Israel and the Palestinians
• Lyn Julius (Times of Israel) deconstructs Cliff Savren‘s notion that Jewish and Palestinian refugees are not equivalent. Julius concludes:
But this is no reason for well-meaning but fundamentally ill-informed commentators to privilege Palestinian rights, while despising the rights of Jewish refugees and their Sephardi and Mizrahi descendants, who make up 50 percent of Israel’s population. There’s a word for that: racism.
• Hamas is on its best behavior, and Ismail Haniyeh’s saying all the things Cairo needs to hear about Sinai security. AFP picked up on Haniyeh’s Eid al-Fitr remarks.
• Toronto Star commentaries respond to the United Church of Canada’s decision to boycott Israeli settlements. Thomas Woodley and Dow Marmur weigh in for and against the boycott, respectively.
The Sinai Situation
• Egypt deployed anti-aircraft missiles in the Sinai — without Israeli permission.
• Worth reading: Itamar Rabinovich (Japan Times) assesses how Israel, Hamas, Egypt and jihadis relate to the Sinai powder keg.
Arab Spring Winter
• The LA Times takes a closer look at the Morsi-Army power struggle. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal (via Google News) says Morsi wants to “reform” the judiciary. Where have you gone, Natan Sharansky?
The moves would give President Mohammed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood backers increased authority over the organs of Egypt’s fledgling democracy.
Some critics fear that they could help Islamists hold broader control of state institutions than Mr. Mubarak did.
• Egypt’s Christians increasingly alienated
“Soon we will no longer have an Egyptian state for all its citizens, but an Islamist state for all its Muslims,” . . .
• Media reports say German and British spies are giving Syrian rebels intelligence gleaned from an offshore spy boat, a Cyprus-based listening post, and a NATO base in Turkey.
• A group with suspected links to Al-Qaida is raising its profile in Syria. The Washington Post introduces us to the al-Nusra Front for the Protection of the People of the Levant, (or, Jabhat al-Nusra for short).
Jabhat al-Nusra’s growing visibility on the streets of Syrian cities highlights one of the reasons the United States and its allies have been reluctant to arm Syrian rebels even as Obama administration officials repeatedly insist that Assad must go.
• A Daily Star staff-ed laments Lebanese government paralysis. Politicians from the country’s rival camps are starting to agree that that Lebanon’s starting to spin out of control.
(Image of Ross via YouTube/AspenInstitute, Dempsey via Dept. of Defense/Myles Cullen, Aleppo via YouTube/AussieNews1)
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream.
Clicking “Unsubscribe instantly” on your mailing will remove you from the Israel Daily News Stream list, but not from your regular HonestReporting emails.
