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Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan, one of the most widely recognized and respected Saudi officials in the world, gave a three-part interview to the government-controlled Al Arabiya news network and proceeded to tear down 70 years of myths about the leadership of the Palestinian national movement. Bandar spent 22 years as a Saudi ambassador to the U.S. and is known to speak for the government. It was an extraordinary series of interviews — a brutal assessment of the numerous self-inflicted wounds by Palestinian leaders going all the way back to the 1930s. It was broadcast in Arabic with English subtitles...

The 1967 Six-Day War by Mitchell Bard -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Israel consistently expressed a desire to negotiate with its neighbors. In an address to the UN General Assembly on October 10, 1960, Foreign Minister Golda Meir challenged Arab leaders to meet with Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion to negotiate a peace settlement. Nasser answered on October 15, saying that Israel was trying to deceive world opinion, and reiterating that his country would never recognize the Jewish State.(1) The Arabs were equally adamant in their refusal to negotiate a separate settlement for the refugees. As Nasser told the United Arab Republic National Assembly March...

Israel's Annexation Plan of the Jordan Valley European thinking, Abdullah’s reaction, and Israel’s rights. Thu May 28, 2020 Joseph Puder The new Israeli government is considering extending Israeli law and sovereignty to the Jordan Valley, which is within area C of the Oslo Accords. The Accords, which gave Israel both military and administrative control in the area, also contains a large bloc of Jewish-Israeli communities. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, on a short visit to Israel (April 22, 2020) told reporters: “As for annexation of the (Jordan Valley) West Bank, the Israelis will ultimately make those decisions.” He added,...

The Palestinian leader spoke in advance of the anticipated roll out of what US President Donald Trump is calling the “Plan of the Century” to resolve the Israeli-Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Trump Administration will allow Israel to annex portions of the West Bank and split the Gaza Strip from the West Bank so that it can be a state of its own, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said on Sunday. Speaking at the Arab League summit in Tunisia, "What is coming from the US is more dangerous and serious,” he said. “The US will tell Israel, annex part of the Palestinian...

I cannot help but think these Irish do-gooders are taking us straight back to the racist laws of the 1930s in Germany. Kauft nicht bei Juden! (Don’t buy Jewish!) The bill now making its way through the Irish parliament that aims to criminalize the trading of goods from Israeli settlements could not be more scandalous! As a native German and citizen of the European Union, I find this proposed law totally misguided, extremely unfair, wholly counterproductive to peace, and – most of all – morally outrageous. On its face, the bill would impose a fine of up to €250,000 or...

During President Obama's second term in office, Secretary of State John Kerry, like his boss and other members of the same peapod (Samantha Power, Susan Rice, Joe Biden, Chuck Hagel, etc.), liked to warn Israel about such things as its isolation and alienation if it did not agree to Arab demands to return to its pre-'67 war, '49 armistice lines (they were never borders) which made it an over-sized ghetto, 9-15 miles wide at its waist, where most of its population and infrastructure are located. President George W. Bush commented that Texas had driveways larger than that. I don't know about driveways, but I also don't doubt...

US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman recently asked the State Department to cease using the term 'occupation' to describe Israel's presence in Judea, Samaria, and eastern Jerusalem, according a report by Kan, the Israel Broadcasting Corporation. According to the report, the State Department objected to the request, but eventually agreed to discuss the matter. Ambassador Friedman described Judea and Samaria as being under an "alleged occupation" in an interview with the Jerusalem Post in September. Later that month, he stated that he believes Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria are part of Israel. “I think the settlements are part of...

UN Security Council Resolution 2334 was the first prong of outgoing US President Barack Obama’s lame duck campaign against Israel. Secretary of State John Kerry’s speech on Wednesday was the second. On January 15, stage 3 will commence in Paris. At France’s lame duck President Francois Hollande’s international conference, the foreign ministers of some fifty states are expected to adopt as their own the anti-Israel principles Kerry set forth in his speech. The next day it will be Obama’s turn. Obama can be expected to use the occasion of Martin Luther King Jr. Day to present the Palestinian war to...

Obama is insisting on the creation of Palestine with a border separating it from Israel based on the ’67 lines plus swaps. In doing so he is ignoring UNSC resolution 242 which grants Israel the right to secure and recognized borders and does not demand a full retreat to the ’67 lines. He is also threatening to allow the UNSC to impose such borders on Israel thereby circumventing his oft stated insistence that all matters are to be negotiated between the parties. Ben-Dror Yemini, writing in YNET, which is left of center and Netanyahu's arch enemy, makes the case, "Given...

- WASHINGTON -- The United States government is not a speed reader, but after 37 years of reading U.N. Resolution 242, on Wednesday the government finally read it accurately. The government saw what is not there -- the missing definite article, ``the.'' Passed after the 1967 Six Day War, 242 mandated the withdrawal of Israel ``from territories occupied in the recent conflict.'' Not from ``the territories.'' Israel insisted on deletion of the ``the'' because it implied, as Arab and other powers acknowledged by their vehement opposition to the deletion -- withdrawal from all territories. This was strategic ambiguity. On Wednesday,...

Before delving into the question of what follows the death of the two-state solution we must get a certificate of death. This may prove to be more difficult than getting a certificate of live birth for President Obama. Everyone prefers to kick a dead horse, so to speak, than to acknowledge it is dead. The Arabs were against the creation of Israel in the first place. They opposed the Palestine Mandate, The Partition Plan, The Declaration of Independence by Israel and Resolution 242. In 1968 they decided at the Khartoum Conference on the three “no’s”; no recognition, no negotiation and...

Arab states are revising elements of a 2002 peace plan to encourage Israel to agree to the establishment of a demilitarized Palestinian state, the London-based paper Al-Quds al-Arabi reported Wednesday. The countries are making the amendments at United States President Barack Obama's request, the paper said. Some of the changes deal with a controversial "right of return" for Palestinian refugees to Israel or a future state of Palestine. The notion of a return to Israel proper by Palestinian refugees and their descendents has met with considerable opposition in Israel from across the political spectrum. According to the pan-Arab paper, the...

(IsraelNN.com) The issue of "Arab refugees" has long been a matter of widespread consensus in Israel, with even left-wing parties declaring that allowing them into Israel would endanger its very existence as a Jewish state. Nevertheless, the subject does not appear to be going away. Reports are that Prime Minister Olmert has now agreed to allow 50,000 Arabs who left Israel in 1948 - or are descendants of those who did - to enter and live in Israel. Channel Ten reported Thursday night that in a private meeting between Olmert and Palestinian Authority Chairman Abu Mazen, the two agreed that...

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush, hardening his tone towards Israel on Thursday, urged an end to "the occupation" of the West Bank and pushed for a peace treaty to be signed within a year to create a Palestinian state. ADVERTISEMENT The United States rarely uses the politically charged word "occupation" to describe Israel's hold on lands captured in a 1967 war. It is a term Palestinians seeking a state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip employ frequently to describe their plight. "The establishment of the state of Palestine is long overdue. The Palestinian people deserve it,"...

It's that time of year again. Summer is here, the temperature outside is rising, and Israel's irresponsible critics are busy turning up the heat. Deploying a potent mix of selective amnesia combined with some good ol' fashioned obfuscation, these "amnesiacs," as I call them, would have us all believe that nothing good ever came from the 1967 Six Day War. Seizing upon this month's 40th anniversary of that heroic triumph, they are trying to rewrite the historical narrative, injecting as much gloom and doom as possible in order to push Israel into making still more concessions to the Arabs. Occupation,...

As polls continue to show overwhelming national opposition to giving up the Golan, opposition MKs blast PM Olmert for offering it to Syria. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's latest offer to give the Golan Heights to Syria flies in the face of polls showing public opposition to ceding the Golan, and has many MKs on both sides of the political spectrum up in arms. Olmert reportedly informed Syria last month that he is willing to cede the Golan to Syrian sovereignty, but wishes to verify that Syria will, in turn, cut its ties with Iran, Hizbullah and Palestinian terrorist organizations...