Today’s Top Stories
*** Breaking news *** After this roundup was published, the IDF struck two Hamas positions after terror balloons launched from Gaza sparked fires in southern Israel. Code Red Alerts are being heard in southern Israel. Developing . . .
1. As this roundup was published, US and Russian Presidents Donald Trump and Vladmir Putin began their first face-to-face meeting in Helsinki, Finland. The Mideast is paying particularly close attention as their discussions on Syria are expected to have major ramifications on Iranian entrenchment in Syria and Israel’s pushback. (The New York Times, CNN and BBC are liveblogging from Finland.)
Indeed, Israel reportedly struck an Iranian base in northern Syria near Aleppo last night. The Al-Nayrab military base near Aleppo is linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps. Reports say 22 people, including nine Iranians, were killed in the attack, which targeted weapons warehouses.
2. Israel allowed reporters from the New York Times, Washington Post and Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) to take a first-hand look at selected Iranian nuclear documents which the Mossad stole from Tehran earlier this year. If you’re stymied by their paywalls, the Times of Israel and Jerusalem Post summarized their coverage.
Coincidentally or not, the stories were published on the eve of the Trump-Putin talks . . .
In a lengthy briefing at a security facility here last week, senior Israeli intelligence officials disclosed additional details about the operation. Those include specifics on how the documents were removed from Iran; the existence within the documents of the warhead designs, for which Israel said Iran got unspecified foreign assistance; the operation of a secret explosives-testing facility that international inspectors had long searched for in vain; and a scramble by Iranian officials to keep their nuclear program alive after international inspectors concluded it had been suspended . . .
The documents track, and in some cases repeat, revelations and assumptions made previously by the International Atomic Energy Agency, but also provide specifics—including, for example, the existence of an underground metallurgical testing facility—about which international inspectors were unaware.
3. The Swiss ambassador to Israel apologized to Hebron’s Jewish community after a Swiss member of the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH) was caught on video slapping a 10-year-old Jewish boy. The man, who serves as a TIPH legal counsel, was ordered to leave Israel.
4. Gaza Rocket Barrage = Anti-Israel Media Barrage: For a number of news services, the Gaza crisis started when Israel fired back.
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
In the News
• In rare step, International Criminal Court is reaching out to ‘Palestinian victims,’ raising the ire of Israeli officials.
In a little-noticed press release issued Friday, three judges who are members of the so-called pretrial chamber dealing with Palestinian complaints of alleged Israeli war crimes ordered the court’s registry “to establish, as soon as practicable, a system of public information and outreach activities for the benefit of the victims and affected communities in the situation in Palestine.”
• The head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ elite force, Qassem Soleimani, to address Gaza via satellite link. Haaretz notes this isn’t the first time Iran-Hamas ties have been on such overt display.
• Additional Iron Dome batteries deployed in southern and central Israel
• The Jerusalem Post and Israel HaYom visited Kfar Aza, Moshav Ein Habasor and Sderot to take the pulse of Israeli communities on the Gaza border.
• Eastern Jerusalem is undergoing an Arab tourism boom as pilgrims from countries that don’t recognize Israel increasingly flock to the Holy City.
• The Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) takes a closer look at Iranian efforts to create a land bridge to Syria, and Israel’s efforts efforts against it.
This map, put together with info from intelligence officials and @LeBeckInt shows the common route by which Iran, with the help of Iraqi Shiite militias, brings weapons from Iran to Syria & Lebanon.
Israel is intent on shutting this route:https://t.co/1Rsp9qwvqY pic.twitter.com/S1KfgSE6xl
— Dov Lieber (@DovLieber) July 16, 2018
• Syrian government forces continued pounding rebel-held areas of southern Syria. According to AP, more than 800 missiles were fired on positions as close as four km (2.5 miles) from the Israeli border. Reuters adds that the Syrians captured a strategic hill overlooking the border.
• Hezbollah and Shi’ite militias aligned with Iran are integrated into the Syrian army in its campaign to take control of south Syria.
• Award-winning Palestinian photographer died in a Syrian jail, reports AFP. Niraz Saied had documented life in the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp near Damascus. Saied was arrested by Syrian forces in 2015.
Around the World
• The UK Labour party’s antisemitism definition could breach the Equality Act, according to legal advice.
The advice, seen by the Guardian, suggests that because Labour has ignored the so-called Macpherson principle – that a racist incident is one perceived to be racist by the victim – when it comes to antisemitism, Jews are being treated less favourably than other groups . . .
The Macpherson principle, which has been widely adopted since the murder of Stephen Lawrence as part of the inquiry into racism in the police, says: “The definition [of a racist incident] should be: A racist incident is any incident which is perceived to be racist by the victim or any other person”. Once the fact of the incident have been established, the burden of proof is then on the accuser to provide an alternative explanation.
• Argentina freezes assets of suspected Hezbollah fundraising network.
• ESPN removes weekly Australian Football League pool participant for ‘Burnthejews’ screen name.
Commentary
• A New York Post staff-ed slams international silence on Hamas’ terror balloons and “ecological war on Israel.”
The world regularly shrugs at such Israeli suffering. But what about the assault on Mother Nature? The fires are destroying nature preserves, killing some animals and destroying the food supply for others . . .
Calling PETA, Greenpeace and all the rest: If one combatant can launch environmental war without global censure, the tactic will catch on. Even if it risks showing sympathy for Israel, you have a clear duty to raise the alarm.
Related viewing: The Environmental Impact of War
• Here’s what else I’m reading today:
– Charles Bybelezer: Trump-Putin summit could avert or pave way to Mideast war
– Zvi Bar’el: If Moscow’s ‘deal of the century’ for Iran works, both Damascus and Jerusalem will smile
– Shlomo Bolts: Putin is laying a bomb on Israel’s doorstep
– Anna Ahronheim: Gaza: Another futile round?
– Amos Harel: Israel signals Hamas it’s not afraid of confrontation
– Michael Cotler-Wunsh: Scorched earth and international law
Featured image: CC BY-SA Gage Skidmore; Helsinki CC BY-NC-ND Jonathan Britain via Wikimedia Commons;
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