunday night.

The familiar cycle of accusing Israelis of “storming” the Old City of Jerusalem is imminent. Hamas incitement claiming it has a “right” to fire rockets will soon begin. The goal is another war with Israel like last year, a conflict orchestrated by Iran to test new rockets and drones.

This could be the messaging behind the Tasnim article. Iran is outraged by the recent Negev Summit of Arab foreign ministers in Israel, and it needs to increase its profile in the region.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and the foreign ministers of the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Egypt, in Sde Boker, Israel, March 27, 2022. (credit: REUTERS/AMIR COHEN)
Tehran wants to use Palestinian suffering to increase these profits. The profits for Iran are not necessarily financial, but rather using proxies against Israel.

Iranian media claim Israel is concerned that a new “operation” in Jerusalem could “bring a new wave of dangerous conflicts and will lead the Hamas movement and the [Palestinian] Islamic Jihad to a very bloody and serious reaction.”

Israeli media have indeed reported that Israel could be ready for another conflict of the sort that took place last year. The driver behind these conflicts is Hamas and PIJ, as well as Iran.

Source: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/iran-news/article-703194

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken plans to warn Israel against continued Chinese investments in the country’s infrastructure and hi-tech industry when he meets with Foreign Minister Yair Lapid in Washington on Wednesday.

“We will be candid with our Israeli friends over risks to our shared national security interests that come with close cooperation with China,” a senior State Department official told reporters during a briefing ahead of the meeting.

Blinken is also expected to meet with Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Wednesday.

The US has been concerned about the UAE’s use of Chinese Huawei Technologies in its communication system in light of its pending sale of advanced F-35 fighter jets to the Emirates, but when speaking of China it focused only on its concern with Israel.

The highlight of the day is expected to be a trilateral meeting Blinken will host with the two foreign ministers that is designed to highlight the success of the Abraham Accords, brokered by the former administration.

The accords allowed for Israel to normalize ties with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan last year, of which ties with the Emirates are the most advanced.

At the trilateral, Israel and the UAE are expected to announce two new working groups, one on religious coexistence and another that would focus on water and energy.

But the range of the topics that will be brought up in all meetings are fairly wide and include China, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Gaza and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Lapid, in his public comments in Washington on Tuesday, will focus on the strong US-Israel bilateral ties and the special relationship Israel has with America and the Biden administration.

Though US officials echoed those same sentiments at the briefing, they also discussed topics of discord in the relationship.

Biden administration officials had spoken about China with National Security Advisor Eyal Hulata when he was in Washington earlier this month.

But State Department senior officials remained vague on Tuesday with respect to their specific concerns on China.

“The US views China as a competitor that challenges the existing international rules-based order; our relationship with China will be competitive when it should be,” the official stated.

ON IRAN, a senior State Department official said that Washington’s main objective at this time is the revival of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, known as the Iran deal, which Israel has traditionally opposed.

Both the US and Israel are joined in their opposition to a nuclear Iran but have differed about how best to achieve that objective.

Lapid said on Tuesday that Iran was one of the major focal points of his Washington trip.

On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the senior State Department officials said that at Wednesday’s meetings, Blinken will “reaffirm our belief” in the benefits of a two-state solution. He will also express his appreciation for “Minister Lapid’s recent, strong statement condemning settler violence in the West Bank.”

The Israeli government is split on how best to approach the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett opposing a two-state resolution to the conflict while Lapid has supported it.

But Lapid’s visions of the borders of those two states differ from those envisioned by the Biden administration, which has not advanced a peace process. The senior State Department officials did not mention any movement on that front, except for stating that “we seek to advance it when we can, as best as we can.”

An official said that the accords are not a substitute for the two-state solutions and suggested that they could be used to push for progress toward a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“We hope that normalization can be leveraged to advance progress on the Israeli-Palestinian track,” the official said.

An official also spoke of the Biden administration’s commitment to maintaining Israel’s qualitative edge and its support for supplemental funding for the defensive Iron Dome system it provides Israel to protect Israeli citizens against Hamas rockets.

The officials repeated their opposition to Israeli settlement activity and the Palestinian Authority’s monthly stipends to terrorists and their families.

Separately, during Lapid’s trip, Foreign Ministry Director-General Alon Ushpiz will meet with Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman.

Source: https://www.jpost.com/international/us-to-warn-israel-china-ties-are-a-joint-national-security-risk-681833

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A ruling by a local Israeli court in favor of a Jewish man who prayed at a flashpoint Jerusalem holy site has heightened Palestinian fears of Jewish encroachment on Jerusalem’s most sacred site.

Palestinians denounced on Thursday a decision by an Israeli Magistrate Court as a violation of the fragile status quo governing the compound.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque compound is the third holiest site in Islam and the holiest site for Jews, who refer to it as the Temple Mount because it was the location of the ancient Jewish Temples. It is the emotional epicenter of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and tensions there helped ignite the 11-day Gaza war in May.

Under informal understandings, Jews are not allowed to pray there. The ruling by a magistrate court in Jerusalem concerned a Jewish man who had been barred from the site for 15 days after Israeli police caught him praying there, violating a long-standing agreement that Muslims pray in Al-Aqsa and Jews pray at the nearby Western Wall.

The court lifted the ban several days early, ruling that the man, “like many others, prays on a daily basis on the Temple Mount.” Noting that he did so quietly and privately, the ruling said “this activity by itself is not enough to violate the police instructions.”

“The appellant stood in the corner with a friend or two, there was no crowd around him, his prayer was quiet, whispered,” Jerusalem Magistrates Court judge Bilhha Yahalom wrote in the legal ruling.

“I have not found that the religious acts carried out by the appellant were externalized and visible,” she said, determining that such prayer did “not violate police instructions,” and canceling his ban from the site.

Magistrate Courts make up the lowest level of the Israeli judiciary and hear cases concerning relatively minor crimes. Under a longstanding but informal arrangement known as the status quo, Jews are allowed to visit the site but not pray there. The agreement has broken down in recent years as large groups of Jews, including hardline religious nationalists, have regularly visited and prayed at the site.

The Israeli government says it is committed to maintaining the status quo. The Palestinians and neighboring Jordan, which serves as the custodian of the holy site, fear that Israel plans to eventually take over the compound or partition it – as it did with a similarly contested holy site in Hebron, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Jordan’s Council of Endowments (Awqaf) that maintains Al-Aqsa called the ruling a “flagrant violation” of the compound’s sanctity and a “clear provocation” for Muslims worldwide.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Ibrahim Shtayyeh called on the United States to fulfill its promise to maintain the status quo of the complex, and the Arab countries to show solidarity with the Palestinians.

“We warn against Israel’s attempts to impose a new reality at the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque,” Shtayyeh said Thursday.

Palestinian resistance group Hamas called the move a “blatant aggression against the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and a clear declaration of a war that goes beyond political rights to an aggression against religion and sanctities”. The group said in a statement that the “resistance is ready and prepared to repel aggression and defend rights.”

The Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Yousef Al-Othaimeen, said in a statement that the ruling is a provocation to Muslims globally.

“Such illegal decisions constitute an unprecedented attack on the inalienable religious rights of the Islamic nation and its heritage, a provocation to the feelings of Muslims all over the world, and a violation of freedom of worship and the sanctity of holy places,” he said, according to Anadolu Agency (AA).

He expressed his organization’s rejection of “any measures taken by the occupying power, Israel, that affect the status of occupied East Jerusalem and the Palestinian presence there, or prejudice the Islamic and Christian sanctities.”

“These prayers constitute provocations and a violation of the sanctity of Al-Aqsa,” mosque director Sheikh Omar al-Kiswani told Agence France-Presse (AFP). “This decision also has no legitimacy because we do not recognise Israeli law on Al-Aqsa,” he said.

Egypt and Turkey also denounced the decision with Cairo calling the court ruling a “violation” and claiming that it held “deep concern about the consequences.”

The Turkish Foreign Ministry in a written statement said that the decision risks encouraging fanatic circles that try to erode the status quo at Al-Aqsa and warned that the move could lead to tensions. The ministry further called on the international community to reject this “wrong, illegal and dangerous decision.”

Friday prayers at the mosque are regularly attended by tens of thousands of Palestinians and are sometimes followed by protests and clashes with Israeli police. A provocative visit by a right-wing Israeli politician in 2000 helped ignite the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising.

Al-Othaimeen said the Israeli measures “constitute a grave violation of international law, international humanitarian law and relevant U.N. resolutions.” He warned that such decisions by courts will “lead to destabilization and ignite religious conflict in the region” and held Israel “fully responsible for the consequences.”

He also urged international actors to intervene to preserve Al-Aqsa’s historical and legal status and to facilitate efforts to achieve a two-state solution between Palestinians and Israelis.

Wednesday’s decision was the first by an Israeli court to support Jewish prayer at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound. The verdict was welcomed by right-wing Israelis.

Israel captured East Jerusalem – including the Old City and its holy sites sacred to Jews, Christians and Muslims – in the 1967 war and annexed it in a move not recognized by most of the international community. The Palestinians want East Jerusalem to be the capital of their future state. The city’s status has been among the most divisive issues in decades of failed peace efforts.

Source: https://www.dailysabah.com/world/mid-east/palestinians-slam-israeli-ruling-on-jewish-prayer-at-al-aqsa

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Burnt vehicles are seen at the scene where a rocket launched from the Gaza Strip hit, in Holon, Israel May 11, 2021.  (photo credit: RONEN ZVULUN/REUTERS)

The massive rocket barrage – involving some 600 rockets from Gaza in a 24-hour period, reaching the crescendo of hundreds of rockets fired around nine in the evening, blanketing central and southern Israel – may be linked to Iran’s warnings about a single, large operation.

Iran’s IRGC head Hossein Salami warned last week that Israel was vulnerable to one large tactical operation because the country is so small. He pointed to the S-200 fired from Syria near Dimona and other threats to Israel as an example of how vulnerable the country is.

The post Is massive Hamas attack on Israel the assault Iran warned of? – analysis first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

(March 30, 2021 / JNS) While Israel was busy with the domestic political imbroglio surrounding last week’s Knesset elections, a strategic threat that could threaten the country’s very existence was developing. If the Iranian-Chinese alliance reaches its full potential, the Middle East could once again be dragged into a new cold war between superpowers.

Soviet support for the late Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s radical policies ensured him regional hegemony that threatened Israel for more than a decade. The American attempt to placate the Egyptian leader only made things worse.

Now, massive Chinese assistance to the radical regime in Tehran could provide Iran support in its attempts to impose its hegemony on the region within the framework of another kind of cold war now developing between Washington and Beijing. Such Chinese support, along with U.S. President Joe Biden’s conciliatory tone, could pose the kind of strategic threat Israel has not seen since the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

In recent years, Israel has faced an escalating war with Iran in an attempt to prevent it from attaining the kind of power that would allow it to construct massive military infrastructure around its borders. Iran understands that only Israel can thwart its aspirations for hegemony. It has tried to deter Israel by threatening its population centers.

Most Arab regimes have also come to understand that only Israel is strong and determined enough to stop the ayatollahs. While the United States is more important, it is less reliable and determined. These Arab states were appalled by former U.S. President Barack Obama’s approach but temporarily encouraged by that of his successor, Donald Trump.

Under Biden, they have begun to worry once again. That is the meaning of the Abraham Accords. In many ways, the old, familiar Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been replaced by an Arab-Israeli coalition that opposes Iran and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and is suspicious of the new U.S. administration.

Trump’s determined stance offered a comprehensive response to the Iranian challenge. It did not relate merely to the nuclear threat.

A focused response in the form of the 2015 nuclear deal, which effectively bolstered Tehran’s position, does not effectively meet the challenge. What is required is a zero-sum game that seeks to harm Iran, mainly in the economic arena, and deters it from conflict by ensuring U.S. support for Israel’s military actions it.

When Iran engaged in numerous provocations against Saudi Arabia’s oil industry, Trump responded by assassinating Qassem Soleimani, head of the elite Quds Force. Tehran didn’t dare offer a suitable response to the painful and humiliating blow it was dealt. But the main tool was sanctions that hit Iran’s economy to such an extent that, had they been in place for another four years, the ayatollah regime would have been unlikely to survive.

We are now witnessing something reminiscent of what we saw under the late U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower: deep economic and military involvement by a superpower competing with the U.S. and a conciliatory response from Washington.

China’s foreign minister signed a 25-year strategic deal, first drawn up during Chinese President Xi Ji Ping’s 2016 visit to Iran, aimed at increasing bilateral trade tenfold, to $600 billion in 10 years. The deal will provide China with priority access to huge investments in Iranian infrastructure, banking, and communications.

The agreement also allows for joint military exercises and military cooperation in the future. In return, China is set to provide Iran with vast amounts of oil and gas in the long-term at relatively low rates.

This kind of agreement serves to effectively neutralize U.S. economic pressure, seriously bolsters Iran’s bargaining position, and could herald a renewed Iranian effort toward regional hegemony. The rate of its realization and its characteristics depend crucially on U.S.-China ties. This is a very important Chinese bargaining chip in the international area—one that was suspended under Trump and pulled out once again under Biden, with significant repercussions for Israel.

This article first appeared in Israel Hayom.

Source: https://www.jns.org/opinion/the-iran-china-deal-is-cause-for-israeli-concern/

The post The Iran-China deal is cause for Israeli concern first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Without much fanfare or notice, the first known commercial aircraft from the United Arab Emirates recently landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport. It was carrying Covid-19 supplies for the Palestinian Authority, which, out of pique, rejected them.

As unprecedented as the flight was, it really shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise. For the past five years, contacts between Israel and the Gulf states—especially Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain—have been booming. The examples of what amounts to a Great Thaw in an otherwise frozen political landscape are plentiful:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, together with his wife and the director of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, has been received in Oman by the late sultan. He has met the UAE and Omani foreign ministers in the U.S. Israel’s minister of culture has visited Dubai. Israelis, including Jerusalem’s chief rabbi, have been welcomed in Bahrain, and Bahrain has reached out to Israel for help battling Covid-19. Israeli athletes have competed in judo competitions in the UAE, where, for the first time, the Israeli national anthem was played and the Israeli flag displayed. Trade between Israel and the Gulf states is now estimated at about $1 billion a year. One Israeli-owned company, AGT International, has reportedly concluded an $800 million deal with the UAE for border surveillance equipment. And this partial list comprises only the visible signs. Much more on the intelligence and security side is reportedly happening below the waterline.

Even more stunning, this putative détente is taking place on the watch of a right-wing Israeli prime minister who doesn’t even feign interest in a two-state solution and is doing everything he can to ensure one never emerges by keeping large parts of West Bank and all of Jerusalem. Contrary to the warnings from diplomats, analysts, and peaceniks who predicted Israel would become a pariah if it didn’t settle up with the Palestinians, Israel seems to be making more progress toward normalization with Arab regimes without a credible peace process than with one.

Clearly the Gulf states aren’t on the verge of full normalization with Israel; nor is the Arab world willing to untether itself from the emotional pull of Palestinian issue or its hostile and all too often anti-Semitic views of Israel. But even the most skeptical observers would have to admit something has changed.

So what explains this shift?

Three significant factors. The rise of Iran and Sunni jihadists spewing terror across the region has created a narrow but important coincidence of interests between Israel and the Arab world. Increasing exhaustion and frustration with the never-ending Palestinian cause has opened up more space for Arab states to follow their own interests. But behind it all, lay a White House enamored of Arab money for arms sales and investment in the U.S. and eager to marshal the Arabs in the service of its anti-Iranian and pro-Israeli agenda. Indeed, in an effort to court the Gulf Arabs, Trump, and his Middle East envoy son-in-law Jared Kushner have given the Saudis carte blanche to pursue disastrous policies while holding their coats. And Arab nations, sensing opportunities with an autocrat-friendly U.S. president, have been only too happy to follow.

From the Israeli perspective, the reasons for the détente are not hard to divine. Netanyahu’s regional outreach to the Arab world is part of his broader campaign to project Israel’s political profile internationally with historic visits into Latin America, Asia, South Asia, and Africa. Israel now has more diplomatic recognition in the international community than at any time since independence. In the Middle East, his outreach is aimed to demonstrate that Israel can do business with key Arab states without having to compromise on the Palestinian issue and of course to marshal Arab state support in his campaign against Iran.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in particular, see Iran—not a seemingly intractable Palestinian issue—as their most pressing national security challenge and see Israel as a powerful partner in containing Tehran’s regional designs. The partnership began to crystallize with the Obama administration’s 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and the perception that Washington was opening the door to legitimizing the Islamic Republic as a potential regional partner.

One of the reasons the Israeli-Arab state détente has gained traction is because it’s homegrown—emerging from the perception of common threat. But the Trump administration picked up the ball and ran with it. Determined to reverse the policies of his predecessor on Iran and the peace process that had alienated both Israel and Saudi Arabia, Trump made both countries key to his Middle East policies. In my first meeting with Jared Kushner in 2017, he made it unmistakably clear that his father-in-law was determined to establish strategic relationships with both countries.

It was certainly no coincidence that the president’s first foreign trip, in May 2017, was to Saudi Arabia, where, accompanied by a retinue of some of the biggest names in American business and finance, the president talked about Saudi investment, American jobs and billions in arms sales. Then it was on to Israel, where Trump became the first sitting president to pray at Jerusalem’s Western Wall. That trip—planned by Jared Kushner—would also give rise to his close relationship with the Saudi king’s son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS. A reckless and impulsive 30-something reformer, MBS would figure prominently in many disasters, from the war in Yemen to the kidnapping of the Lebanese prime minister, to the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, as well as in Kushner’s plans to promote Middle East peacemaking.

At the core of that vision were efforts to promote Israeli-Arab state cooperation, both to cement a common front against Iran and to build leverage to pressure the Palestinians to come to the negotiating table. And the Gulf Arab states played the Israeli card for all it was worth. Convinced the road to Washington lay through Jerusalem, the Saudis in particular cozied up to the Trump administration, which refused to abandon them even after bin Salman’s disastrous role in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. For a few token appearances with the Israelis, such as the Warsaw Conference on Middle East Peace and Security in February 2019, where Netanyahu met with the Saudi foreign minister, Riyadh stayed on Trump’s good side, as it had in low-keying the Saudi reaction to Trump’s opening a U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem. And later that year in Manama, with Riyadh’s permission, Bahrain hosted a U.S.-orchestrated economic conference that brought together Arab and Israeli representatives from the private sector to discuss the economic aspects of Trump’s Vision for Middle East Peace.

Will the Israel-Arab state honeymoon last? The answer is probably yes, anchored as it is in self-interest.

The Iranian threat isn’t going to disappear. The U.S.-Saudi relationship is going through a bad patch now over oil prices. But as long as the Saudis and Emiratis think it’s in their interests to stay in Trump’s favor, their cooperation will continue. And why shouldn’t they? The Saudis have few friends in Washington other than the White House, which recently bypassed Congress, declaring a faux national emergency to facilitate billions of dollars in weapons sales to Saudi and the UAE Positioning themselves as being good on Israel certainly can’t hurt, though the talking points might not be as effective for a President Joe Biden who has labeled Saudi Arabia a pariah state.

As for Netanyahu, as long as he doesn’t expect too much from his new Arab friends and doesn’t break the bank by annexing wholesale the Jordan Valley and the whole West Bank (very unlikely), the Gulf Arabs will stay on board as they did when the U.S. Embassy opened in Jerusalem.

It ain’t peace. But then again that was never in the cards. In a broken, angry, dysfunctional Middle East, who could ask for more?

Source: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/05/27/israel-arab-peace-netanyahu-282727

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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu points at a map of the Jordan Valley as he gives a statement, promising to extend Israeli sovereignty to the Jordan Valley and the northern Dead Sea area, in Ramat Gan on September 10, 2019. (Menahem Kahana/AFP)

Eleven European ambassadors to Israel on Thursday warned Jerusalem of severe consequences if it moves ahead with plans to annex parts of the West Bank as part of a government coalition deal.

The envoys from the UK, Germany, France, Ireland, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, and the EU issued a formal objection to the Foreign Ministry against the move, Channel 13 reported.

The ambassadors made the protest during a video conference with the Foreign Ministry’s Europe deputy, Anna Azari.

“We are very concerned about the clause in the coalition agreement that paves the way for annexing parts of the West Bank. The annexation of any part of the West Bank constitutes a clear violation of international law,” the ambassadors said. “Such unilateral steps will harm efforts to renew the peace process and will have grave consequences for regional stability and for Israel’s standing in the international arena.”

The envoys also demanded a freeze on government plans to allow construction in the Givat Hamatos neighborhood in East Jerusalem.

Also on Thursday, the Arab League said that the planned annexation constituted a “new war crime” against the Palestinians during a virtual conference chaired in Cairo.

“The implementation of plans to annex any part of the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967, including the Jordan Valley… and the lands on which Israeli settlements are standing represents a new war crime… against the Palestinian people,” Arab foreign ministers said in a joint statement.

The Arab League also urged the United States to “withdraw its support in enabling the plans of the occupying Israeli government.”

In this February 18, 2020 photo, a view of the West Bank settlement of Ma’ale Efraim on the hills of the Jordan Valley (AP/Ariel Schalit)

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On Monday, the United States said it was ready to recognize Israel’s annexation of key parts of the West Bank, but said the offer was contingent on an offer of statehood to the Palestinians.

“As we have made consistently clear, we are prepared to recognize Israeli actions to extend Israeli sovereignty and the application of Israeli law to areas of the West Bank that the vision foresees as being part of the State of Israel,” a US State Department spokesperson said when asked if the US would allow Israel’s new government to move forward with the process.

“The annexation would be in the context of an offer to the Palestinians to achieve statehood based upon specific terms, conditions, territorial dimensions, and generous economic support.  This is an unprecedented and highly beneficial opportunity for the Palestinians,” the State Department spokesperson said.

The Palestinians have refused to negotiate with the Trump administration, considering it biased. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas threatened last week to cancel all agreements with Israel and the US if Israel moved forward with annexation plans.

US President Donald Trump in January unveiled a peace plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Rejected by the Palestinians and condemned by much of the international community, the plan gives Israel the green-light to annex Jewish settlements and other strategic territories in the West Bank.

An Israeli coalition government agreement reached last week includes a framework for implementing the annexations outlined in the plan, starting in July.

Blue and White leader Benny Gantz (left) and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sign their unity government agreement on April 20, 2020. (GPO)

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Under the US proposal, the Palestinians would be granted a sovereign but demilitarized state in the remaining parts of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, along with promises of major investment.

The Palestinian state’s capital would be on the outskirts of Jerusalem, which would remain fully under Israeli sovereignty.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that he was “confident” Trump would let him fulfill his election promise to apply Israeli sovereignty over parts of the West Bank “a couple of months from now.”

According to the wording of the “emergency government” deal between Netanyahu’s Likud party and Benny Gantz’s Blue and White faction, starting July 1, 2020, Netanyahu “will be able to bring the agreement reached with the US on the application of sovereignty [in the West Bank] for the approval of the cabinet and or the Knesset.”

In addition, “the law will be passed as quickly as possible… and will not be disrupted or delayed by the chairmen of either the House or the Foreign Affairs and Defense committees.”

The Netanyahu-Gantz deal stipulates that any Israeli action would need US backing, and must take into account Israel’s peace treaties with neighboring Jordan and Egypt, the only two Arab states that have formal peace treaties and diplomatic relations with Israel.

Netanyahu’s right-wing base is eager to move forward with annexation while the friendly Trump administration is in office.

Israel captured the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan during the 1967 Six-Day War. The Palestinians seek those territories as part of a future independent state. The annexation of West Bank settlements would infuriate the Palestinians and Israel’s Arab neighbors.

Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/11-european-ambassadors-warn-israel-against-west-bank-annexation/

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The UN Security Council on Wednesday overwhelmingly opposed the recent US policy shift on Israeli settlements.

Settlement policy is one of the most contentious issues in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most of the international community views Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories as illegal — a view that Israel disputes.

“Unilateral moves fuel anger and disillusionment and significantly undermine the prospects for establishing a contiguous and viable Palestinian state with Jerusalem as the future capital of both states,” said Nickolay Mladenov, UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process.

The council’s monthly meeting on the Middle East came just two days after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the US would no longer consider Israeli settlements to be a violation of international law, reversing US policy consensus that lasted four decades.

Fourteen of the 15 countries seated at the security council rejected the US measure.

US stands by decision

Cherith Norman Chalet, a deputy US ambassador to the UN said her country “remains committed to the cause of peace,” and that Monday’s announcement “does not alter this fact.”

“The US government is expressing no view on the particular legal status of any individual settlement, nor are we addressing or prejudging the ultimate status of the West Bank, that is for Israelis and Palestinians to decide,” Chalet added.

Read more: Opinion: Power overrules the law — especially in Middle East politics

Mladenov opened the council meeting expressing ”regret” over the US decision and reiterating a December 2016 UN council resolution were ”a flagrant violation under international law.”

Prior to the meeting, the UK, France, Germany, Belgium and Poland also released a joint statement calling on Israel ”to end all settlement activity, in line with its obligations as an occupying power,” saying such activity ”erodes the viability of the two-state solution and the prospects for a lasting peace.”

Israeli and Palestinian delegates weigh in

Israel’s UN ambassador, Danny Danon, who is not a council member, was the lone vocal supporter of the US decision, saying it ”rights a historical wrong.”

Danon said criticism of the move represented an ”obstacle to peace” that is ”preventing direct negotiations” between Israelis and Palestinians.

The chief Palestinian delegate at the UN, Riyad Mansour, was also at the meeting and took a jab at the US decision, saying Donald Trump’s administration had again made “another illegal announcement on Israeli settlements in order to sabotage any chance to achieve peace, security, and stability.”

Trump has made a series of pro-Israeli policy moves, which are popular with evangelical Christians in the US, an important part of his political base. It has also brought the US close to the Israeli government. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a close ally of Trump.

Read More: Pompeo Issues Historic Policy Reversal: Israeli West Bank Settlements ‘Not Illegal’

jcg/stb (Reuters, AP)

Source: https://www.dw.com/en/un-security-council-rebukes-us-on-israeli-settlements/a-51342147

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(UPI) — Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, described the world body as “hopelessly biased” against Israel on Tuesday in her last address to the monthly Security Council meeting.

Haley, who will leave her post in January, spoke during the council’s meeting on the Middle East.

“Over the past two years, I have attempted to provide more value in this monthly meeting by using my time to speak about other pressing problems in the Middle East,” Haley said. “I’ve done it to illustrate that most of the region’s problems have absolutely nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And I’ve done it to encourage the U.N. to move away from its obsession with Israel.

But she broke from tradition to address the Israel-Palestinian issue. Two week ago, the General Assembly failed to adopt a U.S. resolution condemning terrorism by Hamas. Yet it has passed passed more than 700 resolutions critical of Israel over the years, she said.

“This U.N. obsession has been entirely unproductive,” Haley said. “It’s actually worse than that. The UN’s obsession with this issue has been counterproductive. It has sent a loud and false message to the Palestinians that they just might be able to achieve their goals by relying on the U.N., rather than through direct negotiations. And it has sent a loud and accurate message to the Israelis that they can never trust the U.N. This biased obsession is not the path to peace. It is the path to an endless stalemate.”

Haley mentioned the Trump administration plans to unveil a Middle East peace plan early next year. Rather than being a few pages “containing unspecific and unimaginative guidelines” she said “thoughtful detail” will be included.

“It brings new elements to the discussion, taking advantage of the new world of technology we now live in,” the U.S. ambassador said. “It recognizes that realities on the ground in the Middle East have changed in powerful and important ways. This plan will be different from all previous ones — the critical question is whether the response to it will be any different.”

In her speech, she noted both sides would benefit with a peace agreement, saying “the Palestinians would benefit more, and the Israelis would risk more.”

“Israel is a thriving, strong, prosperous country,” Haley said. “It has always wanted peace with its neighbors. It has clearly demonstrated its willingness to make big sacrifices for peace, including giving up large areas of land. But Israel will not make a peace agreement at just any price, and it shouldn’t. No U.N. resolutions, anti-Semitic boycotts or terrorist threats will ever change that.”

She noted that Israel has faced threats to its security, saying: “It would be foolish for it to make a deal that weakened its security. And yet, even in the face of constant threats, Israel has become one of the leading nations in the world. Israel wants a peace agreement, but it doesn’t need one.”

Palestinians want peace, she said.

“Like the Israelis, they are a deservedly proud people,” Haley said. “They too do not need to accept a peace agreement at any price. But the condition of the Palestinian people is very different. Economic opportunity, healthcare, even electricity are all scarce in the Palestinian territories. Terrorists rule much of the territory, undermining the safety of all civilians.

She blamed the nation’s leadership on not working toward a peace plan.

“The Palestinian people are suffering terribly while their leadership clings to 50-year-old demands that have only become less and less realistic,” Haley said. “What awaits the Palestinian people with a peace agreement are the prospects of a massive improvement in the quality of their lives and far greater control over their political future.”

During less than a two-year tenure, the United States withdrew from the U.N. Human Rights Council — which Haley called a “cesspool of political bias” — and has cut funding to the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency.

And in a change from 2017, the United States voted against an annual resolution condemning the “occupation” by Israel of the Golan Heights. Last year, it abstained.

“My hope is that as soon as — I am soon to be an outside observer who has invested so much time on this issue — that we will not still be having the same conversation, the same old speeches, in years to come,” she ended her speech.

President Donald Trump has nominate Heather Nauert, a State Department spokeswoman and former Fox News host, to succeed Haley in 2019.

Source: https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2018/12/19/8191545193039/?sl=1

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