Today’s Top Stories
1. The battle for Aleppo is over. But an agreement to allow rebels and residents to evacuate the northern Syrian city fell through with everyone pointing fingers and shelling resuming. Both the UN and Aleppines accused pro-Assad forces of atrocities.
There’s no independent verification, but something awful is happening. This ominous Daily Telegraph snippet summed up the limits of what’s known and why:
One by one, each of the Telegraph’s contacts inside Aleppo has gone dark in recent days. Messages to their phones are no longer answered.
The hope is that they are safe in regime areas, but many had expressed fears before their disappearance that they would be punished for their rebellion . . .
People’s fears of revenge attacks appeared to have become a reality. The UN reported that more than 80 civilians had been killed by pro-government forces in the last 48 hours.
Syrian troops and allied Iraqi militias had entered homes after recapturing them and had executed residents “on the spot”.
“The reports we had are of people being shot in the street trying to flee and shot in their homes,” said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the UN human rights office. “We’re filled with the deepest foreboding for those who remain in this last hellish corner.”
Meanwhile Aleppines tweeted desperate farewells to the world. One tweet getting a lot of attention was Bana Alabed, a seven-year-old girl. (The account’s real: the BBC interviewed Bana and her mother in October.)
My name is Bana, I'm 7 years old. I am talking to the world now live from East #Aleppo. This is my last moment to either live or die. – Bana
— Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana) December 13, 2016
2. An Islamic State in the Sinai “liason” with Hamas was killed, according to an IS announcement picked up by YNet.
It wasn’t specified how Hashem Abdel Aileh Kishtah, who was originally from Gaza, was killed, but IS also recently claimed it was targeted by Israeli air strikes in the Sinai.
It is alleged that Kishtah was smuggled from Gaza into Sinai via a tunnel running underneath the border, and then became an instructor who taught the Sinai terrorists how to use anti-tank missiles and how to create IEDs.
He was thought of as one of the biggest experts in anti-tank missiles and anti-tank fighting in the Middle East.
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
3. Google won’t alter the Holocaust-denying search results for ‘Did the Holocaust Happen’.
Since Google seems cool with altering its search results to benefit the company, surely it can also demote the ranking of a hateful website that promotes lies.
4. The “Occasional Anxiety” Of Terror in Israel: A Canadian pundit is more Palestinian than the Palestinians.
Israel and the Palestinians
• France’s international conference on the Mideast peace process is reportedly postponed to January. Reuters writes that Paris needs more time to make preparations and US attendance is in doubt.
• A Palestinian who stabbed two Border Policemen near Jerusalem’s Old City was shot.
• In a meeting with the Foreign Press Association in Jerusalem, MK Yair Lapid blasted the news industry — singling out The Guardian — for discouraging Palestinian leaders from making concessions for peace. The Jerusalem Post was on hand:
“It’s a declared policy of Israel that we need to go to a two-state solution and the ones who refused it were the Palestinians,” Lapid said. “The ones who call Jews pigs and monkeys in their school books are the Palestinians. The problem is that the Palestinians are encouraged by the Guardian and others saying we don’t need to do anything in order to work for our future because the international community will call Israel an apartheid country.”
Lapid said Israel is not an apartheid country but rather a law-abiding democracy, and that unlike the Palestinian leadership, Israel was making sure the Palestinians’ human rights are protected.
• Survey says two-thirds of Palestinians demand Mahmoud Abbas resign.
• Traveling abroad, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sought Kazakhstan to support a bid for an Israeli seat on the UN Security Council. Netanyahu also signed several economic agreements with Azerbaijan.
• Abbas strikes back (part 1): Abbas strips rivals of immunity, clearing way for their arrest.
• Abbas strikes back (part 2):
Ramallah: PA court sentences Mohamed Dahlan (in absentia) to 3 yrs in prison for embezzling 16 m USD. Also gets a 16 m USD fine.
— Khaled Abu Toameh (@KhaledAbuToameh) December 14, 2016
Commentary/Analysis
• Aleppo’s on my mind.
– Jerusalem Post (staff-ed): Save Aleppo’s civilians
– Avi Issacharoff: Assad and allies commit war crimes in Aleppo, while US stands idly by
– Prof. Eyal Zisser: The war won’t end in Aleppo
• Tweet of the day from Arsen Ostrovsky:
When Israel defended itself from Hamas terrorists in 2014, hundreds of thousands protested in London. And after massacre in #Aleppo, #Syria? pic.twitter.com/xM6aLqYLRy
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) December 14, 2016
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Khaled Abu Toameh: The Palestinian jihads against Israel
– Herb Keinon: Jerusalem likely disappointed by Trump’s secretary of state pick
– Ron Kampeas: What Tillerson as secretary of state could mean for the Jewish agenda
– Daniel Finkelstein: The social media racists must be silenced
Featured image: CC BY Pedro Ribeiro Simooes with additions by HonestReporting; Google CC0 Pixabay;
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