hz, Author at Netzach Yisrael

Israel Will Not Return Bodies of Hamas Terrorists, Ministers Decide

hzJanuary 1, 2017January 1, 2017News

JTA

Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades Cadets in Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip

Israel’s security cabinet decided the bodies of Hamas terrorists killed during attacks on Israelis will not be returned to their families and will instead be buried.

In a meeting Sunday, the security cabinet focused on bringing about the release of Israeli civilians and the bodies of Israeli soldiers held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. “The political-security cabinet discussed standing policy on treatment of the bodies of Hamas terrorists killed during terror attacks and decided that they will not be returned, but will be buried,” read a statement issued Sunday evening by the Prime Minister’s Office.

The security cabinet is a select group of government ministers empowered to make decisions related to Israel’s foreign and defense policy, especially in urgent circumstances like war.Sunday’s decision came a day after Hamas released a cruel video showing what it called a birthday party for Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul, who was killed during the 2014 Gaza war and whose body the terrorist group is holding. Hamas also is believed to be holding the body of Lt. Hadar Goldin, also killed during the 2014 conflict, and Israeli civilians Avraham Mengistu and Juma Ibrahim Abu Anima, who crossed into Gaza on their own.

hzJanuary 1, 2017News

NY Post

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump

President-elect Donald Trump’s advisers want to invite Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu to the inauguration or arrange a meeting of the two leaders before then, a source close to the transition said.

Transition leaders led by Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner have been aggressively courting Netanyahu and want him to attend the Jan. 20 festivities, the source said. “There’s a plan for Trump to meet with Netanyahu,” the source said. “They’re talking all the time. And Netanyahu is talking about possibly going to the inauguration.”

Netanyahu congratulated Trump on his victory a day after the presidential election, and Trump had invited the Israeli leader to meet in the US at his “first opportunity.”

hzJanuary 1, 2017January 1, 2017News

BBC

Forensic teams searching the club at daybreak

At least 39 people, including at least 15 foreigners, have been killed in an attack on a nightclub in Istanbul, Turkey’s interior minister says. A gunman opened fire in Reina nightclub at about 01:30 local time (22:30 GMT), as revellers marked the new year. Suleyman Soylu said efforts were continuing to find the attacker, who was believed to have acted alone.

At least 69 people were being treated in hospital, the minister added. Four were said to be in a serious condition. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the attackers were trying to “create chaos” and pledged to “fight to the end” against terrorism.

hzDecember 31, 2016January 1, 2017Articles

National Review

Palestinian Hamas Terrorists

By Andrew C McCarthy: It was the key national-security debate of the 2016 election. Donald Trump won the election, in no small part, because he appeared to be on the right side of it. Appeared is used advisedly: Trump was at least in the general vicinity of the bull’s-eye; his opponent wouldn’t even acknowledge the target existed — except in the most grudging of ways, and only because Trump had forced the issue. The question boiled down to this: Are you willing to name the enemy?

Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/443440/donald-trump-radical-islam-israel-palestinian-conflict-test-case-new-administration

hzDecember 30, 2016January 1, 2017News

Algemeiner

French President Francois Hollande

A leading US Jewish group called on Friday on French President Francois Hollande to cancel an international conference on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process set to be held in Paris on Jan. 15.

“In the aftermath of the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which was a significant step backward in achieving direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, and Secretary [of State John] Kerry’s speech on Middle East peace earlier this week, the international community should not plunge forward with the ill-conceived and poorly timed Paris conference,” Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations Chairman Stephen M. Greenberg and Vice Chairman and CEO Malcolm Hoenlein stated. “Now is a time for serious reflection on how peace can best be achieved, not for another sham forum in which the usual one-sided outcomes against Israel are the likeliest result. Given the significant issues that were raised in the past week which have long-term implications for the prospects for peace, proper preparation after serious consultation is essential.”

hzDecember 30, 2016December 30, 2016Articles

Wall Street Journal

A Construction Site in Efrat

By Felicia Schwartz: John Kerry’s speech on the Mideast peace process has drawn an exceptionally sharp reaction in Washington, with lawmakers in both parties warning it could further inflame the fraught state of the relations between Israel and the Palestinians that the secretary of state described.

Some top Democrats including incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) said the speech, which attempted to defend and preserve President Barack Obama’s approach to resolving the conflict, could yield the opposite effect, leading to an unraveling of the long-held push for a two-state solution. “While he may not have intended it, I fear Secretary Kerry, in his speech and action at the United Nations, has emboldened extremists on both sides,” Mr. Schumer said in a statement late Wednesday.

hzDecember 30, 2016December 30, 2016News

JTA

Argentina Former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, right

Argentine former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who is on trial over corruption charges, is to be probed also on allegations that she had covered up evidence from the bombing of a Jewish community building in exchange for Iranian oil.

In the 249-page ruling by a Buenos Aires appeals court, which was handed down Thursday, three judges wrote that the evidence presented “does not permit a justified dismissal of possible illicit actions” by Kirchner in connection with a deal between her and her administration with Iranian officials.

hzDecember 30, 2016News

Reuters

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry

Britain scolded U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry for describing the Israeli government as the most right-wing in Israeli history, a move that aligns Prime Minister Theresa May more closely with President-elect Donald Trump. After U.S. President Barack Obama enraged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by refusing to veto a UN Security Council resolution demanding an end to Israeli settlement building, Kerry’s public rebuke of Israel has unsettled some allies such as Britain. Amid one of the United States’ sharpest confrontations with Israel since the 1956 Suez crisis, Kerry said in a speech that Israel jeopardizes hopes of peace in the Middle East by building settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

While Britain voted for the UN resolution that so angered Netanyahu and says that settlements in the occupied territories are illegal, a spokesman for May said that it was clear that the settlements were far from the only problem in the conflict.

hzDecember 30, 2016December 30, 2016News

President-Elect Donald Trump

After a pair of diplomatic victories, the Palestinians are now setting their sights on a Mideast peace conference in France next month in a bid to rally support as they prepare for the uncertainty of the Trump administration.

The Palestinians are hopeful that a strong international endorsement in Paris will insulate them from what they fear will be a close alliance between President-elect Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

hzDecember 29, 2016January 1, 2017Articles

Jewish World Review

By Victor Davis Hanson: Israel would seem to be in a disastrous position, given the inevitable nuclear capabilities of Iran and the recent deterioration of its relationship with the United States, its former patron and continued financial benefactor. Immediately upon entering office, President Obama hectored Israel on so-called settlements. Obama promised to put “daylight” between the U.S. and Israel — and delivered on that promise.

Last week, the U.S. declined to veto, and therefore allowed to pass, a United Nations resolution that, among other things, isolates Israel internationally and condemns the construction of housing in East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

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