Everything you need to know about today’s coverage of Israel and the Mideast. Join the Israel Daily News Stream on Facebook.
Today’s Top Stories:
1. Egypt has formally demanded Hamas to extradite three members of its group over their involvement in this week’s terror attack. According to Haaretz/Reuters:
A senior official informed the newspaper that the three militants provided indirect support to radical groups in Sinai, and are connected to weapons smuggling as well.
According to a security official in Ramallah, the three militants, Iman Nufal, Riyadh al-Atar, and Mohammed Sabu Shimleh, are connected to Hamas’s forces in the southern part of the Gaza strip, and have refused to turn themselves over to the Eyptians.
Note the headline’s odd terrorist/militant combo: Hamas thugs are militants, while Sinai thugs are terrorists.
The Times of Israel notes that Atar had a role in Gilad Shalit’s abduction.
2. Egyptian journalists are unhappy as parliament appointed 50 new editors for state-run papers. AP explains:
State-owned media formally belong to the upper house of parliament, the Shura Council, and it was poised to put its stamp on the newspapers . . . .
Egypt’s journalists’ union is demanding that the Shura Council relinquish ownership. The union warned against turning the papers to a tool of the Muslim Brotherhood, the largest and most influential Islamist group in Egypt. The syndicate has called a partial strike, including running blank columns on Thursday’s papers.
3. Media interest in The Guardian’s mea culpa continues. After the paper admitted it was wrong to call Tel Aviv Israel’s capital, the Jerusalem Post, JTA, Jewish News 1, European Jewish Press, and Guido Fawkes, picked up on HonestReporting’s victory.
Gaza-Sinai Terror Ties
• Egyptian security clashed with gunmen in El-Arish. More on that at YNet.
• Jerusalem Post columnist Khaled Abu Toameh lays out the political economic damage this week’s terror attack has wreaked on Hamas. Mohammed Morsy’s brief honeymoon with Hamas wasn’t as popular with the Egyptian street as I thought.
• The foreign press, including NY Times bureau chief Jodi Rudoren, visited Kibbutz Kerem Shalom. Kibbutzniks spent several tense hours in a bomb shelter during Sunday’s terror attack:
It was half a mile from the kibbutz entrance when Israeli airstrikes destroyed the vehicle.
“As it carried on and on and on, we realized it was more serious than usual,” Mr. Breakell, 58, said in a meeting with journalists here on Wednesday afternoon. “If the troop carrier had turned left into our street and broken into the kibbutz . . . ” he added, trailing off.
• Israeli officials say Sinai jihadis get financial and logistical help from Salafi terror cells in Iraq and Afghanistan. Details at the Jerusalem Post.
• AP: Morsy shakes up his security stablishment: chiefs of intelligence and presidential guards sacked, top commander of military police to be replaced, as heads roll. Israel’s cautiously optimistic about the new intelligence chief. YNet explains why:
The officials said Mohamed Rafaat Shehata, who will replace Murad Muwafi, has good relations with the Israeli security establishment, and has not expressed anti-Israeli positions in public.
• When Israel’s army responded to Gaza terror in 2009, a staff-ed in The Guardian questioned Israel’s place in the family of nations. When Egypt’s army responded to Sinai/Gaza terror this week, a staff-ed in The Guardian praised Mohammed Morsi for “showing he has teeth.” Go figure . . .
• See also Dan Ephron (The Daily Beast) and Tony Karon (Time).
