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Israel on Friday ordered some of its diplomatic staff in Turkey to leave the country for security reasons, after protesters angered by its assault on Gaza sought to storm Israeli embassy buildings. Turkish protesters overnight tried to break into the ambassador's residence in Ankara as well as the consulate in Istanbul, with the diplomatic controversy over the Gaza assault risking a new crisis in relations between Turkey and the Jewish state. "Foreign Minister (Avigdor) Lieberman issued a statement... following the demonstrations and instructed the Israeli consulate and embassy to reduce their diplomatic staff in Turkey," an Israeli embassy spokesman told...

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton proposed that Qatar – the chief financier of Hamas – could play a key role in mediating peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. Clinton, during an interview with Charlie Rose, touted Qatar as a country that could play a constructive role in arbitrating peace between Hamas and Israel, which recently launched a full-scale ground incursion into Gaza in an attempt to cut off the terror group’s access to sophisticated weaponry. Qatar, which has served as Hamas’ chief financial lifeline, keeping the group afloat and facilitating its arms buildup, could convince Hamas to stop trying...

Dan Shapiro: ‘We’ll seek to help moderate Palestinians become stronger in Gaza,’ since they’d run it better than ‘Hamas, a terrorist group’ The US wants to see Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority restored to ruling Gaza after the current conflict is over, and will make efforts to bring this about, American Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro indicated Saturday night. In an interview with Israel’s Channel 2 news, Shapiro was asked about the unity government formed last month by Abbas’s Fatah faction and Hamas. He did not reply directly and instead noted that Abbas was currently in close contact with Egypt, trying...

Cairo (AFP) - Egypt's military said militants firing machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades attacked a border guards checkpoint Saturday, killing 21 soldiers in one of the biggest assaults since Islamist president Mohamed Morsi's ouster. The attack in a desert area 630 kilometres (390 miles) west of Cairo left four soldiers wounded, the military said in a statement, blaming "terrorists". It said a rocket propelled grenade fired by the militants set off an explosion in an ammunition depot at the El-Farafrah post, killing the soldiers. Militants have stepped up attacks on the security forces since Morsi was toppled in July 2013...

US Secretary of State John Kerry apologized this week for using the term ‘Apartheid’ in describing Israel’s status following the collapse of peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Nonetheless, it appears that the Obama administration is convinced that Israel is by large responsible for the impasse in the peace process and therefore slated to pay the price for it in the near future. “The Jewish people are supposed to be smart. You’re supposed to know how to read the map: In the 21st century, the world will not keep tolerating the Israeli occupation,” a US official told Yediot Ahronot....

Jihadists have killed 270 Syrian regime fighters, civilian security guards and employees since seizing a gas field in Homs province, a monitoring group said Friday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights described Thursday's takeover of the Shaar field as "the biggest" anti-regime operation by the Islamic State (IS) since it emerged in the Syrian conflict last year. The watchdog, updating an earlier toll of 115, said it had documented "the death of 270 people killed in the fighting or executed" since Thursday. "A large majority of the men killed were executed at gunpoint after being taken prisoner following the takeover...

Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri says Cairo's offer 'provides the needs of all sides.' Egypt does not have any plans to revise its ceasefire proposal to end the fighting in Gaza, Foreign Minister Sameh Shukrisaid in a joint press conference with his French counterpart Laurent Fabius in Cairo. "It provides the needs of all sides and we will continue to offer it, hoping to get their support as soon as possible," said Shukri, referring to the initiative rejected by Hamas. On Friday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked France to use its influence on Hamas allies such as Turkey and Qatar to...

Analysis: Israel's intelligence community sees Cairo as only real platform capable of influencing Hamas. With all the chatter incessantly coming out of the mouths of experts sitting in air-conditioned television studios and offering their different solutions to the Hamas problem, it's really hard to understand what is going on behind the scenes. But there is one thing we can all agree on: The news about a ceasefire will come from one place only – Cairo. The common estimate among the decision makers is that the Egyptians are the only ones who can end the fighting. The Egyptian capital serves as...

Palestinian and other Arab commentators are blasting Egypt's cease-fire offer this week in the Israeli-Gazan fighting, saying it was a gift to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who accepted it, and a trap for Hamas, which rejected it. Azmi Bishara, the fugitive former Knesset member who now heads the Arab Center for Research and Policy in Doha, Qatar, wrote in the pan-Arab alaraby.co.uk that the offer gave no relief to Gaza, nor freedom for the Hamas members recently returned to Israeli prisons. "This Egyptian declaration represents a stab in the back to the resistance and the people of Gaza. … [T]his...

A recent United Nations report, still classified, confirms that Iran is implicated in exporting longer-range missiles to the region, such as the M-302 rockets launched from Gaza. UNITED NATIONS, N.Y. — Evidence that Hamas is firing more sophisticated weapons at Israel – including longer-range rockets – than in past conflicts is focusing a new light on Iran’s role in arming the militant organization....

Iran said Wednesday it wants to greatly expand its uranium enrichment program despite Western fears that it could be used to make atomic arms. The position outlined by Iranian nuclear agency head Ali Akbar Salehi appeared to be the most detailed yet of what Tehran wants at its closed-door negotiations with six world powers. It also highlighted the huge obstacles in the way of an agreement by a July 20 target date, since the world powers want Iran to reduce its enrichment program. …

The celebrations in Israel Tuesday morning over the Egyptian ceasefire initiative were premature. Contrary to the assessment of all manner of eminent Israeli notables, Hamas is not sufficiently weakened to accept an immediate ceasefire that meets none of its demands. Far from it. As Hamas made clear in the course of a rocket-filled Tuesday, it doesn’t give a damn about Egypt or Arab public opinion, and it is continuing on its own path, one of escalation. You can say a lot to Hamas’s detriment in its handling of this conflict: It was wrong to enter this round of hostilities and...

Military sending voice messages advising Palestinians to vacate by 8 a.m. Wednesday as part of efforts to avoid causing harm to civilians ahead of supposed strikes; Hamas urges residents against heeding IDF calls. The IDF was sending voice messages to residents of the northern Gaza Strip late on Tuesday, advising them to evacuate their homes by 8 a.m. as part of Israeli efforts to avoid causing harm to civilians ahead of supposed strikes. Hamas' Interior Ministry urged residents of Gaza not to heed to the IDF calls to leave their homes, saying the warning were part of Israel's "psychological war."

Qatar, the world’s top liquefied natural gas exporter, is using its gas money to cash in on some top-of-the-line U.S. supplied military hardware. Qatar’s defense minister, Hamad Bin Ali al-Attiyah, met with Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and signed acceptance letters for $11 billion worth of Apache attack helicopters, Patriot missile defense batteries and anti-tank Javelin missiles, the Pentagon said in a statement Monday. “Today’s signing ceremony underscores the strong partnership between the United States and Qatar in the area of security and defense and will help improve our bilateral cooperation across a range of military operations,” said Rear Adm....

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday evening that despite Israel's decision to accept the Egyptian cease-fire proposal, Hamas rejected it and continued fire. Hamas will pay the price for its actions."Anyone who tries to harm Israel, will be harmed," he said. "We would have prepared to solve this diplomatically, but Hamas has left us no choice." Israel's security cabinet will meet at 9 P.M. on Tuesday, 12 hours after accepting an Egyptian cease-fire proposal. Several Hamas officials rejected the proposal, but sources said that Hamas was holding talks with Egypt on the matter and an official statement by the Hamas...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who for years has been on record supporting the idea of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, appears to have abandoned the idea, according to The Times of Israel. "He made explicitly clear that he could never, ever, countenance a fully sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank," the Times reported. While he did not renounce support for the two-state solution, his comments reflected a view that he believes such a state is no longer a possibility after Israel repeatedly evacuated Arab territories only for it to come under the control of Palestinian extremists...

Despite devastation in Gaza, and its inability to inflict Israeli casualties, the organization is in robust shape — personnel unharmed, rocket supplies plentiful, popularity soaring. headquarters and the IDF have been repeating over the past two days assertions like “Hamas is frustrated” and “Hamas wants a ceasefire.”In principle, they’re right,but those statements must be accompanied by two critical caveats that in practice prevent a halt in the fighting. True, Gaza’s Hamas rulers are frustrated to a certain extent. They aren’t happy that the almost 1,000 rockets they’ve fired at Israel so far have caused few injuries and haven’t even significantly...

ISIS unveils ‘cabinet’ lineup: report By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News Friday, 11 July 2014 Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), has reportedly formed a cabinet to be in charge of his newly established “caliphate.” Documents published by The Telegraph newspaper this week revealed for the first time in details the structure of the group, which has claimed universal authority throughout the Muslim world, declaring Baghdadi its caliph. The British newspaper published an infograph that explains the leadership arrangement under Baghdadi, based on documents seized from an ISIS member’s house...

Of course it's a shame for civilians, alas they've become all but indistinguishable from actual Hamas members after mass brainwashing of the territory's youth, who are considered military assets... And it's those same ordinary Gazans that democratically elected martially-obsessed Islamists (w/ charter sworn to destroy Israel) to be their leaders in the first place- so you could say they have it coming...  Yeah, that's a bit harsh, and actually some in Gaza are also blaming Hamas for recent escalations, asking why they brought this retaliation/pending invasion upon them, and what exactly did they expect to gain from starting a battle they can't win...

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri is not helping advance his organization’s cause. Zuhri became the focus of criticism when a clip of him advocating for civilians to act as human shields in order to protect Hamas militants and assets exploded on the internet. A MEMRI TV translation of Zuhri’s appearance on Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV showed him talking up the “character” of Palestinians who “defend their rights and their homes with their bare chests and their blood.”“We in Hamas call upon our people to adopt this policy in order to protect the Palestinian homes,” Zuhri advocated. On Sunday, Zuhri was...