| Distances: | Tel Aviv to Jerusalem 63 kms Tel Aviv to Haifa 95 kms |
Publisher: Routledge (Taylor & Francis), 2002;
ISBN: 0415281172 (paperback),
0415281164 (hardback); Map: NPR Online
Click here for prior news from July 29th, 2009
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Publisher: Routledge (Taylor & Francis), 2002; ISBN: 0415281172 (paperback), 0415281164 (hardback); Map: NPR Online
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Israel accuses report's UN backers of anti-Semitism ISRAEL has responded to the UN endorsement of the Goldstone report with pressure on countries which supported the report and claims of anti-Semitism. Anger grew among Israeli politicians and media outlets yesterday led by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who targeted two of the countries which voted to endorse the report, China and Russia. Mr Lieberman boycotted a function he was due to attend as a guest of the Chinese embassy in Tel Aviv, while his deputy Danny Ayalon cast doubt on a Russian initiative to host a Middle East conference.
Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said it "to a certain degree anti-Semitic to say that what is permitted for the US in Afghanistan, for Russia in Chechnya and also for Turkey in northern Iraq is forbidden for Israel in defending itself from Gaza". "We will not co-operate with this," Mr Steinitz said. "Jews will not again be led like lambs to slaughter."
The sentiment was reflected in much of the Israel media with one paper, Israel Hayom, running an article headlined A Typhoon of anti-Semitism. The article, by Dan Margalit, attacked the author of the UN report, South African judge Richard Goldstone, as an "assimilated and gentile-grovelling Jew", "a retrospective collaborator with the Arab bloc" and "a deceived collaborator". Nonetheless, Margalit went on to urge Israel "as a matter of urgency" to reach an agreement with the US regarding Jewish settlements in the West Bank and with Britain and France over establishing an independent internal investigation into Gaza.
But amid the attacks on Goldstone (one paper recently referred to him as "the criminal") came a growing counter-opinion that perhaps Israel may have made mistakes in its approach to the Goldstone report, which looked into allegations of war crimes against Israel and Hamas after the January war. Israel decided from the outset not to co-operate with the inquiry, claiming it was always going to be anti-Israel, but some commentators are now suggesting Israel should have opened itself to questions.
Yesterday Kadima MP Nachman Shai said Israel had to make "a brave decision" to establish its own judicial investigation. So far Israel has only agreed to military investigations, and doubts have been expressed about the credibility of the military investigating itself. "The time has come to put an end to the government's misgivings concerning the Goldstone report and to conduct a judicial inquiry into Operation Cast Lead (Gaza war)," Mr Shai said. "As time goes on, it is becoming clearer that this is the only way to save Israel from the dead end into which the government has forced us and that disrupts Israel's foreign affairs."
Israel is also trying to save its souring relationship with Turkey, which has been one of its few regional allies. Last week Turkey refused to proceed with a joint military exercise. Prime Minister Recep Ergodan said yesterday Turkey had "never been on the side of the tyrants".
Same Day NOW the UN Human Rights Council has endorsed the Goldstone report, there are important implications to the decision that could make it a global turning point. It is the first make-or-break test for Barack Obama's foreign policy. There is no easy way out. The US President must either block this disastrous resolution through effective diplomacy at the UN, accept a bad resolution to avoid a confrontation or veto the resolution and accept the price in world unpopularity.
Oh, it also marks the end of the Middle East peace process era that began in 1993, showing both sides why they can't accept a compromise deal.
This says a great deal about the nature of international affairs nowadays. What does it say about the UN that it condemns Israel but does not act against Hamas, which is guilty of aggression, terrorism, seizure of power by force, calls for genocide, anti-Semitism, indoctrination of children to become suicide bombers, oppression of women, systematic use of civilians as human shields and a range of war crimes, as the report makes clear.
Trying to present the Goldstone report in a more favourable light, the Western media overstated its even-handedness, playing up its few mentions of Hamas to pretend that both sides in the conflict were condemned. The UNHRC drops this pretence and speaks only of Israel, totally removing the factors that forced a reluctant Israel to launch its attack on the Gaza Strip.
This is not merely another of the many ritual condemnations of Israel but a demonisation. Israel is accused of massive war crimes on a remarkably flimsy basis. Of course it is all political, but this is a step toward delegitimisation. The Arab-speaking, Muslim-majority nations and the left-wing governments that supported the resolution see this as a step not towards a compromise peace but towards an elimination of Israel altogether.
I am not saying this is going to happen, or that the resolution will have any negative impact on Israel. But what is most important is that having tasted blood, these forces will not be interested in getting anything less. Why should they — including the Palestinian Authority — settle for a stable two-state solution when they believe they can get far more without giving up anything?
It is an accident but not a coincidence that the Palestinian Authority signed a unity agreement with Hamas in the same week the UN resolution was passed. The two groups will not actually co-operate but the document they reluctantly signed for reasons of organisational rivalry symbolises the fact that their strategies, although not their tactics, now coincide to a large degree.
This is the first reason why the passage of the resolution is an important development. It marks not only the end of the peace process but also the end of the peace process era. The Arab-speaking Muslim-majority nations, and some countries governed by left-wing administrations (Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua in Latin America, for example, and others), seek a one-state solution in which Israel no longer exists. It marks a return — in thinking but not in military practice — to the pre-1993 period, when there was nothing to talk about.
The most important country that voted to pass the Goldstone resolution in the UNHRC, Russia, does not think that way, and nor does China. The European countries also do not support such a development. Loud sectors in intellectual life and the media do, but these do not set policy. The point is these countries will not act to stop the resolution. The many abstentions on the vote are symbolic of the fact that most Western democracies and countries that do not directly endorse this campaign are at best bystanders, and at worst appeasers.
The second reason why this development is so important is what it tells us about US policy. Remember that the Obama administration joined the UNHRC based on the explicit argument that it could moderate the radical-dominated group. This strategy has failed. And so, on a larger-scale, has the concept that Obama's "popularity offensive" — in which he distanced himself from Israel, lavished devotion on the Palestinian cause, extolled the glories of Islam and apologised for past US misdeeds — would have some beneficial effect. The policy has done worse than fail — it has, predictably, backfired. The question is whether this will be recognised, much less reversed, by the Obama administration.
But there's more. The US now faces more tests.
Test 1: can it stop the progress of this resolution and report into their implementation through judicial decisions and sanctions against Israel, or not? Certainly, the US will work to water down the ensuing resolutions. To do so, it will need to use leverage and even threats to succeed. A "nice guy" strategy could fail miserably here.
Test 2: the next possible failure would be if the US government accepted a resolution that was somewhat watered down but still too extreme. In other words, Washington would buy off immediate trouble in exchange for longer-term woes.
Test 3: if the resolution is still too far-out, the Obama administration may have to veto it. The European countries know they can afford to be cowardly and leave it to the US to stop the madness. If Washington does veto the resolution, it will have to brave international condemnation and unpopularity. Does Obama have the guts for this?
Finally, there is the lesson for Israel. Let's cut away all the obvious points about relying on itself, mistrusting the world and so on. There is one item of overriding importance. Israel knows that if it yields territory and is attacked from that territory, no matter how great the provocation, it cannot depend on international support but instead knows it will face international condemnation.
What does this say about a two-state solution? Suppose Israel pulls out of the West Bank and a Palestinian state is created, either on the West Bank or that plus the Gaza Strip, and that state then either attacks Israel or allows and encourages terrorists to do so across the border. Israel has no response to defend itself that isn't highly costly. Bottom line: no Israeli government will make such a deal, and the Israeli people will not support such a deal.
Along with a myriad other reasons, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas can now argue persuasively that they enjoy broad international support for wiping out Israel. They have no incentive — since both are indifferent to the welfare of their people — to make any compromise for peace.
Good-bye, hopes for peace. I now declare the window of opportunity that seemed to open in the late 1980s, which met and failed the test of the Oslo process, and yet which continues to inspire false hope for many people, to be fully and officially closed.
Israel coalition teeters as faction chief quits ISRAEL'S fragile coalition government was made even more precarious yesterday when the Labour party's key faction chief in parliament resigned, saying that if peace talks were not resumed within two weeks, Labour should withdraw from the Netanyahu government. Daniel Ben-Simon resigned in protest, claiming that "we haven't done anything" that the coalition partners had told the public they would do in relation to dismantling illegal outposts in the Palestinian West Bank.
Writing yesterday in Haaretz newspaper about why he resigned as Labor's senior political official in the parliament, Mr Ben-Simon said he had told Labor's leader and Defence Minister Ehud Barak: "Look, Ehud, there is no peace process, there are no negotiations, there's no settlement freeze or outpost evacuation. We haven't done anything we promised the public. What will we tell the Israeli public? To my astonishment, he said we have no partner, that there's no one to talk to. I remembered that nearly a decade before, when we heard similar lines from Barak, they sank the country into despair and brought a series of misfortunes in their wake."
Meanwhile, South African judge Richard Goldstone has hit back at Israel's claims that his Gaza report had endangered the peace process. Mr Goldstone yesterday said there was no peace process because Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the ultra-nationalist party Yisrael Beiteinu, did not want one. Speaking by telephone conference to American rabbis, Mr Goldstone said: "If the Israeli government set up an open investigation, that would really be the end of the matter, as far as Israel is concerned."
Mr Barak and armed forces chief Gabi Ashkenazi are leading the resistance to any independent inquiry, arguing that the army's own inquiries are sufficient and that an independent inquiry would play into the hands of Israel's enemies.
Mr Goldstone, who said as a South African Jew he had supported Israel from an early age, told the rabbis, who are fasting to protest against Israel's two-year blockade of the Gaza strip, he had been surprised by how venomous and personal the attacks against him had been. Two weeks ago, he was described in one newspaper in Israel as "the criminal" and this week was described in Israel Hayom as "this assimilated and gentile-grovelling Jew" and "retrospective collaborator with the Arab bloc". He said if Israel agreed to conduct an independent inquiry, it would put huge pressure on Hamas to do the same and he did not know whether Hamas was capable of carrying out such an inquiry.
Turkey embraces its Islamic friends Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University
"THERE is no doubt he is our friend," Turkey's Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, says of Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, even as he accuses Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman of threatening to use nuclear weapons against Gaza. These outrageous assertions point to the profound change of orientation by Turkey's government, for six decades the West's closest Muslim ally, since Mr Erdogan's AK party came to power in 2002.
The foreign ministers of Turkey and Syria met in Aleppo this month, and three recent events reveal the extent of the change. The first came on October 11 with the news that the Turkish military - a long-time bastion of secularism and advocate of co-operation with Israel - abruptly asked Israeli forces not to participate in the annual "Anatolian Eagle" air force exercise.
Mr Erdogan cited "diplomatic sensitivities" for the cancellation and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu spoke of "sensitivity on Gaza, East Jerusalem and al-Aqsa mosque". The Turks specifically rejected Israeli planes that may have attacked Hamas (an Islamist terrorist organisation) during last winter's Gaza Strip operation. While Damascus applauded the disinvitation, it prompted the US and Italian governments to withdraw their forces from Anatolian Eagle, which in turn meant cancelling the international exercise.
As for the Israelis, this "sudden and unexpected" shift shook to the core their military alignment with Turkey, in place since 1996. Jerusalem immediately responded by reviewing Israel's practice of supplying Turkey with advanced weapons, such as the recent $US140 million ($152.4m) sale to the Turkish Air Force of targeting pods. The idea also arose to stop helping the Turks defeat the Armenian genocide resolutions that regularly appear before the US congress. Barry Rubin of the Interdisciplinary Centre in Herzliya not only argues that "the Israel-Turkey alliance is over" but concludes that Turkey's armed forces no longer guard the secular republic and can no longer intervene when the government becomes too Islamist.
The second event took place on October 13, when Syria's Foreign Minister, Walid al-Moallem, announced that Turkish and Syrian forces had just "carried out manoeuvres near Ankara". Thirdly, 10 Turkish ministers, led by Mr Davutoglu, joined their Syrian counterparts on October 13 for talks under the auspices of the just-established "Turkey-Syria High Level Strategic Co-operation Council". The ministers announced having signed almost 40 agreements to be implemented within 10 days; that "a more comprehensive, a bigger" joint land military exercise would be held than the first one in April; and that the two countries' leaders would sign a strategic agreement in November.
In brief, Mr Davutoglu envisions reduced conflict with neighbours and Turkey emerging as a regional power, a sort of modernised Ottoman Empire. Implicit in this strategy is a distancing of Turkey from the West in general and Israel in particular. Although not presented in Islamist terms, "strategic depth" closely fits the AK party's Islamist world view.
As Barry Rubin notes, "the Turkish government is closer politically to Iran and Syria than to the US and Israel". Caroline Glick, a Jerusalem Post columnist, goes further: Ankara already "left the Western alliance and became a full member of the Iranian axis". But official circles in the West seem nearly oblivious to this momentous change in Turkey's allegiance or its implications. The cost of their error will soon become evident.
Israel wins US support on freeze ATTEMPTING to jolt the moribund Israeli-Palestinian talks into life, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last night accepted Israel's position that a total freeze on settlement activity in the West Bank should not be a precondition for a resumption of talks, as the Palestinian side is insisting. Standing alongside Benjamin Netanyahu at a press conference during a brief stopover in Israel, she agreed with the Israeli Prime Minister's contention that in 16 years of talks with the Palestinians a settlement freeze had never been raised as a precondition. She also praised as "unprecedented" Mr Netanyahu's pledge not to build new settlements and to undertake a limited period of "restraint" in construction within existing settlements in order to permit negotiations to get off the ground. She urged the two sides to begin talking.
Palestinian officials said Washington had been backtracking regarding settlements since President Barack Obama declared shortly after taking office that a total settlement freeze should precede the resumption of talks. Mr Netanyahu rejected that approach. He said Israel would be willing to halt settlement activity for nine months but excluded from that freeze the construction of 3000 units said to be already in the pipeline. Mr Obama subsequently softened his call for a total freeze, calling instead for "restraint".
Mrs Clinton's statements in Jerusalem were the clearest indication yet that Washington was backing off from its insistence on a freeze before talks resumed. Mr Netanyahu said Israel was prepared to enter into peace talks immediately and without preconditions. He said the Palestinian demand was "a pretext — an obstacle that prevents the re-establishment of negotiations". Earlier in the day, Mrs Clinton had met Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Abu Dhabi. Palestinian officials termed the meeting "hard", with Mrs Clinton failing to persuade Mr Abbas from dropping his precondition.
Palestinian officials expressed deep disappointment at Washington's inability to persuade Israel to freeze construction. A spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudainah, said there could be no change in the Palestinian position. "It is not possible to accept justification for settlement activity on lands occupied (by Israel) in 1967, including Jerusalem." In what some saw as a slight softening in Mr Abbas's position, he said later he was not insisting on an Israeli pledge for a permanent halt in settlement activity but one for "a limited time" in order for talks to get under way.
Mrs Clinton noted that all American presidents had challenged the legitimacy of Israeli settlements built in the West Bank on captured Palestinian land after the 1967 Six Day War. Final resolution of the issue, however, must be left to negotiations, she said. She continued on from Jerusalem to Morocco to attend a conference of Muslim states.
The Israeli news agency, YNet, quoted an unnamed Palestinian official as saying pressure from Washington and "Arab elements", a clear reference to Egypt, which has been strongly pushing for peace talks, will in the end persuade Mr Abbas to change his position. "The renewal of negotiations will probably be announced at the end of the current round," he said. The situation presented Mr Abbas with an uncomfortable dilemma, said the official. "If renewed negotiations don't bring results, this will harm Abbas and the Palestinian Authority. If negotiations are not renewed this, too, will harm us, but less."
Mr Abbas, who has called for Palestinian elections next year, has recently adopted a hard line towards Israel in an apparent attempt to shore up his image as a strong leader. In addition to the settlement issue, the normally moderate Mr Abbas has assailed Israel for the way it suppressed Arab disturbances on Jerusalem's Temple Mount recently. At American urging, Israel has made some moves on the West Bank as concessions to Mr Abbas in order to shore up his position. These include the removal of hundreds of earthen barriers and roadblocks that impeded movement and helping the Palestinian Authority to upgrade its economy.
Middle East talks 'doomed to fail' THE Obama administration's quest to restart Middle East peace talks looks increasingly doomed after the influential Arab League yesterday said there was a sense of failure around the US efforts. Secretary-General of the Arab League Amr Moussa said "failure is in the atmosphere" following Israel's refusal to bow to calls from Washington to halt growth in Jewish settlements in the West Bank. His comment was made in Morocco during a visit by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who sought before an Arab audience to soften her weekend praise of Israel that the Netanyahu government had made an "unprecedented" effort by agreeing to a temporary halt to new settlements.
While Israel is prepared to resume peace talks, Palestinian leaders insist they will not unless there is a complete freeze of settlements. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said yesterday Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had restated this to US Middle East envoy George Mitchell. "We do not put conditions for resuming negotiations, but we want the talks resumed on the basis of the provisions of the road map, which stipulates the cessation of all forms of settlement activity in the Palestinian territories," Mr Erekat said. Mrs Clinton's "unprecedented" comment in praise of Israel led to a backlash in the Arab world, which she tried to address yesterday.
Earlier this year, US President Barack Obama and Mrs Clinton repeatedly stated that the US wanted Israel to halt all settlement activity. Israel refused to do this, saying such a policy would prevent "natural growth" of the settlements in which about 300,000 Jewish people live. The US has now clearly accepted that Israel will not agree to their request and is trying to salvage the peace process by crafting a new deal under which Israel will agree to a moratorium — most likely for nine months — to new settlement activity apart from 3000 new housing units already approved. Without the support of the bulk of the 22 Arab and Muslim countries in the Middle East, any peace agreement with Israel, which would give Israel landing rights and normalised relations with most of these countries, would be unlikely to hold.
Mrs Clinton said yesterday: "The Obama administration's position on settlements is clear, unequivocal and it has not changed. "As the President has said on many occasions, the US does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements." While the Israeli offer of a temporary halt to new settlements "falls far short of what we would characterise as our position or what our preference would be", she said she would support any moves towards a two-state solution. "I will offer positive reinforcement to either of the parties when I believe they are taking steps that support the objective reaching a two-state solution," she said.
Clearly seeking to appear to all sides to be balanced, Mrs Clinton yesterday used the same word — unprecedented — to praise the Palestinian Authority for improved security in the West Bank. But her balancing act does not appear to be working: Mr Abbas is under enormous pressure from his own ranks to refuse negotiations with Israel without a freeze on settlements. Since Mr Obama first called for a halt to building activity in the West Bank, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced Israel will proceed with 3000 new houses that had already been approved. Both major Palestinian factions — Mr Abbas's Fatah faction and the militant Hamas faction that runs the Gaza Strip — are strongly opposed to any talks without a freeze on settlements.
Israel seizes Iranian arms shipment ISRAELI commandos and warships yesterday intercepted a ship carrying weapons from Iran to the Lebanese Hezbollah militia in a raid dozens of miles off its coast. The pre-dawn seizure near Cyprus was a rare interception of a suspected arms shipment by Israel, which has long accused Iran of arming its enemies. "During the night a special marine force intercepted a ship that was supposed to be carrying cargo around 100 miles from our shore," a military spokeswoman said last night. Photographs of the ship being searched in Israel's Ashdod port identified the vessel as the Francop, sailing under an Antigua flag. "We suspected it was carrying weapons and when we inspected it that turned out to be true," the spokeswoman said. President Shimon Peres said it appeared to be ferrying weapons from Iran to Lebanon. "The IDF successfully seized a boat that apparently came from Iran and was heading to Syria and Hezbollah," Mr Peres said. "All those involved deny involvement, but the world is witness today to the huge gap between what Iran and Syria say and their actions."
Local media reported that the vessel was carrying a shipment of several tonnes of anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles, and Deputy Defence Minister Matan Vilnai told army radio that Katyusha rockets were among the cache. Defence Minister Ehud Barak hailed the operation, calling it a "new success in our struggle against weapons smuggling aimed at reinforcing terrorist organisations that are threatening the security of Israel". Mr Vilnai told military radio that the crew apparently did not know about the weapons, which were sealed in cargo containers. Israel's Haaretz newspaper reported that the ship set out from Iran and later docked in Yemen and Sudan before passing through the Suez Canal en route to either Syria or Lebanon.
Israel has long accused arch-foes Syria and Iran of supplying weapons to Hezbollah and to Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, which has been ruled by the Islamist Hamas movement since June 2007. On Tuesday a senior Israeli general warned that Hamas had successfully test-fired out to sea a rocket that was capable of reaching Tel Aviv from Gaza. The rocket, believed to be Iranian-made, has a range of about 60km, putting Israel's major population centres in range, said Major General Amos Yadlin, head of military intelligence.
Hamas called the claim a "fabrication" designed to mobilise world opinion against the Islamist group before the UN General Assembly, which was today due to discuss a controversial report on the Gaza war. The UN report by respected South African jurist and former international war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone accused both Israel and Palestinian militants of committing war crimes during the December-January Gaza war. About 1400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed in the three-week war launched by Israel on December 27 and aimed at halting rocket attacks, which have been mostly confined to communities a few kilometres from the Gaza border.
Israel has in the past seized shipments of weapons allegedly bound for Gaza, including in May 2003, when it intercepted a ship off its northern coast loaded with bomb-making material it said was from Hezbollah. On January 3, 2002, Israel intercepted a 50-tonne shipment of weapons destined for the Palestinians aboard the Karine A in the Red Sea. The late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat admitted responsibility for the smuggling attempt, and the affair seriously eroded his standing with Washington. In May 2001, the navy intercepted the Santorini, which was packed with 40 tonnes of arms sent to Gaza by a Palestinian faction based in Syria.
Syria, Iran deny weapons claim TENSIONS between Israel and Iran escalated last night as Israel claimed a shipment of weapons it intercepted in the Mediterranean Sea was Tehran sending weapons to "hornets' nests of terrorists" intended to kill Israeli citizens. Iran and Syria denied Israel's claim that a ship intercepted off Cyprus with "hundreds of tonnes" of weapons had originated in Iran and was destined to be delivered to Hezbollah in Lebanon through Syria.
Syria's Foreign Minister, Walid Muallem, and Iran's Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, jointly denied Israel's claim.
Mr Muallem would not acknowledge that the shipment on board the Francop was weapons but rather were Syrian-made "items" destined for Iran. Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor last night challenged Syria's claim. "It is absurd that Syria should supply Iran with weapons and ammunition," he said. "It's always going the other way. Since the ship was stopped travelling from an Egyptian port to Syria, this contradicts the Syrian claim."
Hezbollah's reaction was also predictable: "Hezbollah staunchly denies any link to the weapons that the Zionist enemy has seized from the Francop ship. At the same time Hezbollah denounces Israel's piracy in international waters."
Israel linked the shipment to the Goldstone report into the Gaza war, now being debated at the UN, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying the ship's interception highlighted the folly of the Goldstone debate. "The navy's seizure of the ship illustrates the great absurdity," he said. "On the one hand, Iran is sending weapons to hornets' nests of terrorists in order to kill our civilians. On the other hand, the Goldstone report points the finger at Israel." Mr Netanyahu said those who needed further proof Iran was supplying weapons to terror organisations were given it in "a clear and unequivocal manner".
Israeli intelligence is believed to have tracked the ship as it sailed through the Mediterranean. Israeli naval commandos boarded the Francop, which was flying an Antiguan flag, in the early hours of Tuesday and met no resistance. The interception adds to a growing nervousness in Israel that preparations for war are being made by two of its neighbours - Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. On Tuesday, Israel's head of military intelligence, Major General Amos Yadlin, told a Knesset committee Hamas last week had test-fired a missile with a 60km range into the Mediterranean.
The increasing level of alert comes as attempts by the Obama administration to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks look doomed. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat yesterday said Palestinians were considering giving up any ambition for a two-state solution that would see the establishment of an independent Palestinian state and were coming to terms with "a one-state solution". A "one-state solution" implies that demographically Palestinians would over time become the majority inside Israel, forcing major changes to the nature of the Jewish state by increasing the Israeli Arab population from its current 20 per cent to a majority.
Some Israeli politicians such as opposition leader Tzipi Livni have argued in favour of a two-state solution by saying a one-state solution, or binational state, would alter Israel's character. Mr Erekat said: "Successive Israeli governments have destroyed any chance of reaching a two-state solution. The Palestinian Authority must start searching for other options. A Palestinian state without Jerusalem as its capital would be meaningless. The Palestinian people haven't excluded other options, including the option of a one-state solution."
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has faced a backlash from Arab and Palestinian leaders since her comments last weekend praising Israel for the "unprecedented" effort it has made on the issue of Jewish settlements. Israel has agreed to a temporary freeze of Jewish settlements in the West Bank apart from 3000 new housing units which have been approved but not yet completed. But Israel rejected US President Barack Obama's calls that all settlement activity should be halted. Arab and Palestinian leaders are increasingly saying that attempts by the Obama administration to resume peace talks have failed.
Departure of Abbas hits hopes for peace BARACK Obama's push to restart talks in the Middle East was in tatters last night as the man the US had backed to lead a new Palestinian state announced he was walking away from politics. Mahmoud Abbas shocked leaders across the Middle East when he announced he would not contest elections in January.
Mr Abbas made clear his anger at Israel's refusal to agree to US calls for a freeze to Jewish settlement expansion in the West Bank and last weekend's praise by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for Israel's "unprecedented" efforts on the settlement issue. "The problem is Israel and its position," Mr Abbas said. Referring to the US, he said: "We were surprised by their favouring the Israeli position." He also attacked his Palestinian rivals, Hamas, saying the rulers of the Gaza Strip had engaged in "destructive practices". But while he said "many dangers" existed in the two-state solution, he held out hope that this was achievable. He restated the removal of Jewish settlements in the West Bank as a necessary condition for peace.
The resignation leaves in disarray Mr Obama's repeatedly stated ambition to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Mr Abbas was the first world leader he telephoned on taking office this year and he was seen as the only real option as a negotiator. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quoted as saying last week: "Of the existing alternatives, if we want an agreement with the Palestinians then Abbas is the best partner."
Mr Abbas, 74, succeeded Yasser Arafat as Palestinian leader five years ago. During his term he has been criticised as a puppet of the US and Israel, as not being tough enough on corruption inside Fatah, on not confronting Hamas and of not being able to unite Fatah. But his experience, support from the Bush and Obama administrations and his connections on the international stage had singled him out as the best available candidate to run the Palestinian Authority. No candidate is seen as an obvious successor. Prime Minister Salam Fayyed, while respected for his international economic credentials, is regarded with hostility by Hamas and has alienated large sections of his own Fatah party for his attempted crackdown on corruption.
Mrs Clinton's praise of Israel's settlements stance caused a backlash in the Arab and Muslim worlds, leading to the Arab League saying attempts to restart the peace talks now had an atmosphere of failure around them. She spent much of the last week trying to convince Arab leaders that the US had not changed its opposition to Jewish settlements. Regional leaders telephoned Mr Abbas to try to convince him to remain as leader. Israeli President Shimon Peres, who enjoyed a close relationship with Mr Abbas, told him: "If you leave, the Palestinians would lose their chance for an independent state", according to Haaretz newspaper.
Same day
Israel rejects UN vote on Gaza JERUSALEM: Israel last night rejected a UN resolution calling on it and the Palestinians to probe suspected war crimes committed during the Gaza war. "Israel rejects the resolution of the UN General Assembly, which is completely detached from realities on the ground that Israel must face," the foreign ministry said in a statement. Israel said during the 22-day war it "demonstrated higher military and moral standards than each and every one of this resolution's instigators".
On Thursday, the 192-member assembly approved an Arab-sponsored resolution that endorsed a UN report accusing both Israel and Palestinians of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity during the war, which killed about 1400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis. The vote was 114 in favour and 18 against, with 44 abstentions. As well as Israel, the US, along with Australia and a few European countries voted against. A majority of EU countries, including Britain, France, Spain and Sweden abstained.
Don't give up, Peres urges Abbas TEL AVIV: Israeli President Shimon Peres has used a speech honouring slain premier Yitzhak Rabin to urge Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to stay in power despite frustrations over the peace process. "We both signed the Oslo accords and I address myself to you (Abbas) as a colleague would: 'Don't give up'," Mr Peres said at a mass rally at the weekend in a Tel Aviv square where Rabin was gunned down in 1995. He was referring to the deal that gave Palestinians autonomy, which Mr Peres and Mr Abbas signed at a 1993 White House ceremony overseen by then US president Bill Clinton, Rabin and late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. At the time, Mr Peres was Israel's foreign minister and Mr Abbas represented the Palestine Liberation Organisation.
Rabin is revered as a national hero, both for his legendary career as army chief and for peace efforts in the 1990s that earned him a Nobel peace prize shared with Mr Peres and Arafat in 1994, a year after the Oslo accords.
Mr Abbas announced on Friday he would not seek re-election in January, voicing annoyance at Washington's failure to press Israel to halt settlement constructions. His decision has been seen as a major blow to Washington's efforts to re-launch Middle East peace talks frozen since Israel's devastating offensive on the Gaza Strip at the turn of the year.
"I know the sufferings that your people have endured for the past 50 years . . . I know my people and the Israeli government and I tell you that Israel wants real peace," Mr Peres said. "Maybe next year will bring independence for the Palestinian people . . . Next year could be decisive, it depends on you and on us."
About 20,000 people massed in the square where Rabin was killed by a Jewish extremist on November 4, 1995 after attending a peace rally. In a recorded video message beamed on a giant screen, US President Barack Obama reaffirmed his administration's support for "two states living side by side in peace and security. America's bonds with our Israeli allies are unbreakable," Mr Obama said, adding however that "Israel will not find security as long as Palestinians are in despair. We will never lose sight of our shared purpose for a just and lasting peace in Israel, in Palestine and in the Arab world."
Obama, Netanyahu hold strained talks US President Barack Obama hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for closed-door talks yesterday, amid friction between the two allies as US efforts to revive Middle East peace talks flounder. Mr Netanyahu left the White House after spending an hour and 40 minutes inside, without making the customary public appearance with the US President. A brief White House statement said the two leaders discussed a number of bilateral issues, including Iran and "how to move forward on Middle East peace". Ahead of the meeting, Mr Netanyahu said he was ready to immediately engage in peace negotiations, but prospects of renewed talks appear dimmer than ever. The summit was announced late on Sunday only after Mr Netanyahu had arrived in Washington, forcing officials on both sides to deny the last-minute invitation reflected US frustration with the hawkish premier.
Israeli prime ministers hardly ever go to Washington without meeting the US president, usually holding a high-profile press conference. Israel's ties with the Obama administration had been strained over Mr Netanyahu's refusal to heed the US demand for a full settlement freeze in the occupied West Bank ahead of a resumption of peace talks with the Palestinians.
The White House appeared anxious not to present yesterday's end-of-day meeting as a backing of Mr Netanyahu's stance. Mr Netanyahu yesterday urged moderate Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas, who last week announced he would not run for re-election in January, to renew the peace negotiations. Mr Abbas said he was "very close" to reaching a peace agreement with Israel before Mr Netanyahu's government assumed power at the end of March.
The Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
UN rights vote ends hope of Mid-East peace
Barry Rubin, © The New Republic
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs Centre and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs
The Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
The Australian
Daniel Pipes
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
The Australian
Abraham Rabinovich, Jerusalem
Monday, November 2, 2009
The Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
The Australian
Correspondents in Jerusalem, AFP
Thursday, November 5, 2009
The Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Additional reporting: agencies
Friday, November 6, 2009
Weekend Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Additional reporting: agencies
Saturday, November 7, 2009
AFP, AP
The Australian
AFP
Monday, November 9, 2009
The Australian
Correspondents in Washington, AFP
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
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Netanyahu says he won't impose any conditions
PARIS: Israel is ready to restart peace talks with Syria immediately and without conditions, a senior Israeli official said yesterday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Paris. Following talks in Paris with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, a senior Israeli travelling with the Prime Minister said: "Mr Sarkozy raised the issue of the Syrian track. The Prime Minister said he is willing to meet with the Syrian President at any time and anywhere to move on the peace negotiations on the basis of no pre-conditions."
Telephone talks arranged by Turkish mediators between the arch foes were broken off last year during Israel's offensive in Gaza, closing a promising diplomatic channel towards a broader Middle East settlement.
A short statement from Mr Sarkozy's office made no specific mention of Syria, whose President, Bashar al-Assad, is due in Paris today, but said the French and Israeli leaders had discussed ways to restart the peace process. Mr Netanyahu and Mr Sarkozy did not speak to reporters after their two-hour meeting in the Elysee Palace, and the Israeli leader set off for the airport immediately afterwards. The statement from Mr Sarkozy's office said the talks had included only the leaders and one senior adviser each.
Earlier, in Damascus, Mr Assad told a meeting of Arab political parties Syria would not "put forward conditions on making peace" but warned that it had "rights that we will not renounce", SANA news agency reported. The Paris meeting produced no sign of progress on peace between Israel and the Palestinians. On the eve of the visit, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said a "real political difference" separated Mr Sarkozy and Mr Netanyahu on Israel's continued building of settlements on Palestinian land. "We think that a freeze on settlements — that's to say, no more colonisation while talks are ongoing — would be absolutely indispensable," Mr Kouchner said. "We need talks and the peace process to restart."
President Mahmoud Abbas to benefit from poll axing JERUSALEM: Palestinian election officials say they cannot hold planned elections in January, which could give President Mahmoud Abbas a way to stay in office despite his threat to stand down — but could further roil Palestinian and Israeli politics. Mr Abbas's threat, and a wider breakdown of US-led peace efforts, are taking a toll in the Palestinian territories and on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government in Israel. The Israeli premier is coming under fire for not making headway towards peace.
Speaking at a televised news conference in Ramallah, Palestinian election officials said yesterday that Hamas's opposition to polling was the main obstacle. Hamas has rejected new elections until reaching a long-stalled reconciliation accord with Mr Abbas's Fatah. "We planned to go to Gaza to figure out how we can conduct elections there," said Hanna Nasser, head of the Palestinian Elections Commission. "We received an answer from Hamas that we are not welcome in Gaza. It is clear now that we cannot hold an election in Gaza."
If Mr Abbas accepts the commission's recommendation to cancel elections, it could allow the Palestinian leader to stay in office. He has threatened not to stand for re-election, blaming frustrations over the stalled peace process.
Calling off elections could present a mixed blessing for US-led peace efforts, analysts say. A Palestinian government that remains in power without scheduled elections could appear to have less legitimacy to make concessions in peace negotiations with Israel. Still, there is no obvious candidate to replace Mr Abbas at the helm of the Palestinian Authority, and were he to stand down, it could throw the US's peace efforts into further disarray.
Palestinians to ask for UN approval of separate state TENSIONS between Israel and the Palestinians have heightened after a suggestion by Palestinian leaders that they would seek international support to unilaterally declare a Palestinian state. Palestinian leaders yesterday announced that they would proceed with a proposal to approach the UN seeking recognition of a Palestinian state.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat told news agency AFP: "We have reached a decision . . . to go to the UN Security Council to ask for recognition of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital and with June 1967 borders. We're going to seek support from EU countries and Russia and other countries."
The proposal was immediately met with concern by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who said if the Palestinians acted unilaterally, then Israel could likewise act this way. "Any unilateral path will only unravel the framework of agreements between us and will only bring unilateral steps from Israel's side," he said, but he did not detail what those steps might be. "I want to begin negotiations immediately," Mr Netanyahu said. "These negotiations should be a good faith effort to reach a final peace agreement. My government is prepared to make generous concessions in exchange for a genuine peace that protects Israel's security."
Palestinian leaders, at least publicly, are abandoning the pursuit of a two-state agreement with Israel and are increasingly talking about a one-state solution or the unilateral declaration of a state within the borders which were in place before the 1967 war. Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad has raised the possibility of such a unilateral declaration within two years and over the weekend both Mr Erekat and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas repeated calls for a unilateral declaration. The change in rhetoric reflects a growing view on the Palestinian side that attempts by the Obama administration to restart peace talks have failed following Israel's refusal to agree to Barack Obama's request to freeze building activity in Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
Former US president Bill Clinton, in Jerusalem for a conference, yesterday re-entered the Middle East debate when he called on both sides of the conflict to resume negotiations, saying "you cannot get a divorce and move to another planet". He urged Israelis not to see the new US administration as against it and not to over-analyse the relationship between Mr Obama and Mr Netanyahu. "You should not think that President Obama is your enemy," he said.
"No American president can serve in good conscience and not be committed to the security of Israel."
He sounded a warning to Israelis that for two reasons — demographics and technology — it was in their interests to reach an agreement. In a reference to the high birth rate of Palestinians, he told Israelis: "If you want to be a democracy and a Jewish state, you have to cut a deal." He also said "the trajectory of technology is not your friend" — a reference to the possibility that with improving technology, Israel's enemies, such as Hamas in the Gaza strip, would be able to develop more accurate missiles.
Addressing Palestinians, he bluntly said they would achieve a far better outcome through negotiations than by any unilateral declaration of a state. He echoed the view of his wife, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who recently praised Israel for an "unprecedented" concession regarding slowing the growth of settlements in the West Bank. "This is the first time that any Israeli government has said we will not issue new permits and not have any new settlements and that should be enough to open the door and start talking," he said.
Israeli Information and Diaspora Minister Yuli Edelstein said Mr Erakat's comments "prove that among the Palestinian leaders, there are many who still believe that they can achieve their goals through violence and terrorism". "I hope the international community will not co-operate in this project and will speak out clearly in favour of the only possible approach, namely direct negotiations," Mr Edelstein said.
US anger as Israel approves housing RELATIONS between the US and Israel have again been set back with a reprimand by Washington over a plan by Israel to build 900 housing units in a sensitive suburb of Jerusalem. The White House said yesterday it was "dismayed" by a decision to proceed with the project - reportedly a day after US special envoy George Mitchell asked Israeli negotiators not to go ahead with the project. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat condemned the decision "in the strongest possible terms". "It shows that it is meaningless to resume negotiations when this goes on," Mr Erekat said.
But Israel insisted that the suburb, which was captured by Israel from Jordan during the 1967 war, was as much a part of Israel as any other suburb in Jerusalem. Mr Netanyahu's office issued a statement defending the decision to proceed in Gilo: "This concerns a routine procedure of the district planning commission. The neighbourhood of Gilo is an integral part of Jerusalem." Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said the US statement showed a double standard. "Israeli law does not discriminate between Arabs and Jews, or between east and west of the city," he said. "The demand to cease construction just for Jews is illegal, also in the US and any other enlightened place in the world. It is inconceivable that the US government would demand a construction freeze in the US based on race, religion or sex, and the attempt to demand this from Jerusalem constitutes a double standard and is unacceptable."
Gilo is a southern suburb of Jerusalem about a 20-minute drive from the centre of the city. Established after the 1967 war, its population in 2007 was about 32,000, according to the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies. It is sensitive as it is beyond the Green Line - the ceasefire line that prevailed between Israel and Jordan between the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the war in 1967.
After 1967, Gilo, which had been mainly vacant land, became one of Israel's major immigration centres but in the past 15 years has become a middle-class , almost exclusively Jewish, suburb. As an established Jewish suburb, it is considered by many Israelis and Palestinians as likely to remain part of Israel under any peace agreement in exchange for predominantly Palestinian suburbs and towns. Unlike outposts, which are illegal under Israeli law, suburbs such as Gilo have been incorporated into the Jerusalem municipal authority. The US believes that until any peace agreement is signed Israel should not develop such disputed land. Being part of the Jerusalem municipal authority means that should they be evacuated under a peace deal, the residents would be compensated by the Israeli government.
"At a time when we are working to re-launch negotiations, these actions make it more difficult for our efforts to succeed," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. The White House also took the opportunity in its statement to object to "other Israeli practices in Jerusalem related to housing, including the continuing pattern of evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes". Israel's decision to press ahead with the Gilo project is a direct snub to US President Barack Obama, who had made a settlements freeze a condition for negotiations to proceed in good faith with the Palestinians. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas also declared after a meeting in New York in September with Mr Obama and Mr Netanyahu that peace negotiations with Israel could not resume without a complete freeze of settlements.
Mr Mitchell was reported in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper to have made a late attempt on Monday to prevent the Gilo decision going ahead during discussions with Israeli officials in London. "We are dismayed at the Jerusalem Planning Committee's decision to move forward on the approval process for the expansion of Gilo in Jerusalem," the White House statement said yesterday. It added that neither side should take actions that could unilaterally pre-empt, or appear to pre-empt, negotiations. This last point was as much a warning to the Palestinians that they should not unilaterally seek recognition for an independent state without negotiations. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned Israel's decision, referring to Gilo as a settlement built on land "conquered from the Palestinians in 1967".
Extract - Israel on dangerous path: Obama US President Barack Obama has warned Israel that its policy of ignoring US pleas and continuing to expand housing in sensitive areas of Jerusalem could end up being "very dangerous". Israel yesterday rejected the condemnation of the Obama administration and other world leaders and proceeded to demolish two Palestinian homes — bringing to seven the number of Palestinian homes demolished this week in east Jerusalem. Mr Obama, in his strongest condemnation yet, warned that the development of 900 new houses in the disputed Jerusalem suburb of Gilo could "embitter Palestinians". He said it made it difficult to resume any peace talks. Israeli authorities said the Palestinian buildings it demolished yesterday had been illegally built.
Within Israel, the political leadership locked behind the decision to develop Gilo, a southern suburb captured by Israel from Jordan in the 1967 war. Opposition leader Tzipi Livni, who rarely supports Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said: "Gilo is part of the Israeli consensus." However, Ms Livni reportedly criticised the Netanyahu government's broader direction. According to Haaretz newspaper, Ms Livni said: "Israel has been de-legitimised and its position has been eroded." Urging Mr Netanyahu to begin negotiations with Palestinians, Ms Livni was reported to have said the government had "hurt Israel's ability to receive legitimacy for justified military operations".
As part of his quest to bring the Israelis and Palestinians together, Mr Obama had made it a condition of relaunching peace negotiations that no further settlements should proceed. But the Israeli government claims Gilo is part of Jerusalem and does not consider it West Bank land, where much dispute over Jewish settlements has occurred. US negotiators argued that when the US is trying to convince Palestinians to return to the negotiating table, such an announcement would be seen as provocative and possibly end any chance of peace talks.
The latest rebuff to the US marks a further deterioration in relations between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations. Speaking on Fox News, Mr Obama stressed he believed it was in Israel's interests not to build the settlements. The President said Israel's security was a vital national interest to the US, and reaffirmed that the US would make sure Israel remained secure. But he added: "I think that additional settlement building does not contribute to Israel's security. "I think it makes it harder for them to make peace with their neighbours."
Let's share power, says moderate Arab AS the shock departure of Mahmoud Abbas sinks in for Palestinians, Ahmad Aweidah is rising fast in the new generation of leaders. Mr Aweidah, 39, insists he is not interested in politics, though he's rarely shy about entering the major debates. He argues that Mr Abbas's successor be Nasser al-Qudwa, nephew of the late PLO chief Yasser Arafat, rather than the contender who polls highest among Palestinians, the jailed Marwan Bargouti.
As head of the Palestine Securities Exchange - responsible for $US7 billion ($7.6bn) in deposits and $US2bn in loans - Mr Aweidah refuses to join a political party and abhors Hamas's militant outlook. He says Arafat's major achievement was to give the Palestinians independence from countries such as Iran and Syria. He voted last election for Mr Abbas. On all these measures, he is a moderate, which is why it is ominous that someone like Mr Aweidah reflects a growing view among the Palestinian elite that the pursuit of a two-state solution is over. "In terms of one state, I think we should go with the Martin Luther King call of one man one vote," he said.
Palestinians, he said, should focus on a single state in which Palestinians were the majority. It would be a federal system under which the Israel Defence Forces would retain responsibility for defence. "Under one state, Jews and Arabs would share power at a local level for things like education and health, while things like water would be decided at a national level," he said. "The Jews would have their own canton and the Arabs would have their own canton. It would be a federal structure. The Palestinian canton would not be responsible for the defence of the country. I am happy for the Jewish canton to remain in charge of defence through the IDF. Not a single Palestinian would serve in the IDF. Jerusalem would be everybody's. Jews would be able to live in Hebron not as settlers but as full citizens. The Irish and the English resolved their conflict. The English and the Scots. There have been many other conflicts that have seemed as intractable as this one. It's better than continued conflict, is it not?"
In two recent interviews - one with foreign journalists and one with The Weekend Australian - Mr Aweidah argued that the possibility of a Palestinian state passed with the growth of Jewish settlements. Palestinian politician Mustafa Bargouti said this week that international pressure had encouraged Palestinians to seek a two-state solution - an independent Palestine alongside Israel - but that this was no longer realistic. Mr Aweidah agreed: "The two-state solution is no longer viable," he said. "I think the only solution now is one state where the Palestinians are the majority and the Jews are a protected minority, just like the whites are now in South Africa. Time and demographics are on our side. In 15 years' time, Palestinians will be the majority."
Mr Aweidah claims the Palestinians have a birth rate of 4.3 per cent. As with everything in this conflict, this is disputed. Israeli analyst Yoram Ettinger described it as "a fairytale". "We have come up with documented data, mostly Palestinian material, which determines that the trend is exactly the opposite," Mr Ettinger, head of research group Second Thought, told The Weekend Australian. He found the number of Arabs in Judea and Samaria had been inflated by 66 per cent, and the number of Arabs in Judea, Samaria and Gaza had been overestimated by 43 per cent. "The demographic tailwind is Jewish - the Arab birth rate is coming down in a free dive," he said. However, prominent Israelis such as opposition leader Tzipi Livni continue to sound the demographic alarm for the Jewish population.
As Washington's push to resume peace talks sinks, Palestinians more frequently are speaking about a unitary state. "What have we got from 15 years of negotiating since Oslo?" Mr Aweidah said. "Today we're sitting behind a wall with 500,000 Jewish settlers. So what will we get from another 15 years of negotiations - one million settlers? The Jews say `never again' about the Shoah. We say `never again' about losing more years negotiating for nothing."
Asked of Israelis who would resist his vision out of fear for the end of the Jewish state, he said: "But it would be the birth of the Jewish canton. Don't worry, we will be good to them. They will be treated as a protected minority. We are not interested in oppressing them. Historically, we don't have a problem with Jews. Anti-semitism is not an Arab or Muslim thing, it's primarily been a Christian thing." Mr Aweidah says his views are typical today. The question is, if the moderates are speaking like this in public, how are the hardliners speaking in private?
Same day
Israel can't take US support for granted ISRAEL has surely lost more this week in support abroad - in the US, above all - than it has gained in asserting its right to build houses around Jerusalem. This is an incomplete list of those who condemned the plans to build 900 new housing units in Gilo, in East Jerusalem: China, Russia, the European Union, Britain and France, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, Egypt, Jordan. US President Barack Obama expressed dismay and the White House issued a stinging second blast.
It takes something to unite your friends and enemies against you. Israel is taking to a reckless level the indifference it shows to foreign opinion, even that of the US. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister, is wrongly assuming two things will never change. The first is that the US will always veto a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israel. Obama is not about to make an historic switch to abstention, but his officials say it's no longer taboo. Nor, for now, is the council about to recognise a unilateral declaration of statehood that some Palestinian leaders want to make. But again, it's not unthinkable.
Netanyahu's officials have wheeled out arguments for Gilo, which they present as decisive, but these ring hollow. One is that the 40,000-strong town is part of Jerusalem, and will be part of Israel under any Palestinian deal. That ignores the disputes since its creation. Gilo sits east of the 1967 line on land Israel captured in that war, and divides Bethlehem from East Jerusalem, still largely Arab, which Palestinians want as their capital.
A second claim is that there is a huge consensus for building in Jerusalem, and no leader could ignore that, nor move to share Jerusalem with the Palestinians. Indeed, Tzipi Livni, leader of the opposition Kadima party, has backed Netanyahu on Gilo. But popularity does not confer legitimacy.
Israel makes light of the diminution of support abroad. Its best, urgent call on that support stems from its justified fears of terrorism and attack. Obama rightly said Israel needed security, and the US would uphold it. But Israel's weakest claim is that settlements have much to do with security. Netanyahu should take note of Obama's warning to Hamid Karzai, sworn in on Thursday as Afghan President: no one should take US support for granted.
Weekend Australian
Wall Street Journal
Saturday, November 14, 2009
The Australian
John Lyons Middle East correspondent
With agencies
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
The Australian
John Lyons and Brad Norington
Thursday, November 19, 2009
The Australian
John Lyons and Brad Norington
Friday, November 20, 2009
Weekend Australian
John Lyons, Middle East correspondent
Saturday, November 21, 2009
ANALYSIS: Bronwen Maddox, The Times
| Source: Peace Now |
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IT was the moment the Palestinians might have had a state, with a capital in East Jerusalem. For a single moment, the dove of peace hovered hopefully over the Middle East. On September 16 last year, the then Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, offered the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, the most far-reaching and comprehensive peace deal any Israeli prime minister has ever offered. Mr Olmert recalls his pleas to Mr Abbas to accept the deal: "I said to him, do you want to keep floating forever - like an astronaut in space - or do you want a state? I told him he'd never get anything like this again from an Israeli leader for 50 years."
Mr Olmert, who as a rule avoids the media these days, has undertaken hours of discussion and interviews with The Weekend Australian and provided unprecedented detail of his peace offer to Mr Abbas. The interviews took place amid growing tension over West Bank settlements. Palestinians appealed to the US yesterday to raise pressure on Israel, saying an Israeli plan to halt new construction in the West Bank was insincere. Presidential adviser Yasser Abed Rabbo urged US envoy George Mitchell to bring about "a real peace process" that would halt all settlement construction.
Mr Olmert says such disputes could have been resolved with his deal. He recalls meeting Mr Abbas more than 35 times for "intense, serious" negotiations, in the two years leading up to the September 16 offer last year. Mr Olmert says his offer to Mr Abbas included a Palestinian state occupying 94 per cent of the West Bank and all of Gaza. This would have allowed Israel to keep the major Jewish population areas in the settlements in the West Bank.
But in return he would have given the Palestinians an equal parcel of land from Israel proper in compensation. He offered Palestinian sovereignty over all the Arab areas of East Jerusalem, so that it could function as a capital for the new Palestinian state. Dividing Jerusalem is an explosive issue in Israeli politics. Mr Olmert recalls his own struggle to come to grips with his offer on Jerusalem: "This was a very sensitive, very painful, soul-searching process. While I firmly believed that historically and emotionally Jerusalem was always the capital of the Jewish people, I was ready that the city should be shared."
Perhaps Mr Olmert's most radical and audacious proposal was for an international administration of the sites in Jerusalem holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians. Mr Olmert proposed forming an area of "no sovereignty" to be administered jointly by Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the new Palestinian state, Israel and the US. He offered to build a tunnel, under Palestinian control, between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Mr Olmert says every European leader, and senior Americans, who knew of the plan acknowledged it as the most far-reaching and extensive peace offer Israel has made.
Mr Olmert still regards Mr Abbas as a peace partner for Israel. "I think he's genuine in his desire to achieve a Palestinian state and he recognises the right of Israel to exist," he says. Mr Olmert speculates that Mr Abbas didn't accept the deal because he felt he could not deliver the Palestinian commitment to it, or perhaps because he feared the outcome of approaching Israeli elections. But nor did Mr Abbas directly reject the deal. Instead he said he wanted to bring experts back with him the next day. But the next day, the Palestinians' chief negotiator postponed the meeting. "I never saw him again," Mr Olmert says.
Click here for the whole interview.
Jewish settlers up in arms over settlement freeze ISRAEL'S leadership is attempting to quell a growing revolt by Jewish settlers in the West Bank angry about the government's freeze of new construction for 10 months. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was to meet leaders from the settlements overnight to try to convince them to support the moratorium, which he announced following US calls for a settlement freeze. In the face of the revolt, Mr Netanyahu has said building in the settlements would resume as soon as the 10 months had passed.
And Defence Minister Ehud Barak yesterday told settlers that their communities, which have been built in disputed territory that Palestinians want as part of any future Palestinian state, would remain part of Israel in any final agreement. "Settlement blocs will be an integral part of Israel in any future negotiations with the Palestinians," he said. Mr Barak added: "I know that this step is a difficult one but this is a step essential to the state of Israel today."
He made the comments at what was intended to be a meeting of key leaders of the settlements. However, as a protest, only four representatives attended the meeting and the rest boycotted it. There were more clashes in settlements yesterday between police, who have been asked to enforce the settlement freeze, and settlers, some of whom have vowed to prevent inspectors from gaining access. Five settlers were arrested, including Beit Aryeh council leader Avi Naim. Mr Naim was later taken to hospital after telling police he was feeling chest pains. Before leaving for hospital, he said: "I was arrested for no reason, and had done nothing. The police delayed my evacuation to hospital. This was despite the demand of the Magen David Adom (ambulance) personnel in the intensive care ambulance to take me to Tel Hashomer immediately."
The government has been branded as anti-Jewish and anti-Zionist, and many settlers have said they feel abandoned. Among the protests is a strong hostility towards the administration of US President Barack Obama. Many settlers blame Mr Obama for pressuring Israel into the moratorium. Mr Obama had wanted a complete and permanent freeze on expansion of Jewish settlements to allow peace talks with Palestinians to resume. While the US has said the moratorium does not go as far as it wanted, it has also described it as a significant development towards peace talks.
While the government is facing an on-the-ground revolt, about 50 key Likud party figures and mayors yesterday met Mr Netanyahu to express support for his decision on the freeze. They also said they would not tolerate any Likud figures using the decision to undermine him. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party, also defended the decision.
But he said Israel would not continue to make concessions to Palestinians.
Palestinian leadership has dismissed the moratorium as inadequate — they say its limited time-frame and the fact that construction in disputed East Jerusalem will continue means it is insufficient. Politically, while the anger from Jewish settlers creates a problem for Mr Netanyahu inside elements of his own right-wing coalition government, it also serves to send a message to Washington, the international community and the Palestinians that the moratorium is a real concession.
Same day
Australia a 'leader of the free world' SILVAN Shalom, Israel's Deputy Prime Minister, has a higher estimation of Australia than perhaps even most Australians do - he believes Australia is a leader of the free world and as such its strong support for Israel is critically important.
Mr Shalom is leading a delegation of 30 from Israel, the most high-powered and influential Israeli delegation to visit Australia, for the second Australia Israel Leadership Forum. At a lunch in Sydney attended by Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott, Mr Shalom thanked Australia for two recent acts of solidarity with Israel and the Jewish people.
One was to reject the one-sided Goldstone Report, which accused Israel of war crimes in the Gaza Strip. The other was to boycott the UN Anti-Racism Durban 11 conference, at which Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made his usual anti-Israel rant.
"Australia is one of the major leaders of the free world," Mr Shalom told The Australian in Sydney. "There is the US, the EU, Japan, Canada and Australia that people always look to. "With Australia leading with such a line which is supportive of Israel, with the US and Canada, this is tremendously important. I really believe there is a friendship between the peoples of Israel and Australia, based on common values of democracy, freedom, human rights, the rule of law (and) Western culture."
He urged the Palestinian Authority leadership to resume negotiations with the Israeli government. Asked why he believed the Palestinians were refusing to do this, he said: "The Palestinians really believe the Americans might bring concessions from Israel without them having to make any concessions of their own." This is an implicit rebuke to the Obama administration for its decision early on to demand a freeze on all Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank, even within Jewish areas of Jerusalem. The Palestinians then made this a condition of resuming talks, but the Americans have been unable to deliver this freeze.
However, Mr Shalom would not make any direct criticism of the Obama administration: "I know this demand (for a total freeze on building within settlements) was never made of any other prime minister of Israel and yet they made far-reaching offers and concessions to the Palestinians." Mr Shalom said the Palestinians were deeply mistaken if they thought it represented a weakening of US solidarity with Israel: "The Obama administration is very friendly to Israel and committed to Israel's security."
Mr Shalom said he was greatly encouraged by Barack Obama's decision this week to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan. "It shows the US administration is committed to bringing peace and security to Afghanistan. It also shows other extremists that the US is really serious about their intention to fight extremists and terrorists."
Also, Same day
Ex-Israeli spy chief warns about Iran THE escalating war in Afghanistan must not distract Australia and the US from dealing with the threat posed by Iran's nuclear ambitions, according to one of Israel's foremost security experts. Avi Dichter — former head of Israel's domestic spy service, Shin Bet, and a leading figure in the opposition Kadima party — said the West could no longer afford to ignore Iran's growing defiance of international efforts to curb its suspected nuclear program. "I think the United States has a scale (of priorities) and Iran is not first or second on that scale," Mr Dichter said. "I think the threat in Iran should be promoted on that (priority) scale."
Mr Dichter, who has been touted as a possible future Israeli prime minister, spoke with The Australian shortly before meeting Kevin Rudd as part of the Australia Israel Leadership Forum in Sydney. The former Israeli minister for internal security and the head of Shin Bet from 2000 to 2005, said the threat posed by a nuclear-armed Iran was directly relevant to Australia's interests. "Iran is a global threat,' he said. "A threat like Iran is like a disease: you know when it starts but never when it stops." He said Australia had shown its credentials as a nation willing to combat terrorism and it was important that Australia's voice in international forums be heard on the issue of Iran.
Iran was condemned this week for escalating its nuclear program by announcing it would build 10 new uranium enrichment facilities. Tehran maintains the facilities would be used only for civilian purposes, but Western intelligence agencies believe they would be used to assist Iran's suspected clandestine nuclear weapons program. Iran's announcement was seen as provocative and has prompted one of its allies, Russia, to declare that it is ready to back sanctions against Tehran's nuclear program.
Mr Dichter said Iran's behaviour was not surprising, "because if we expect them to behave in a rational way we are simply wrong".
"It is well known to all intelligence services that Iran is determined to have a nuclear bomb," he said. "It is not a question of 'if', it is a question of 'when' — whether it is going to be in two years or in five years."
Mr Dichter was coy about whether Israel, which regards Tehran's nuclear ambitions as a direct threat, might take unilateral military action against Iran, saying he believed it was up to the US to take the lead in international efforts to confront Iran on the nuclear issue. "This should be a role for superpowers and Israel is not a superpower," he said. Mr Dichter said he fully supported the West's campaign to combat terrorism in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, but he warned that these campaigns must not blind the West to the urgency of dealing with Iran's nuclear ambitions.
Click here for the whole interview.
The Australian
John Lyons Middle East correspondent
Friday, December 4, 2009
Greg Sheridan, Foreign editor
Cameron Stewart
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BENJAMIN Netanyahu is preparing to announce major new concessions to Jewish settlers in the West Bank after up to 10,000 people closed off streets near the Israeli Prime Minister's Jerusalem residence to protest against the 10-month freeze on new construction activity. Mr Netanyahu will take a redrawn map of "priority areas" to Sunday's cabinet meeting, which would bestow "national priority status" for employment, education and infrastructure on 110,000 settlers not covered by government concessions.
According to briefings given by the Prime Minister's office to Israeli media yesterday, the new concessions will cost 110 million shekels ($32m) and are designed to "encourage population dispersal in the state of Israel and increase the population of the periphery and of areas near the border" and "to preserve and bolster national security stamina". The newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth said under the national priority status, every minister in the government would be obliged to allocate more resources, in relative terms, to communities inside national priority areas than those outside, such as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. The paper reported: "The Education Ministry, for example, is obliged to allocate a greater number of teaching hours, the National Infrastructure Ministry is obliged to allocate a supplementary sum for paving roads and laying train tracks and the Housing and Construction Ministry is obliged to grant discounts on the allocation of lands from the Israel Lands Administration."
Upgrading the status of the settlers, most of whom are in smaller settlements outside the main settlement blocs, is an attempt to defuse the anger reflected by demonstrators in Jerusalem who targeted US President Barack Obama, Mr Netanyahu and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who they blamed for the moratorium. "The message from here is very clear," said National Union politician Michael Ben-Ari. "The Jews have been exiled enough. If there is a people that has to be evacuated and should not be here, it is not the Jewish people." Speakers vowed not to allow a repeat of 2005 when settlers in Gaza were forcibly withdrawn as part of a "disengagement" from Gaza. National Union politician Arieh Eldad told the rally: "We are giving a simple Zionist response to the freeze: this will be our miracle of rebellion, we will build everywhere, everywhere."
One figure from Mr Netanyahu's Likud party, Tzipi Hotovely, said the real battle was over Jerusalem rather than Judea and Samaria, the biblical name for the West Bank. Referring to a resolution this week by the European Union — which said the status of Jerusalem should be negotiated as part of any final status agreement between Israelis and Palestinians — Ms Hotovely said: "When the European Union wishes to declare Jerusalem the capital of Palestine, it's not a struggle over Judea and Samaria but over Jerusalem."
The resettlement of those who left Gaza for Israel continues to be a political issue in Israel, with claims that many of them have not been provided the housing or support they were promised at the time of the withdrawal. In the lead-up to the election in February, Mr Netanyahu criticised the disengagement from Gaza, saying that in return all Israel received was rockets from Hamas.
Same day
Egypt to block tunnels under Gaza
Correspondents in Cairo, Agencies
EGYPT has enlisted American help to begin constructing a huge metal wall along its border with the Gaza Strip as it attempts to cut smuggling tunnels from the Palestinian territory. Reports last night said the wall would be 10-11km long and would extend 18m below the surface. The Egyptians are being helped by American army engineers, who the BBC reported had designed the wall. The plan has been shrouded in secrecy, with no comment or confirmation from the Egyptian government, the BBC report said.
Israeli media reported yesterday that Egyptian engineers were carrying out major excavation work at the Gaza border and that an anti-smuggling barrier was under construction. Workers were placing 20m-long pipes every 4m or so along the border with the Palestinian territory, which Israel has long complained has been vulnerable to arms smuggling. The Israelis say the tunnels are used to smuggle people, weapons, and the components of the rockets that are fired at southern Israeli towns by Hamas. Security forces prevented journalists from getting nearer than 200m away from the works but residents said that heavy construction equipment had been deployed the length of the fence that separates the two sides of the divided border town of Rafah.
Municipal official Suleiman al-Bair said residents whose property had been affected had received compensation but he said he could not confirm the purpose of the work. The Israeli daily Haaretz reported that the aim was to construct a massive underground iron wall the whole 9-10km length of the border. The newspaper cited Egyptian sources as saying that the barrier would extend 20-30m underground in an attempt to block all but the most determined smuggling. "It will be impossible to cut or melt," the newspaper said, although it added: "It is not expected to stem smuggling completely."
Israel has repeatedly complained that Egypt has not done enough to prevent trafficking into Gaza, including arms smuggling by its Islamist Hamas rulers. But in recent months, Cairo has destroyed large numbers of tunnels, using detection equipment provided by Washington. Israel has closed off Gaza to all but very limited basic supplies since Hamas seized it from loyalists of Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in June 2007. The territory has since been dependent on smuggling for all but those supplies and the border is honeycombed with tunnels, which often collapse, sometimes killing the smugglers.
The wall would reportedly take 18 months to complete. The BBC reported the wall was manufactured in the US, that it fits together in similar fashion to a jigsaw, and that it has been tested to ensure it is bomb-proof. Intelligence sources in Egypt told the broadcaster 4km of the wall had already been completed north of the Rafah crossing, with work now beginning to the south.
Extract - Tehran is testing bomb components CONFIDENTIAL intelligence documents show that Iran is working on testing a key final component of a nuclear bomb. The notes, from Iran's most sensitive military nuclear project, describe a four-year plan to test a neutron initiator, the component of a nuclear bomb that triggers an explosion. Foreign intelligence agencies date them to early 2007, four years after Iran was thought to have suspended its weapons program.
An Asian intelligence source last week confirmed that his country also believed that weapons work was being carried out as recently as 2007 — specifically, work on a neutron initiator. The technical document describes the use of a neutron source, uranium deuteride, which independent experts confirm has no possible civilian or military use other than in a nuclear weapon. Uranium deuteride is the material used in Pakistan's bomb, from where Iran obtained its blueprint.
"Although Iran might claim that this work is for civil purposes, there is no civil application," said David Albright, a physicist and president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington, which has analysed hundreds of pages of documents related to the Iranian program. "This is a very strong indicator of weapons work." The documents have been seen by intelligence agencies from several Western countries. A senior source at the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed they had been passed to the UN's nuclear watchdog. A British Foreign and Commonwealth Office spokeswoman said yesterday: "We do not comment on intelligence, but our concerns about Iran's nuclear program are clear. Obviously this document, if authentic, raises serious questions about Iran's intentions." Responding to the findings, an Israeli government spokesperson said: "Israel is increasingly concerned about the state of the Iranian nuclear program and the real intentions that may lie behind it."
Same day
Israeli Prime Minister faces explosive decision THE moment is fast approaching when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have to make the most difficult decision of his career — whether to launch a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities and risk triggering a conflagration that could spread across the Middle East. Israeli experts believe the point of no return may be only six months away when Iran's nuclear program will have — if it has not already — metastasised into a multitude of smaller, difficult-to-trace facilities in deserts and mountains, while its main reactor at Bushehr will be online, and bombing it would send a radioactive cloud over the Gulf nations.
Mr Netanyahu has consistently called Iran the most serious threat that Israel faces. Its President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has called for Israel to be obliterated, and his Revolutionary Guards supply training, money and weapons to both Hezbollah in Lebanon, on Israel's northern border, and to Hamas in the Gaza Strip, whose missiles are believed to be capable of reaching Tel Aviv. In the run-up to his election this year, Mr Netanyahu promised that "under my government, Iran will not be allowed to go nuclear". Yet Mr Ahmadinejad has promised to produce 20 per cent enriched uranium: a big step towards weapons-grade fuel.
With the Iranian threat at the front of his strategic thinking, Mr Netanyahu has surrounded himself with old comrades from Israel's most prestigious military unit, the Sayeret Matkal, or General Staff Reconnaissance. Mr Netanyahu served in the elite unit in the 1970s under Ehud Barak, who went on to become Israel's most decorated soldier and later prime minister. When Mr Netanyahu came to power, he made great efforts to recruit his former commander as defence minister. Mr Barak serves with another former leader of the unit, Deputy Prime Minister Moshe "Bogie" Yaalon. The Israeli Prime Minister has hard-wired his core cabinet with so much military experience for a good reason. Striking Iran's nuclear facilities will be a huge military and political gamble. Although Russia has delayed supplying Iran with S300 anti-aircraft missiles, which could weaken any Israeli attack, the air force would have to mount one of its largest long-range attacks to have a chance of disabling Iran's nuclear installations.
Earlier this year a report by Anthony Cordesman of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, warned that "a military strike by Israel against Iranian nuclear facilities is possible . . . (but) would be complex and high-risk and would lack any assurances that the overall mission will have a high success rate". In 2007, in what is often seen as a trial run for an attack on Iran, an Israeli squadron flew undetected through Turkish airspace and over Syria's border to destroy what was thought to be a nuclear facility under construction with Iranian and North Korean support. In June last year, the air force staged exercises over the Mediterranean, with dozens of fighters, bombers and refuelling tankers flying roughly the same distance as between Israel and Iran. Earlier this year, Israeli jets again carried out a long-range bombing mission, hitting trucks in Sudan that were believed to be bringing Iranian weapons to Hamas via Egypt.
In the immediate term, the threat of a strike has receded. Israel is satisfied that Iran's hostile stance towards the international community has increased the chances of serious, crippling sanctions. Officials noted that for the first time Russia seemed to be serious about isolating Tehran. But that international front could easily crack, and then Mr Netanyahu would be faced with the decision on whether to order his bombers into action. Iran has already threatened to bomb Israel's cities with its long-range missiles should its nuclear facilities come under attack, but that is only one of its many options. It could also, in stages, order Hezbollah to launch rockets across the northern border. Or both sides may choose to do nothing. Some analysts believe that Israel might tolerate Iran as a "threshold nuclear state", capable of building a bomb but not testing it.
Iran could well opt for the path chosen by Syria in 2007, if Israel strikes at isolated facilities far from an urban areas, where the only casualties would be technicians and guards. After a similar strike against Syria, neither side admitted what had happened, thereby avoiding a war and saving face.
Iran's bomb work hardens US hearts REVELATIONS that Iran has been working secretly on a trigger for a nuclear bomb urgently underscore the case for tough new sanctions against Tehran, the Obama administration says. Referring to a report in The Times that suggested Iran had been working on testing a key final component of a nuclear bomb, a senior US official said: "Now that work may have been done on a trigger mechanism, this certainly gives urgency, in the absence of any meaningful response from Tehran . . . in terms of additional pressure on sanctions." The official added: "The revelations that work has been done (on a nuclear trigger) do add a sense of urgency and these revelations certainly don't hurt." The reaction from Washington comes as the US begins a push to get China and Russia to back a tough new set of sanctions against Iran after a year in which Tehran has snubbed President Barack Obama's overtures to open a diplomatic dialogue over its nuclear program.
Meanwhile, Israel — described by a Saudi source as a "huge obstacle" in freeing the region of nuclear weapons — used increasingly aggressive rhetoric over the threat from Iran. Making clear that Israel reserves the right to launch a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak warned "all players not to remove any options from the table", adding: "We do not remove it . . . There is a need for tough sanctions, something that is well and coherently co-ordinated to include Americans, the EU, the Chinese, the Russians (and) the Indians."
At the same time, Middle Eastern diplomats warned of a regional nuclear arms race and demanded greater involvement in diplomatic efforts to force an Iranian climbdown.
The revelations about work on the nuclear trigger, contained in confidential intelligence documents obtained by The Times and which foreign intelligence agencies date to early 2007, come as the Obama administration enters a new phase over Iran's nuclear ambitions. After months of largely fruitless efforts to establish a dialogue with Tehran, the administration now hopes to get meaningful sanctions out of the UN, something that requires the co-operation of Russia and China. US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Friday that world powers would soon impose "significant additional sanctions" on Iran. At a news conference with the Spanish Foreign Minister, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signalled that a push for sanctions may be coming soon. She said US concerns "have been heightened already".
Same day
Israeli leaders 'harassed' on Gaza records ISRAEL claims political and military leaders are being "harassed" by anti-Israeli groups who are using the international legal system to seek arrest warrants for war crimes over the Gaza conflict. The latest incident came yesterday after a court in London reportedly issued an arrest warrant against Israel's foreign minister during the Gaza war, Tzipi Livni, now opposition leader. Ms Livni's office denied her planned trip to London was cancelled because of any legal threat, citing her inability to secure a meeting with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown because of his schedule. But it appears the court issued the warrant believing she would be in Britain for the trip.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told The Australian there had been a great deal of confusion whether the arrest warrant had been issued. He said the Israeli embassy in London confirmed reports that one had been issued. The details of the warrant were unclear. "But it appears that anti-Israeli and pro-Palestinian groups are filing suits in a number of countries in order to harass Israeli political and military leaders," Mr Palmor said. "These suits never materialise into anything, and for good reason, but they're very annoying. What the law allows, the law allows. But if it allows for people to harass foreign leaders, then there is a problem, and they should be able to find a way to stop this."
The British Foreign Office issued a statement saying: "The UK is determined to do all it can to promote peace in the Middle East and to be a strategic partner of Israel. To do this, Israel's leaders need to be able to come to the UK for talks with the British government. We are looking urgently at the implications of this case."
British reports said it was the second time in months that lawyers had gone to a magistrates court in London after a warrant for the arrest of an Israeli politician. The Guardian reported yesterday that in September the court was asked to issue a warrant for the arrest of Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak under the 1988 Criminal Justice Act, which gives courts in England and Wales universal jurisdiction in war crimes cases. It said Mr Barak, attending a meeting at the British Labour Party conference in Brighton at the time, avoided arrest when the Foreign Office told the court he was a serving minister who would be meeting his British counterparts, which gave him immunity.
Ministers hoping for private visits to Britain now asked the Israeli embassy in London to arrange meetings with British officials to ensure legal protection. But the newspaper said Ms Livni, no longer a minister, could not enjoy such immunity nor could Ehud Olmert, then prime minister and now a private citizen. Israeli media said the legal situation may deter Israeli politicians from travelling to Britain. Ms Livni's office said she was "proud" of the decisions she made during the Gaza war and would "continue presenting her view everywhere around the world".
Peace possible within six months: Abbas PALESTINIAN leader Mahmoud Abbas has declared that a final-status agreement between Israelis and Palestinians can be completed within six months if Israel freezes all construction in Jewish settlements and in East Jerusalem. In the most optimistic timeframe given by any key player in the Middle East in recent times, Mr Abbas said he had put a fresh proposal to Israel's Defence Minster, Ehud Barak. Mr Abbas made the comments in a wide-ranging interview with the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
Israel has announced a 10-month freeze on new construction in the West Bank but Palestinians say it is inadequate because it fails to include Arab-dominated East Jerusalem and allows for at least another 3000 new houses and public buildings to be built. The Abbas comments suggest that East Jerusalem — the most sensitive issue of all as both Israelis and Palestinians want Jerusalem as their capital — is the major obstacle to new peace talks.
"I suggested to him (Mr Barak) three weeks ago that Israel freeze all construction in the settlements for six months, including East Jerusalem," Mr Abbas said. "But I demanded that construction stop . . . during this time, we can get back to the table and even complete talks on a final-status agreement. I have yet to receive an answer. They tell me I had not previously demanded a construction freeze in the settlements. True, in 1993 we didn't do so, but then there were no agreements about a freeze. Now there is the road map."
The road map was an agreement brokered in 2003 by the Middle East Quartet — the UN, US, Russia and the European Union — and backed by former US president George W. Bush. With the aim of a formal agreement by 2005 leading to a two-state solution, Israel agreed to halt all settlement activity and gradually withdraw from the West Bank while Palestinians agreed to cease all terrorist activities and incitement to violence against Israel and to improve security in the West Bank.
"So come and see what we did," Mr Abbas said in the interview. "The security situation throughout the West Bank is excellent. But what steps have you (Israel) taken so far? You have not met a single clause in the road map. You removed a few roadblocks and there are still 640. Every day there are arrests, house demolitions. I don't understand why. We have security co-ordination, so why do this?"
Mark Regev, the spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told The Australian yesterday that in a speech Mr Abbas gave in Arabic yesterday to a Palestinian conference, he included preconditions that he did not include in the interview. "What is of concern to us is that yesterday in the speech in Arabic, Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) placed more reasons why we can't start negotiations," Mr Regev said. "Up until now, he was talking about a settlement freeze. Now he is adding (a return to) 1967 borders. It's like we have to accept the outcome of negotiations before negotiations start. We are concerned that they are trying to avoid negotiations. The reason we haven't been negotiating is the Palestinians have been placing new preconditions on talks."
Asked about Mr Abbas's claim that he had put a proposal to Mr Barak and had not received any response, Mr Regev said: "Let's be fair: the 10-month cessation of new housing in the West Bank is unprecedented and has been called as such internationally. No Israeli government has ever gone so far. Internally in Israel, groups such as Peace Now have called it historic. Yet he (Mr Abbas) ignores it. It doesn't make sense to me."
US warns Chinese on Iran nuclear threat JERUSALEM: US President Barack Obama has warned his Chinese counterpart that Washington would not be able to keep Israel from attacking Iranian nuclear installations for much longer, reports said yesterday. Israeli officials told Haaretz Mr Obama warned Chinese President Hu Jintao during the US President's visit to Beijing a month ago as part of the US attempt to convince the Chinese to support strict sanctions on Tehran if it does not accept Western proposals for its nuclear program. The Israeli officials said the US had informed Israel about Mr Obama's meetings in Beijing on Iran. They said Mr Obama made it clear to Mr Hu that at some point the US would no longer be able to prevent Israel from acting as it saw fit in response to the perceived Iranian threat, the report said.
After the Beijing summit, the US administration thought the Chinese had understood the message — Beijing agreed to join the condemnation of Iran by the International Atomic Energy Agency only a week after Mr Obama's visit. But in the past two weeks the Chinese have maintained their hard stance on the West's wishes to impose sanctions on the Islamic republic.
The Israeli officials told the paper the Americans now understood that the Chinese agreed to join the condemnation announcement only because Mr Obama made a personal request to Mr Hu, not as part of a policy change. The Chinese have even refused a Saudi-American initiative designed to end Chinese dependence on Iranian oil, which would allow China to agree to the sanctions, the Israeli officials told the paper. Saudi Arabia, which is also worried about the Iranian nuclear program and keen to advance international steps against Iran, offered to supply the Chinese the same quantity of oil the Iranians now provide, and at much lower prices, Haaretz said. But China rejected the deal.
Since Mr Obama's visit, the Chinese have refused to join any measures to impose sanctions. The Israeli officials told the paper Russian President Dmitry Medvedev was showing a greater willingness for sanctions on Iran, despite hesitations by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
Western governments yesterday united to denounce Iran's test-firing of a long-range ballistic missile, warning it would only increase international determination to press for more sanctions if Tehran refused to negotiate over its nuclear program. Britain, the US, France and Germany condemned the rocket launch. Germany called the test alarming, and France described it as "a very bad signal to the international community".
The first test of an improved version of the Sejil-2 missile, which is capable of reaching Israel and US bases in the Gulf, was reported on Wednesday in a one-sentence announcement on Iranian state television. The extended range of 1930km puts not only targets across the Middle East within striking distance, but also reaches southeastern Europe.
'Paralysing force' to remove Israeli settlers IN what settler spokesmen called a declaration of war against them, the Israeli army has drawn up a plan to employ "paralysing power" to enforce demolition of structures built in defiance of the 10-month construction freeze declared by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. A 17-page document leaked to the press over the weekend calls for employment of overwhelming force to overcome anticipated resistance by the settlers. Reading like a battle order, the document calls for surprise raids on targeted settlements, deployment of forces in an outer ring to prevent reinforcement from other settlements, reconnaissance flights by the air force, shutdown of mobile phone service to the affected area and closure of the operation to press coverage. All intelligence agencies, including military intelligence and the Shin Bet security service, would be involved.
The tone of the document, suggesting an unprecedented toughness in dealing with settler resistance, reflects Mr Netanyahu's aim of demonstrating to US President Barack Obama and the international community that he is serious about the construction freeze he announced last month. Mr Obama had called for a total freeze in order to open the way to negotiations between the Palestinians and Israel.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has so far declined to reopen negotiations, saying the freeze does not go far enough in that it does not apply to East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians see as their future capital, and also does not apply to more than 2000 housing units "in the pipeline". Still, Washington is hoping that vigorous enforcement of the partial freeze will persuade Mr Abbas to drop objections.
Previous attempts by Israel to remove unauthorised structures built by settlers in the West Bank have frequently been half-hearted. When pressed home, they have met violent resistance by settlers from the affected settlements and others who came to their assistance. The air force has been overflying settlements since the freeze was announced to monitor violations. Demolitions will be carried out by the Israeli civil administration in the West Bank under protection of the police and the paramilitary border police. The army is to provide troops but only in an outer ring to avoid direct involvement of the soldiers, some of whom themselves are from settler families, in the demolitions.
There have been two incidents in recent weeks in which such soldiers have held up placards during ceremonies decrying the destruction of houses in settlements. The soldiers involved were sentenced to several weeks in military prisons. The document says that soldiers will be brought into the settlements to deal with resistance only in the case of "extreme violence". Army commanders have been ordered to prepare for cases of insubordination. "There is no concrete intelligence about intention (of settlers) to take up arms but this scenario cannot be discounted," says the document.
Prepared by the army's Central Command, which is responsible for the West Bank, the document notes that settlers are likely to resist demolitions forcefully, since they fear the action heralds plans for a large scale evacuation of entire settlements, such as in the Gaza Strip four years ago. Physical force would likely have to be used against the settlers, it says.
Tehran leaders lose touch but protesters lack organisation PARIS: Iran's regime has lost touch with the aspirations of its people but it is still far from certain that the opposition protest movement is ready to seize power, experts say. The street battles that rocked Tehran and other major cities over the Ashura holiday show the demonstrations have entered a new phase, with increased state repression and more violent incidents. But unlike the 1979 revolution that overthrew the shah, Iran's latest uprising is not led by a well-organised opposition in exile.
The largely spontaneous protest movement does not appear poised to take over. Former Iranian legislator Ahmad Salamatian said the civic revolt was "not organised and non-hierarchical" and warned that "it should not fall into the trap of violence, because it's not clear that the middle classes would follow". "Meanwhile, the agents of repression will do everything to trigger a violent showdown," he said in Paris, describing the battle for representative government as "a marathon, not a boxing bout".
Several Iran experts said the response of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's government to the protests triggered by June's disputed election reminded them of the last days of the shah. The mounting anger on the streets, where protesters are increasingly taking on the police and members of the Basij militia, shows the frustration of a public that is more in tune with the modern world than are their leaders.
Francois Nicoullaud, French ambassador in Tehran between 2001 and 2005, said protests had now spread beyond the capital to the city of Tabriz in the northwest, a centre of opposition to the shah during a revolution in 1905, and considered a political bellwether. "Ironically, the current regime now faces the same dilemma as the shah," he said. "It is toughening its stance and in doing so, it runs the risk of making martyrs of its victims and giving its detainees a passport into politics." He described the revolt as spontaneous and said opposition flag-bearers such as former prime minister and defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi were following events rather than leading them.
Thierry Coville, who studies Iran at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations in Paris, said former regime insiders such as Mr Mousavi "are being dragged along behind a civil society which is racing ahead". "It wasn't they who led Sunday's demonstrations," he said, while also dismissing the influence of Iranian opposition movements in exile such as Maryam Radjavi's National Council of Resistance of Iran.
Ayatollah Khamenei's failure to address the anger caused by Mr Ahmadinejad's dubious re-election has destroyed his own legitimacy and that of the Islamic Republic brought to power in the 1979 revolution, observers said. That opposition supporters - some of them at prayer - were attacked by the security forces during the religious holiday of Ashura, a celebration of one of Shia Islam's greatest martyrs, was particularly shocking to Iranians. "The regime has turned an electoral crisis into a political crisis, then into a systemic crisis and, since Sunday, into a religious and security crisis," Mr Salamatian said. "The citizens' Iran that is being born is a more and more individualist, molecular, urban society, vastly different from that of 1978-79," he added, noting the many means of communication open to protesters. They want to change the behaviour of an "archaic system of power", he said.
Commentary - Iran hasn't won the cold war yet
Jonathan Spyer is a senior research fellow at the Global Research in International Affairs Centre in Herzliya, Israel.
THE salient strategic fact in the Middle East today is the Iranian drive for regional hegemony. This Iranian objective is being promoted by a rising hardline conservative elite within the Iranian regime, centred on a number of political associations and on the Iranian Revolutionary Guards corps. This elite, which is personified by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has received the backing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Their aim is a second Islamic revolution that would revive the original fire of the revolution of 1979. They appear to be aiming for the augmenting of clerical rule with a streamlined, brutal police-security state, under the banner of Islam. Building Iranian power and influence throughout the Middle East is an integral part of their strategy.
The Iranian nuclear program is an aspect of this ambition. A nuclear capability is meant to form the ultimate insurance for the Iranian regime as it aggressively builds its influence across the region. This goal of hegemony is being pursued through the assembling of a bloc of states and organisations under Iranian leadership. This bloc, according to Iran, represents authentic Muslim currents within the region, battling against the US and its hirelings. The pro-Iranian bloc includes Syria, Sudan, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas among the Palestinians, and the Houthi rebel forces in northern Yemen.
A de facto rival alliance is emerging, consisting of states that are threatened by Iran and its allies and clients. This rival alliance includes Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait. Israel, despite lacking official diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, is also a key member of this camp. Unlike the pro-Iranian bloc, which has a simple guiding ideology of resistance to the West, the countries seeking to counter Iran are united by interest only.
The rivalry between these two camps now informs and underlies all-important developments in the Middle East. It is behind the joint Israeli-Egyptian effort to contain the Iran-sponsored Hamas enclave in the Gaza Strip. It is behind the fighting in north Yemen, as Saudi troops take on Shia rebels armed and supported by Iran. The rivalry is behind the face-off between pro-American and pro-Iranian forces in Lebanon. The insurgencies in Afghanistan and in Iraq are also notable for the presence of weaponry traceable to Iran in use by insurgents against Western forces.
Who is winning in this ongoing Middle East cold war? The rhetoric of the Iranians, of course, depicts their advance as unstoppable. The reality is more complex, and the past year has seen gains and losses for both sides.
First, within Iran the electoral victory of Ahmadinejad and the subsequent backing given to him by Khamenei represented a major advance for the Iranian hardline conservatives. Ahmadinejad subsequently confirmed his victory by forming a cabinet that is packed with conservatives and Revolutionary Guardsmen. But the refusal of large sections of the Iranian people to accept the possibly rigged election and the unprecedented scenes of opposition in the streets of Iranian cities in recent weeks have severely tarnished this achievement.
The ongoing unrest in Iran probably does not constitute an immediate danger to the regime. But it surely indicates that large numbers of Iranians have no desire to see their country turned into the instrument of permanent Islamic revolution and resistance envisaged by the hardline conservatives. The domestic unrest thus hits significantly at the emerging regime's legitimacy, and their ability to promote their regime as a model for governance to the Arab and wider Muslim world.
Iran made major advances in Lebanon last year. The formation of the new Lebanese government in November in essence confirms Hezbollah's domination of the country. Hezbollah is the favoured child of the Iranian regime and its partner in subversive activity globally. There is now no serious internal force in Lebanon able to oppose its will.
In Gaza, the Iranian-sponsored Hamas regime is holding on. The Iranian investment is central to Hamas's ability to stay in power. The movement just announced a budget of $US540 million ($590m) for 2010. Of this, just $US55m is to be raised through taxes and local sources of revenue. The rest is to come from "aid and assistance". Hamas does not reveal the identity of its benefactors. But it is fairly obvious that the bulk of this funding will come from Iran. The Palestinian issue remains the central cause celebre of the Arab and Muslim world. The Iranian regime's goal is to take ownership of it.
But there have been setbacks here too. The Iranian resistance model failed in a straight fight with the Israeli Defence Forces in the early part of the year. Hamas's 100-man "Iranian unit" suffered near destruction in Gaza. The Hamas regime in Gaza managed to kill six IDF soldiers in the entire course of Operation Cast Lead. This is a failure, recorded as such by all regional observers.
In addition, someone or the other appears to be trying to demonstrate to the Iranians that the use of terrorism as an instrument of state policy is a two-way street. Hence the killing of 29 Revolutionary Guards in a bombing in October near the Iran-Pakistan border, and the mysterious explosion in Damascus last month that killed a number of Iranian pilgrims.
So at the beginning of 2010, the lines are clearly drawn in the Middle East cold war, and the contest is far from over.
Ultimately, like other totalitarians before them, the Iranian hardline conservatives are likely to fail through overreach. The inefficient, corruption-ridden and oppressive state they are coming to dominate is likely to prove an insufficient instrument to sustain their boundless ambition. Still, this process probably has a long way to run yet. Much will depend on the sense of purpose, will and resourcefulness of the Western and regional countries that this regime has identified as its enemies.
This is a contest for the future of the region. It has almost certainly not yet reached its height.
Iran's nuclear sites 'can be bombed' WASHINGTON: The top US military commander responsible for the Middle East and the Gulf region says Washington has developed contingency plans to deal with Iran's nuclear facilities, insisting that they "can be bombed".
"Well, they certainly can be bombed," General David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, said yesterday as he commented on suggestions that the Iranian nuclear facilities are heavily fortified. "The level of effect would vary with who it is that carries it out, what ordnance they have, and what capability they can bring to bear," he added. General Petraeus did not elaborate on the plans, but he said the military had considered the impacts of any action taken in Iran. "It would be almost literally irresponsible if Centcom were not to have been thinking about the various `what ifs' and to make plans for a whole variety of different contingencies," he said.
Iran maintains its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, but the US and other Western nations fear Tehran wants to acquire nuclear weapons. Israel has called Iran's nuclear program the major threat facing its nation. General Petraeus declined to comment about Israel's military capabilities or reports that it may attack Iran.
The US is leading efforts to slap a fourth round of UN sanctions on Iran after it failed to meet an end-of-year deadline to accept a deal offered by five permanent UN Security Council members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the US - plus Germany. In response, Tehran gave the West until the end of this month to accept its own proposal. General Petraeus said he thought there was still time for the nations to engage Iran in diplomacy, noting there was no deadline on the enactment of any US contingency plans. But he added that "there was a period of time, certainly, before all this might come to a head, if you will".
Same Day TENSIONS between Israel and the Obama administration have increased after a strong response from politicians to suggestions by a key US negotiator that loan guarantees to Israel might be withheld to pressure it over the stalled peace process. Speaking after a cabinet meeting yesterday, Israel's Finance Minister, Yuval Steinitz, said: "We don't need to use these guarantees. We are doing just fine. But several months ago, we agreed with the American treasury on guarantees for 2010 and 2011 and there were no conditions."
The response came as tensions increased in the Gaza Strip after three members of Islamic Jihad were killed in an Israeli air strike. Israel said the strike was in response to militants preparing to fire missiles from the position. Amid growing expectation of another war between Israel and Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, The Jerusalem Post yesterday reported that in the event of future conflict, the Israeli Defence Forces may take control of the Philadelphi corridor, the strip along the border between Gaza and Egypt that features a network of tunnels used to smuggle weapons, many of which are believed to have originated in Iran, into Gaza.
The change in Israel's military strategy would be due to the fact that in last year's war with Hamas, Israel heavily bombed the tunnel network but much of it survived and continues to be used. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday said his government would respond more harshly than the previous government to rockets from Gaza. "We will not repeat the mistake of the Kadima government, which practised restraint and received a flood of rockets in the end," he said.
Meanwhile, reactions continued to President Barack Obama's special envoy on the Middle East, former senator George Mitchell, who last week raised the possibility of withholding the loan guarantees in relation to pressure on Israel. Israeli politicians attacked the threat and visiting US senators predicted any move would not pass the US congress. Speaking in Jerusalem, one of Israel's strongest supporters in congress, senator Joe Lieberman, said: "Any attempt to pressure Israel, to force Israel to the negotiating table by denying Israel support will not pass the congress of the United States." Senator Mitchell is due back in the Middle East in coming days to try to restart the peace talks.
Same Day ISRAEL yesterday announced plans for a new border fence, this one aimed at keeping out African migrants rather than Palestinian bombers. Construction of the fence, to be built along the border with Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, is aimed at stemming the inflow in recent years of thousands of Sudanese and other Africans across the open frontier seeking work. Residents of southern Israeli towns such as Eilat and Arad have complained of what they term an overwhelming influx that has hurt their quality of life. In approving construction of a fence along the more accessible stretches of the 170km-long border, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu termed it "a strategic decision to secure Israel's Jewish and democratic character".
Although the border has often been tested by Bedouin drug-smugglers and, more recently, by Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip attempting to carry out attacks inside Israel, army patrols have been deemed sufficient to cope with the problem. However, the mounting tide of economic migrants has proven a more difficult challenge. Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch last week said that up to 200 African infiltrators were caught every week on the border. Many others reach Tel Aviv, where they often sleep rough while they seek work. Israel has been loath to close the border to political refugees because of the memory of Western countries barring entry to German Jews on the eve of World War II.
Israel tries to calm Turkish row ISRAEL'S Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon offered an indirect apology yesterday for having deliberately humiliated a Turkish diplomat after Ankara threatened to recall its ambassador to Israel amid escalating tensions between the countries.
Mr Ayalon triggered the fresh row when he summoned the ambassador, Ahmet Oguz Celikkol, to be rebuked for an anti-Israel television series in Turkey depicting the Mossad as baby-snatchers and for attacks on Israel by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Departing from diplomatic protocol, Mr Ayalon invited Israeli television cameras to record the beginning of the meeting at which the ambassador was seated on a couch a few centimetres lower than the chairs on which Mr Ayalon and two colleagues were seated. Mr Ayalon told the cameramen in Hebrew, which the Turkish envoy does not speak: "Pay attention that he is sitting in a lower chair, that there is only an Israeli flag on the table (and no Turkish flag) and that we are not smiling." The conversation that ensued in English between the diplomats after the cameramen left was polite, both sides reported, and it was only after learning of Mr Ayalon's remark to the cameramen that Mr Celikkol realised an attempt had been made to humiliate him.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry summoned Israel's ambassador to Ankara, Gaby Levy, to demand "an explanation and an apology" for Mr Ayalon's behaviour. The ministry issued a statement calling for "corrective steps to be taken with respect to the treatment shown our ambassador" and an official warned that without an apology, the ambassador would be withdrawn. In Israel, criticism of Mr Ayalon's behaviour was widespread, even among serving diplomats, several of whom called it, anonymously, "an embarrassment" and "childish".
Mr Ayalon initially defended his action. "Others will respect us only when we protect our honour," he said. Yesterday, however, he issued a statement aimed at terminating the episode. "My protest of the attacks against Israel in Turkey still stands," he said. "However, it is not my way to insult foreign ambassadors and in the future, I will clarify my position by more acceptable diplomatic means." There was no immediate indication from Ankara as to whether this was considered adequate apology.
Mr Ayalon, a professional diplomat who served as Israeli ambassador to Washington, began displaying hardline views after being chosen by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman last year to serve as his deputy. Mr Lieberman has called upon Israeli diplomats to make a forceful response to perceived diplomatic insults and not to seek favour. In a statement issued earlier this week, Israel condemned Mr Erdogan's "unbridled tongue-lashing" of Israel for its incursion into Gaza last year. The Turkish Prime Minister has repeatedly accused Israel of disproportionate use of force against the Palestinians. The Israeli statement, alluding to Turkey's actions against its own Kurdish militants, and perhaps to its massacre of Armenians in World War I, said "Turkey is the last country that can preach morality to Israel".
The falling-out is of significance to both countries. The close ties that have existed for decades between them bear far-reaching political and security resonance.
Following Day JERUSALEM: Israel has issued a second apology to Turkey over its envoy's treatment, bowing to Ankara's ultimatum to defuse a spat over a TV show that marred ties between the two allies. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday that Ankara had received the apology it "wanted and expected".
Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon apologised to Turkish ambassador Oguz Celikkol for giving him an angry dressing down in front of cameras to protest a Turkish television series portraying Mossad agents as baby-snatchers. A statement from Mr Ayalon's office said that "out of respect" for a request by President Shimon Peres, the deputy minister sent the envoy an apology. "I had no intention to humiliate you personally and apologise for the way the demarche was handled and perceived," Mr Ayalon wrote in the apology letter.
Ankara, a key Muslim ally to Israel, was infuriated and demanded "an explanation and apology" after Mr Ayalon made Mr Celikkol sit on a low couch and had the Turkish flag removed from the table at their meeting on Monday. Mr Ayalon issued a initial apology on Wednesday, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the "protest to the Turkish ambassador was just in its essence but should have been conveyed in an acceptable diplomatic manner". But Turkish President Abdullah Gul threatened to recall the ambassador if there was no formal apology. Following the second, formal apology, Mr Netanyahu hoped the two allies would now put the crisis behind them.
Party of God on war footing HEZBOLLAH says it has regrouped since the 2006 conflict with Israel and is in a stronger position for a new war between Israel and Lebanon. The group's international spokesman, Ibrahim Mousawi, told The Australian yesterday that if Israel and Lebanon returned to war, "we will do something that they will regret."
"If they (Israel) attack again, Hezbollah is in a position to defend and liberate," Dr Mousawi said in his Beirut office. "Hezbollah is stronger now than in 2006. Hezbollah has been training thousands and thousands and thousands of people to defend their country. Hezbollah is ready."
The comments followed last weekend's speech by Hezbollah's Lebanon-based chief, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, in which he said the organisation would "change the face of the region" in any war with Israel. Nasrallah made the comments to a conference attended by Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal and delegates from about 30 countries, who gathered to discuss "the resistance" against Israel. Nasrallah told the delegates: "I promise you, in view of all the threats you hear today, that should a new war with the Zionists erupt, we will crush the enemy, emerge victorious and change the face of the region."
Dr Mousawi, who has a PhD in political science from Birmingham University, would not go into detail when asked whether Hezbollah would deploy its weaponry on Lebanon's southern border with Israel in the event of any Israeli attack on the nuclear facilities of Iran, Hezbollah's ally. Asked what Nasrallah had meant by "changing the face of the region", Dr Mousawi said: "Israel has always been viewed as an army that cannot be defeated . . . Israel is looked upon now as the policeman of the region, the superpower, the one that can do what it wants. This will change. It will not have the same capacity to carry out its aims."
Hezbollah was the leading partner in the "March 8 alliance", which was defeated in last year's Lebanese elections by the pro-Western "March 14 alliance", led by Saad Hariri. However, Hezbollah retains significant power in the new government via a blocking veto over any major government decision. Hezbollah - the Party of God - holds its "resistance" against Israel as central to its identity. "Hezbollah views Lebanon as under attack from Israel and needs to have all Lebanon united against the Israeli threat," Dr Mousawi said.
Netanyahu rejects freeze on settlements The Prime Minister reaffirms his commitment to 'greater Jerusalem'
ISRAELI Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday gave his most public and comprehensive rejection of Washington's call for all activity to cease in Jewish settlements, telling a group of settlers: "The settlement blocs are an indisputable part of Israel forever."
On a tour of the largest settlements hours after meeting US President Barack Obama's special envoy, George Mitchell, Mr Netanyahu gave his strongest rejection to any permanent freeze in settlement activity and reaffirmed a commitment to "greater Jerusalem". He told settlers during one tree-planting ceremony: "The message is clear: we are here and will remain here. The settlement blocs are an indisputable part of Israel forever.
"This is acceptable to the great majority of Israel's citizens and is gradually being instilled in international consciousness." In the settlement of Maaleh Adumim, Mr Netanyahu said: "We will build here as part of greater Jerusalem. "I came here from Gush Etzyon, which is Jerusalem's southern gate. Now we're in Maaleh Adumim, which is Jerusalem's eastern gate."
Mr Netanyahu recently announced a 10-month freeze on new construction in the settlements, which he said was a show of goodwill to convince Palestinians to resume peace negotiations. But both the US and Palestinians had called for a complete and permanent freeze on building in Jewish settlements in the West Bank to help the resumption of peace talks. Mr Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had called for a complete freeze, but when Israel rejected this and announced the 10-month freeze, Mrs Clinton said Israel's moratorium was "unprecedented". Palestinian officials point to the fact that during the moratorium, 3000 houses already approved were still being built.
Palestinian officials last night responded to Mr Netanyahu's comments by saying they were undermining efforts to resume the peace process. An aide to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, told Haaretz newspaper: "This is an unacceptable act that destroys all the efforts being exerted by Senator Mitchell in order to bring the parties back to the negotiating table."
Mr Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, himself Jewish, is increasingly being targeted in Israel as responsible for the administration's approach, which has been far more challenging of Israel than that of its predecessor. Two right-wing activists in Israel have written to Mr Emanuel saying they will protest when he visits Israel for the bar mitzvah of his son. Army Radio said the two activists, Baruch Marzel and Itamar Gvir, told Mr Emanuel: "You are like the Hellenists who acted against the Israel nation. You advise President Obama against Israel and incite and instigate against us. You are a traitor against the entire Jewish people."
Iran menace hangs over Holocaust day OSWIECIM, Poland: In the biting cold of the Polish winter, warnings of the renewed rise of anti-Semitism and the threat posed to world peace by a nuclear-armed Iran marked Holocaust Memorial Day, the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In the death camp where 1.1 million Jews were murdered, politicians and religious leaders from Poland and Israel gathered to urge that the lessons of the Holocaust be learned and passed on to future generations. In the shadow of a replica of the iconic Auschwitz sign, Arbeit macht frei (Work sets you free), elderly survivors met the last few Red Army liberators still alive. Speakers said last month's theft of the camp's wrought-iron sign served as a reminder that memories of the Holocaust and its victims remained under threat. "From this place, I swear as the leader of the Jewish people, never again shall we allow evil to hurt our people," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Warnings about Iran were led by Israeli President Shimon Peres. Addressing the German parliament in Hebrew in Berlin, he said the Iranian government was a "fanatic regime" and sponsor of international terrorism. To applause from the 622 German deputies, he said Tehran's nuclear program "threatens destruction" and represented "a danger to the entire world". "This day not only represents a memorial day for victims, not only the pangs of conscience of humankind in the face of the incomprehensible atrocity that took place, but also of the tragedy that derived from the procrastination in taking action," he said. "Never again ignore bloodthirsty dictators, hiding behind demagogical masks, who utter murderous slogans."
At a memorial event in Cracow, near Auschwitz, Tel Aviv chief rabbi Meir Lau said Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was "threatening the very existence of a neighbour". "I see the headlines every day," Rabbi Lau said. "Within two years he will have an atomic weapon, so it means there is a threat." World Jewish Congress president Ronald Lauder, who was saved from the gas chamber aged seven, when his mother shoved him into a different queue, said: "I believe another horror is coming to our world. I am talking about what is happening in Iran. We have a man who denies the Holocaust. We have a man who talks about the destruction of Israel."
Islamic revolution a failure: Mousavi IRAN's internal crisis looks set to worsen after an extraordinary attack by opposition leader Mir Hussein Mousavi, who branded the Islamic revolution of 1979 a failure. Pushing his criticisms of the ruling Islamic regime further than he has before, the former prime minister said the revolution had failed to eradicate "the roots of tyranny and dictatorship" that marked the reign of its predecessor, the Shah. "Stifling the media, filling the prisons and brutally killing people who peacefully demand their rights in the streets indicate the roots of tyranny and dictatorship remain from the monarchist era," he said. "I don't believe that the revolution achieved its goals." He added: "Dictatorship in the name of religion is the worst kind."
Mr Mousavi's comments came as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad appeared to make a concession in relation to Iran's nuclear program. The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that his government would accept a nuclear fuel-swap agreement overseen by the UN. It said the announcement on Iranian television was immediately greeted with scepticism by Western diplomats who had watched Iran "flip-flop"on the fuel-swap issue since it was proposed in October. Mr Ahmadinejad told state TV: "We have no problem sending our enriched uranium abroad. If we send our enriched uranium abroad and then they do not give us the 20 per cent enriched fuel for our reactor we are capable of producing it inside Iran."
The US is leading the push for harsher sanctions against Iran. In his State of the Union address last week, President Obama said if Iran did not comply with international requirements it would face harsh consequences. While he did not raise military action, Israel has repeatedly said that it is keeping "all options on the table" in relation to Iran. The most likely course of any military action would be that the US would not be directly involved in flying aircraft itself but would provide support for an Israeli air strike on Iran's nuclear facilities.
Mr Mousavi's comments are likely to incense the regime, which is already bracing for more demonstrations next Thursday, the anniversary of the Islamic revolution. The regime warned yesterday that it would "firmly confront" any demonstrators who attempt to turn official rallies to commemorate the revolution into anti-government protests. While the regime has tried to discredit Mr Mousavi, inside Iran he has authority having been prime minister under Ayatollah Khomeini and leader of Iran during the Iran-Iraq war.
The regime yesterday made clear it was not softening in its attitude to opposition protesters with the announcement that it was preparing to execute nine more protesters who were detained during the uprising in June. The protesters were charged with "waging war against God". Millions of Iranians protested in June claiming that the election result which saw Mr Ahmadinejad returned to power had been rigged. An Iranian official yesterday told Fars news agency: "Nine others will be hanged soon. The nine, and the two who were hanged on Thursday, were surely arrested in the recent riots and had links to anti-revolutionary groups."
New diplomacy for Damascus IN an effort to loosen the gridlock that is blocking progress towards peace in the Middle East, the US State Department has appointed one of its foremost Arabists as its new ambassador to Syria. Robert Ford, whose appointment has yet to be confirmed by the Syrian government, would be the first US ambassador to Damascus since his predecessor was withdrawn in 2005 because of apparent Syrian involvement in the death of Rafik al-Hariri, the former Lebanese prime minister.
A former ambassador in Algiers with experience in Iraq, Mr Ford's task will be to try to coax the government of Bashar Assad away from Iran and its support of Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Palestinian territories. He will also press urgently for a peace deal between Israel and Syria, which Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said yesterday was the only alternative to a slide to war. "In the absence of a deal with Syria, we could reach an armed conflict that could develop into a full-fledged war," he told Israeli army officers.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem responded by warning Israel to "stop being the neighbourhood bully" and said if war broke out, it would be "all-out and (would) take place inside your cities". Syria has never acknowledged any role in the Hariri assassination but has been seeking ways to avoid diplomatic isolation over the incident.
Mr Ford's name was mentioned in talks last week between Mr Assad and George Mitchell, the US Special Envoy to the Middle East. Mr Moallem confirmed yesterday his name had been submitted. The US had nominated an ambassador, he said: "This is an American sovereign issue and it is Syria's right to study the nomination." An official at the US embassy in Damascus said Washington hoped Mr Ford's appointment, if approved, would "help change Syria's attitude in the region to ensure stability and security. Washington hopes Syria will play an essential role in eliminating US concerns regarding its attitude in the region."
Iran in warning to street protesters, clashes expected IRAN is facing crises internally and externally as the regime prepares for clashes today with opposition supporters at the same time as the US has vowed to pursue tougher sanctions. The regime has warned it will deal harshly with protesters who plan to use today's anniversary of the Islamic revolution to renew demonstrations over last June's presidential elections, which it claims fraudulently returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to office. Hundreds of protesters have been detained, killed or executed since then. Demonstrators have used the cover of any government-endorsed events to bring supporters to the streets. Police last night said several people had been arrested while preparing for anti-government protests.
US President Barack Obama yesterday increased his rhetoric in response to Iran's declaration that it has begun enriching uranium to 20 per cent, a major step on the path to the 90 per cent required to make a nuclear bomb and further than the 3 per cent previously acknowledged. Mr Obama said that despite Iranian "posturing" that its nuclear program was for civilian use, "they, in fact, continue to pursue a course that would lead to weaponisation and that is not acceptable to the international community". He said the US would support tougher sanctions within weeks.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday called for "crippling" and immediate sanctions against Iran. "Iran is racing forward to produce nuclear weapons in brazen defiance of the international community," he said. "And the international community must decide if it is serious about neutralising this threat to Israel, the region and the entire world. I believe that what is required right now is tough action from the international community. This means not moderate sanctions or watered-down sanctions. This means crippling sanctions and these sanctions must be applied right now."
Holocaust survivor Eli Wiesel told Israel's Army Radio: "We're sure that the President of Iran, the world's No 1 Holocaust denier, plans to destroy and annihilate the Jewish state and bring disaster to the entire world." Mr Wiesel has organised a petition signed by about 50 Nobel prize winners warning about Iran.
One of Israel's leading writers, A.B. Yehoshua, said Iran might be dragged into the same "mad aggression" as Nazi Germany. Writing in Haaretz newspaper, he said: "But for all the differences (with Nazi Germany), the Iranian regime has adopted the same total opposition to Israel's existence. It is therefore liable to slip into the same human mechanism that created the infinite hatred for Jews of the Holocaust era. And when Iran has nuclear weapons, it might be dragged, as Nazi Germany was, into mad aggression."
Mr Yehoshua said one way to neutralise the Iranian threat was a peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians. He drew on a recent speech by the Palestinian minister of the Waqf religious trust, Mahmoud Habash, who said Iran was making the Israeli-Palestinian conflict worse by encouraging Hamas and provoking a harsh response from Israel.
US in diplomatic push against Iran THE Obama administration started an intense diplomatic push yesterday to achieve global isolation of Iran over its nuclear weapons program. The move was spearheaded by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who landed in the region to confer with Arab allies. The diplomatic effort involves a team of US officials fanning out across the Middle East, and it began as the White House said for the first time China was close to backing a new round of UN sanctions against the regime.
As the US's top four diplomats landed in the region, Barack Obama's National Security Adviser, James Jones, said the US would press the UN to impose new sanctions this month. Russia and China, who have veto power as permanent members of the Security Council, have appeared cool to the idea of punitive action against Tehran. General Jones, however, offered a rare expression of confidence in Moscow's willingness to help. "Russia is supportive and on board," he said.
US Vice-President Joe Biden said the US expected to win support from China to impose sanctions but did not give the reason for his optimism. "We have the support of everyone from Russia to Europe," Mr Biden told NBC's Meet the Press. "And I believe we'll get the support of China to continue to impose sanctions on Iran to isolate them." The comments came as the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, said he was concerned about the consequences of any attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. "The outbreak of a conflict will be a big, big, big problem for all of us, and I worry a great deal about the unintended consequences of a strike," he said in Jerusalem.
The American diplomats, including Mrs Clinton, will visit Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Although the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will feature in the talks, the main issue will be Iran. The offensive comes after a year of failed attempts by the Obama administration to engage with Tehran. It carries significant risk. If it fails to bring China, or even Russia, on board, Mr Obama will have few options left to deal with the menace of a nuclear-armed Iran, which is consuming Israel and threatens a nuclear arms race in the region. The diplomats must convince Sunni Arab nations the US is serious about tackling the threat from Iran and to enlist other countries to back new sanctions. Central to the effort is Mrs Clinton, who arrived in Qatar yesterday and spoke at the US-Islamic World Forum before a visit to Saudi Arabia. "We don't want to be engaging (with Iran) while they are building their bomb," she said.
The diplomatic push came as major powers made a new offer to supply Tehran with nuclear fuel, in return for it shipping out most of its stocks of low-enriched uranium, said Iran's atomic energy organization chief Ali Akbar Salehi. Iran last week said it had started enriching uranium itself after rejecting an earlier Western offer.
Clinton talks tough on Iran THE US and Israel have begun a major campaign throughout the Middle East and Europe to enlist support for immediate sanctions over Iran's nuclear program. In the toughest comments yet about the regime in Tehran, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described Iran as becoming a "military dictatorship" that had been captured by the Revolutionary Guards. "We see the government of Iran, the Supreme Leader, the President, the parliament is being supplanted and Iran is moving towards a military dictatorship," she said yesterday. The comments came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flew to Moscow to lobby the Russians to use their vote on the UN Security Council to support "crippling" sanctions against Iran.
The US and Israel appear to have decided to put aside the disagreement of recent months over the growth of Jewish settlements in the West Bank to focus on Iran. High-level political, intelligence and military figures from the US visited Israel in recent weeks and Vice-President Joe Biden will visit Israel shortly. The flurry of US visitors has added to a sense that Israel has made it clear to the US that it is seriously considering a strike against Iran's nuclear targets. The head of the US military, Admiral Michael Mullen, warned this week of "unintended consequences" for any Israeli strike on Iran but also that if Iran developed nuclear weapons, it would amount to "a big, big problem for all of us".
Israeli officials have told The Australian that US officials stressed to Israel that any military strike against Iran should wait until all US combat troops are out of Iraq — which would be the beginning of next year. US soldiers are withdrawing from Iraq, but US officials fear that as they leave, they could confront brutal retaliation from elements loyal to Iran, should Israel strike Iran.
Mrs Clinton said in Qatar that she feared the rise of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard "poses a very direct threat to everyone". The US administration has said publicly that it wanted to target businesses owned by key figures in the Revolutionary Guard. "Certainly, we don't want to be engaging while they're building their bomb," Mrs Clinton said. She continued her tough line while speaking at a woman's college in Saudi Arabia last night, saying "evidence doesn't support" Iran's claim it is pursuing a peaceful nuclear program. Mrs Clinton also said if Iran got a nuclear weapon it could trigger a nuclear arms race in the region.
Iran continues to give mixed signals about its nuclear program. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said at the weekend Iran could develop a bomb if it wanted to, but a few days earlier insisted its program was for civilian purposes.
Opinion: Tehran on path to our destruction STAND by for some bad news. No, I mean really bad news. The world is not going to apply crippling sanctions to Iran. Even if it did, Iran would not be deterred from developing nuclear weapons. The only way that Iran can be significantly delayed in its pursuit of nuclear weapons is through an Israeli air strike on its nuclear facilities. I think the chances of an Israeli attack are somewhat less than 50-50. Even with an air strike, the likelihood is you would delay rather than prevent Iran getting nuclear weapons. Don't get me wrong, a delay is much better than no delay, but the balance of probabilities is that Iran will ultimately have a nuclear arsenal.
Even sanctions would only have an outside chance of working. But the world is not even going to try them. China, and to a lesser extent Russia, are going to make sure that doesn't happen. This is a tragedy far beyond Copenhagen, but like Copenhagen it illustrates the complete breakdown of the multilateral system.
The US could strike Iran's nuclear facilities far more effectively than Israel could, but to do so would be foreign to every instinct of the Obama administration. It would also be hugely risky. But the risks of not acting are even greater. Nonetheless, the portents are strong that the Obama administration will dither. More than 12 months ago, just after his inauguration, Obama said: "If countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us." Since then Obama has done everything an American president could possibly do to engage and entice Iran. He has made countless statements about the genius of Persian civilisation, the wonders of Islam as a religion, the sweetness of the Iranian people, the potential reasonableness of the Iranian government. And in response he has received contemptuous game playing from the Iranians.
I come to my conclusion that Iran will ultimately get nuclear weapons with great reluctance, but it follows ineluctably from the facts. Consider the main players: Iran, the US, China, the UN, Russia, Israel.
Iran has been determined to acquire nuclear weapons for a long time. It is, as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton describes it, something of a military dictatorship, with the Revolutionary Guard assuming more and more power. It is still also, however, a theocratic dictatorship. The purpose of the state is to serve theological ends. Most Western analysts refuse to take Islamic religion seriously as a factor in geopolitics, assuming there must always be a rational national-interest explanation for any state's behaviour.
The truth is that history is littered with states behaving irrationally and pursuing irrational ends, and doing so in often self-destructive ways. In Mao's China tens of millions of people died in famines directly caused by state policy. North Korea has driven its people into starvation. Pol Pot not only committed genocide on his own people, he then attacked Vietnam so that it would destroy him. Saddam Hussein was such a canny, realist calculator of the odds that his regime ended up gone and he ended up dead.
It is intensely ahistorical to believe political regimes will always act according to Western conceptions of enlightened self-interest. Iran believes the US is the Great Satan and Israel the little Satan. Its leadership came to power with intensely theocratic political programs. There is no evidence it has ever deviated from the idea of achieving nuclear weapons. There is some evidence that in 2003, scared by the American invasion of Iraq, it temporarily suspended the formal weaponisation part of the program.
The West has invested enormous hope in the democratic opposition inside Iran, and these heroic people deserve our support. But Iran made huge nuclear weapons progress when the moderate Mohammad Khatami was its president. Achieving nuclear weapons is a widely shared goal across Iranian society. Moreover, Iran is a robust dictatorship. It has slowly but ruthlessly, and with great brutality, ground down its domestic, democratic opposition, beating, imprisoning, raping, torturing and murdering them. It is not the least squeamish about killing its own people, always a reliable guide to the short-term survivability of a dictatorship. And all this repression has cost it very little in terms of its international connections. It is in the midst of a diplomatic boom in Africa and Latin America, and is ever closer with China.
Hamas vows revenge for hit JABALIYA, GAZA STRIP: Thousands of Hamas supporters have vowed revenge at a rally in honour of a commander assassinated in Dubai. "The decision to avenge the martyr Mahmoud al-Mabhouh has been taken, and it will be equal to the crime," Abu Obeida, a masked spokesman for Hamas's armed wing, told the crowd. "All you killers can do now is wait. We are the ones who will decide the tools suitable to carry out our promise. We will not tell you how or where or when, but only to prepare to receive the hellfire of our anger."
Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal gave a televised address from Damascus, blaming the killing on Israel's Mossad spy agency. "The time for promises and talk of revenge is done. Now is the time for action," he said. A masked marching band trampled a long Israeli flag before other fighters in military fatigues glided down on ziplines from the surrounding buildings. "We do not cry tears, but bullets and bombs," shouted the master of ceremonies from a lit-up stage with a flaming banner as a backdrop.
Mabhouh, a senior commander in the armed wing of the Islamist group, was assassinated last month in Dubai by a professional hit squad of at least 11 people carrying forged European passports. The killing of Mabhouh while on an apparent weapons-purchasing trip has widely been blamed on Mossad, which has refused to comment on the affair.
A vague comment from Israel's Foreign Minister only added to the spy-novel-like mystery surrounding the slaying. "Israel never responds, never confirms and never denies," Avigdor Lieberman said in Israel's first official comment on the affair. He added: "I don't know why we are assuming that Israel, or the Mossad, used those passports."
But senior Israeli security officials not directly involved in the case said they were convinced it was a Mossad operation because of the motive — Israel says Mabhouh supplied Gaza's Hamas rulers with their most dangerous weapons. The officials characterised the operation as a significant Mossad bungle that could hurt the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Same Day HAILED last month for the daring and efficiency displayed in the assassination of a Hamas commander in Dubai, Israel's Mossad, widely blamed for the killing, has been pilloried at home for what is seen as an operational failure. Israelis, including perhaps the Mossad hierarchy, were astonished at the efficiency of the Dubai police in sifting through reams of airport and hotel videotapes to come up with photographs and assumed names of at least a dozen men and women holding European passports who were allegedly part of the hit team. All had left the country within hours of the killing.
The slaying of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in his hotel room was intended, according to some Israeli commentators, to be made to seem as death by natural causes. The Dubai authorities held off for more than a week before announcing their conclusion that Mabhouh had been murdered. Israel has not acknowledged involvement in the killing of Mabhouh, said to be responsible for transporting arms from Iran to Hamas in Gaza. But the publication by Dubai of the names of the hit team stunned at least five Israelis, who found that their names had been used on the forged passports. This could open them to the possibility of arrest as suspected terrorists anytime they travel abroad.
"I just don't understand how something like this could happen," said John Keeley, a British-born repairman who emigrated from Britain a decade ago and lives on a kibbutz. "I am worried for my family." A former senior Mossad official, Rafi Eitan, said those whose identities had been used would not be exposed to any danger travelling abroad except perhaps for "a technical difficulty or two", but it is questionable whether that proves reassuring to those involved. Security officials say Mossad, and all intelligence agencies, will have difficulty travelling under false identities in the future when passports will include biometric measures that cannot be forged.
Beyond the question of identity theft, critics have begun asking whether Mossad and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is responsible for the agency, had considered the political ramifications. "Did the goal justify the risk of carrying out a hit in a moderate Arab country?" asked an editorial in Haaretz newspaper yesterday. Similar flaps about the use of false foreign passports by Mossad agents have arisen before in New Zealand, Canada and elsewhere and, like those, this imbroglio is expected by Israeli officials to eventually be contained.
But the press has demanded the resignation of Mossad chief Meir Dagan, whose term was recently extended by Mr Netanyahu to an eighth year. He is regarded by critics as too quick on the trigger but as long as things went smoothly for the spy agency, he was the subject only of praise.
A series of killings in Arab countries has been attributed to Mossad. In December, an explosion aboard a bus in Damascus reportedly took the lives of three Hamas operatives returning from training in Iran, as well as six members of the Iranian Republican Guard. Three weeks later, a bomb exploded beneath a car in Hezbollah's security zone in Beirut, killing two Hamas officials. Two years ago, Hezbollah's security chief, Imad Mugniyah, was killed in a car-bomb explosion in Damascus.
Netanyahu met with Dubai hit squad LONDON: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met members of a hit squad at Mossad headquarters shortly before they went to Dubai to kill Hamas commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in a Dubai hotel. Mr Netanyahu was welcomed to the Midrasha - the intelligence agency's headquarters, in the northern suburbs of Tel Aviv - by Mossad chief Meir Dagan in early January and briefed on plans to kill Mabhouh, The Sunday Times reported yesterday. The Prime Minister authorised the mission, which was not seen as complicated or risky. "Typically on such occasions, the Prime Minister intones: `The people of Israel trust you. Good luck'," the paper added. It also quoted a source saying burns from a stun gun were found on the body of Mabhouh and that there were traces of a nose bleed, possibly from being smothered. The hit squad allegedly trained for the mission by secretly rehearsing in a Tel Aviv hotel.
The methodical stalking of Mabhouh by a team of people using fake European passports was captured on CCTV cameras in the Dubai hotel. Dubai police have blamed Mossad and named 11 suspects who apparently travelled to Dubai on the European passports. Interpol has put the 11 suspects on its top watch list but said those whose identities were stolen should be able to travel as usual though may face more scrutiny. Two Palestinians also are being held in Dubai on suspicion they helped the assassins.
The case has spread across several continents with investigators probing possible credit card links to US-based banks and European officials grilling Israeli envoys over the fraudulent British, Irish, French and German passports used by the hit squad. The German media have reported that the intelligence services of the country are certain Mossad was involved in the killing and that the German Foreign Minister demanded that Israel explain why it used a German passport in the operation.
Hamas at the weekend said Mabhouh exposed himself to attack when he breached security protocol by talking about his trip over the phone and making hotel reservations on the internet. Hamas politician Salah Bardawil said Mabhouh unwittingly led his attackers to him by openly planning his travels - a move that would make him easily traceable. "Al-Mabhouh called his family by phone before he travelled to Dubai and told them of his plan to stay in a specific hotel, and he booked his travel through the internet. This undoubtedly created a security breach in the movements of al-Mabhouh," Mr Bardawil told reporters in Gaza. Mabhouh's brother Fayek denied the phone leak, saying the slain operative didn't reveal any details regarding his reservations or other travel plans. "I am the last one who received a call from Mahmoud," the brother said. "He didn't tell me that he was going to Dubai and he never told anyone of the family the details of his work or his movements."
Israel has declined to confirm or deny Mossad's involvement. The assassination has also triggered accusations between Hamas, which controls Gaza, and its rival Fatah, which controls the West Bank. Hamas and Fatah alleged that the other group had collaborated with the spy agency but both hold Israel responsible for the assassination itself.
Holy plan sparks unrest HEBRON: Palestinians yesterday clashed with Israeli troops in the West Bank town of Hebron amid outrage over a plan to restore two flashpoint Jewish holy sites in the occupied territory. Dozens of youths hurled rocks at an Israeli checkpoint as troops fired tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets. Shops and schools shut down as a strike was declared.
On Sunday Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he hoped to include the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem in a $US100 million ($111m) plan to restore 150 national heritage sites. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat called on the international community to consider the move illegal. Palestinian Islamic courts head Taysir al-Tamimi said it amounted to a declaration of war against "the Islamic holy sites in Palestine".
The Tomb of the Patriarchs, where Abraham is believed buried, is sacred to both Muslims and Jews. A few hundred settlers under Israeli military protection have converted part of the Ibrahimi mosque above it into a synagogue. Rachel's Tomb is surrounded by 8m-high concrete walls. The decision to include the two sites was made at the last minute following protests from right-wing ministers. A spokesman insisted the list of 150 sites was not final.
Biden's Israel visit a kickstart THE US is about to begin another push to restart the Middle East peace talks with the highest-level visit to Israel by the Obama administration. Vice-President Joe Biden arrives in Israel on Monday with two aims: to restart the peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians and to discuss possible responses to Iran's nuclear program. The visit comes as US mediators try to bring together key ministers from Israel and the Palestinian Authority, to foster goodwill. The aim would be that these talks would be a step towards leaders Benjamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas resuming talks.
Mr Abbas has said he would resume talks with Mr Netanyahu if Israel agreed to a three-month freeze in new building activity in the Jewish settlements on the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. Mr Netanyahu has agreed to a 10-month freeze in the West Bank, now in place, but will not include Jerusalem, which he says is "the undivided and eternal capital of Israel" and has exempted 3000 homes in the West Bank that had already received approval. US Middle East envoy George Mitchell returns to the region this weekend to try to start the proximity talks — but he is believed to have lost hope that he can bring about a peace agreement.
While both sides continue to say they hold out hopes for resumption of talks, privately they admit that while they were enthusiastic in the first months of the Obama presidency, they believe that window has shut. Also, privately, they say they fear an increase in violence and tension. It was reported recently that Mr Mitchell had offered to resign but that US President Barack Obama asked that he continue. The growing sense of despair was echoed yesterday by the departing UN Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Co-ordinator, John Holmes, who said Israel's blockade of Gaza was encouraging "a smuggler-gangster economy, which, incidentally, benefits Hamas financially".
Same Day HAMAS'S reputation as a tight-knit, ideologically firm and politically coherent group has been shaken since the assassination of a top operative in Dubai raised the spectre that Mossad has penetrated its inner-most workings. To deny that possibility and preserve morale, a senior Hamas official summoned a hasty press conference to say that murder victim Mahmoud al-Mabhouh had violated basic security precautions by booking his flight online and calling his family in Gaza from Damascus to tell them which hotel he was staying in. But Dubai's police chief, Lieutenant General Dahi Khalfan, said Mabhouh's travel plans had apparently been leaked to his killers by a Hamas member. It subsequently emerged that Mabhouh had been under lengthy surveillance by the organisation that killed him. Rather than just being a target of opportunity, he had been stalked by a team of 27 or more agents in a carefully planned operation.
If this were not enough to keep Hamas leaders from looking over their shoulders and wondering who around them might be a mole, an even more shocking event took place this month when the son of one of Hamas's founders revealed he had worked for Israel's Shin Bet security service for a decade. Mosab Hassan Yousef, whose father, Sheik Hassan Yousef, is in an Israeli prison, told Ha'aretz he had played a key role in the destruction of many of Hamas's militant cells on the West Bank during the intifada, a claim supported by a former Israeli security official.
Yousef fingered top members of Hamas's military wing who were subsequently killed or arrested. He said he had intended to be a double agent on Hamas's behalf until, serving a brief prison sentence as a cover for his activities, he saw how Hamas members tortured fellow prisoners. The possibility that the son of a revered leader like Sheik Yousef was a turncoat working on behalf of the Israelis was initially dismissed by many Palestinians as "Zionist propaganda". However, the younger Yousef, who converted to Christianity and moved to the US several years ago, was soon confirming the story in interviews with CNN and other media outlets.
A political science professor at al-Azhar University in Gaza, Mkhaimar Abusada, said the revelation was "a catastrophe for Hamas". A former Israeli intelligence officer, Brigadier General Shalom Harari, said Yousef's revelation coming on the heels of the Dubai assassination made Hamas appear vulnerable.
Vulnerability had not been a Hamas hallmark since its emergence in Gaza in 1987 as an offshoot of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Focusing initially on building a social base, it set up clinics, schools and mosques and won wide popularity. It soon formed its own underground militia. During the Palestinian intifada, or uprising, that broke out in 2000, Hamas was perhaps the most militant faction, employing numerous suicide bombers. The uprising was suppressed by Israel but Hamas shifted deftly to the political arena. In January 2006, the Islamist movement participated in Palestinian parliamentary elections and — to the surprise of everybody, including itself — scored a huge victory, taking 76 of the 132 seats. Its principal rival, the Fatah movement, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, had been mired in corruption and inefficiency. Hamas was seen as not corrupt but efficient while its role in the intifada won wide respect. The election victory was Hamas's high-water mark. Two more coups followed, but both would prove double-edged. In a daring operation in June 2006, Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was taken prisoner and Hamas demanded the release of more than 1000 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for him. A year later, Hamas seized exclusive control of the Gaza Strip after defeating Fatah in a bloody coup.
However, retribution followed. In the wake of Shalit's capture, Israel imposed a blockade on the Gaza Strip, permitting entry only of humanitarian goods. It launched limited military incursions to force Shalit's release. It did not succeed but hundreds of Palestinians were killed. As for the Gaza takeover, it severed Hamas from the Palestinian Authority, increasing its isolation in the Arab world and beyond. Its leaders expected the massive release of Palestinian prisoners, which appeared imminent a few months ago, would restore its image within the Palestinian camp but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted hard-core prisoners not be returned to the West Bank and Hamas baulked.
Its biggest mistake would prove to have been firing thousands of rockets at Israeli communities bordering Gaza. Israel's massive incursion last year left about 1400 Palestinian militants and civilians dead and much of Gaza in rubble. Abbas would say Hamas's rocketing and the capture of Shalit had cost the lives of 2500 Gazans. Hamas has refrained from firing rockets since.
The pressures on Hamas have inevitably led to divisions at the top, particularly between the political leadership based in Damascus and local leadership in Gaza. Arab affairs expert Avi Issacharoff wrote this week in Ha'aretz that the more pragmatic leaders in Gaza favoured acceptance of an Egyptian draft agreement for patching up the differences with the Palestinian Authority and reknitting a coalition government that could enter into negotiations with Israel. However, he wrote, the Damascus group, headed by Khalid Meshaal, "preferred instead to travel to Tehran for a show of solidarity with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad". Given Egypt's deep discomfort about Iranian regional ambitions, Meshaal's pro-Iranian policy could perpetuate Gaza's misery since Egypt controls the only entry to the strip outside of Israel.
Last week, one of the senior Hamas leaders in Gaza, Mahmoud al-Zahar, publicly resigned from the team negotiating the prisoner exchange. He blamed Israel for the breakdown in talks but Israeli observers believe his move was aimed at Damascus, not Jerusalem. "It's a sign," says Issacharoff, "that Zahar, along with Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya and others who make up the group's pragmatic wing, are shocked by the radicalisation of Meshaal's faction in Damascus." Hamas followers in besieged Gaza can only wonder where it can take them from here.
Hamas losing its grip, military chief says IN the first indication from a Hamas leader that the Islamic organisation is in danger of losing control in the Gaza Strip, the commander of its armed wing has warned the movement's political leader that the area is descending into anarchy. A letter by Ahmed Jaabri, the powerful military chief, to Khaled Mashal in Damascus was reported in the London-based Arabic-language newspaper A-Sharq Al-Awsat and the Palestinian news agency PalPress.
"The situation is deteriorating," he wrote. "The Strip is witnessing explosions and chaos and operatives from (Hamas's military wing) are being killed." The letter did not blame Israel for these troubles and A-Sharq said Jaabri was referring to extremist "jihad" groups that had emerged in Gaza. These groups have been blamed for bombings and a number of assassinations of Hamas officials in the past year.
Since last year's Israeli incursion into Gaza, Hamas has cracked down on hardline groups that attempt to ignore the ban Hamas has imposed on any further firing of rockets into Israel. Some Palestinian sources claim the assassinations reflect internal strife within Hamas. In his letter, Jaabri said Hamas was guilty of errors in its governing of Gaza, which it seized in a bloody coup three years ago. He indicated the existence of a deep rift between the military wing he heads and the local Hamas government headed by Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.
"We began to lose control of the internal situation after you asked us to transfer control to the government and not to interfere in order to allow it to direct the affairs of Gaza," he wrote. The government, he said, had ignored the military wing's achievements during the incursion and instead focused criticism on its assassination of operatives of the rival Fatah movement, who were accused of collaborating with Israel. The military wing "may have made a few stupid mistakes", he admitted, when some of its operatives killed members of the Palestine Authority's security services. "But the security of the movement was always vastly more important than a death here and there." Hamas spokesman Abu Obeida denied any such letter had been written.
Iran strengthens naval power with home-made cruise missile TEHRAN: Iran announced yesterday it had started a new production line of highly accurate short-range cruise missiles, adding a new element to the country's arsenal. Iranian Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi told state television the cruise missile, called Nasr 1, would be capable of destroying targets up to 3000 tonnes in size. General Vahidi said the missile could be fired from ground-based launchers as well as ships, and would eventually be modified to be fired from helicopter gunships and submarines.
Western powers are already concerned about Iran's military capabilities, especially the implications of its nuclear program. The US and some of its allies, as well as the International Atomic Energy Agency, fear Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons, a charge Iran denies. The West is considering stiffer sanctions against Tehran to try to force it to halt uranium enrichment, a process that has civilian uses but can be used for nuclear arms if the uranium is enriched more than 90 per cent.
Iran has an array of short-range and medium-range missiles capable of hitting targets in the Middle East and nearby, including Israel, US military bases in the region and much of Europe. Tehran frequently makes announcements about advances in military technology that cannot be independently verified. General Vahidi said the production of the cruise missiles, which took two years to develop, showed the Western sanctions against Iran had failed. He said the cruise missiles would strengthen Iran's naval power.
Cruise missiles are highly advanced, usually subsonic, rocket-powered weapons that can hug the ground and hit targets with great precision. The US used large numbers of cruise missiles in its attack on Baghdad in 2002, launching most of them from warships in the Persian Gulf. Iranian state TV showed footage of boxes containing several missiles in a warehouse, and broadcast images of Iran's cruise missile test in 2007. That missile was reportedly imported.
Tehran began a military self-sufficiency program in 1992, under which it produces a range of weapons, including tanks, missiles, jet fighters, unmanned drone aircraft and torpedoes.
Same Day THE Obama administration has made a rare breakthrough in the Middle East peace process, as clashes between Israelis and Palestinians become more frequent and more violent. It was announced yesterday that ministerial talks to be brokered by the US will begin soon between key figures from the Israeli government and officials of the Palestinian Authority. As US Vice-President Joe Biden was about to arrive in Israel, it was announced that "proximity talks" would begin as part of a strategy to enable discussions on the boundaries of any future Palestinian state to begin between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and PA leader Mahmoud Abbas. The talks were seen as some sort of breakthrough for the Obama administration, which until now has been unable to achieve its aim of bringing the Israeli and Palestinian leadership together.
On Friday, clashes continued for hours in Jerusalem's Old City. Israeli security forces stormed the site of the Al Aqsa mosque after several Palestinians locked themselves inside the compound and threw rocks at the Israeli forces. Since the heritage announcement, clashes have broken out in the Old City of Jerusalem and in Hebron near the Cave of the Patriarchs.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said yesterday both sides of the conflict needed to seize the new opportunities of the proximity talks. "Now, more than ever, I believe it is the Israeli leadership's duty to make certain we do not miss another opportunity, and this means a willingness to make some difficult decisions that will require support from all corners of the political establishment," he said. "(Mahmoud) Abbas will also have to make some difficult decisions regarding his own people. Peace is in the interests of all sides." Mr Barak said he hoped the talks would facilitate "actual negotiations on the core issues and eventually lead to an agreement".
US ignores Olmert's concessions THE Obama administration yesterday discarded far-reaching offers made to the Palestinians by former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert as it announced the two parties had agreed to resume peace talks that have been frozen for more than a year. Reports last night said US special envoy for the Middle East, George Mitchell, told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas that the understandings reached following the 2007 Annapolis Conference were non-binding in the current round of negotiations.
Haaretz reported that Mr Mitchell's deputy David Hale said the negotiations after Annapolis and the understandings reached would not be binding. Mr Olmert had gone further in offering concessions than previous leaders, proposing an Israeli withdrawal from 94 per cent of the West Bank with the remaining 6 per cent swapped for an equivalent swath of Israeli territory. In addition, he proposed international governance of the holy sites in Jerusalem and the symbolic acceptance of about 5000 Palestinian refugees into Israel. Mr Abbas never responded to Mr Olmert's offer, but the Palestinians insisted the negotiations resume from where they stopped during Mr Olmert's term as prime minister. But the report last night said the US accepted Israel's position on the matter, which was to ignore everything that was not signed as part of an agreement.
The US will play an active role in the indirect negotiations about to get under way and will "act accordingly" if the sides fail to make progress. Palestinian officials said yesterday Mr Mitchell would not simply be a messenger shuttling between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators but would be proposing ideas as well. According to the Palestinians, an American official has told them that "the US expects both sides to behave seriously, with honesty and in goodwill, because if one of the sides, in our judgment, does not fulfil our expectations, we will make our concerns clear and we will act accordingly in order to overcome every obstacle".
The Palestinians have been seeking such assurance from Washington for fear that the more powerful Israelis might attempt to ride roughshod over them.
The announcement of the resumed talks came as US Vice-President Joe Biden arrived in Israel, the highest-level American visitor since Barack Obama became President. Although the Israeli-Palestinian talks are certain to figure in his meetings with Mr Netanyahu, the fact that Mr Mitchell will not attend suggests that the focus of Mr Biden's trip will be the Iranian nuclear threat.
Mr Biden is the latest high-ranking American to have visited Israel in an apparent effort to ensure that it does not undertake a strike against Iranian nuclear facilities on its own. Jerusalem has become increasingly concerned at the failure to impose meaningful sanctions on Iran. In an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yediot Achronot before his visit, Mr Biden said: "I can promise the people in Israel that we will confront as allies every security challenge that we will face."
US condemns Israeli plan US attempts to restart the Middle East peace process were in serious doubt last night after Israel announced 1600 new homes in sensitive East Jerusalem during a visit by US Vice-President Joe Biden. Only hours after Mr Biden said an opportunity to renew peace existed, he issued a statement condemning Israel. The White House, the UN, the Palestinian leadership and large sections of the Israeli media joined his denunciation of Israel's plan and its timing. The move was even panned by Israel's Defence Minister, Ehud Barak. "The entourage of Defence Minister Ehud Barak expresses its anger after the unwarranted announcement, which affects peace negotiations with the Palestinians - negotiations of the highest interest for Israel," a statement said.
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas was already under fire from his constituency for agreeing to "proximity talks" between Israelis and Palestinians. Mr Biden was 90 minutes late for his dinner with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu because he was working on a statement about the announcement. "I condemn the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units," Mr Biden said in the statement. "The substance and timing of the announcement, particularly with the launching of proximity talks, is precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need . . . and runs counter to the constructive discussions I've had in Israel."
Israeli media debated whether Mr Netanyahu knew the announcement was coming or whether it was released by a committee responsible to Interior Minister Eli Yishai, who is also leader of the ultra-orthodox Shas party and a proponent of expanding Jewish populations in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Mr Netanyahu reportedly told Mr Biden the announcement was confirmation of an earlier decision and was not intended to embarrass him. But an article in Maariv newspaper said: "The closest man to Netanyahu in Washington (the two have indeed known each other for many years) suffered the usual treatment here, following which the guest returns to his capital angry, humiliated, agitated and seeking revenge. It's always `technical', the timing is always `coincidental', and the Prime Minister is `surprised' when his aide brings in the note with the report on the new construction tenders in East Jerusalem, but somehow it always happens. With the precision of a Swiss clock."
Mr Yishai told Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper he did not know the decision on the 1600 homes would be submitted the day Mr Biden was in Jerusalem. But a Jerusalem city councillor, Meir Turjeman, said Mr Yishai had known the committee was going to convene yesterday and had instructed his representatives on the body to work towards approving the decision. Mr Yishai denied this.
Mr Abbas agreed to the talks four days ago, but the day after Israel announced it would build 112 new apartments in a West Bank settlement. Yesterday's announcement brings to almost 5000 the number of new apartments Israel has flagged in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since it announced a 10-month freeze on settlement growth, although Israel says Jerusalem is its "undivided and eternal capital" and is not part of any freeze. Mr Abbas has said he would begin direct peace talks with Mr Netanyahu if Israel agrees to a three-month freeze of new buildings in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. But under pressure from the US he has agreed to the proximity talks under which Mr Mitchell will meet Israeli officials in Jerusalem then relay what they say to Palestinian officials.
netanyahu government in crisis over east jerusalem development THE Middle East peace process was in tatters last night and Israel's coalition government faced crisis after it announced a huge new housing development in the Arab area of East Jerusalem. Israeli Agriculture Minister Shalom Simhon said the Labour Party was considering quitting the coalition government, and Palestinian negotiators said they were pulling out of the US-brokered "proximity talks".
The crisis erupted during the visit of US Vice-President Joe Biden to Israel to support the talks. Mr Simhon said: "Members of the Labour Party have more and more difficulty in taking part in a coalition government that they joined with the purpose of relaunching the peace process with the Palestinians. The anger of Biden is justified. A grave error has been committed, and there is a price to pay."
The Arab League, which pressed Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to accept renewed talks even though Israel had not agreed to freeze Jewish settlements, withdrew support for the discussions. Mr Biden condemned Israel, saying the Netanyahu government had "inflamed tensions" by announcing 1600 housing units would be built in Arab East Jerusalem. On Mr Biden's first day in Jerusalem, Israel announced plans for the development in East Jerusalem, a mainly Arab area prized by Palestinians as the capital of a future Palestinian state.
For the second day running, Mr Biden, this time standing alongside Mr Abbas in Ramallah, condemned Israel. "The decision by the Israeli government to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem undermined the very trust, the trust we need right now to begin, as well as have profitable negotiations," Mr Biden said. The US would hold both sides accountable for any statements or actions "that inflame tensions or prejudice the outcome of talks, as this decision did".
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said the Palestinians were withdrawing from the talks unless Israel cancelled the East Jerusalem development, Agence France Presse reported. The Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported Mr Biden had said privately Israel's decision to build in East Jerusalem was liable "to set the Middle East on fire". It said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent three officials to tell the US delegation he did not know the announcement was coming, but "US administration officials didn't buy the explanation" and "officials in both the White House and the State Department accused Israel of having set Biden up".
Haaretz quoted Israeli officials as saying 50,000 new housing units beyond Jerusalem's "Green Line" (the division between Jewish and Arab areas of the city) were ready for planning and approval. The paper said Israel, through the Israel Lands Administration and the Housing and Construction Ministry, was the main force behind the new projects, which were supported by private businesses and political organisations, including settler groups. The green line is the armistice line that existed from 1948 until 1967, when Israel captured much of the land, including East Jerusalem, in a war with Arab nations.
Same Day MOSSAD mania continued in Israel this week when a supermarket chain filmed a marketing campaign inspired by the assassination of a Hamas commander in Dubai by a 27-strong hit squad. The TV commercials for the Mahsaney Kimat Hinam (Almost Free Warehouse) supermarket chain shows actors carrying tennis rackets, and wearing hats, glasses and wigs - the same disguises worn by the alleged killers in surveillance images released by Dubai police - as they make their way through store aisles.
The actors are seen through the supermarket security cameras surreptitiously slipping products into their shopping trolley. One actor wearing a tennis outfit browses the frozen food section while an actress wearing a wide-brimmed floppy hat mimicks Israel's policy of neither confirming nor denying involvement in the assassination, saying she "couldn't admit to anything". The advertisement even carries the tongue-in-cheek slogans: "Eliminate the prices" and "We offer killer prices".
Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a founder of the military wing of the Islamist Hamas movement which controls Gaza, was found dead in his room in the al-Bustan Rotana hotel near Dubai airport on January 20. Mabhouh had been drugged and then suffocated. Dubai police have released extensive surveillance camera footage they say shows the team of 27 suspects from the hit squad they have linked to Mossad, the Israeli spy agency.
Advertising executive Sefi Shaked said the campaign was inspired by the footage released by Dubai police. He dismissed any accusation the advertisement was in bad taste, saying the firm hoped to capitalise on the huge amount of media attention generated by the Dubai killing. "It's a funny take of this event," Mr Shaked said. "We were fascinated by the technique of using surveillance cameras instead of (expensive) high-production commercial cameras, and the latest events in Dubai gave us a great opportunity. All the Israeli television comedy shows have done it, so why shouldn't we?"
Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement in Mabhouh's death - despite increasingly confident announcements by Dubai police that they have linked Mossad to the killing. In the wake of the murder, the spy agency has become popular again in Israel, with stores selling out of the agency's memorabilia and a soaring number of people visiting its official website interested in applying to become agents. Opticians also reported a rise in sales of the horn-rimmed glasses in the style worn by some of the suspects, while T-shirts with Mossad logos were also selling out at stores.
Ilan Mizrahi, a former deputy director of the agency, declared that "Mossad has been restored to its glory days". Meanwhile on Monday, the international police agency Interpol issued arrest notices for a further 16 suspects wanted by Dubai in connection with the killing, on top of 11 already issued.
Clinton lashes Israel US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has delivered a stinging rebuke to Israel after last week's announcement that 1600 new homes for Jewish settlers would be built in East Jerusalem. The State Department said Clinton spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone on Friday to vent US frustration with the move, which cast a pall over a visit to Israel by US Vice President Joe Biden. It also endangered peace talks with the Palestinians that the Obama administration had announced just a day earlier. The unusually blunt tone of Mrs Clinton's call underscored the administration's concern about prospects for the negotiations and its anger over Israel's refusal to heed US appeals not to make provocative gestures.
Yesterday, Israel sealed off the West Bank as tension in Jerusalem escalated. Israeli police also barred men under the age of 50 from prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque — holy to both Muslims and Jews. Four young Palestinians were arrested after several youths hurled stones near Jerusalem's Old City, where the mosque is situated, police said.
Mrs Clinton's criticism and condemnation by the White House and Mr Biden comes ahead of a trip to the region by US Mideast peace envoy George Mitchell and a meeting in Moscow next week of the Quartet of Mideast peacemakers. The Quartet — the US, European Union, United Nations and Russia — yesterday condemned Israel's plans to build new settler homes and said unilateral actions would not be recognised by the international community.
Mr Netanyahu has apologized for the timing, though not the substance, of the announcement. The international community does not recognize Israel's annexation of East Jerusalem, captured in the 1967 Mideast war. Palestinians see that part of the city as their own future capital.
Israeli PM moves to placate furious US ISRAELI Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has summoned his inner cabinet to an unusual late-night meeting to order a probe after furious American reaction to the announcement of housing construction in East Jerusalem during US Vice-President Joe Biden's visit.
Mr Netanyahu's move yesterday came after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lashed out at the housing announcement, calling it "insulting" to Washington. "It was just really a very unfortunate and difficult moment for everyone - the United States, our Vice-President, who had gone to reassert our strong support for Israeli security - and I regret deeply that that occurred and made that known," Mrs Clinton said. She "made it known" directly to Mr Netanyahu in a 45-minute telephone conversation in which the Prime Minister mostly remained quiet and listened to Mrs Clinton's scathing criticism.
At President Barack Obama's direction, Mr Biden condemned the announcement. The Israeli ambassador in Washington was summoned to the State Department. Mr Netanyahu has said he was unaware of the housing announcement before it was made. Although the American protest was linked to Mr Biden's presence in Jerusalem, which made it seem that the US was complicit in the announcement, Washington has made it clear that it objects not just to the timing but to Israeli construction itself in East Jerusalem, where the Palestinian Authority wishes to create the capital of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
A State Department spokesman said Israel had "undermined trust and confidence in the peace process, and in America's interests" and had endangered an agreement to revive peace talks with the Palestinians in the coming days. Some Israeli commentators believe that Mr Netanyahu will now be obliged to accept a de facto freeze on Israeli housing construction in East Jerusalem. In announcing a 10-month freeze last year on settlement construction on the West Bank he specifically excluded East Jerusalem, which Israel captured from Jordan in the 1967 Six Day War. Unlike the rest of the West Bank, East Jerusalem was formally annexed by Israel, which argues that no one can dispute Israel's right to build on what is now its sovereign territory.
The announcement during Mr Biden's visit of plans to build 1600 more housing units in East Jerusalem, in addition to the tens of thousands already built, was denounced by Israeli media as grossly provocative, an assessment much of the Israel public agreed with. During Mr Biden's speech to students at Tel Aviv University following the incident the largest hand went not to his warm words about Israel but to his mention of the condemnation he had issued of the building project.
Mr Netanyahu, who last year declared for the first time his readiness to accept a Palestinian state alongside Israel and to impose a de facto freeze on settlement construction, has been attempting to offset the impact of these concessions on his right-wing coalition partners by building projects in East Jerusalem. Over the weekend, he called German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian President Silvio Berlusconi to express regret at the incident. "I even apologised to Vice-President Biden," he said. "But I was not in any way aware of the building plan ahead of the announcement."
Furious US turns up heat on Israel THE US is turning up the heat on Israel as relations between the two countries continue to deteriorate in the wake of last week's disastrous visit to Israel by US Vice-President Joe Biden. As Israel's ambassador to the US Michael Oren was reported as saying this was the worst crisis in relations between the two countries in 35 years, the US was believed to be demanding that Israel overturn the announcement that triggered the crisis - a new development of 1600 apartments in East Jerusalem.
Israeli media yesterday carried reports of new conditions the US is set to put to Israel to ensure peace talks with the Palestinian Authority resume. US special envoy George Mitchell returns to Israel this week as US officials continue to condemn Israel. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the announcement of the housing development in Arab-dominated East Jerusalem, made during Mr Biden's visit to Israel, "an insult" to the US while senior White House official David Axelrod escalated the row yesterday, saying it was "an affront".
While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has set up a committee to ensure that such an incident does not occur again, the US is making it clear it regards the problem as the policy of expanding Jewish populations in sensitive areas rather than the timing of any announcements. Israel's Channel Two reported that Mrs Clinton has asked Mr Netanyahu to cancel the new development and to ensure "proximity talks" include substantive issues rather than procedural matters.
Haaretz newspaper said Mr Oren told Israel's diplomats over the weekend that the two countries faced their worst crisis for 35 years. It reported that Mrs Clinton told Mr Netanyahu in a 43-minute phone call that there were four things Israel needed to do to restore confidence in the US-Israel relationship: investigate whether the announcement during the Biden visit was deliberate; reverse the decision to approve the 1600 apartments; make a substantial gesture to Palestinians, such as the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from additional areas of the West Bank; and declare that the proximity talks will deal with core issues such as borders, refugees, Jerusalem, security arrangements, water and settlements. The row comes as tensions between Israelis and Palestinians escalate.
Clashes have been breaking out, particularly in Hebron and Jerusalem, since Mr Netanyahu announced three weeks ago that two Jewish holy sites would be heritage-listed. The sites, Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem and the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, are in the West Bank and various international and Palestinian figures have said the announcement's timing, as the US was trying to restart peace talks, was provocative. Israel sealed off the West Bank on Friday and is likely to continue the lockdown as up to 3000 security personnel have positioned themselves around Jerusalem, particularly the Old City, in anticipation of more clashes.
Meanwhile, Israel announced it had captured in the West Bank Maher Ouda, a founder of the military wing of Hamas.
Extract - US envoy cancels trip over Israeli building defiance US special envoy George Mitchell last night cancelled his Middle East trip in an escalation of Washington's worst row in decades with Tel Aviv. Mr Mitchell had planned on coming to wrap up preparations for relaunching Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. But now it is not clear when the indirect talks, to be mediated by Mr Mitchell, will begin. "When Mrs Clinton outlined what she thought appropriate actions would be to the Prime Minister, she asked for a response by the Israeli government. We wait for the response," a State Department spokesman said. US senator Joe Lieberman, a supporter of Israel, said: "Let's cut the family fighting, the family feud. It just doesn't serve anybody's interests but our enemies."
Mr Netanyahu told his parliament yesterday that no Israeli government in the past 40 years had agreed to limit building in East Jerusalem and that nearly half the population of Jerusalem now lived in neighbourhoods beyond the 1967 borders. "Building these Jewish neighbourhoods did not harm the Arabs of East Jerusalem in any way and were not built at their expense," Mr Netanyahu said.
"Nearly half of the Jewish population in Jerusalem now lives in these neighbourhoods. These places are not far away. They are a few minutes' drive from here, they are less than 6km from the Knesset."
An estimated 3000 Israeli security officers were positioned around East Jerusalem yesterday and Israel sealed off the West Bank for the fifth consecutive day. Last night clashes broke out in Jerusalem between scores of Palestinians and Israeli security officers. PLO executive member and former prime minister Ahmed Qureia warned of a third intifada. "If matters remain at this level, regardless of whether we take the decision or not, it is coming. If Israel continues these practices, it is coming."
The Wall Street Journal reported that the US-Israel row was threatening the Obama administration's campaign to achieve new sanctions against Iran. In Gaza, Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar used the occasion of the re-dedication of the Hurva Synagogue in Jerusalem to make a firebrand, anti-Semitic speech. "You who are opening Hurva are heading towards ruin," he said. "Wherever you have been you've been sent to your destruction . . . you're destined to be destroyed. You've made a deal with the devil and with destruction itself - just like your synagogue."
Israel declared two scenes of demonstrations against the security barrier, Bilin and Naalin, as military zones until August.
Extract - Clinton backs Israel as mobs riot HILLARY Clinton has tried to ease tensions with Israel as the top US commander in the Middle East warned that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was stirring anti-US sentiment in the region. Amid clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinian protesters around Jerusalem yesterday, the US Secretary of State said the row between Washington and Israel would not change their "unbreakable bond". Mrs Clinton rejected reported comments by Israel's ambassador to the US, Michael Oren, that relations were the worst for 35 years. "I don't buy that," she said. "We have an absolute commitment to Israel's security. We have a close, unshakeable bond between the US and Israel and between the American and Israeli people."
The head of the US Central Command, General David Petraeus, told the US Senate armed services committee yesterday the Israeli-Palestinian conflict fomented anti-American sentiment "due to a perception of US favouritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of US partnerships with governments and peoples," he said. The conflict increased Iranian influence in the Arab world through "clients" such as Hamas, the Palestinian militant faction that runs the Gaza Strip, and the Hezbollah group in Lebanon, he told the committee. General Petraeus said the conflict was undermining US interests in the Middle East by presenting "distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests".
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed Mrs Clinton's remarks. "In the past year, the government of Israel has proven its commitment to peace in both word and deed, including PM Benjamin Netanyahu's Bar Ilan speech, the dismantling of hundreds of checkpoints and roadblocks in Judea and Samaria, and the decision to suspend new construction starts in Judea and Samaria for 10 months, which Secretary of State Clinton defined as `unprecedented'," the office said. "By contrast, the Palestinians have raised preconditions for the resumption of the diplomatic process, such as they have not done in the past 16 years. They are waging an assault to delegitimise Israel in international institutions via the Goldstone report. "They are also continuing to incite towards hatred and violence; included in this is the decision to dedicate a square in Ramallah to the woman terrorist responsible for murdering 38 Israelis."
But Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said: "Israel is lighting matches in the hope of sparking a fire, deliberately escalating tensions in occupied East Jerusalem rather than taking steps to placate the situation. This is an explosive situation. These are Netanyahu's policies, which are tantamount to pouring oil on fire."
Israeli forces fired stun grenades and teargas as Palestinian protesters threw rocks and what appeared to be molotov cocktails in yesterday's clashes. In one incident, someone appeared to fire live bullets at an Israeli police patrol. The clashes occurred in about five suburbs of East Jerusalem, near the Old City. About 3000 Israeli security forces sealed off the Old City. The Palestinians claimed 91 protesters were injured, while Israel claimed 15 police were hurt. About 60 rioters were arrested.
Extract - Netanyahu, aides in desperate effort to appease US ISRAEL'S inner cabinet is trying to formulate a response that will satisfy the Obama administration as a way to restart the Middle East peace process. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has held marathon meetings with the six most powerful ministers to come up with a course of action that will satisfy the US, particularly Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The deliberations with the six ministers - Avigdor Lieberman, Eli Yishai, Ehud Barak, Moshe Yaalon, Dan Meridor and Benny Begin - came as US President Barack Obama denied a crisis, saying: "We and the Israeli people have a special bond that's not going to go away. But friends are going to disagree sometimes . . . there is a disagreement in terms of how we can move this peace process forward," he said, urging Israelis and Palestinians to rebuild trust.
Palestinian official Mohammed Dahlan, a leading figure in the Fatah faction opposed to the Hamas faction, called on Hamas to "join a collective battle rather than settle for calling on the Palestinians to prepare for an intifada in the West Bank".
Israel's media yesterday had conflicting reports about the reception Mr Netanyahu is likely to receive next week when he travels to the US to address the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a Jewish lobby group. The newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that US officials had refused to schedule any key meetings for Mr Netanyahu unless they received "satisfactory" answers from Israel to the demands by Mrs Clinton. The paper said the US might arrange key meetings for Israel's opposition leader Tzipi Livni, who will address AIPAC, as "revenge" on Mr Netanyahu. Yedioth said some ministers saw this as an attempt by the US to guarantee an extension of the 10-month freeze in the West Bank while others believed the US wanted to drive a wedge between Mr Netanyahu and the right wing of his government in the hope to see his administration fall.
As relations with the US remained rocky, Israel reported the first death from a rocket fired by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip for more than a year.
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