Today’s Top Stories
1. Iran provocatively test-fired a ballistic missile believed to be capable of carrying a nuclear warhead on Sunday. The UN Security Council was due to meet today for urgent talks on the test and whether the launch violates Security Council resolution 2231. According to the New York Times:
The Iranian missile traveled about 600 miles, but its re-entry vehicle reportedly exploded before the flight was complete. It is unclear whether that was accidental or a deliberate detonation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is due to meet President Donald Trump on February 15, denounced the test and called for a strengthening of sanctions. But don’t hold your breath: Russia already says the launch is not a violation.
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2. Mexico’s leading rabbi is blaming Netanyahu’s support for Trump’s border barrier for a spike in online anti-Semitism. Rabbi Shlomo Tawil told Israeli radio:
The moment the prime minister tweeted, he said, comments against Jews and Israel began to appear, with statements such as “out Jews” targeting the community. Tweets included calls to “burn the Jews,” while others called Jews “disgusting” or used more vulgar language to describe them.
3. The IDF warned residents to evacuate Amona by midnight, Wednesday, the illegally built settlement outpost not far from Ramallah and Beit El.
The announcement came ahead of the final February 8 deadline to demolish the outpost, home to some 40 families, which the High Court of Justice in 2014 ruled was illegally constructed on privately owned Palestinian land in 1996.
4. ‘Puff Piece’ Praises Extremist, Anti-Israel MK: The Guardian doesn’t tell you Haneen Zoabi built her political identity around open support for terror, violence and anti-Semitism.
Israel and the Palestinians
• The Knesset once again pushed off voting on the controversial “Regulation Bill” to next week. The legislation would retroactively legalize 4,000 housing units built on privately owned Palestinian land. More at YNet.
• Mahmoud Abbas is in Africa trying to counter Israel’s diplomatic efforts there. In Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, the Palestinian chief addressed the summit of the African Union. Times of Israel coverage.
• The Jerusalem Post takes a closer look at the IDF Home Front’s preparation for a heavy barrage of rockets in a war with Hezbollah. We’re talking about apps warning specific neighborhoods of incoming rockets, new and upgraded bomb shelters, the evacuation of 150,000 northern residents, and more.
The IDF considers Hezbollah the most substantial threat, with at least 120,000 rockets aimed at Israel, many of them able to strike anywhere in the country. While most have a range of just 45 kilometers, the army has said that it expects a bombardment of over 1,000 rockets in the course of just one day.
• Worth reading: The New York Times visited Maale Adumim.
Around the World
• Canadian authorities report a spike in Palestinian asylum seekers.
The number of refugee claims from the West Bank and Gaza has more than quadrupled from 50 in 2010, to 242 during the first nine months of 2016, according to the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, the court that determines if a person is eligible to be admitted as a refugee. In 2016, almost 80% of these refugee claims were accepted.
• No one tells black students not be offended by racist language just as no one tells women not to be offended by sexist language. Why shouldn’t Jewish students have the same right to self-define what constitutes hatred against their group like all other minority groups? But that is what we’ve come to at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies.
Jewish students told they 'do not have the right to define anti-Semitism' https://t.co/0KjQOVBpL6
— Mark Jacobs (@mr_markjacobs) January 31, 2017
Commentary/Analysis
• Here’s what else I’m reading today . . .
– Yonah Jeremy Bob: Finally an end to the settlement tightrope walk?
– Max Singer: A truth-telling strategy to advance Israeli-Palestinian peace
– Jonathan Tobin: The embassy and the realists
– Thomas Pickering: Could the US have two embassies in Jerusalem?
– Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinians’ fort of torture
– Ben-Dror Yemini: Rights groups provide jihad with free services
– David Horovitz: Netanyahu must not be Donald Trump’s yes-man
– Boaz Bismuth: A tweet blown out of proportion
– Amos Harel: World waits to see if Trump will go ballistic after Iranian missile test
Featured image: CC0 StockSnap; Mexico flag CC BY Nicolas Raymond; Israel flag CC BY Nicolas Raymond; jigsaw CC BY-SA Psyon;
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