ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION

UNCLAS TEL AVIV 000272 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 -------------- SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: -------------- Mideast -------------- Key stories in the media: -------------- All media led with statements made yesterday morning by FM Avigdor Lieberman at Bar-Ilan University yesterday that Syria would be defeated and the regime of President Assad and his family toppled were it to attack Israel, and that Syria should renounce the idea of receiving the Golan. Maariv says that the FM is trying to thwart secret contacts with Syria that were initiated by DM Ehud Barak. Most media stressed efforts by PM Benjamin Netanyahu and DM Barak to calm down relations with Syria, while other media outlets reported that the PM is trying to reconcile or appease his senior ministers or silence his cabinet members. Maariv quoted the IDFQs OC Central Command Maj. Gen. Avi Mizrahi as saying that the IDF can reach Damascus. Mizrahi was speaking to students in the Efrat Yeshiva (in the West Bank). Maariv quoted Assad as saying in an interview with The New Yorker that he will not give Israel the peace it wants. Media reported that Assad commented on IsraelQs messy decision-making. Israel Radio quoted the London-based newspaper A-Sharq Al-Awsat as saying that Washington is trying to resolve the differences between Israel and Syria. Leading media cited a report written by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon upon the request of the U.N. General Assembly that Israel has responded in detail to the U.N.Qs demand to comment on its actions during Operation Cast Lead, but that it is still impossible to draw conclusions regarding IsraelQs examination of the accusations included in the Goldstone Report, because the investigation is on-going. The Yediot-linked news service Ynet quoted Israeli diplomats as saying that BanQs comment reflects IsraelQs determination to conduct independent probes. Maariv reported that the IDF will include a Qhumanitarian officerQ in any future incursion into Gaza. Kadima Knesset Member and former minister Meir Sheetrit was quoted as saying this morning in an interview with Israel Radio that his party might enter NetanyahuQs government coalition under certain circumstances. Yediot reported that, contrary to other senior leaders, Hamas Qchief of staffQ Ahmed al-Ja'abari is opposed to the prisoner swap involving Gilad Shalit, as it would remove the movementQs trump card. Israel Radio quoted IranQs Ambassador in Moscow as saying that Russia will make good on the delivery of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to his country. The radio cited RussiaQs silence on the matter. HaQaretz reported that, following the controversy over the alleged role of the New Israel Fund (NIF) in providing information to the Goldstone Commission, The Jerusalem Post is dropping a weekly left-leaning column by NIF President Professor Naomi Chazan. HaQaretz said that Jerusalem Post Editor-in-Chief David Horovitz would not comment. HaQaretz (Amira Hass) reported that settler efforts to stem Qillegal Arab buildingQ in Beit Sahur-East (in the Bethlehem area) have momentarily borne fruit: USAID stopped funding a public park in the community and the IDF is building a watchtower that the settlers hope will expand onto a Jewish town in the only empty space left in the Christian town HaQaretz reported that a group of Israelis and Palestinians have joined forces to create a binational neighborhood along the Jerusalem/Bethlehem border -- for the first time since 1967. HaQaretz reported that the central district attorney is set to serve an indictment, pending a hearing, against Omri Abo, who was then in the Border Police, on charges of negligent manslaughter in the fatal shooting of 10-year-old Ahmad Musa in the village of NaQalin 18 months ago. Israel Radio reported that this week British PM Gordon Brown and French PM Francois Fillon responded to harsh reports about manifestations of anti-Semitism in their respective countries -- most of them in the wake of Operation Cast Lead -- by promising to implement deterrent measures and promote legislation. HaQaretz reported that over 40 Nobel Prize winners from various countries have added signatures to a full-page ad denouncing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that is due to be published in The New York Times and International Herald Tribune in the next few days. The ad, initiated by Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel, condemns IranQs severe human rights violations and warns that IranQs nuclear program is a danger to humanity. For the past couple of weeks, the media wondered whether popular TV and print journalist Yair Lapid -- the son of the late journalist and politician Yosef (Tommy) Lapid -- would enter politics. Likud politicians demanded that he observe a Qcooling periodQ and suggested that legislation be voted to this effect. According to a HaQaretz poll conducted on February 1 and 2, 53 percent of the Israeli public are unhappy with FM Lieberman. - The survey also asked, QIs a military confrontation between Israel and Iran more likely in 2010?,Q to which 43 percent of respondents answered QyesQ; 41 percent believe there will be no change in likelihood; while 4 percent said Qno. -------------- Mideast: -------------- Block Quotes: -------------- ¶I. QThe New Maturity Editor-in-Chief David Horovitz wrote on page one of the conservative, independent Jerusalem Post (2/5): QThe frustrations ObamaQs administration feel with Israel are empathetically still there.... But still, for now, some [Washington] insiders reiterate, things are a little better. Ties between a fresh, young president newly recognizing the limits of his power and a second-time prime minister all-too aware of the limits of his, have reached a certain maturity. II. QSuddenly, a Crisis Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn wrote on page one of the independent, left-leaning HaQaretz (2/5): QDamascus' appearance on the American tourist map and the imminent appointment of a U.S. ambassador there reflect a rapprochement between Bashar Assad's regime and the United States after years of tension and distance.... But suddenly a crisis has erupted. Syrian and Israeli officials exchanged declarations about war and cranked up the threats.... Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried, as usual, to appease [his defense and foreign ministers] and released a lukewarm response. QIsrael wants peace without preconditions,Q he said to appease Ehud Barak, and QIsrael will react resolutely and firmly to any threat, to appease Avigdor Lieberman. III. QBlowing off Steam Palestinian affairs correspondent Avi Issacharoff and military correspondent Amos Harel wrote on page one of HaQaretz (2/5): QIn the absence of an American Qstick,Q there is no obvious candidate for urging Syria to initiate unconditional talks with Israel. Even Syria's bitter rivals in the Arab world, such as Saudi Arabia and Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, son of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, who was assassinated in 2005 apparently on Syrian orders, recognize they must reconcile with Damascus for the sake of Lebanon's stability. Perhaps it is Syria's new, brighter situation that led Assad to declare that it will not stand idly by if Israel carries out another aerial assault on Syrian targets or if there is another mysterious assassination on Syrian soil. IV. QFrustration in Damascus The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized (2/5): QBashar Assad understands the price he and the ruling Alawite minority would have to pay, in a country that is 74 percent Sunni, for a genuine peace with Israel. That is why in this weekQs New Yorker, Assad frankly told Seymour Hersh that even if Syria regained the entire Golan, Israel Qcannot expect me to give them the peace they expect.Q Indeed, if Israel got the peace we expected, AssadQs de-facto truce with the Muslim Brotherhood would come undone. HeQd have to expel Hamas leaders from Syria, a step the Brotherhood would find insufferable. A bad divorce with Teheran would ensue. Hizbullah would reorient LebanonQs policies accordingly. In short, Assad would be going down the path taken by the late Anwar Sadat: carving out a separate peace with Israel while the Palestinian issue festered, albeit due to the PalestiniansQ own intransigence. Naturally, if Assad got the Golan Heights on his terms, the legitimacy of his regime would be bolstered. But no Israeli government -- not Yitzhak RabinQs and not Benjamin NetanyahuQs -- can come down from the Golan in return for a sham peace.... Regrettably, Assad cannot afford to make real peace. Worse still, through a series of military and rhetorical miscalculations -- inspired, perhaps, by Iranian mischief-making -- Assad is blundering toward a conflagration with Israel. ¶V. QWhat Wonderful Leadership Diplomatic correspondent and television anchor Ben Caspit wrote on page one of the popular, pluralist Maariv (2/5): QThis is our foreign minister: instead of dealing with calming matters, rapprochement, quiet diplomacy, and improving IsraelQs standing around the world, he deals with threats, warnings, and a bloody battle over IsraelQs dignity. In other words, because Lieberman identifies Barak as the real foreign minister, he tries to be the defense minister. In his terms, the defense minister is the war minister.... Lieberman has caused major, inconceivable damage over the past year to IsraelQs international standing. He has caused this damage by saying a great many true things. But in the end, when the truth disperses, we are left with the shards, with a Goldstone report, and with officers and leaders who cannot leave IsraelQs borders for fear of being arrested. Israel is under international siege, losing its legitimacy, and losing the worldQs attentiveness for its arguments. This is greater strategic damage than the damage of a war or an Intifada. Lieberman is not interested in this. The main thing is that we maintained our posture and stuck it to the Syrians. VI. QLieberman Speaks their Language Nationalist columnist Erel Segal wrote on page one of Maariv (2/5): QForeign Minister LiebermanQs threat against Bashar Assad is not a bad answer to the Syrian Foreign Minister. One can deride LiebermanQs triteness, lack of sophistication, and verbal brutality. Everybody is so touchy about the Damascus tyrantQs dignity. But inwardly ... all of you know that in real life, the more so in our neighborhood, one must talk in a language that absolutely everyone understands. With due respect to diplomacy and pandering, sticky cocktail parties, Israeli diplomacy gets a failing grade and sinks into the murky water of apologies. Maybe it should try something else. VII. QA Marketplace Style Veteran journalist and television anchor Dan Margalit wrote on page one of the independent Israel Hayom (2/5): QNetanyahu is paying a double, hefty price for the dizzy show of the Foreign Minister who assails key countries. Domestic and foreign voices increasingly wonder whether the two men may be playing Qgood cop/bad copQ in full coordination. I cannot imagine that this is a real possibility, but the very fact that it being mentioned in every debate is causing the Prime Minister damage by its very futility. VIII. QLieberman Is Not Alone Senior diplomatic correspondent Shimon Shiffer wrote in the mass-circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot (2/5): QPrime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu hurried to call Lieberman after the speech, but NetanyahuQs advisers made it clear: QHe didnQt reprimand him.Q In fact, they say, the two are completely in accord as to the content of the statements. They differ only on the question of the timing. Netanyahu wants quiet now on the Syrian front. He seeks to lower the flames in the statements made on the Israeli side.... No less important is the position of the United States. In advance of the planned pullout of U.S. troops from Iraq in the course of 2010, the administration is preparing to establish understandings with the states of the region in order to ensure that Iraq will not disintegrate. From the standpoint of the U.S., there is great importance to the way Syria will act: it can encourage terrorist groups or it can cooperate with the Americans. The decision to return an American ambassador to Damascus, which was announced by U.S. Special Envoy George Mitchell to Assad, was intended to strengthen the cooperation between the CIA and the Syrian security services, in an attempt to cope with terror organizations whose members leave from Syria to attack American and Iraqi troops. Assad expects the U.S. to reward him for the cooperation: to extricate NetanyahuQs consent to a withdrawal from the entire Golan Heights as part of a peace agreement. One way or another, the next peace agreement will be signed according to the principle established by Menachem Begin: all the territory occupied in 1967 in exchange for peace with Syria and the Palestinian Authority. IX. QShattered Images in the South Ha'aretz editorialized (2/5): QBarack Obama and other dignified guests have been taken to Sderot to witness the town's suffering under Qassam barrages. But the townspeople's expectations that they would be the first to be protected by Iron Dome have been shattered. Now our defense chiefs are telling them that a situational evaluation will be necessary to figure out where to put the system. The mutual backslapping over the system's success and the fight over who deserves the credit have given way to mutual accusations and complaints.... The cost of producing launchers and missiles against cheap rockets is extremely high. We need money for building attack forces, protecting civilians and other defense measures, not just Iron Dome. The dilemma is more real than its packaging. Israelis deserve not merely defense, but a leadership that speaks to them seriously, without spreading illusions. CUNNINGHAM