'Obama Behind Jerusalem Apartheid'
by Maayana Miskin
Recent days have seen conflicting reports on construction in Jerusalem. While Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu states that construction in Jerusalem will continue, reports indicate that in practice, Jews are barred from building in some parts of the capital city. Arutz Sheva's Hebrew news service spoke to Jerusalem Construction and Building Planning Committee member Yair Gabbai to clarify the situation.
According to Gabbai, there is definitely a distinction being made between "west" Jerusalem, meaning the territory that has been under Israeli sovereignty since 1948, and "east" Jerusalem, the lands that were under Jordanian control from 1948 until 1967. Recently, officials have begun making a distinction between Jews and Arabs, allowing Arabs to build in neighborhoods where Jews are turned down for construction permits, he said.
"The most recent meetings have taken on a certain apartheid-like quality," he said. "Construction permits in eastern Jerusalem are given exclusively to Arabs, while in the western half of the city there's no discrimination."
United States President Barack Obama is behind the de facto construction freeze, Gabbai believes. " is the source of the pressure on the prime minister and the government to freeze construction in eastern Jerusalem, even though it's not good for Jerusalem," he said.
The construction freeze is not only discriminatory, but is even criminal, he said. By law, the entire city of Jerusalem is under Israeli sovereignty, and no distinction should be made between various neighborhoods.
Gabbai suggested two ways in which Israelis can fight the Jerusalem building freeze. One path would be a legal battle. "I'm convinced that if a Jew can prove he's been discriminated against, and that suddenly only Arab construction plans are coming before the committee even though he was supposed to come before the committee as well, the court won't allow it," he said.
Another possibility is to fight the freeze at its source, by putting pressure on Obama, he said. If tens of thousands of Americans take to the streets and tell Obama to leave Jerusalem alone, the president will be forced to do so, he stated.
"The American public... is sensitive to the subject of Jerusalem, more so than to any other part of American foreign policy. If the public's anger is aroused, he will be forced to change his policy," Gabbai said. Proof of the Obama administration's need for public support can be seen in the administration's efforts to enlist support from Jewish organizations in the wake of tensions over Jerusalem, he added. (IsraelNationalNews.com)
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Israelis blame Obama for strained relations
A public opinion poll conducted by Israel's War and Peace Index revealed that a plurality of Israelis blame US President Barack Obama for the strained relations between America and the Jewish state.
Sixty-one percent of respondents said Israel and the US still have good relations, though that number is considerably lower than in the past.
A 56 percent majority said they do not blame Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the rift, and gave him a positive grade in handling Israel's relations with the US. Only 43 percent said the same of Obama, while 48 percent said the US president has done a poor job handling relations with Israel.
Nevertheless, most of the respondents did not chalk Obama's behavior up to hostility, but rather 43 percent said he is pragmatic and indifferent toward Israel. At the same time, 55 percent said Obama is overtly friendly and supportive toward the Arabs.
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Syria, Russia Upgrade Ties, Israel Fears More Arms for Hizbullah
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is visiting Syria for the first time Monday night as the two countries upgrade trade ties despite American disapproval of Syria's supplying Hizbullah terrorists with missiles. Medvedev's arrival in Damascus comes hours after he hosted President Shimon Peres during a three-day visit.
The United States has raised suspicions that Syria also is arming Hizbullah with long-range Scud missiles, a charge that Syrian President Bashar Assad vehemently denies. The Obama administration recently charged that Hizbullah has one of the largest missile arsenals in the world.
Israel has been unsuccessfully trying to convince Russia not to sell it an advanced anti-aircraft defense system, which the IDF fears could end up in Hizbullah's increasingly advanced arsenal. Hizbullah surprised Israel in the Second Lebanon War with advanced Russian anti-tank missiles that destroyed heavily armored IDF tanks.
Medvedev and Assad will talk about regional security at a time when the Obama administration is trying to reverse previous American policy and restore diplomatic relations with Damascus to the level of ambassador. Republicans in the U.S. Senate last Friday blocked an attempt by President Obama's Democratic party to confirm Robert Ford as the first American ambassador to Syria in five years.
The United States officially regards Syria as a state that supports terror.
Medvedev also is scheduled to visit Turkey, which has rapidly dropped formerly friendly relations with Israel and has embraced Iran and Syria. Turkey has offered to resume its role as a mediator in indirect Syrian-Israeli peace talks, which former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert approved during his term of office but which were suspended more than a year ago. Israel has rejected the offer. (IsraelNationalNews.com)
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Suspected Spy for Hizbullah Heads Anti-Israeli NGO
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyah
Amir Makhoul, one of the Israeli Arabs suspected of spying for Hizbullah, heads a group that has rejected an anti-terror funding clause and promotes boycotts of Israel, according to NGO Monitor.
Makhoul, of Haifa, and Omar Radwan Said of Kfar Kana were arrested by Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) agents for allegedly spying on behalf of the Hizbullah terrorist organization. A gag order on the arrests was lifted Monday. Both suspects deny the accusations.
Makhoul is the brother of a former Arab Knesset Member of the Hadash party and heads the Israel-based Arab organization Ittijah.
NGO Monitor, headed by American-born Prof. Gerald Steinberg (pictured below), reported that Ittijah is involved in anti-Israel "demonization."
Established in 1985 and based in Haifa, Ittijah describes itself as "the network for Palestinian non-governmental organizations in Israel Ittijah. NGO Monitor noted, "Updated funding information is not available due to lack of transparency," and added, "Ittijah joined a number of Palestinian NGOs in rejecting anti-terror clauses in funding agreements.
During Israel's Operation Cast Lead war against Hamas terror last year, Ittijah claimed that "the IDF is turning Gaza to kind of an extermination camp, in the full sense of the word and with the full historical relativity."
It also was prominent in the anti-Israel Durban Conference against Racism in 2001, where the United States and other leading Western nations walked out following biased resolutions aimed only at the Jewish State and which ignored the denial of human rights in the Muslim world.
The group's website claimed that it "gathered, facilitated and directed the vision and position of the Palestinian NGOs inside Israel on racism, particularly Israeli-state racism towards Palestinian citizens, and the apartheid the State practices" in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
Ittijah also backs the Saudi Arabia 2002 plan that calls for the immigration of several million foreign Arabs into Israel, in what the Arab world refers to as "the right of return." Ittijah organized a 2004 conference entitled "Right of Return and Just Peace," according to NGO Monitor.
The same group, besides backing boycotts of Israel divesting of companies having a presence in Judea and Samaria, also signed a petition against the L'Oreal company for operating in pre-1967 Israel.
It claimed the firm's factory in the Lower Galilee city of Migdal HaEmek is located in a "settlement was established in 1952 on lands belonging to the ethnically-cleansed Palestinian village of al-Mujaydil..."
Makhoul and Said, who is a member of the Balad political party, are suspected of a number of serious offenses, including contact with a foreign agent. Police arrested Said at his house, provoking a string of protests.
His arrest last Thursday sparked angry protests in the Haifa Arab community, although the gag order had prevented reports in the media. The Arab rights group Abdullah charged that the arrests were political motivated because the suspects are not members of mainstream Israel parties.
Their arrests are the latest in an increasing phenomenon of Israeli Arabs being involved with Hizbullah. Former Knesset Member Azmi Bishara remains outside the country after being indicted on charges of selling classified information to Hizbullah durng the Second Lebanon War in 2006.
Earlier this year, an Israel Arab was arrested on charges of working out in the health club as IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and passing on to Hizbullah information on his approach route to the facility. (IsraelNationalNews.com)
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Feiglin: US statement shows Netanyahu lied
By GIL HOFFMAN
10/05/2010 03:15
Jewish Leadership head demands revote of Likud decision.
Likud activist Moshe Feiglin demanded that the party conduct a revote on its decision 10 days ago that he lost to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, after the US State Department revealed on Sunday night that the government had pledged not to build in Jerusalem's Ramat Shlomo neighborhood for two years.
Netanyahu easily defeated Feiglin's loyalists in a vote of Likud central committee members that postponed elections for all the party's institutions. Netanyahu turned the vote into a battle between him and Feiglin, while Feiglin painted it as a fight over the future of Jerusalem.
Likud rightists such as Minister-without-Portfolio Bennie Begin and Vice Premier Moshe Ya'alon backed Netanyahu in the vote, promising that Netanyahu would not freeze building in Jerusalem and would never divide the city.
"The American announcement proved that I was correct when I said that Netanyahu would allow a freeze in Jerusalem, and I think it also proves that I am correct and nearly the entire faction that stood behind Netanyahu is wrong when they say he won't divide Jerusalem, and I say that whatever Bibi says, the opposite is true," Feiglin said on Sunday night.
Feiglin's spokesman briefed him about the American announcement while he was discussing whether his Manhigut Yehudit forum should leave the Likud, in a meeting with some 40 of his loyalists at a private home in Jerusalem.
Manhigut Yehudit director-general Michael Fuah said after the meeting that most of the people who attended said the Likud under Netanyahu was no more democratic than Israel Beiteinu under Avigdor Lieberman. Referring to the prime minister's nickname, he called Netanyahu "Bieberman."
Likud MKs said Netanyahu had told the Likud faction very clearly two weeks ago that building in Jerusalem would continue.
He said we "will never stop building in Jerusalem due to the Palestinians demands just like the US would not stop building in Washington at the request of the Taliban," MK Danny Danon said.
Habayit Hayehudi faction chairman Zevulun Orlev warned on Sunday night that "if Bibi won't build in Jerusalem, he won't be able to build on this coalition."
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Demographic Revolution: Jewish, Arab Growth Equal in Jerusalem
by Maayana Miskin.
The Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) released data on Jerusalem's population Monday in honor of Jerusalem Daym which begins Wednesday night. The CBS information showed that in recent years, the Jewish fertility rate in the capital city has increased to the point where it now equals the Arab rate.
Both Jewish and Arab Jerusalemites now bear an average of four children, and the parity contradicts claims that the population soon will overtake that of Jews.
The total population of Jerusalem stood at 774,000 at the end of 2009.
Data showed a trend of one-way assimilation when it came to neighborhoods of the city that were regained in 1967, after falling under Jordanian control in 1948. While Jews and other non-Arabs have moved into the post-67 areas, few Arabs have moved in the opposite direction. 98 percent of Jerusalem's Arab residents live in neighborhoods that were temporarily under Jordanian control.
Thirty-nine percent of Jerusalem's Jews and other non-Arabs live in post-67 neighborhoods. In total, 42 percent of the residents of post-67 Jerusalem are Jewish or other non-Arab..
While fertility rates are identical for Arabs and Jews, Jews appeared to be more affected by negative migration, which stood at 7,100 for 2009, with 12,800 people moving to Jerusalem and 19,900 leaving the city.
Those who left went primarily to Jewish towns in the greater Jerusalem area.
Jerusalem is unusually religious, data showed. Hareidi-religious Jews live in Jerusalem at a rate 3.6 times higher than their percentage in Israel as a whole, while non-hareidi religious Jews are 1.4 times as common in the capital as elsewhere. The percent of non-religious Jews in Jerusalem is less than half of that in the country as a whole. (IsraelNationalNews.com.
