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Defense Minister Ehud Barak has proposed a unilateral withdrawal from most of Judea and Samaria, with tens of thousands of Jews outside of population centers in Judea and Samaria to leave or remain under a Palestinian Authority government. He issued the suggestion of another one-sided move in an interview with the Yisrael HaYom newspaper. Excerpts were published Monday and the full interview will be published Tuesday, the day before Yom Kippur. Jews in Ariel, located in Samaria (Shomron), Maaleh Adumim -- a large city between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea -- and in Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem, would remain...

Tensions between Israel and the current U.S. administration further deteriorated last week when President Barack Obama refused to meet with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu during his upcoming visit to New York, where he will address the UN General Assembly. The White House insisted that the meeting would not take place due to the president’s pressing “campaign obligations” which would take him out of New York. Obama has further snubbed Israeli leaders by refusing to meet with Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who will also be in New York next week, WND news station reported.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak spoke by telephone to his Egyptian counterpart Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Friday morning, according to Arabic-language news agency Al-Hayat. According to the report, al-Sisi affirmed Egypt's commitment to maintaining the 1979 Camp David peace treaty with Israel in the phone call, ahead of a meeting with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy. The report comes over speculation that relations with Egypt could break down over an Egyptian military build-up for counter-terror operations in Sinai, and Morsy's plan to attend the Non-Aligned Movement's conference taking place in Tehran at the end of the month. The conference marks the...

MK Danny Danon (Likud) on Friday called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to intervene and complete the process of recognizing the Ariel University Center in the Shomron as a full-fledged university. Danon’s call came following reports that Defense Minister Ehud Barak has been delaying the announcement of Ariel’s recognition as a university for over three weeks. The Judea and Samaria Council for Higher Education (CHE-JS) has already decided to recognize Ariel as a university, but final approval needs to come from the IDF, which has legal authority over Judea and Samaria. “This delay is unacceptable,” said Danon, who noted that...

Defense minister says Obama most supportive president of Israeli security; Panetta to arrive to press Israel to give sanctions time. In what appears like a clear endorsement of a presidential candidate, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Monday night that Barack Obama has been the most supportive president on matters of Israeli security throughout the two countries' diplomatic relations. In an interview aired late Monday night on CNN, Barak told Wolf Blitzer that the Obama administration’s support of Israeli defense and intelligence establishments was far greater than under any other administration he remembered working with since and including President Jimmy Carter....

Monday morning's attack by terrorists against Israeli workers building the security fence on the southern border is further evidence of the increasing failure of Egyptian security efforts in Sinai, said Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Speaking at a meeting of his Atzma'ut faction, Barak said that several recent events, including Grad rocket attacks against Israel over the weekend, meant that Egypt needed to do more to fulfill its international obligations. “We see Monday's attack as a very serious incident,” Barak said. “It comes in the wake of an incident on Shabbat in which two Grad rockets were fired into southern Israel...

If Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu calls early elections, Ehud Barak, a thorn in the coalition’s official backing of Judea and Samaria, could be left out in the cold. The trigger for possible elections later this year is the movement for changing the military draft system, whose critics have targeted exemptions or shorter terms of service for young men studying Torah. The Prime Minister said Sunday he backs military service for all Jews and civilian service of Arabs, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu met with leaders of the “suckers’ rally” that has staged a week-long demonstration opposite his office. Protest leaders said...

Jews forced out of the Machpelah House in Hevron last week spent Passover in tents just meters away. In the meantime, the building sits empty. Defense Minister Ehud Barak, with support from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, insisted on going ahead with last week’s eviction ahead of Passover, arguing that Jewish presence in the building was an operational threat that must be rectified immediately. The IDF, he said, could verify that Jews had a legal right to the home after forcing them to leave it. The eviction caused discord in the government, with senior figures including Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz and...

The IDF Civil Administration on Thursday took the unprecedented step of rejecting a government plan to normalize the status of the Sansana community in the South Hebron Hills. In Israel, as in other democracies, military officials are beholden to policy decisions made by civilian officials and are expected to implement their directives in good faith. The Civil Administration decision that "there is no justification for a new settlement, as [new homes] can be constructed within an existing settlement" comes 12 years after Sansana was established. In 1997 a Nahal outpost was established at Sansana, but the first homes were not...

Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak called on the international community Saturday to tighten sanctions even further on Iran, warning it is essential to halt the Islamic Republic's nuclear development activities. Speaking to reporters in Tokyo following meetings with Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and other Japanese officials, Barak said, “I think there is consensus now in most of the world's capitals that Iran should not be allowed to become a military nuclear power.” He added that at least in the West, and in North American, “no option should be removed off the table in regard to dealing with the threat” of...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak alluded to the 2005 Disengagement from Gaza Sunday as he warned that Israel would strike back at terrorists there. "Since Friday, about 36 missiles have been fired from Gaza at Israeli communities," he said in a speech at the World Policy Conference in Vienna. "Israel will know how to defend itself and will not let this situation continue. [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon evacuated the Gaza Strip and took out every last soldier and civilian, gave instructions to tear down all buildings, even synagogues, so as not to supply any excuse to the Palestinians. And what happened?...

Barak Joins Dots on Mysterious Iranian Explosions Sunday, December 04, 2011 Defense Minister Ehud Barak: 'In Iran These Days Accidents Can Happen As Well As Other Things" 'Those Who Argue That We'll Know When Iran Makes Dash For Nuclear Weapons Ignore Possibility That Iranians Will Get The Bomb On The Sly & Then Become Immune From Intervention' IsraCast Assessment: By Saying Sanctions Would Fail & Refusing To Say If Israel Was Involved In Mysterious Explosions, Barak Inferred That Israel Was Not Ready To Allow Iran To Secretly Develop The Bomb For the second time in two weeks, a major explosion...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak played down speculation on Saturday that Israel and US-led allies were waging clandestine war on Iran, saying sanctions and the threat of military strikes were still the way to curb its nuclear program. Barak was asked in an interview whether two explosions in Iran last month showed "the war has already begun" through sabotage. "I don't think so," he told Channel 2. "I think that the answer to your question is negative."One of last month's explosions in Iran killed at least a dozen members of the Revolutionary Guards, including a general. Iran called it an accident...

In an interview Thursday morning, Defense Minister Ehud Barak sounded somewhat more pessimistic on the likelihood that the international community could stop Iran's nuclear program with sanctions than he did in an interview on American TV a day earlier. Speaking on Israel Radio, Barak said that although Israel was trying to convince members of the international community to economically isolate Iran, he did not think that effort would work. Despite his pessimism, he said, Israel needed to continue working through diplomatic channels – and avoid the alternative. On Wednesday, Barak had told American interviewer Charlie Rose that it was in...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak reiterated on Wednesday that a nuclear Iran would have dangerous consequences on the Middle East and the entire world. In an interview on the Charlie Rose Show on PBS, Barak said that the recent IAEA report on Iran’s nuclear program left no room for mistakes regarding Iran’s intentions. “It’s clear that they are determined to reach nuclear capability,” Barak said. “None of the series of experiments that they were running can be explained other than their pursuing a nuclear military capability. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Thursday said Israel was "willing to consider apologizing" for problems that occurred during last year's raid of the Turkish flotilla ship the Mavi Marmara in which nine Turks were killed when they tried to lynch IDF commandos. Speaking to reporters in Washington following a meeting with his US counterpart Leon Panetta, Barak said he would prefer to "come to an understanding" with Turkey rather than wait for the publication of a UN report on the incident, which he deemed "problematic for Israel." "Defense Ministry and IDF legal advisers recommend that we come to an understanding...

While the government has thus far refused to apologize to Turkey over a clash aboard a Gaza-bound boat in 2010, senior cabinet ministers are divided on the matter. Foremost among them are Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Defense Minister Ehud Barak; the former staunchly opposes an apology, while the latter supports it. “This is not a legal matter, but rather a political issue, and is not a question of defending IDF soldiers but of neglecting them, of irresponsibility on the diplomatic level,” Lieberman said Thursday. “If there is an apology, that means admitting defeat on the battlefield and the political...

Sunday’s Cabinet decision to strip Defense Minister Ehud Barak of some aspects of his unilateral authority regarding Jewish neighborhoods in Judea and Samaria is gratifying for the Land of Israel-loyal public. The Cabinet decided to transfer responsibility for the World Zionist Organization Rural Settlement Division from the Agriculture Ministry to the Prime Minister's Office. Specifically, some issues that until now needed to be approved by the Defense Minister will now merely be decided "in coordination with the Defense Minister." Judea and Samaria (Yesha) have not been annexed to Israel, and are still under military control – meaning that Defense Minister...

Policy making for Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria is moving from the Defense Minister to the Prime Minister's Office.. The move could be the result of an initiative by Coalition Chairman MK Ze'ev Elkin (Likud) and MK Miri Regev (Likud), who demanded that authority over construction be taken away from Barak after they visited Efrat in February. Defense Minister Ehud Barak had requested a delay in discussing any such action until he was to return from Paris. Nevertheless, on Sunday the government authorized the transfer of responsibility for the Settlement Department of the World Zionist Organization from the Agriculture...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak says the PA should not object to Israeli construction in Judea, Samaria, and eastern Jerusalem because Israel will just hand over anything in areas ceded during talks, anyways. "There's a reality on the ground and natural population growth. People need to build kindergartens," Barak said, noting another construction freeze is not possible. "But why should the Palestinians care? If a building is constructed on land that will be transferred to them under a peace agreement, they will get the building, hence the issue if of no significance," Barak argued.