Free Republic

NEW YORK -- Ambassador Ron Dermer, Israel’s chief diplomatic representative in the U.S., asked some 700 American Jews on a conference call this week for their help shifting the messaging on Israel. Israel is being routinely portrayed in both conventional and social media as an angry, well-armed giant leaving many innocent victims in its wake during the current crisis with Hamas, Dermer said. The call was organized by the Jewish Federations of North America, which this week sent federation leaders to visit targeted towns in Israel, and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. Dermer told his audience that Hamas may...

The IDF has already called up 48,000 reserves, bringing the total number to 56,000, once the additional forces are called up. The cabinet on Wednesday authorized the call-up of 8,000 additional reservists to assist in the military operations along the Gaza frontier. The IDF has already called up 48,000 reserves, bringing the total number to 56,000, once the additional forces are called up. Last week, the IDF began actively calling up the 40,000 reserves approved to it by the cabinet for Operation Protective Edge. IDF chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz requested the call-up of 40,000 reserves in order to...

The Egyptian cease-fire initiative proposes precisely what Hamas said from the outset it would refuse: “quiet for quiet.” Hamas and Islamic Jihad are convinced that Egypt designed the cease-fire together with Israel, and that was why Israel accepted it so quickly. Some even believe that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was also involved in the details, which was why he welcomed it. In contrast, activists from Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization thought the formulation of the Egyptian proposal rendered it unacceptable. Moreover, Hamas found out about it from the media, and viewed it as an attempt to humiliate the organization,...

If ordered into the Gaza Strip, IDF Ground Forces expect to encounter Hamas cells with anti-tank missiles, heavy urban combat, subterranean warfare, and other challenges. "This is the combat that characterizes a terror organization," the source said. The IDF has maintained large numbers of Ground Forces on the Gaza border. IDF Brigade commanders would have a high degree of independence if ordered to enter the Gaza Strip. Hamas planned to employ bomb-filled tunnels to facilitate large-scale killing sprees and kidnapping attacks on the border, according to Israeli security officials. Hamas will try to prove that an Israeli ground offensive will...

WASHINGTON — The US Congress showed tangible support for longtime ally Israel as Gazan terrorists fired rockets Tuesday, backing a measure that would double the amount of money for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system. The Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee approved a defense spending bill on Tuesday that would provide $621.6 million for Israeli missile defense, including $351 million for the Iron Dome system that intercepts short-range rockets and mortars. In the latest hostilities between Israel and Hamas, Iron Dome has been successful in shooting down rockets and preventing Israeli deaths. “It works,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, a Democrat and...

Turkey has stepped up diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire in Gaza, AFP reported on Tuesday. According to the report, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu spoke separately by telephone with Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal to discuss the ceasefire process. Abbas is due to meet Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey on Friday but Turkish officials refuse to confirm if Mashaal would visit. No contacts have been made with Israel so far, a Turkish official told AFP. "Concrete steps can only be taken after Israel stops its assault on Gaza," the official...

The security cabinet met late on Tuesday night to determine the next steps in Operation Protective Edge, at the end of a topsy-turvy day that started with the prospect of a cease-fire and ended with dozens of Hamas rockets hitting Israel and intense retaliatory attacks on the Gaza Strip. Before convening the security cabinet, which some 12 hours earlier had approved a cease-fire brokered by Egypt that Hamas never accepted, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Israel would answer Hamas’s rejection of a truce with stepped-up attacks. “If there is no cease-fire, our answer is fire,” Netanyahu said, adding that Hamas...

Tuesday was a roller coaster day that started with talk of a cease-fire, and ended with fire that would not cease. In the early hours of the day, however, when it appeared – at least in theory – as if the Egyptian- brokered cease-fire might lead to an end to Hamas’s rockets and Operation Protective Edge, diplomatic officials said that the security cabinet agreed to the Egyptian proposal in order to “give an opportunity for the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip.” The idea of a demilitarized Gaza Strip is an idea that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his spokesmen began...

The United States has blocked the transfer of Qatari funds earmarked for the salaries of civil servants hired by Hamas in Gaza, The Times of Israel has learned. A diplomatic source in the Gulf state, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that Qatar had transferred hundreds of millions of dollars to Arab Bank for the salaries of some 44,000 Hamas civil servants. Those civil servants — employed by Hamas in Gaza since its takeover of the Strip in 2007 – were rendered jobless by the unity agreement with Fatah last month. But the money was never processed by Arab Bank...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, discussing the escalating Israeli air strikes in Gaza and the rockets fired into Israel from Palestinian militant groups there, said at a press conference Friday that this latest violence shows why Israel cannot withdraw unilaterally from the West Bank as it did in 2005 from Gaza. While many have interpreted this as opposition to any two-state solution whatsoever, it reads to me as something a little different: a major Israeli requirement for any peace deal to work, and one that precludes Israel from ending its West Bank occupation without Palestinians agreeing to a deal that...

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...

In a dramatic development Tuesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has fired his Deputy Defense Minister Danny Danon. Danon, who is a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, has been a consistent and sometimes harsh critic of the prime minister's leadership. Sources close to the PM say Danon's scathing criticism of the government's decision to sign up to a ceasefire agreement with Hamas proved the last straw. Hopes of a ceasefire crumbled after Hamas rejected it and fired dozens of rockets onto Israeli population centers, prompting Israel to respond with more airstrikes after several hours of restraint. While some analysts - including...

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...

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday stepped up his rhetoric against Israel over its deadly air offensive on Gaza, accusing the Jewish state of committing “state terrorism” against the Palestinians. Presenting himself as the sole world leader speaking up for the Palestinians, Erdogan said that any normalization in the troubled ties between Israel and Ankara was currently out of the question. “Israel is continuing to carry out state terrorism in the region. Nobody, except us, tells it to stop,” Erdogan told members of his ruling party in parliament, accusing Israel of perpetrating a “massacre” of...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said he expects "full support" from world leaders for Israel's military operation to end rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, after Hamas rejected ceasefire proposals and fired a barrage of rockets at Israeli towns and cities Tuesday. Speaking before a meeting with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Netanyahu pointed out that Israel had accepted the ceasefire, which stipulated that both sides should immediately end hostilities. Hamas claimed the truce amounted to a "surrender" on its part, since it did not include the conditions they had stipulated for a ceasefire - which included prisoner releases and a...

As Hamas rockets continued to fall on Israel even after Jerusalem accepted the Egyptian ceasefire proposal at 9 A.M., Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said that if Hamas does not accept the ceasefire than Israel will “have all international legitimacy to broaden the military operation to achieve the required quiet.” Netanyahu, speaking at the beginning of a meeting in Tel Aviv with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, said that Israel “agreed to the Egyptian proposal in order to give an opportunity for the demilitarization of the Strip - from missiles, from rockets and from tunnels - through diplomatic means." The prime...

Israel's security cabinet met Tuesday morning to discuss the Egyptian cease-fire proposal, as Operation Protective Edge enters its second week. According to the Egyptian proposal, a cease-fire would begin Tuesday at 9 A.M. local time. A senior Israeli official said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accepts the offer and will bring it to a vote. Economy Minister Naftali Bennett will reportedly vote against a cease-fire. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri already rejected the proposal late Monday night on the grounds that "we are still under occupation and resistance is the right of our people."

Cabinet will likely accept terms of Arab League-backed ceasefire deal as Gaza terror group remains defiant. Hamas said Tuesday morning that the terms of an Egyptian ceasefire proposal were tantamount to surrender, as the Israeli government prepared to meet on the issue, and was expected to approve the deal. Meanwhile the Arab League, the US and PA leader Mahmoud Abbas all urged approval of the truce. As the security cabinet meets to discuss the terms of an Egypt-backed ceasefire, Palestinian sources report that Israel is still attacking targets in the Gaza Strip early Tuesday morning, Israel Radio reports.

US and Palestinian Authority also support ceasefire terms, but Hamas appears set to refuse the offer. Israel was poised to accept on Tuesday an Arab League-backed ceasefire deal with Hamas which would go into effect in the evening, Israeli officials indicated Monday night, as the terrorist group signalled that it would refuse the deal Israeli media sites quoted diplomatic sources suggesting that Jerusalem was inclining to accept the Egyptian proposal. Earlier, sources told The Times of Israel that “Those proposals are being considered very seriously.” If the cabinet accepts the ceasefire, it would be doing so despite staunch opposition from...

The current Hamas assault on Israel has lured the predictable coven of Palestinian nationalists, Islamists, Leftists, and antisemites from the woodwork to bash the Jewish state. But, more surprisingly, Israel is getting support, or at least restraint and fairness, from unexpected sources: United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon: “Today we face the risk of an all out escalation in Israel and Gaza with the threat of a ground offensive still palpable and preventable only if Hamas stops rocket firing.” The Lebanese Internal Security Forces detained two persons for having fired rockets into Israel. Egyptian security forces seized 20 rockets on their...