Today’s Top Stories
1. Egypt discovered massive tunnels from Gaza into the Sinai large enough to drive trucks through. They’re unusually long too, which has the IDF concerned. YNet explains:
These enormous tunnels, some of which stretch for over three kilometers, are designed to traverse the security zone Egypt set up between the border with Gaza and the Sinai. This security zone – which ranges between half a kilometer and a kilometer in length on the Egyptian side – has been cleared out of any buildings or people. The area has also been flooded in order to block the existing shafts into the tunnels. . .
Israeli security officials don’t know of any tunnels that large crossing into Israel. However, if they do exist, Israel will have to take into account the possibility of the existence of tunnels that are over three kilometers in length, which will make them harder to find . . .
. . . it turns out that Hamas has become a weapons exporter to Egypt. In the past several months, several types of weapons were found by Egyptian security forces which bear the markings of being manufactured by the Hamas military wing.
Meanwhile, a delegation of Hamas leaders is in Cairo to, uh, mend fences with Egypt, and then make nice with the Saudis.
2. The IDF shut down a radio station that had been broadcasting incitement. The Ramallah-based Palestine Today was affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The army confiscated transmitters and other equipment.
After the International Federation of Journalists denounced Israel, “condemning this brutal attack against free press,” Knesset member Yair Lapid — a former journalist — slammed the IFJ.
In a letter to Boumelha on Saturday, Lapid wrote: “Yesterday, after the channel was closed down members of the military wing of Islamic Jihad held a rally protesting the closure. Islamic Jihad used Palestine Today to incite against Israel and encourage others to carry out attacks. The manager of station has been convicted of being a member of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The connection is so patently obvious that it calls into question your motives in condemning Israel’s actions.”
He added that “freedom of the press does not extend to terrorist propaganda and to those who incite to murder. The content on Palestine Today would not pass the editorial guidelines of any of your members. I was a journalist for over three decades; this isn’t journalism. This isn’t free speech, this is hate speech. You are not defending press freedom; you are defending incitement to murder.”
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3. The Times of Israel uncovered one way Hamas is making money from Gaza reconstruction despite efforts designed to bypass the terror group. Here’s what Hamas did after Qatar completed some 1,000 housing units for the Strip’s homeless last January:
The Hamas government, the de facto rulers of Gaza, instituted a lottery in which those who had no home could register to win apartments for free.
But that was not what was really going on.
The winners discovered to their amazement that they were required to pay Hamas $40,000 for each apartment. One claim was that a significant sum was needed to connect the homes to infrastructure such as water and electricity. Others were told that they needed to make a donation for those who were still left homeless . . .
At the end of the day, Hamas will be $36 million richer on Qatar’s dime.
Israel and the Palestinians
• A Palestinian shot two soldiers on Route 443 late on Friday. In separate incidents, Palestinians on Friday stabbed Israelis in Jerusalem: one near the Old City’s Dung Gate, the other near the Old City’s Jaffa Gate. Also on Friday, explosives were thrown at Israeli car driving near Hebron. No injuries were reported in that incident.
• After Palestinians fired four rockets at Israel on Friday night, the IDF responded with air strikes on Gaza that killed two Palestinian children.
• Hamas found the bodies of two of its men in a collapsed tunnel on the Egyptian border. The tunnel caved in after being flooded by Egypt. According to AFP, “Since January 26, at least 12 Gazans have been killed in five separate tunnel collapses with both Israel and Egypt operating against the diggers.”
• YNet: A study of the latest intifada attacks concludes the terrorists didn’t act as lone wolves. Rather, Hamas is covering its involvement very, very well.
• Ahava, the makers of Dead Sea cosmetics, is moving its factory out of West Bank following BDS pressure. The company is in the process of being acquired by a Chinese company. YNet coverage.
• Haaretz: Israel prevented Indonesia’s foreign minister from entering Ramallah after she refused to visit Jerusalem.
• Suspected Palestinian hackers interrupted an Israeli TV broadcast on Friday night, “showing images of terror attacks and threatening messages in Hebrew.”
• Injured and trapped on a mountainside, an Israeli tour guide in Jordan was rescued by the Jordanian military.
• Palestinian teachers ended a month-long strike after Mahmoud Abbas pledged a pay raise and other benefits.
• Israel-Jordan gas pipeline to become operational in 2017.
• Israel and South Africa are quietly mending fences.
Around the World
• Arab League declares Hezbollah a terrorist organization
• According to a UN report, Iranian executions are at their highest levels in a quarter century. Good thing the country’s run by moderates or the numbers would be worse, right?
The investigator, Ahmed Shaheed, the special rapporteur for human rights in Iran, said in a report to the organization’s Human Rights Council that at least 966 people were put to death in the country last year, roughly double the number executed in 2010 and 10 times as many as were executed in 2005 . . .
Month-by-month figures in Mr. Shaheed’s report showed that executions increased fairly steadily in the first half of 2015, reaching 136 in June — more than four per day — which the investigator called “especially alarming.”
• Following Israel’s request to Paris, EUTELSAT pulled the plug on Hamas’ Al Aqsa TV. The Jerusalem Post explains what happened next:
After the channel was removed from the European satellite carrier, the Islamist group managed to connect the frequency to the Egyptian satellite, Nilesat. Al Aksa TV is now operating as per usual.
• According to the Jewish Chronicle, Jennie Formb, the political director of Unite, the UK’s largest trade union, is leaving her position following a series of anti-Israel controversies.
• UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn’s getting bad press from the Daily Telegraph over another friend, Mohammed Kozbar, who has called for Israel’s destruction. He’s chairman of the Finsbury mosque (best known for Abu Hamza al-Masri, now imprisoned in the US for supporting terror).
He has praised as “always cracking the words of truth” the extremist cleric and Muslim Brotherhood ideological leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who has supported suicide bombings of civilians and defended rape . . .
Under Mr Kozbar’s chairmanship Finsbury Park Mosque continues to host bigots, extremists and terrorist supporters. One of its other trustees, Mohammed Sawalha, is a leading activist and former commander in the terror group Hamas.
• Indianapolis Star: In recent days, anti-Semitic graffiti was found at the University of Indianapolis and Purdue University.
Commentary/Analysis
• On a US speaking tour, Professor Eugene Kontorovich is discussing the legal case for Israeli settlements. You can watch this 50-minute video of Kontorovich at Syracuse University, or check Legal Insurrection‘s interview, summing up the main points.
• Palestinian journalist Khaled Abu Toameh Facebooked his thoughts on the murder of US student Taylor Force during last week’s stabbing attack in Jaffa.
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– James Sorene: The prospect of a two-state solution in Israel is drifting further away
– Jonathan Marks: This is how you fight BDS
– Nahum Barnea: The Palestinian project
– Jonathan Tobin: Why no consequences for Abbas?
– Mira Awad: Palestinian Israelis are often dismissed, yet our voice is key to peace
– Burak Bekdil: Turkey’s runaway anti-Semitism
– Abdulrahman Al-Rashed: Is it only today that Hezbollah has been a terror group?
– Elliott Abrams: Obama gratuitously damages US alliances
Featured image: CC BY Jon S with additions by HonestReporting; Hamad City via YouTube/New China TV; Marsudi CC BY-ND Utenriksdepartementet UD; satellite
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