Today’s Top Stories
1. After the Washington Post reported that President Donald Trump revealed highly classified intelligence about Islamic State to Russian diplomats, speculation abounded whether the information shared perhaps came from Israeli or Jordanian intelligence services.
The White House denied the report, but here are two tea leaves to consider: Trump’s top agenda item for today was calling Jordan’s King Abdullah. And in January, Ronen Bergman reported that US intelligence officials warned their Israeli counterparts to “be careful” about sharing information with the White House because of Trump’s “Russia thing.”
Former Mossad chief Danny Yatom elaborated to the Jerusalem Post why Trump’s alleged slip would be a “grave violation” of the norms of intelligence sharing.
2. Syrian crematory hides mass killings of prisoners, US says.
Mr. Assad’s forces and their allies have been widely accused by human rights groups and others of killing thousands of prisoners and burying their bodies in mass graves during the course of the war, now in its seventh year.
But the Trump administration went further on Monday, contending that the government was systematically incinerating the corpses of executed inmates at the Sednaya prison complex north of Damascus to destroy evidence that could be used to prosecute war crimes.
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
3. Ahead of Trump’s visit, the Gulf states have offered to improve their relationship with Israel if Israel makes a “significant overture” to the Palestinians. The Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) picked up on an “unreleased discussion paper shared among several Gulf countries.”
The Arab carrots include “establishing direct telecommunications links with Israel, allowing overflight rights to Israeli aircraft, and lifting restrictions on some trade,” as well as “the issuance of visas for Israeli sports teams or trade delegations to take part in events in Arab countries,” and “Israeli integration into regional trade and business bodies.”
The Gulf countries, in turn, would require Mr. Netanyahu to make what they would consider to be a peace overture to the Palestinians. Such steps could include stopping construction of settlements in certain areas of the West Bank and allowing freer trade into the Gaza Strip . . .
The confidence-building steps being considered by Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E. and other Gulf states would be phased in if Israel were to take reciprocal steps to improve relations with the Palestinians.
Israel and the Palestinians
• The easiest way to follow the soap opera of Jerusalem and the Trump administration is to simply list the headlines from one paper in chronological order. Sheesh.
– Tillerson: Trump weighing whether embassy move will help or hurt peace
– Trump set to become first sitting US president to visit Western Wall
– Israel won’t commit suicide over US Embassy move, top lawmaker says
– Liberman: No need to pick a fight over moving US embassy
– New US ambassador arrives in Israel, prays for Trump at Western Wall
– Senior member of Trump team said to tell Israelis: Western Wall is not your territory
– Netanyahu denies privately urging Trump not to move embassy to Jerusalem
– Adelson reportedly ‘furious’ with Tillerson for tying embassy move to peace deal
– US officials said to be pressuring Trump not to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital
– White House: Western Wall comments ‘unauthorized,’ do not represent Trump’s stance
– Amb. David Friedman meets Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler at Western Wall
Ambassador Friedman presented his credentials to President Reuven Rivlin in Jerusalem today, as did new ambassadors from Spain and Thailand. Aerosmith performs in Tel Aviv tomorrow night.
Look who Ambassador to #Israel David Friedman ran into at the #WesternWall #Aerosmith .@IamStevenT pic.twitter.com/e4ZwQdqjq1
— USEmbassyTelAviv (@usembassyta) May 16, 2017
• There may be an end to the Palestinian hunger-strike impasse. Haaretz reports that both Israel and the PA want the issue resolved ahead of Trump’s visit and the International Committee of the Red Cross may provide a face-saving compromise allowing both sides to claim victory:
The striking prisoners were very upset when their family visits were cut from twice a month to just once a month. But that reduction had nothing to do with Israel; it was announced by the ICRC, which organizes the visits, about a year ago, for reasons of its own.
The defense establishment is therefore talking with the ICRC about reinstating the twice-monthly visits. That would be a significant improvement for the prisoners, and they might consider it enough of an achievement to justify ending the strike.
However, Ynet reports that the prisoners are threatening to escalate their hunger strike by refusing to drink water. And Israel HaYom reports that Israeli officials are laying the groundwork to transfer a group of hunger-striking prisoners to a geriatric care facility in Rishon Lezion, should it become necessary.
• Days before Trump visit, Palestinian mayor dedicates square to terrorist. The West Bank town of Tulkarem dedicated the square to Maher Younis, who is imprisoned for the 1980 murder of IDF soldier Avraham Bromberg. Details at the Jerusalem Post.
• Palestinian lawmaker Jamal Hawil of Fatah was photographed participating in a clash with soldiers near Beit El according to Israeli media reports.
Asked by Channel 2 to comment on the images, Hawil tried to downplay the significance of a PA official throwing rocks at Israeli soldiers.
“It doesn’t matter if I threw rocks or not, the entire Palestinian nation throws rocks,” he said.
??? ??????? ?? ??”? ????? ?’??? ?’??? ????? (??? ?? ????? ??????) ????? ???????? ?? ??”? ??? ????? ??? ??
????? pic.twitter.com/QFsfGRK4V7— Gal Berger ?? ???? (@galberger) May 15, 2017
• Israel and Ukraine mended fences as Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman visited Israel. Ties between the two countries took a hit when Ukraine voted for UN Security Council resolution 2334 which denounced Israeli settlements. The Jerusalem Post reports that more recently, Ukraine tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to block a UNESCO resolution rejecting Israeli sovereignty over both eastern and western areas of Jerusalem.
Groysman, who is Jewish, wants to “finalize cooperation deals with regard to counterterrorism, health and statistical data exchanges” that were put on the backburner in the fallout over the Security Council vote.
• Israeli cabinet minister cancels Jordan visit after stabbing.
• Ynet: Israeli family rescued after accidentally entering Palestinian village.
• Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein to address Russian parliament 30 years after gulag release. Jerusalem Post coverage.
“This is a special trip and there is great excitement about it,” Edelstein said Monday. “We can’t ignore the symbolism of something that could have been considered a mirage not that many years ago, that someone who was a prisoner in the Soviet Union will stand on the stage of the parliament in Moscow and give a speech as the speaker of the Knesset of Israel.”
Around the World
• Jewish Chronicle: UK Labour changes manifesto to condemn Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel.
• I would never have the patience to attend Israel-bashing academic conferences. Which is why I’m glad someone like David Collier shines a light on the dishonesty and chicanery he found at a University of Sussex gathering discussing 50 years of Israeli occupation.
Commentary/Analysis
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Amos Harel: The triple blow of Trump’s intelligence leak to Russia
– Bassam Tawil: The Palestinian threats Trump needs to hear
– Aaron David Miller: Why Trump’s love affair with Netanyahu won’t last
– Jeff Jacoby: Great timing, Mr. Ambassador
– Colbert King: Trump wants to treat Middle East peace like a real estate deal. That’s arrogant thinking.
– Moshe Elad: The ‘impending humanitarian disaster’ syndrome
– Jonathan Schanzer: There’s no such thing as ‘the Arab street’ (click via Twitter)
– Saeed Rahnema: Iranians set to choose the lesser of two evils (click via Twitter)
– Benny Avni: Iran’s set to choose another angry prez
• For a sense of what the critics are saying, see Nathan Thrall.
Featured image: CC0 Pexels; White House CC BY-NC-SA Russian Foreign Ministry; opinions CC0 Pixabay;
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