Today’s Top Stories
1. A Palestinian fugitive who eluded an Israeli extradition request by hiding in the PA embassy in Bulgaria died after apparently falling from the building’s fourth floor, according to Bulgarian media.
Omar Nayef Zayed a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and two other Palestinians were convicted of the 1986 murder of yeshiva student Eliyahu Amadi in Jerusalem’s Old City and sentenced to life in prison. While hospitalized during a hunger strike, Zayed escaped and made his way to Arab countries, eventually settling in Bulgaria.
Hours before before Zayed’s death, Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borisov returned from a visit to Jerusalem and Ramallah, where he discussed Zayed’s extradition. Israel denied Palestinian claims it murdered the fugitive and Bulgarian investigators said they found no evidence of foul play. More at the Times of Israel and YNet.
2. An agreement to install surveillance cameras on the Temple Mount are still dogged by disagreement between Israel and Jordan over what the cameras can film and who controls the footage.
Israel wants surveillance inside Al-Aqsa mosque, arguing that this would expose Palestinians hoarding stones and firecrackers in the mosque for clashes with Israeli security forces.
Jordan wants the cameras to only show the outdoor areas of the Temple Mount compound, including large plazas around the two mosques. Jordan’s king said in November that “there will be no cameras inside the mosque.” He gave no reason, but Palestinians have said they fear Israel will use the footage to spy on activists.
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3. Will the International Criminal Court proceed with war crimes charges against Israel? The Jerusalem Post‘s Yonah Bob visited chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda for an exclusive, deep, and nuanced look at the likelihood of Israeli leaders being dragged into the docket.
4. The Guardian States Israeli Military Raped Palestinian Woman: A rape allegation is one of the ugliest slurs that can be leveled at the IDF. HonestReporting secured the correction after pointing out to editors the flawed subhead.
5. Video: Is Israel an Apartheid State? As Israel Apartheid Week organizers prepare campus events demonizing Israel, Daniel Pomerantz examines the truth of their claims.
Israel and the Palestinians
• On Saturday night, shots were fired at a children’s playground in the settlement of Beit El. Police believe the gunfire came from the nearby Jalazoun refugee camp. Nobody was injured. A Palestinian trying to stab soldiers at a West Bank checkpoint near Beit El was shot and killed on Friday. On Thursday night, a Palestinian attacked an Israeli guard in Maale Adumim with an axe on Thursday night.
• Israel denied recent media reports that it is talking with Turkey over the construction of a Gaza seaport.
• The Palestinian Authority rejected Iran’s offer to pay thousands of dollars to the families of “martyred” terrorists and to families whose homes are demolished.
• At least five Hamasniks were trapped in a tunnel collapse, according to Palestinian reports picked up by the Jerusalem Post.
If the report is accurate, it would mark the fifth time in recent weeks that a tunnel built by Islamist forces in the Gaza Strip crumbled.
• And you wonder why the Egyptian military’s feverishly working against Gaza tunnels:
Gazans said streaming into Sinai to fight with Islamic State
• The New York Times examines Mahmoud Abbas’s political weakness and his would-be successors.
• Because of Syria’s civil war, Israel has emerged as the go-to land bridge for European products transported to Arab countries. The number of trucks from Turkey and Bulgaria passing through Israel to Jordan jumped more than 25% last year, and more are on the way, the Jerusalem Post reports:
Israel collects duties on each truck that enters and exits the country.
• YNet takes a closer look at how the IDF is preparing for a possible war with Hezbollah.
• A US court vacated Rasmieh Odeh’s conviction for immigration fraud. Odeh, now 68, failed to tell US immigration authorities Israel imprisoned her for role in a 1969 supermarket bombing in which two people were killed. Reuters reports:
The 6th Circuit U.S. Appellate Court opinion said a lower court should have allowed expert testimony that Odeh was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) due to torture in prison, and did not know her statements to immigration officials were false.
The appellate court said the lower court erred by excluding the testimony.
• What challenges face Israel’s new Shin Bet chief?
Around the World
• A student referendum at Montreal’s McGill U. rejected a BDS motion. According to the Montreal Gazette, the vote stirred up hostility towards Jewish students. Vice chancellor Suzanne Fortier explained why the administration had opposed the motion:
The BDS movement, which among other things, calls for universities to cut ties with Israeli universities, flies in the face of the tolerance and respect we cherish as values fundamental to a university. It proposes actions that are contrary to the principles of academic freedom, equity, inclusiveness and the exchange of views and ideas in responsible, open discourse.
• Oberlin president “respects” free speech of faculty member behind anti-Semitic Facebook post.
• Vienna mayor wants to pull plug on BDS events in a municipally-funded building.
• Over at Britain’s York University, Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn’s son is embroiled in his own anti-Semitism controversy. The Sunday Times of London reports:
Tom Corbyn, a first-year engineering student, is events manager for the Palestine Solidarity Society, which has been staging a play on campus called Seven Jewish Children.
Jewish students claim the drama by Caryl Churchill — a 10-minute history of Israel that ends with the bombing of Gaza — is an example of “blatant anti-semitism” and has left them feeling “very isolated”.
• London police dropped their investigation into an anti-Semitic BBC radio caller who was allowed to rant for 13 minutes during a live broadcast.
“After careful review of the facts the evidence did not support a prosecution and the investigation has now been closed,” a police spokesman said.
Commentary/Analysis
• Dennis Ross and David Makovsky suggest the US break the ice on peace talks by acknowledging that not all settlements are created equal. They explain what this means in a Washington Post op-ed:
Such an approach would be guided by the understanding that approximately 80 percent of settlers live in approximately 5 percent of the West Bank largely adjacent to the pre-1967 lines and inside the security barrier. Most of the remaining 20 percent live outside the security barrier, in 92 percent of the West Bank.
A new U.S. approach would acknowledge that building within the blocs does not change the contours of the “peace map.” While not formally endorsing settlement activity, it would nonetheless seek to channel it into areas that will likely be part of Israel in any two-state outcome.
• Worth reading: Anti-Zionists are fools if they think they have a monopoly on compassion, says Howard Jacobson.
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Avi Issacharoff: On Gaza seaport, Israel navigates between Cairo and Hamas
– Khaled Abu Toameh: US, Europe fund torture by Palestinian Authority
– Nessia Shemer: Palestinian lone-wolf attacks don’t come out of thin air
– Eugene Kontorovich: Obama’s conflation and obfuscation about Israeli settlement boycotts
– Ben-Dror Yemini: Hamas is to blame for Gaza’s terrible state, not Israel
– Jonathan Neumann: Oxford’s problem with Jews?
• Plenty of commentary on the Iranian elections. Early results indicate success for the moderates approved to run by the ruling mullahs.
– Aaron David Miller: Moderation in Iran? Don’t get your hopes up
– Sohrab Ahmari: Will Iran’s elections matter?
– Eyal Zisser: The farce of Iranian elections
– Ray Takeyh: The economic question Iran’s election campaign hasn’t answered
Featured image: CC BY Christine Rondeau; Odeh via YouTube/Palestine in America; Vienna CC BY-NC-ND Franz Jachim; Khamenei via YouTube/euronews (in English);
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