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Netanyahu: Rather than soothing international public opinion, Abbas should choose between Hamas and peace with Israel.Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas released a special message on Sunday in Arabic and in English on the occasion of Israel's Holocaust Remembrance Day, in which he decried the murder of Jews in the Holocaust as "the most heinous crime against humanity in modern history. This is the first time a Palestinian president has ever made such a public declaration.

Compensation for Jews pushed out of Arab lands may become yet another issue MUCH as Palestinian refugees and their offspring remember the orange groves and cinemas they lost in Jaffa when Israel was born in 1948, Jews who once lived in Iraq recite the qasidas—lyrical Arabic poetry—and recall the time when most of Iraq’s banks and transport companies were run by Jews. “Iraq has gone downhill since they forced us out,” sighs a professor at a gathering of academics of Iraqi origin at Or Yehuda, a Tel Aviv suburb, slipping into Arabic. “Mubki, lamentable.” American officials are unclear on the...

Environmental Protection Minister Amir Peretz (Hatnua) accused the Bayit Yehudi party Sunday of recklessly endangering the “peace process” with the initiative to approve 1,200 housing tenders in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. The decision was announced by Construction and Housing Minister Uri Ariel. "While [Hatnua leader] Minister Tzipi Livni is making extensive efforts to convince the leaders of Europe that we desire peace, and that the matter of borders will only be determined in negotiations between us and the Palestinians, Minister Ariel is busy with an unnecessary provocation and with messages that run counter to the prime minister's decision to renew...

Housing Minister Uri Ariel (Bayit Yehudi) has become a target for left-wing anger. Ariel’s encouragement of housing projects built for Jews in Jerusalem has led various groups to accuse him of trying to “mess up the peace talks.” The latest such project is an initiative to build 63 housing units between the majority-Jewish neighborhood of Armon Hanetziv and the majority-Arab Jabal Mukaber neighborhood. The new homes will be marketed to Israelis. Ariel will be at the site on Sunday for the inauguration of the new project, as will Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat. Leftist activists published statements expressing their frustration with...

In what is being described as yet another example of Palestinian Authority (PA) denial of the Jewish connection to Jerusalem and the very legitimacy of the State of Israel, the Presidential Guard of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has claimed the Western Wall as an Arab and Islamic site. Last week, a picture of the Western Wall was posted onto the PA Presidential Guard's official Facebook page with a PA flag superimposed on it, along with the words "The Al Buraq Wall - Public Relations and Information - The Presidential Guard - Palestinian youth know their rights." The Western Wall...

Middle East peace talks could "collapse" due to continuing Israeli settlement expansion, a senior Palestinian Authority (PA) official warned Tuesday, on the eve of the scheduled resumption of the fragile process. "Settlement expansion goes against the U.S. administration's pledges and threatens to cause the negotiations' collapse," Yasser Abed Rabbo told AFP. The comments came after Israeli authorities approved the construction of a total of more than 2,000 homes in Jerusalem and the Biblical Jewish heartland of Judea and Samaria, in the days leading up to Wednesday's scheduled new round of direct talks between the Israel and the PA. .......

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu accidentally let the "cat out of the bag" when he said two months ago that, “The crumbling of the UN force on the Golan Heights underscores the fact that Israel cannot depend on international forces for its security. They can be part of the arrangements. They cannot be the basic foundation of Israel’s security.” Netanyahu's lawyer-like parsing of the words "cannot depend," "basic foundation," and "can be part of" cannot hide the fact that the words "can be part of" really only mean US troops will almost certainly "be part of" any "peace" deal in Judea...

Residents of Migron face expulsion and are being pressured by the government to leave peacefully and by neighboring communities to protest. Migron has been the victim of the same type of government policies that uprooted Gush Katif Jews from their homes after years of government support and promises they would never be forced out of their homes. Promises from the Netanyahu administration to back Migron fell, one by one, even when investors bought a number of land parcels from alleged Palestinian Authority owners. The High Court did not deny the recent purchases were legal but ruled the change in property...

Residents of the community of Migron told Arutz Sheva on Sunday that they did not understand why the State was demanding that they leave their homes right away, particularly when the Supreme Court has not even yet discussed their case and is not scheduled to do so until Tuesday. Video .....

"Official" name change ceremony held. Residents: If we were Arabs, we would not be treated this way. Video .....

Levy's committee has restored Israel's legal narrative about its rights in the "West Bank". There is a huge difference in how a compromise will look if Israel comes to the table as "foreign occupiers," or as a party that has just territorial claims. In January 2012, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yaakov Neeman, the justice minister, turned to former Israeli supreme court justice Edmond Levy to head a panel of legal experts that would look into questions of land ownership in the "West Bank" (biblical Judea and Samaria, located west of the Jordan River, ed) . The initiative came...

Mahmoud Abbas Flash 90 Officials in Ramallah on Wednesday slammed the Netanyahu government's plans to accept the conclusion of the Levy Commission report on Jewish settlement in Judea and Samaria. "We will not sign any peace agreement if there is a [single] settlement on Palestinian Land," Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas' spokesman Nabil Abu Rodier said. The Levy report concluded Israel is not an occupying power in Judea and Samaria, and that Jewish communities in the region are therefore legal under international law. .....

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, head of the Yisrael Beitenu faction, said Monday that the attacks against Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria (Yehuda and Shomron, or Yesha) are wrong and hypocritical. "There is no justification, and no excuse can be accepted with regard to hurting IDF soldiers," he said, in reference to the incident a week ago in which Yesha youths allegedly vandalized an IDF base. "Between that and shooting protesters – and it doesn't matter if they are Jewish or not – there is a great difference." "In the media frenzy regarding the outposts, too, the media is not...

Swarms of refugees from Iraq and Syria, along with the rising Muslim Brotherhood, may bring the Arab Spring to Jordan. A growing reality of the nightmare of refugees from Iraq, from the Palestinian Authority (PA) and from Syria swarming across the borders to Jordan, along with the growingly influential Muslim Brotherhood, threaten the kingdom’s stability, researchers report. “Within the Kingdom and across three of its borders, unfolding developments carry far reaching implications for the region in general and Jordan’s stability in particular,” according to Oded Eran of the Institute for National Securities Studies (INSS). King Abdullah faced minor but unusual...

The government claims to be in favor of allowing Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria to grow “naturally,” expanding incrementally to ensure that children and grandchildren are able to remain in the towns where they grew up, if they so wish. In reality, though, no practical steps have ever been taken to ensure this minimum growth in Yesha, with the result being that many Yesha towns are experiencing severe housing shortages, since the government will not allow wide-scale expansion in these towns, despite the huge demand for housing by young couples. MKs Ya'akov Katz (Ketzaleh), chairman of the National Union,...

The Civil Administration, an arm of the IDF, plans to solve charges of bias in favor of illegal Arab buildings – by defining them as legal. Jewish leaders in Judea and Samaria have complained for years that Civil Administration, under the command of Defense Minister Ehud Barak and the IDF, destroys Jewish homes that do not have Barak’s required signature for approval but ignores thousands of illegal Arabs structures. The High Court also has questioned whether the government is illegally discriminating against Jews. The Civil Administration has come up with a way to solve the problem with one stroke of...

Firebrand lawmaker Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) plans to introduce a bill in US House of Representatives expressing congressional support for Israel’s right to annex Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. The move comes as Palestinian Authority officials move forward over US objections with a controversial request for a declaration of statehood at the United Nations. Walsh's resolution, modeled closely on a bill introduced in the Israeli Knesset, is the latest effort by Congress ahead of the proposed UN vote. Lawmakers from both parties returned from stints in Israel last month warning that Congress could seek to cut aid to the PA...

Jordan closed Bethlehem to Christians from 1949 until 1967 when Israel opened the gates. Now the Palestinian Authority, headed by Mahmoud Abbas, prohibited a Jewish guide from attending a Congressman’s tour. Florida Republican and Tea Party member Allen West wrote his constituents after touring Israel earlier this month, “When we went to Bethlehem to visit the birthplace of Jesus- a Jew- our group was not allowed to have our regular Jewish guides or bus drivers because Israeli citizens are not allowed in Bethlehem or the ancient city of Jericho where the Bible teaches us that Joshua blew down the wall...

Member of Knesset Danny Danon visited the Samarian Jewish community of Migron Thursday evening, ahead of Friday's scheduled demolition, by the government, of a number of buildings on the strategic hilltop. Speaking to a solidarity gathering, attended by rabbis and other public figures, the World Likud chairman said, " We won't let the extreme left enjoy the destruction of houses in Judea and Samaria. The government must settle the status of the community for once and for all. We were not elected to destroy communities."

And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.And he came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat upon...