Iran Defiantly Tests New Ballistic Missile

Today’s Top Stories

1. Defying US warnings, Iran tested a new missile capable of reaching Israel.

Revolutionary Guards aerospace chief General Amir Ali Hajizadeh was quoted by the official IRNA news agency as saying on Friday, when the missile was unveiled, that “the Khoramshahr missile has a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) and can carry multiple warheads.”

 

Iran says all of its missiles are designed to carry conventional warheads only and has limited their range to a maximum of 2,000 kilometers, although commanders say they have the technology to go further.

 

That makes them only medium-range but still sufficient to reach Israel or US bases in the Gulf.

Israel denounced the missile test.

Iran's missile arsenal, visualized. https://t.co/7QDsT1T1Rg pic.twitter.com/QD6It6GlqO

— CSIS (@CSIS) September 23, 2017

2. Israel reportedly struck a Hezbollah arms depot near Damascus International Airport on Friday morning.

3. The Palestinian Authority is pushing for membership in Interpol when the International Police Organization holds its annual meeting in Beijing next week. As Israel tries to foil the PA bid, the Jerusalem Post explains what’s at stake:

In addition, regarding Interpol specifically, Israel is concerned that if the Palestinians join they would push for arrest warrants against Israeli citizens.

 

Jerusalem also is concerned that sensitive information it shares with the organization could – if the Palestinians were members – be compromised.

Tweet of the day goes to Arsen Ostrovsky:

Palestinian Authority joining @INTERPOL_HQ would be like Al Capone joining FBI. https://t.co/BwdZS2PWsa. #INTERPOLGA cc. @nadplo pic.twitter.com/K0bgsAoTKi

— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) September 24, 2017

Israel and the Palestinians

• Among the more notable developments at the UN was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi — they were even photographed together. In his speech to the General Assembly, Sisi called on Palestinians to set aside their domestic differences and coexist with Israel.

1st public meeting between Netanyahu & Egyptian President demonstrates Israels improved standing in Sunni Arab Worldhttps://t.co/xqqhZlKYT3

— Gabriel Rosenberg (@GabRosenberg) September 19, 2017

• According to a Middle East Eye report picked up by the Times of Israel, Israel and Bahrain may announce the establishment of relations as soon as next year.

• A Palestinian involved with several Gaza flotillas admitted that their efforts were propaganda and never humanitarian. Zaher Birawi, who is affiliated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood is certainly in a position to know. The Jerusalem Post describes him as the chairman of the International Committee for Breaking the Siege on Gaza, an umbrella organization established to send flotillas to Gaza.

More on the story at the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center which caught wind of Birawi’s comments.

Mideast Matters

• Russia’s defense minister will make a rare visit to Israel for talks on Syria and security coordination sometime in “mid-October.”

• US military cedes territory in Syria to Iranian proxies.

• Ahead of tomorrow’s Kurdish referendum on independence, the New York Times takes a closer look at the long history of Jewish-Kurdish relations.

Car with Israeli & Kurdish flags in support of Kurdistan independence referendum. Israel supports independence ref https://t.co/Opod26EzRc pic.twitter.com/xblEMOzfvO

— Wladimir (@vvanwilgenburg) September 23, 2017

Around the World

• JTA: French prosecutors finally acknowledged that the murder of Sarah Halimi — a Paris Jew brutally killed by a Muslim neighbor — was indeed an anti-Semitic hate crime.

• As Germans go to the polls in national elections, the Jerusalem Post examines what the vote means for Israel.

• “The German Cabinet announced Wednesday that it unanimously adopted the working definition promoted by the International Alliance for Holocaust Remembrance, a body with 31 member states.”

HR supports the working definition as well and is glad to see its growing acceptance (notwithstanding some councillors in the London Borough of Brent).

• The legal saga of former PFLP terrorist Rasmea Odeh came to an end when she was deported to Jordan. Odeh was stripped of her US citizenship after US immigration authorities learned she had lied about her conviction and prison time for her role in a 1969 bombing of a Jerusalem supermarket in which two Israelis were killed. The deportation was a local story for the Chicago Sun Times and Detroit Free Press.

https://twitter.com/SalzmanSam/status/911652666639552518

• Former CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson is catching flak for tweeting an article from a fringe right wing web site titled ‘America’s Jews Are Driving America’s Wars.’ The tweet was subsequently removed and Plame apologized. But see Molly Roberts‘ response.

• Anti-Semitic graffiti was found on the eve of Rosh HaShanah at Oakland‘s Temple Sinai and Washington’s Georgetown University are being investigated as hate crimes.

• A Belgian judge sentenced a Holocaust denier to visit 5 ex-Nazi camps, and write about it.

• Israel sent a delegation of 70 people to assist search and rescue efforts in earthquake-stricken Mexico. The team includes IDF Homefront Command engineers, and personnel from ZAKA, IsrAID and iAID. More on their efforts at Haaretz, Jerusalem Post and Israel HaYom.

So far, 305 people have been confirmed dead from Tuesday’s quake. Among them was the body of a rabbi pulled from the rubble.

Commentary/Analysis

• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .

– Bernard-Henri Levy: American Jews should care about and support the independence of Kurdistan
– Ofra Bengio: Kurdistan, the new Israel?
– Herb Keinon: Netanyahu and Sisi: Lights, camera and a new era of public diplomacy?
– Jerusalem Post (staff-ed): Bibi and Sisi
– Alex Fishman: The Egyptian maestro and his Palestinian marionettes
– David Horovitz: With US president in his corner, Netanyahu brings new swagger to his UN address
– Ron Ben-Yishai: Iran shows its defiance of the US, carefully

– Col. (res.) Eldad Shavit: Trump’s Mideast policy: No motivation, no courage
– Bassam Tawil: The true enemies of the Palestinians
– Diana Buttu: Issa Amro is merely the latest casualty of Palestine’s war on free speech
– Dr. Reuven Berko: Qatar explains away terrorism
– James Jeffrey, Dennis Ross: The US needs a Mideast strategy
– Andrew Exum: The hubris of Hezbollah

• In today’s Lead Screed, British free-lance writer and cyclist Richard Abraham introduces us to a new word. Sportwashing. Israel will be hosting the opening stages of the Giro d’Italia bicycle race in May to distract the world from “Israel’s occupation and apartheid.” It inappropriately “rewards Israel for its decades-long human rights abuses against the Palestinian people.”

Featured image: by Unsplash/Jean Gerber; typing by Unsplash/rawpixel;

For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.

Before you comment on this article, please remind yourself of our Comments Policy. Any comments deemed to be in breach of the policy will be removed at the editor’s discretion.