ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION

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SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION

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SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT:
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1. Mideast


2. Iran

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Key stories in the media:
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Israel Radio quoted Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley as
saying yesterday, at the daily State Department briefing: QThere had
been some reporting after yesterdayQs briefing that I think
represents some misinterpretation. ThereQs been some reporting that
the United States is contemplating financial or economic pressure
against Israel. We are not contemplating such action.

HaQaretz reported that he U.S. administration has issued a stiff
warning to Israel not to build in the area known as E-1, which lies
between Jerusalem and the West Bank settlement of Ma'aleh Adumim.
Anychange in the status quo in E-1 would be "extremel damaging,"
even "corrosive," HaQaretz quoted th message as saying.

Makor Rishon-Hatzofe reportd that the Qmost influentialQ Center for
America Progress, which is the Qclosed research center to Obama,
has issued a document calling for removingJerusalem from Israeli
sovereignty.

Major meda reported that yesterday PM Benjamin Netanyahu called on
the Arab world to negotiate with Israel on the Arab League's peace
initiative, hinting that certain alterations in it would help to
advance peace in the region. The Jerusalem Post emphasized
NetanyahuQs praise of the QspiritQ of the initiative. Speaking at a
reception marking EgyptQs Revolution Day at the Egyptian
ambassador's home in Herzliya, Netanyahu said, "We appreciate the
efforts by Arab states to advance the peace initiative. If these
proposals are not final, they can create an atmosphere in which a
comprehensive peace can be reached." QWe hope in the months ahead
to forge peace with the Palestinians and to expand that into a
vision of a broader regional peace," Netanyahu added. Maariv quoted
President Shimon Peres as saying at the ceremony that President
Mubarak is capable of being the man who will lead to peace with the
Palestinians and the Arab world.

Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union of Reform Judaism, was
quoted as saying in an interview with HaQaretz that the vast
majority of American Jews back a settlement freeze. Charles
Bronfman, one of the Jewish peopleQs most prominent philanthropists,
was quoted as saying in an interview with HaQaretz (English Ed.)
that what keeps Israel and U.S. Jewry apart is not lack of religious
pluralism, but lack of peace in the Middle East.

Reviewing the current state of U.S.-Israel relations, incoming
Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren granted a particularly
optimistic interview to YediotQs Washington correpondent Orly
Azolai, who remarks that his dream may be disturbed by an QAmerican
hammer.Q Maariv (Shmuel Rosner) reported that the latest flare-up
between the Israeli government and the U.S. administration resulted
from a conversation between Oren and the State DepartmentQs Jacob
Levy.

Yediot (Alex Fishman) reported that over the past few months Israeli
and Palestinian officials have drafted a detailed security annex to
a future agreement establishing a Palestinian state (including a
withdrawal calendar, warning systems, and even GPS devices to be
distributed to drivers entering the West Bank). Yediot says that
this is how Qwolves are supposed to dwell with sheep.Q The
newspaper reported that the document, which was completed around two
months ago, will be officially presented this week to Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton and National Security Advisor James Jones, and
that the Pentagon, the White House, and the foreign ministries of
France, Egypt, Britain, and Jordan have already viewed it over the
past few weeks..

The Jerusalem Post quoted Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz as saying
yesterday that growing tensions between Israel and the U.S. over
construction in Jerusalem and the West Bank will not affect U.S.
loan guarantees.

HaQaretz and other media reported that yesterday the UN Security
Council accused Hizbullah of violations of UNSC Resolution 1701.
The Council convened upon a request by the U.S. HaQaretz and Israel
Radio quoted IsraelQs Ambassador to the UN Gabriel Shalev as saying
that, for the first time, a UN body addressed such Israeli
complaints.

HaQaretz reported that yesterday Kyler Kronmiller, a diplomat at the
American Consulate-General in Jerusalem, visited the protest tent of
two East Jerusalem Palestinian families served with an eviction
order. The newspaper said that during an initial visit there two
weeks ago, Kronmiller did not enter the tent in order not to
publicly expose a U.S. protest against house demolitions. The
Jerusalem Post reported that yesterday the state called on the High
Court of Justice to reject a petition by the NGO Yesh Din calling on
it to demolish nine permanent residential buildings in Rehalim, an
outpost established on state and private land without government
permission in 1991.

The Jerusalem Post reported that yesterday Vice PM and Regional
Development Minister Silvan Shalom lashed out at the PA for not
accepting IsraelQs offer to resume talks unconditionally.

The Jerusalem Post reported that the IDF and the United States
European Command conducted a joint exercise this week of the X-Band
radar that is deployed in the Negev to check its interoperability
with Israeli early-warning systems.

Maariv reported that John Ging, Director of Operations of UNRWA,
left Gaza for two weeks after he refused to hand over aid money to
Hamas. Maariv and The Jerusalem Post cited IsraelQs concern that
$900 million in U.S. aid to Gaza will be used for terror purposes.

The media reported that PM Netanyahu plans to impose faction
discipline on his Likud Party during the vote on the so-called
"Mofaz Bill" this coming Monday, and any Knesset member who fails to
vote with the coalition will be sanctioned. This decision is meant
to prevent another humiliating defeat like the one Netanyahu's
reform of the Israel Lands Administration (ILA) suffered on
Wednesday, when he was forced to pull the bill at the last minute
after several coalition members made it clear they planned to vote
against, while others ostentatiously absented themselves from the
hall. The "Mofaz Bill" would make it easier for a group of Knesset
Members to split off from their party and form an independent
faction. It is so called because Netanyahu hopes it will enable a
group of MKs to quit the opposition Kadima party and join the
government, and MK Shaul Mofaz is considered the most likely person
to lead such a group. HaQaretz noted that Government Services
Minister Michael Eitan (Likud),a staunch opponent of the QMofaz
Bill,Q is a primary target of NetanyahuQs dismissal threat. Vice PM
and Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya'alon (Likud),a close
Netanyahu ally, skipped the vote on the ILA bill because he opposes
it. However, HaQaretz and other media reported that Netanyahu is
trying to reach an agreement with him.

Russian Ambassador to Israel Piotr Stegniy was quoted as saying in
an interview with HaQaretz that Russia has no desire to regain
superpower status. He hinted that, when it comes to territorial
compromie, small nations like Israel just cannot act like ig ones.
Regarding the issue of weapons to Iran,Stegniy was also quoted as
saying that his county honors an arms balance in this Qsensitive
regin,Q and that it will not sell any weapons that wil truly upset
this balance drastically.

The meia reported that far-Right militants Baruch Marzel and Itamar
Ben-Gvir (parliamentary aide to National Union Knesset Member
Michael Ben-Ari),and Ben-Ari himself, plan to lead a march on
Sunday in the Israeli-Bedouin Negev town of Rahat to protest what
they call building violations there. The police have only
authorized the participation of 60 people in the demonstration.

HaQaretz (English Ed.) quoted a World Zionist Organization (WZO)
official as saying that the expected election next month of Rabbi
Michael Melchior, a dovish politician, will lead to a clash between
the WZO and the Jewish Agency, chaired by the hawkish Nathan
Sharansky.

HaQaretz (English Ed.) reported that a group of 23 students from
Jerusalem's Hebrew University came up with a small application which
uses the Facebook "status line" to inform hundreds of thousands of
users at any given moment about positive facts about Israel.

Lawrence (Larry) Franklin, a former senior analyst at the Pentagon,
who was accused of revealing secret information to Israel, was
quoted as saying in an interview with HaQaretz that he had felt
betrayed by then AIPAC officials Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman.
However, Franklin was quoted as saying that he had broken the law
by telling Rosen about internal rivalries within the U.S.
administration. HaQaretz also quoted Franklin on the Iranian issue:
QThe Israeli government's intelligence agencies must do everything
short of attacking Iranian territory to disrupt the rule of Iran's
military theocrats. To take the bait and bomb Iran's known nuclear
facilities will gain some time, but it will unite Iranians behind a
despised regime. Propaganda, cyberwar, sabotage all are viable
weapons [in this struggle]."

All secular media (lead stories in Yediot and Maariv) reported that
several rabbis, three New Jersey mayors and two state legislators
were among the 44 people arrested in New York and New Jersey
yesterday in a sweeping corruption investigation that began as a
probe into an international money laundering ring that operated
between Brooklyn; Deal, NJ; Israel; and Switzerland, and trafficked
in goods as diverse as human organs and fake designer handbags.
Media reported that the key suspects are members of the
Jewish-Syrian community in Brooklyn. Banners in Yediot: QThe Jewish
QLaundryQQ and Maariv: QA Money-Laundering Synagogue.

The Jerusalem Post cited the results of a poll carried out by the
Maagar Mohot Survey Institute: 62% of Israelis believe that
Palestinian leaders want to destroy Israel, not live alongside it.

Yediot cited the results of a Pew survey: 71% of Israelis have a
positive view of the U.S. However, Israel is the only reviewed
country where the status of the U.S. has not dramatically increased
recently.











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1. Mideast:
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Block Quotes:
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"A QCrisisQ Manipulated"

The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized (7/24):
QDiplomacy involves an element of political manipulation --
sometimes even psychological warfare. WeQre witnessing this in the
U.S.-Israel relationship. The Obama administration has made a
strategic decision to pressure Israel pointlessly, relentlessly, and
publicly, while, for now at least, asking little of the
Palestinians. The diversionary issue employed in this campaign is
housing construction over the Green Line. Washington cannot
realistically think that Israel is going to knuckle under and stop
building within strategic settlement blocs, or in post-Q67
Jerusalem. So it appears that the administration is engaging in
confrontation for the sake of confrontation. The object? To gain
credibility with the Arab world in the belief it will give them an
incentive to make peace. ItQs the same failed approach pursued by
practically every administration since 1967 -- only on hyper-drive.
And this time, itQs characterized by manipulatively overplaying the
chasm in the U.S.-Israel relationship.... In response, Israel
engages in its own, clumsy manipulation.... The Netanyahu government
is wrong to think that exacerbating the perception of a crisis in
U.S.-Israel relations is the wisest method of setting Qred lines
for future negotiations with the Palestinians.... ItQs a [very big]
shame that the administration is expending so much energy on an
approach that actually reduces the prospects of a breakthrough --
and that in so doing, it is employing manipulative tactics that make
mainstream Israelis even more fearful of taking risks for peace.











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2. Iran:
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Block Quotes:
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I. "Last Train to Tehran"

Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote in the mass-circulation,
pluralist Yediot Aharonot (7/24): QNetanyahu is out of whack.
That's what his problem is. He zigzags between the trivial and the
main thing. He has no compass. He has no sense of direction. On
Sunday, [Special Envoy for Middle East Peace George] Mitchell will
arrive. The next day Secretary of Defense Robert Gates will arrive,
and on Tuesday National Security Adviser James Jones. Gates was the
most outspoken, the most forthright against a clash with Iran.
Israelis who met him received the impression that there had been a
change in his position. He realizes that the Iranians are
determined in their decision to move toward obtaining the bomb.
Words will not divert them from their path. He also realizes that
Iran is more vulnerable today than in the past to international
economic pressure. Now is the time to get him moving.... Obama is
losing stature, both in AMERICA and also in a large part of the
world.

II. "No Existential Threat form Iran"

Gabi Sheffer, a liberal political science professor at the Hebrew
University, wrote in the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz (7/24):
Q[Netanyahu government officials and senior IDF officers] repeat the
same mantras that the current Iranian regime will continue to rule,
that it will become even more extreme, that Iran will attain a
nuclear military capability, that it will not hesitate to use it
directly or through terrorist intermediaries, and that it would set
off reactionary nuclear armament in other Middle Eastern countries
which, in their view, would cause a disaster. Barack Obama, Nicolas
Sarkozy, Angela Merkel and other politicians and generals in the
West and Middle East have voiced more restrained fears.... There are
three basic reservations regarding these much-talked-about concerns
over Iran. First, like other small states, Iran seeks to attain
nuclear weapons in order to deter other nuclear-armed states from
attacking it. So if Iran is not attacked, it will not attack.
Second, Iran's goal is primarily to boost its influence in the
Muslim world. Third, and most important, with the exception of two
atomic bombs that were needlessly used by none other than the
democratic and liberal United States -- since Japan was very near
surrender -- no other country possessing nuclear weapons has used
them. The other reasons for not using nuclear weapons are numerous.
The main reason is these states' fears, including Iran's, of a
response by other nuclear-armed countries.... Other reasons for
refraining from using nuclear weapons include moral considerations,
fear of mistakenly striking allies in the region, concern over
widespread destabilization and other related factors. The
conclusion is that even if Iran attains nuclear weapons, it does not
pose a real existential threat to other countries, Israel included.
It would behoove Israeli politicians and defense officials to take
these considerations into account and cease disseminating statements
about the existence of this threat and military operations against
Iran. Even if the Iranian threat is not completely imagined, it is
completely weak and the Israeli public should understand this rather
than allow itself to be dragged into supporting a destructive
military operation.

CUNNINGHAM