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At the Camp David talks in July, 2000 hosted by President Clinton, Yasser Arafat rejected the proposals for a final status agreement put forward by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and offering Arafat virtually all the territories beyond the pre-1967 armistice lines. He rejected as well Clinton’s suggested amendments to Barak’s offer. Nor did Arafat submit any alternative proposals. The reason for Arafat’s tack was not difficult to discern for anyone who had been paying attention to what the Palestinian leader had been saying and doing since the inception of the Oslo Accords in 1993. It was not that he...

JERUSALEM – President Barack Obama on Monday denied betraying Israel by not using the U.S. veto against an anti-settlement resolution at the United Nations Security Council last month. Obama said it was his duty as president “to do what I think is right,” according to an interview he gave on Israeli television. “I did believe it was important to send a signal and to lift up the facts that so often get buried under other news in terms of what is happening with settlements in the West Bank,” he said. “The fact of the matter is that I’m president until...

US President Barack Obama warned in an interview broadcast Tuesday on Israel’s Channel 2 that “unfettered support” for Israel’s settlement policies would lead to a “worsening situation” over time between Israelis and Palestinians. The interview, filmed in Washington last week, appeared 10 days before Obama, who has been an outspoken critic of the Netanyahu government particularly concerning Israeli communities in eastern Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, hands over the reins to President-elect Donald Trump, who takes an entirely different approach to the Israeli-Arab conflict, among most other issues. “If the notion is that unfettered support for Israel or, more specifically, support...

The terrorist responsible for Sunday’s deadly terror attack in Jerusalem should be buried with a pig’s head, said MK Yaakov Margi (Shas) on Monday. Margi, who chairs the Knesset’s Education Committee, tweeted that were it up to him, the terrorist, reportedly inspired by the ISIS terror group, would have been interred with the head of a pig, an animal whose very touch is considered unclean in Islam. “If it were up to me, I would bury this cursed terrorist with a pig’s head,” wrote Margi. The attacker, he continued “brought us back to reality and reminded us who the real...

The death of the two-state solution didn’t happen by accident. It stems from Israel’s continued expansion of subsidized settlements on Palestinian land, a policy that has been considered illegal and an obstacle to peace by both the United States and the UN for decades. This was the context in which the UN resolution was passed. Opposition to settlements is a moderate stance, yet on this issue, even the Democratic Party is siding with Trump instead of Obama.

President Obama’s clashes with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may cost him a membership at an exclusive golf club, sources said. Obama is looking to join the elite Woodmont Country Club in Maryland once he becomes a private citizen. But members of the mostly Jewish club are at each other’s throats over whether to accept the golf-loving president, with many saying he deserves to be snubbed for not blocking an anti-Israel vote at the United Nations, according to the sources.

Pope Francis will grant Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas an audience at the Vatican on Saturday, the Holy See confirmed indirectly Tuesday by announcing arrangements for media coverage of the visit. It will be the third time Francis has met Abbas following an encounter during the pontiff's 2014 trip to the Holy Land and the Palestinian leader's 2015 visit to the Vatican to attend a canonization ceremony for two Palestinian nuns. Relations between the Holy See and Palestine were upgraded in 2015 with the signing of an accord expected to lead to the establishment of a Palestinian embassy in the...

President-elect Donald Trump's team is moving ahead with plans to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel out of Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, although diplomats and officials are ramping up warnings against the move. CNN reported speculation in Israel is the U.S. will announce the move May 24, a national holiday in that country. Earlier this month, President Barack Obama renewed a waiver that blocks the move for six months. Allies have said moving the embassy could ramp up violence. "It's very dangerous," one European diplomat told CNN. "Chances for the peace process are going very quickly — it's now or...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The incoming Trump administration has told allies it is moving ahead with plans to relocate the US Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem -- even as those countries issue stark warnings of the potential impact and the Palestinians and Arab nations are escalating calls not to do it. In Israel, where officials have lobbied countries for years to move their diplomatic missions to Jerusalem, which Israel claims as its capital, there is speculation a US announcement could be made as early as May 24 -- "Jerusalem Day" in Israel, a celebratory national holiday. That date...

Amidst accusations of soldier inaction at the recent terror attack in Jerusalem, inspection of the terrorist's body found that it contained bullets from both automatic rifles used by soldiers and civilian hand guns...

Originally published by the Jerusalem Post. It is not in the least surprising that the PLO-controlled Palestinian Authority did not condemn the terrorist attack on Sunday. It is not surprising because the PLO-controlled PA encouraged the attack. As Khaled Abu Toameh wrote for the Gatestone Institute, in the aftermath of last month’s US-enabled passage of UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which criminalizes Israel, the PA went on the warpath. . Among other things, Muhammad Abu Shtayyeh, who serves as a close adviser to PLO chief and PA leader Mahmoud Abbas called for an intensification of terrorist attacks against Israelis. Shtayyeh...

The State of Israel is preparing for a new diplomatic battle, this time in Paris. In less than a week the Paris International Conference will convene with participation of delegates from 70 countries. Participants at the conference will call on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to disassociate from Jewish Home leader Naftali Bennett due to his opposition to the establishment of a Palestinian state. The world leaders will call on Israel to endeavor to establish such a state in order to reach an agreement with the Palestinian authority. The leaders maintain that there is no possibility of implementing such a solution...

Another 5,000 French Jews emigrated to Israel last year, figures showed Monday, continuing a trend that has seen tens of thousands quit the country after a series of attacks targeting the community. The Jewish Agency of Israel issued the update as France marked two years since attacks on the Charlie Hebdo magazine offices and on a Jewish supermarket in Paris, where four shoppers were shot dead. Daniel Benhaim, who heads the Israeli-backed group in France, said that insecurity had been a “catalyst” for many Jews who were already thinking of leaving. The 5,000 departures in 2016 add to the record...

Last Thursday evening 342 out of the 435 total Members of the House of Representatives objected to last month’s United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Israel. In a chamber where the majority party rules, the vote was about as bipartisan as it gets. H.Res.11 was supported by most Democrats and all but four Republicans. But the House vote wasn’t entirely prompted by the anti-Israel resolution in the UN. Similar resolutions have been authored before. The House vote was prompted by the Obama Administration’s refusal to use its veto power to shoot down the UN resolution– thereby making it the first...

Palestinians took to the streets and social media on Sunday to celebrate the truck-ramming attack in Jerusalem in which 4 IDF soldiers were killed, Israel’s Channel 2 reported. In the Gaza Strip, the ruling Hamas terror group praised the attack, calling it a “natural response to the Israeli occupier’s crimes” and proof that the “Jerusalem Intifada” was not over. Since September 2015, Palestinian terrorists have killed 40 Israelis in an ongoing surge of violence. A short time after Sunday’s attack — which was carried out by a resident of the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabel Mukaber — people in Gaza...

The Obama administration attempted to influence the results of Israel’s election by funneling U.S. taxpayer funds to a political group opposed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau, according to a congressional report. The U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI) said the State Department gave $349,276 in U.S. taxpayer-funded grants to the OneVoice Movement, which had built a political infrastructure aimed at defeating Netanyahu’s re-election bid in 2015. Sen. Rob Portman: ‘American resources should be used to help our allies in the region, not undermine them.’ /AP “It is completely unacceptable that U.S. taxpayer dollars were used to build a...

I’m staying in Jerusalem for a few weeks and today I was in Alon Shvut, the town where one of the Israeli soldiers killed on Sunday had lived. His funeral was today. I went. The boy was 20 years old. All Israeli kids are expected to serve in the army, but to this young man the army had given a pass – a health exemption of some kind. He had to press hard to be allowed to serve. In his town, where the vast majority of families are religious Jews, and which is located in what is commonly referred to...

Hamas celebrates Sunday terror attack while world media poorly reports on events Poor media coverage of terror attack in Jerusalem which killed 4, injured 17 more; Hamas holds celebrations in the streets; Netanyahu: Attack inspired by ISIS International media poorly reported on the terror attack that took place in Jerusalem on Sunday in which four Israeli soldiers were killed. Many of the headlines took hours to publish the news, with even more headlines rarely attributing the terror attack to terror. On Sunday, four IDF soldiers were killed and 17 injured when a terrorist rammed a truck into a group IDF...

The Palestinian Authority's International Relations Department in Ramallah condemned Israel's "empiralistic calls" to annex Area C, warning such a move may have "dangerous consequences" and would destroy any chance of a "Palestinian" state. "We have been told that the right-wing leadership of Israel is calling to annex what is called the settlement blocs in area C of Judea and Samaria. The first areas they wish to annex are those around Jerusalem. This is in order to begin a discussion amongst the Israeli public not about ending the occupation but about making it stronger and applying Israeli law to Palestinian areas,"...

The British Broadcasting Corporation’s coverage of Sunday’s terror attack by an Arab truck driver in Jerusalem sparked controversy, after a headline by the news outlet emphasized the shooting of the terrorist and downplayed the attack itself. The headline in question described the terrorist as a “Driver of a lorry”, writing that he was shot after “allegedly ramming pedestrians”. “Driver of lorry shot in Jerusalem after allegedly ramming pedestrians, injuring at least 15, Israeli media report.” Four Israelis were killed in the purposeful attack in which a truck drove onto a promenade filled with Israeli soldiers, reversed slightly and ran them...