Everything you need to know about today’s coverage of Israel and the Mideast. Join the Israel Daily News Stream on Facebook.
Today’s Top Stories
1. The IDF discovered a tunnel running under the Gaza-Israel border. YNet reports that this tunnel led to Kibbutz Ein HaShlosha — near a kindergarten, no less — and was intended to be used for a terror attack or a kidnapping. AFP reports that Israel responded by suspending the delivery of building materials to Gaza.
2. Auditors say £1.95 billion EU aid lost in Palestine. The Sunday Times reports:
Brussels transferred more than £1.95bn to the occupied territories between 2008 and 2012 but had little control over how it was spent, the auditors say in an unpublished report seen by The Sunday Times.
EU investigators who visited sites in Jerusalem, Gaza and the West Bank noted “significant shortcomings” in the management of funds sent to Gaza and the West Bank.
3. Israel and the PA reportedly reached an agreement to exploit a gas field 20 miles off the coast of Gaza. According to the Washington Institute, the primary obstacles now is Hamas resistance, and popular rejection of cooperating with Israel.
Israel and the Palestinians
• A Palestinian killed an Israeli in a Friday morning terror attack. IDF reserve colonel Seraya Ofer was attacked outside his Jordan Valley home. Five Palestinians were arrested later in the day.
• Palestinians living in West Bank refugee camps are fed up with the PA, its security services, and are ready to move out. PA officials told The Economist the feeling’s mutual.
Almost 70% of West Bank refugees already live outside camps. The refugee department of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, an umbrella group, is hoping Western countries will pay for decent new housing elsewhere. “We should settle the hills above Nablus with [Palestinian] refugees, not [Jewish] settlers,” says Said Salameh, the department’s head.
• Former settler advocate Dani Dayan weighs in on Israeli-Palestinian peace prospects in a LA Times op-ed. For more commentary, see Jonathan Kay.
- Mullahs reportedly move nuclear weaponization research center to avoid detection.
- Big Media responds to Bibi’s media offensive against Iran.
- Is Hezbollah trying to create offshore drilling crisis to open new front with Israel?
