August 23, 2018

Bolton Visits Yad Vashem And New U.S. Embassy In Jerusalem

President Trump’s National Security Advisor, John Bolton, visited the new U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem on Tuesday (21st), as part of his three-day visit to Israel.

Bolton was received at the embassy by U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman a day after the NSA met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and took part in a joint press conference.  Bolton arrived in Israel Sunday (19th), and is expected to meet with Netanyahu several times during the trip, with a focus on Iran’s nuclear program and U.S. efforts to convince European powers to leave the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

Also on Tuesday (21st), Bolton met with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, who accompanied him on a tour of the Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem.

At the end of his visit to Yad Vashem, Bolton signed the center’s guest book, writing: “In memory of the greatest tragedy which the spirit and resilience of the Jewish people has overcome, to help us prevent its like from ever happening again… to anyone.”

(israelnn.com)

 

Netanyahu Sends Muslims, Druze Eid al-Adha Greetings Amid Nation-State Law Issues

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday evening (20th) posted a video on social media blessing the Muslim and Druze communities as they began celebrating the Eid al-Adha festival.

“I would like to wish the Muslim and Druze an ‘Eid al-Adha mubarak,’” or blessed Eid al-Adha, the premier said in the Hebrew-language video, which has been published with Arabic and English subtitles.

“I’m proud of the fact that in Israel we have freedom of worship for all: Muslims, Druze, Christians, Baha’is, Jews – everyone.  And I would like to wish you and your families a happy holiday. Bless you,” Netanyahu said.

The festive message came as the government was making efforts to mollify minorities over the controversial Jewish nation-state law.

Eid al-Adha commemorates the willingness of the patriarch Abraham, or Ibrahim in the Muslim tradition, to sacrifice his son and God’s intervention that stopped the slaughter.

According to the Muslim faith, Abraham’s ‘almost-sacrificed-son’ was Ishmael, while in Judaism, it was Isaac.

The holiday continues for the next four days, and falls every year during the Muslim month of Dhu al-Hijjah, when Muslims perform the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.  

(timesofisrael.com)

 

‘Gaza Siege Will Be Lifted Soon,’ Hamas Leader Declares

In a fiery speech that contradicted the reports of efforts to broker an Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh declared that the “Palestinian resistance will continue in its efforts to crush the siege on Gaza.”

In an address delivered in Gaza City at the onset of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha (Festival of Sacrifice), Haniyeh said, “The criminal siege of the Zionist occupation of Gaza will end very soon, but Hamas will not make any political concessions to have it removed.  The resistance will break the siege on Gaza. We will crush it and continue to fight without relinquishing the principles and weapons of the resistance.”

Israel imposed a maritime blockade on the Gaza Strip after the Islamist terrorist group seized control of the enclave in a military coup in 2007.

Israel maintains the measure is necessary to prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons and terrorists into Gaza.

Haniyeh further demanded that the Ramallah-based regime of Palestinian Authority Leader Mahmoud Abbas “immediately cease its security collaboration with the Israeli occupation.”

Hamas’ ouster of Abbas’ Fatah-led government in 2007 effectively split the Palestinian Authority into two entities.  All efforts made over the past decade to promote a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation – the latest brokered by Egypt in 2017 – have failed.

(israelhayom.com)

 

Senior Turkish Official Claims ‘Jewish Bankers’ Run The World

A veteran Turkish politician has drawn criticism over the past few days, after he accused “Zionist bankers” of conspiring to dominate the world and claimed a small cadre of Jews had destroyed the American monetary system.

Burhan Kuzu, a founding member of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, served as a member of the Turkish parliament until June’s election.  He nevertheless remains an influential figure within the party, and a confidant of President Erdogan.

Last Wednesday (15th), Kuzu claimed via Twitter that a group of some 300 “Zionist bankers of Jewish descent” had taken control of the printing of US currency, as part of a larger plot to ‘run the world.’

“This is not a hoax!” Kuzu wrote.  “The American people think that the dollar is US money.  However, the paper bills are printed and controlled by just 12 families of Zionist bankers of Jewish descent, whose numbers do not exceed 300.”

This group of “Zionist bankers,” Kuzu claimed, “runs the world.”

To back up his claims, Kuzu cited the end of America’s use of the Gold Standard in monetary policy, claiming that the switch to fiat money in 1972 was evidence of the plot by “Zionist bankers.”

Anti-Semitic hoaxes, including the famous ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion,’ have relied on the canard of Jewish bankers conspiring to subvert economic and political systems in countries around the world.

Since the elimination of the gold window, fringe groups including the Nation of Islam and Aryan Nations have accused the Federal Reserve System and the fiat monetary system of serving the interests of a group, run by Jewish bankers involved in a global conspiracy.

(israelnn.com)

 

Former Mossad Chief Calls For International Sanctions To Defeat Hizbullah – Yonah Jeremy Bob

• Tamir Pardo, who headed Israel’s Mossad Intelligence service from 2011 to 2016, has proposed defeating Hizbullah with sanctions led by an alliance of the U.S, EU and moderate Sunni-Arab states.
• He told the Jerusalem Post in an interview: “The ability to limit the Hizbullah threat with sanctions is 10 times easier than with Iran – and if Trump would do it now, it would have a big effect on the Iran nuclear standoff.”
• “Lebanon is the only state in the world with a terror entity which has more raw power than the country’s army.  Hizbullah is Lebanon.  It sits in the government and the parliament,  It decides all political issues.” At the same time, “Hizbullah is an inextricable part and operative of a third state – Iran.”
• During the Second Lebanon War in 2006, there was a concept of attacking Hizbullah without attacking the rest of Lebanon, Pardo explained, but this concept is now outdated.  “To defeat Hizbullah completely, we would need to invade all the way to northern Lebanon because of their long-range missiles. I argue that we can solve the Lebanese issue with a different and more fitting solution.”
• “If Trump announces sanctions against Lebanon like he did against Iran, the Lebanese economy would not be able to last for more than three to four months.  Lebanon is not Iran. It is a tiny nation which relies on the West and the Sunni moderate countries.”
• “Even if only some aspects of the serious Trump sanctions on Iran were imposed on Lebanon,” he said, this would be much more effective than a war against Hizbullah, if there was “a clear message that sanctions would only be removed if: 1) Hizbullah gave up its arms or was absorbed entirely into the Lebanese army, and 2) if Iran withdrew its tentacles completely from Lebanon.”

(jpost.com)