Today’s Top Stories
1. The Vatican made news by signing a treaty with the Palestinians governing the Holy See’s activities and legal status in the PA. News services, however, spun the story as the Vatican recognizing the state of Palestine. Fortunately, Washington Post reporter William Booth went against the grain, pointing out that the Vatican recognized Palestine in 2012 (which Catholic media knew all along). Indeed, Yair Rosenberg blames AP for the confusion.
So, if the Vatican didn’t just officially recognize Palestine, but instead did so years ago, what actually happened here?
Simply put, the AP got the story wrong and caused a cascade of similarly sloppy coverage before other outlets had a chance to follow up. Given the AP’s centrality in international reporting, this chain reaction is not surprising . . .
The real story here, then, is not that the Vatican just officially recognized Palestine. It’s that the Vatican has been talking about the state of Palestine for years—and certain media outlets just noticed today.
2. From Reuters:
The Czech Republic blocked an attempted purchase by Iran this year of a large shipment of sensitive technology useable for nuclear enrichment after false documentation raised suspicions, U.N. experts and Western sources said.
The incident could add to Western concerns about whether Tehran can be trusted to adhere to a nuclear deal being negotiated with world powers under which it would curb sensitive nuclear work in exchange for sanctions relief.
3. Russia just undermined a key White House argument for the emerging Iranian nuclear deal. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told Bloomberg News that Moscow rejects automatic “snapback” sanctions if Iran is caught cheating. Keep in mind Russia has veto power in the UN Security Council.
“There can be no automaticity, none whatsoever” in reimposing UN sanctions if Iran violates the terms of an agreement to curb its nuclear program, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told Bloomberg News on Wednesday. He didn’t elaborate.
While the Obama administration maintains that Russia agreed “in principle” to the need for a sanctions “snapback” mechanism if Iran fails to comply with the agreement now being negotiated in final form, the Russian government has offered no corroboration.
4. BDS Battles Taking Toll on Jewish Students: Journalist touring US campuses finds Israel losing the battle for legitimacy.
Israel and the Palestinians
• A Palestinian rammed a car into Israelis at the entrance to Alon Shvut, injuring four teenagers. The driver is now in police custody. Times of Israel coverage.
• Reuters and the Associated Press picked up on the IDF’s warnings about Hezbollah placing military sites in Lebanese villages. The latter writes:
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity under military guidelines, said an estimated 200 villages have been turned into “military strongholds.”
One photo showed the village of Muhaybib, with a population of around 1,000 people and 90 buildings, of which more than a third had been marked as Hezbollah assets. In the larger village of Shaqra, with some 4,000 people, Israeli intelligence identified Hezbollah targets in around 400 out of some 1,200 buildings.
The army refused to allow publication of the images.
If war breaks out and Hezbollah fires missiles at Israel, these buildings will be targeted by Israel’s air force, the official said, adding that Israel would give civilians time to evacuate.
• Israeli-French talks deteriorate over Paris peace initiative at UN.
• What to make of this?
Turkish gov’t ignores 2014 court request to seek Interpol Red Notice for Israeli officers
• Israel’s domestic politics makes my head hurt. I just can’t keep up with the musical chairs game of cabinet appointments.
Mideast Matters
• Ahead of the Camp David summit, the Los Angeles Times reports the White House is “carefully” lowering expectations.
But Obama appears to have run up against the constraints of his policy of limited U.S. engagement in the Middle East. If he wants to yield responsibility to the gulf states for their own security, their leaders have signaled, he’ll have to live with the decisions they make. And they have shown recently that their priorities diverge from the president’s.
• The Saudis vowed (again) to match Iranian nuclear capability
• The Guardian: The Syrian intelligence chief reportedly arrested for plotting a coup against Bashar Assad turned up at a meeting with Assad and a visiting Iranian official. He was even in a photograph published in Sana, Syria’s state-run news agency.
Around the World
• Montreal man scrubs away anti-Semitism
• Government funds $500,000 security wall for Melbourne Jewish center
• The Columbia Journalism Review looks at why nobody’s covering Yemen. There’s no reliable way for journalists to enter the country, and limited electricity and internet infrastructure make citizen journalism almost impossible. Ironically, it was a a tweet about the black hole of information that got a lot of attention when Saudi coalition airstrikes began in March.
Commentary/Analysis
• By not cooperating with the International Criminal Court’s preliminary investigation of Operation Protective Edge, Israel’s playing a very high-stakes game of chicken. Yonah Bob explains:
Israel’s only plays if Bensouda opens a full criminal investigation without its cooperation, is an appeal to the ICC judges that she overreached her powers in recognizing Palestine or a diplomatic push to discredit or indirectly pressure her office into dropping the issue before indictments.
All of this signals that Israel may be passing up a case to stake its big fight on complementarity, or the idea that its own investigations are reasonable enough that Bensouda cannot initiate a full criminal investigation or get involved at all.
• I’m also reading:
– Yitzhak Eldan: Anti-Semitism in a liberal disguise
– Ben Cohen: Yarmouk and the failure of Palestinian solidarity
– Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians’ anti-peace campaign
– Jonathan Tobin: Congress must draw the line on BDS
– Dr. Edy Cohen: No solution for Palestinian refugees without justice for Jewish refugees
– New York Daily News (staff-ed): Vatican recognition of Palestine will have lamentable consequences
Featured image: CC BY flickr/Jef Fisher with additions by HonestReporting; Churkin via UN Photo/Loey Felipe
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