Israel Daily News Stream 05/09/2012
May 9, 2012 15:20 by Pesach BensonIranian Atomic Urgency
• Russia is now refusing to deliver S-300 air defense systems to Iran, going so far as to return Tehran’s advance payment (with interest). More at the Fars News Agency (via Israel Matzav).
• New satellite photos raise suspicions that Iran’s “cleaning up” a nuclear site to remove evidence of illicit weapons work. The Daily Telegraph writes:
The IAEA believes that a large explosives containment chamber was installed at the complex in 2000 for explosives experiments that are “strong indicators of possible weapons development.”
Arab Spring Winter
• David Wearing’s Israel-Bahrain comparison is disgraceful, but what do you expect from The Guardian‘s Comment is Free section?
• Washington Post correspondent Karin Brulliard visits the Golan to see where the Druze communities stand on the Syrian uprising:
Members of both sides say they are the majority.
Many Druze, who adhere to a mostly secret faith that is an offshoot of Islam, export apples to Syria; hundreds of Golan residents study in Syrian universities; and Druze pilgrims visit religious sites there. Criticizing Assad, a member of the Shiite-affiliated minority Alawite sect, could endanger relatives in Syria, residents here said.
• Press freedom in Egypt’s tanking. The Committee to Protect Journalists is outraged, having documented 18 cases of reporters assaulted and arrested in Cairo over a three-day period. The LA Times adds:
The Egyptian military has refined its skills at manipulating state media while suggesting that independent reporters and bloggers are enemies of the state often controlled by foreign interests. Such portrayals have turned the public, especially a large population of poor and uneducated, suspicious of journalists. Foreign reporters are often referred to as spies.
• There could be as many as 15,000 shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles missing from Libya. Al-Qaida is already acquiring and refurbishing what it can. Washington Post columnist David Ignatius rightly raises the alarm.
But there’s also some good news from the world of aviation security: Al-Qaida’s most advanced non-metallic underwear bomb was given to the CIA by a double agent. AP had me feeling upbeat.
Rest O’ the Roundup
• Norman Finkelstein appears on BBC’s Hardtalk to discuss “The Israel Lobby.” My colleague, Simon Plosker, asks, BBC or Norman Finkelstein: Who is More Despicable?
• Google Earth spots new Hezbollah bases in the Bekaa Valley plus considerable construction in Southern Lebanon. According to the Daily Star:
The scale of the activity hints at the enormous efforts Hezbollah has undertaken since the 2006 war to prepare itself for the possibility of another conflict with Israel. But the construction work also raises questions as to the purpose of these facilities, which are easily visible to Israel’s near daily aerial reconnaissance violations as well as to satellite surveillance by Western nations and now to anyone with Google Earth installed on their computer, assuming they know where to look.
New Hezbollah facilities in Janta, in the Bekaa Valley
• Turkey says it has completed its probe of the Mavi Marmara affair and will push legal action against the commandos. More at the Jerusalem Post.
• Haaretz: Attorney General mulls charges against “Jenin, Jenin” director Mohammed Bakri.
• Tel Aviv Called One of the Best Places to Open a Start-Up.
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream.
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jeb stuart
4:50 pm
May 09, 2012
Doesn’t Ben Birnbaum have problems of his own in reporting on the state of politics in Israel. It seems to me i remember an article that was published recently that was off in many respects. In the article for the New Republic, i have to note, he seems to heap discredit on Netanyahu for pulling the rug out from under Fayyad after 9 months of suspending building settlements, they were resumed after the Palestinians insisted on naming East Jerusalem their capital. I can not see how Netanyahu could have done anything else. Jerusalem is Israel’s capital, until the US recognizes the right and the de facto existence of the Israeli capital inJerusalem Ican not see how they will get around that conundrum. It seems to be a built in intentional mechanism the Palestinians have applied to derail talks just when they are making progress. in that respect I do not believe Netanyahu yanked the rug out from under Fayyad unless Birnbaum thinks the Israeli’s capital is Tel-Aviv. I do not know if it is an error in reporting or simply a difference of belief in what constitutes the Israeli state. I believe Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.
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Avi
5:00 pm
May 09, 2012
“According to the Daily Star:
But the construction work also raises questions as to the purpose of these facilities, which are easily visible to Israel’s near daily aerial reconnaissance violations”
“Violations”!
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Brent Pudsey
1:18 am
May 10, 2012
Interesting how money is an issue with everyone. Thank you Honesty Reporting for your insight and wit into the situation in the Middle East. I only hope that with all the military activity in terms of planning and stategic efforts that war is not on the horizon.
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M.Sphardi
3:27 am
May 10, 2012
How powerful propaganda is! Goebbels and Hitler did it! The Arab League and Palestinian Arabs did it! and how careless Israel has been about outshouting the Arabs by making crystal clear that far more Jews from Musllim countries were expelled in revenge for the Palestinian flight.
It’s finished! Drop the subject of the Palestinian Arabs or put both issues on the table at the same time: the remaining 50,000 actual Palestinian “refugees” still alive and the estimated 70,000 Arab Jews still alive. On the table too should be whatever they and their ancestors lost in the course of these misfortunes. Finish it all. The Arab countries have much to gain from the Israelis and together they could vastly improve the lives of all who live in the area. The hatred has no source other than obscure passages of the Koran, manipulated Arab masses diverted from their real oppressors, and paranoid jealousy/fear of the Jews.
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Len Kurtz
7:18 pm
Jun 22, 2012
Apparently, a new discovery shows that skid marks help render the bomb harmless.
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