ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION

UNCLAS TEL AVIV 001164 STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEA/PPD WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM NSC FOR NEA STAFF SECDEF WASHDC FOR USDP/ASD-PA/ASD-ISA HQ USAF FOR XOXX DA WASHDC FOR SASA JOINT STAFF WASHDC FOR PA CDR USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL FOR POLAD/USIA ADVISOR COMSOCEUR VAIHINGEN GE FOR PAO/POLAD COMSIXTHFLT FOR 019 JERUSALEM ALSO ICD LONDON ALSO FOR HKANONA AND POL PARIS ALSO FOR POL ROME FOR MFO SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: OPRC KMDR IS SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION Please note: The Israel Media Reaction report will not appear on Friday, May 29, 2009, due to the Israeli holiday of Shavuot. -------------- SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: -------------- Mideast -------------- Key stories in the media: -------------- Israel Radio quoted Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as saying yesterday that President Obama "wants to see a stop to settlements -- not some settlements, not outposts, not natural-growth exceptions." Leading media reported that, at their meetings with PM Benjamin NetanyahuQs envoys in London this week, U.S. officials stated that the U.S. will not renounce its opposition to Israeli construction in the territories and outposts. The Jerusalem Post and other media reported that yesterday leading religious Zionist rabbis called on IDF soldiers to disobey orders to dismantle and evacuate outposts and settlements in the West Bank. However, the daily reported that a major insubordination is unlikely. Leading media reported that Peace Now Secretary-General Yariv Oppenheimer called on Attorney General Menachem Mazuz to launch an investigation against those religious leaders. "The rabbis are using their religious authority to sabotage democracy and turn the IDF into a political tool to be used by the settlers," Oppenheimer was quoted as saying. The Jerusalem Post reported that Netanyahu told the Knesset yesterday that he is committed to agreements signed by previous government -- Qthe closest he has come in public to adopting the two-state solution formula. The Jerusalem Post quoted Secretary Clinton as saying yesterday that the U.S. would present detailed plans on the peace process to the parties as part of its efforts to jumpstart negotiations. The media reported that PA President Mahmoud Abbas Is due to meet with President Obama in the White House today. HaQaretz wrote: QObama considers his role as one in which he provides Abbas with the necessary support, in part by pressing Netanyahu and taking a tough stance on settlements.Q Maariv predicts that the President will pressure Abbas to remove the three conditions he set to a meeting with Netanyahu. Israel Radio quoted Abbas as saying at a meeting yesterday that he "will not demand the return of five million" Palestinian refugees to Israel -- saying "we will not destroy Israel." HaQaretz notes that the U.S. media has questioned AbbasQs effectiveness ahead of the visit. The media reported that yesterday the Knesset plenum gave initial approval to a bill that would make it a crime to publicly deny Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state, punishable by a sentence of up to a year in prison. The bill would outlaw the publication of any "call to negate Israel's existence as a Jewish and democratic state, where the content of such publication would have a reasonable possibility of causing an act of hatred, disdain or disloyalty" to Israel. Forty-seven Knesset members voted in favor of the bill and 34 voted against, with Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin (Likud) abstaining from the vote. The measure would have to pass three additional votes in parliament and a committee review before becoming law. HaQaretz reported that on Sunday MK David Rotem (Yisrael Beiteinu) will introduce a bill that would force candidates for Israeli citizenship to take an oath of allegiance to the state. Makor Rishon-Hatzofe reported that the Foreign Ministry has dissociated itself from MK Arieh EldadQs (National Union) QJordan is PalestineQ idea. The Jerusalem Post and other media noted that several such new legislative initiatives from right-wing parties are causing discomfort among mainstream U.S. Jewish advocacy organizations that worry that efforts to forbid anti-Israel activism in the country may be tinged with racist intentions and lead to infringements on freedom of speech. The Jerusalem Post reported that visiting Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) told the newspaper yesterday that President Obama Qcan never dictate to Israel to follow a path that would lead to harming itself.Q Lautenberg was referring to the possibility of Israel bombing IranQs nuclear facilities. Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk was quoted as saying in an interview with Yediot that Syria will agree to discuss the possibility of leaving Israeli settlements in place in the Golan under its sovereignty. Israel Radio reported that 70 representatives of foreign governments and armies will arrive in Israel to watch the nationwide drill it will conduct next week. The Jerusalem Post reported that, Qin a move liable to reignite controversy over QWhoQs a Jew?,QQ Shas and United Torah Judaism are preparing a bill that would give the Chief Rabbinate sole jurisdiction over conversions in Israel. The Jerusalem Post quoted senior Israeli defense officials as saying yesterday that the IDF is drafting operational plans to evacuate several West Bank outposts by the end of June. Maariv reported that a ministerial committee on economic peace with the Palestinians held its first meeting yesterday. Major media quoted DM Ehud Barak as saying yesterday that Israel intends to build a Palestinian city near Ramallah, the idea of which was put forward by Barak and Quartet envoy Tony Blair a long time ago. Maariv and The Jerusalem Post cited IsraelQs concern that assault helicopters and tanks that the U.S. promised the Lebanese Army will fall into HizbullahQs hands. Maariv quoted an Israeli defense source as saying that a statement by Vice President Joe Biden regarding U.S. military aid to Lebanon is evidence that the U.S. lacks understanding about what is happening in that country. Israel Radio and The Jerusalem Post reported that Amnesty InternationalQs annual report denounces actions by Israel, the PA, and Hamas .. The report states that Gaza is on the brink of disaster. HaQaretz reported that according to an inspection by the Palestinian human rights organization Mizan, which was commissioned by the newspaper, 1085 of the 1400 Palestinian casualties in Operation Cast Lead were killed in Israeli air raids. Mizan said that around 7% of Palestinians killed during the operation were shot at point-blank range. Maariv reported that the rift between Jews and Arabs in the city of Acre has deepened since last yearQs riots. HaQaretz and other media reported that police investigators are increasingly confident that they will be able to press charges within the next few weeks against FM Avigdor Lieberman, over a series of violations for which he is being questioned. Yediot reported that next week former PM Ehud Olmert will undergo surgery in a New York hospital to remove a tumor from his prostate. -------------- Mideast: -------------- Block Quotes: -------------- ¶I. "A Worthy Agenda" The independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized (5/28): QIn his speech next week directed at the Muslim and Arab world, U.S. President Barack Obama is expected to launch a new era in AmericaQs relations with Islam.... The U.S. is striving, not only with the PresidentQs speech, to restore its political legitimacy in the Middle East. This legitimacy has badly eroded both because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as AmericaQs special relations with Israel. Due to the wars and the United StatesQ tendency to support IsraelQs positions absolutely, the U.S. has lost its statuts as a honest broker and a power that can and wants to impartially examine the needs of Israel, the Palestinians and the Arabs. [wbs1]Israel is used to zero-sum games in which every American leaning toward the Arabs does so at IsraelQs expense, and every expression in IsraelQs favor is an achievement at the Arabs expense. So it awaits the speech suspiciously, not to say apprehensively. So far Israel has QbenefitedQ from the balance in which Muslim hostility toward the U.S. has turned Israel into AmericaQs only apparent strategic partner in the region. Now Washington may find new friends. IsraelQs exclusivity is about to crack, if not to crash.... [Nonetheless,] an American-Arab and Muslim friendship could prove to be s strategic asset. Washington is now expected, as a continuation to ObamaQs speech in Cairo and his meeting with Saudi King Abdullah, to present a viable peace plan that would launch the practical stage of the American vision. II. "Is Obama truly Looking for a Fight with Israel over QNatural GrowthQ?" Diplomatic correspondent Herb Keinon wrote on page one of the conservative, independent Jerusalem Post (5/28): QIsraeli officials are confident -- perhaps overly confident -- that if they Qline up with the U.S. administration on the Qright side of the fenceQ on most settlement issues, they could find a formula to work regarding natural growth. This means that if, as the Olmert government declared, the Netanyahu government says it will uproot illegal outposts, not set up new settlements, not give incentives to move to the settlements, and not expropriate any additional Palestinian lands, then the conventional wisdom in the current government is that the U.S. would permit -- as it has in the past -- natural growth construction as long as it does not go beyond the existing construction lines. But what if Obama, as some maintain, is actually looking for a public fight with Israel on this issue in order to win credit with the Arab world, and legitimacy among the Europeans as a leader who is willing to take Israel on when necessary? That could be a tricky tactic, because if the U.S. President picks a fight with Israel over the natural growth issue at a time when Israel has declared it won't build new settlements, expropriate land or give incentives to move there, then it could be perceived among some Obama supporters in Congress as being unfairly tough on Israel, especially since various verbal understandings were made over the years that Israel interpreted as a green light for natural growth. III. "Only the Outposts Interest Them" Settler leader Israel Harel wrote in HaQaretz (5/28): QDarfur can wait. Our outposts interest [President Obama] more, as does removing the roadblocks. They are not pleasant, but what are they compared to the atrocities in vast parts of Africa and Asia? But they are more important than his other humanitarian concerns. ItQs not merely a humanitarian problem. The outposts, according to the AmericansQ political beliefs, are obstacles to peace.... Anyone who equates [outposts] with IranQs nuclearization betrays an extreme lack of sense of proportion. How can one rely on him for matters that are a thousand times more serious? IV. "When Rahm Emanuel Curses" Editor-in-Chief Amnon Lord wrote in the nationalist, Orthodox Makor Rishon-Hatzofe (5/28): QThe fact that senior former and current U.S. administration officials allow themselves to frown and harm the respect due to the Prime Minister is a grave phenomenon in itself.... But those attitudes betray something -- Obama and his peopleQs tactic in handling Netanyahu, such as what was and what was not achieved during the Obama-Netanyahu meeting. ¶V. QSave Yourselves from Yourselves In the popular, pluralist Maariv, conservative Op-Ed Page Editor Ben-Dror Yemini imagined an QalternativeQ speech by President Obama in Cairo (5/28): QThose who relieve the Muslim world from responsibility for the culture of fear and oppression that has taken it over harm Muslims and strengthen Islamists who slaughter them. They told you that the West is to blame. In their incitement they proclaimed: Zionism is guilty. There is no bigger lie than that. There is no worse racism than that. As the son of a Muslim father, I do not believe that I am different from others. The first condition required to get out of this misery is the recognition that a choice must be made between self-delusion and outer delusion, on one side, and responsibility for oneself on the other. Stop blaming all others. CUNNINGHAM [wbs1]THIS SENTENCE DOESNQT MAKE SENSE. A word must be missing.