Free Republic

The choice of companies to boycott reveals extremism and hatred for the existence of the Jewish state in any borders. Giulio Meotti The writer, a journalist with Il Foglio, writes a weekly column for INN. He is the author of the book "A New Shoah", that researched the personal stories of Israel's terror vicitms, published by Encounter. He lives in Italy. His writing has appeared in publications, such as the Wall Street Journal, Frontpage and Commentary. â–º More from this writer European pension funds, Western universities, major labor unions, food coops, industrial companies, shopping mallsÂ… The boycott movement is growing...

Vice Premier Moshe "Bogie" Yaalon rejected Wednesday the claims of some housing protest demonstrators that communities in Judea and Samaria are linked to Israel's housing woes. "Construction in Judea and Samaria is not related to the problems protesters complain about, although if we build more in Judea and Samaria there will be more affordable housing [in Israel]," Yaalon said. Yaalon singled out the slander of the radical left that money for social programs and housing in Tel Aviv ended up in Judea and Samaria. "I do not accept the claim of the protest leaders that the problem is the settlements,"...

Police handed out administrative restraining orders early Tuesday morning against some residents of the Samaria Jewish community of Yitzhar. The orders were signed by Central Command Chief Maj.-Gen. Avi Mizrahi. Mizrahi has had a long running vendetta against Yitzhar, and several weeks ago called to close its yeshiva. Mizrahi made the comments in an interview on Channel 2 News, saying that some of the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria have “centers out of which terrorist elements come,” and adding that “the yeshiva in Yitzhar has several people whose norms are not consistent with democracy and this yeshiva should be...

As Israel's housing crisis comes to a head in the press, a group of resevists, second and third generation residents of Judea and Samaria, have written Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu demanding a solution to the region's housing shortage, which they term "the quiet freeze." The letter states, "we are reserve soldiers and officers, members of the second and third generation born in Judea and Samaria, and we plan to build our homes near our parents in the communities that reared us. We protest your government's construction policy in Judea and Samaria. "Although the freeze officially ended long ago, the truth...

“My Israel,” a grassroots Zionist group that boasts a membership in the tens of thousands, announced Thursday its activists will mark products of Judea and Samaria with stickers. The stickers will be placed on the products on the shelves of retailer outlets nationwide, the group promised. The move is a response to an initiative by far-left Meretz activists, who entered stores in Tel Aviv Wednesday and placed stickers on products made in Judea and Samaria. There is no difference in the wording of the stickers – only in the graphic design. Meretz’s stickers say “produced in the settlements” against a...

For perhaps the first time, a minister in Binyamin Netanyahu's government has admitted that the Prime Minister plans to give away most of Judea and Samaria to an incipient Arab state, with Israel retaining only the settlement blocs. During a tour of Gush Etzion, Michael Eitan, whose title is Minister for Improvement of Government Services, said that “enacting the Prime Minister's policies will lead to the annexation of the settlement blocs, including Gush Etzion, with the intent of giving up other parts of Judea and Samaria for the benefit of a Palestinian state.” Gush Etzion Council head Shaul Goldstein, who...

(IsraelNN.com) In a letter to US. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Jewish leaders in Judea and Samaria explain the unshakeable historic and religious bonds between the Jewish People and Jerusalem. The letter was written in response to President Obama’s and Clinton’s criticism of Israel’s intentions to build in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo. The neighborhood is a part of Jerusalem-proper, and is surrounded nearly completely by Jewish-populated areas. Though it is part of area liberated by Israel in the 1967 Six Day War, it was not recaptured from Jordan, but was rather considered no-man’s land between 1949 and 1967.

Israel will build 50 new homes in an existing West Bank settlement as part of a wider plan to absorb residents slated to be evicted from the illegal outpost of Migron. The complete plan calls for the construction of 1,450 homes in the settlement of Adam. The State Prosecutor's Office informed the High Court on Friday that 190 housing units will be built in the settlement of Adam in the first stage, in accordance with the plan, which was approved by the Defense Ministry in May. However, only 50 of the units can be erected without further approval from the...

A senior Israeli government official said that Israel is “fed up” with American statements against Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, the Hebrew-language Yisrael HaYom (Israel Today) newspaper reported Monday. As Defense Minister Ehud Barak flies to Washington for meetings with U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell, the unnamed senior official stated, “Israel will demand that any compromise be part of a wider program of regional peace, and only after agreement on the basic principles outlines by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in his [recent] speech at Bar-Ilan University.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that his suggestion of a demilitarized Palestinian state was gaining international ground and was the only solution for Middle East peace. "The idea of a demilitarized state will in course become accepted," Netanyahu said after meeting the leaders of France and Italy. "If it is not accepted, there will not be an agreement," he told following his meeting in Paris with French President Nicolas Sarkozy. "It cannot be that there is a Palestinian state and the struggle will continue within it." Sarkozy, meanwhile, said that Israel must take immediate confidence-building measures for Middle...

Vice President Joe Biden and Democratic Senator John Kerry told the pro-Israel AIPAC lobby Tuesday that Israel must freeze all building in Judea and Samaria and make further concessions to the Palestinian Authority.

Peace Now finds that 73% of Israelis - including Arabs - have not visited Jewish Yesha in five years, and has therefore begun to organize trips. Meanwhile, three left-wing MKs were praised by European Union leaders for their proposal to move all Jews out of Judea and Samaria (see below). The radical left-wing Peace Now organization claims it has found that 73% of Israelis - including Arabs - have not visited Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria (Yesha) in the past five years. To rectify this, and to promote the cause of separating Jews from their Biblical homeland areas of...

(IsraelNN.com) Over 100 unauthorized Judea/Samaria outposts - slated to be tomorrow's new Jewish towns - are on a ministerial committee's agenda today (Sunday). The committee's chairman, Minister Chaim Ramon (Kadima), says that at least 26 outposts should be destroyed immediately. The timing of the session is acute, in that the State is due to give a response this week to the Supreme Court on a suit brought by Peace Now and a group of Arabs against the Jewish outpost/community of Migron. Peace Now, which has been working since 1978 to uproot all Jewish presence in Judea, Samaria and Gaza and...

Female Soldier Punished for Talking With Yesha Girls 16:05 Feb 16, '06 / 18 Shevat 5766 By Hana Levi Julian A female IDF soldier has been disciplined for answering a group of girls who criticized soldiers. The incident in question occurred as they rode together on a civilian bus towards Beit El. The soldier was talking with a group of girls who were returning from last week's demonstration in Jerusalem protesting the vicious manner in which the Amona outpost had been evacuated. The soldier was warned by a female IDF officer, who was also on the bus, not to talk...

Nov. 14, 2005 18:38 | Updated Nov. 14, 2005 18:45 Peretz fronts bill to pay off settlers By SHEERA CLAIRE FRENKEL In a move that stirred controversy among MKs of all parties, newly elected Labor Party chairman Amir Peretz submitted a Knesset bill Monday that would grant compensation to West Bank settlements where 60% of the residents left voluntarily. In a statement accompanying the bill Peretz wrote that he intended to create "incentives for the continuation of voluntary evacuation of the Israeli citizens located in Judea and Samaria.” "[The disengagement] was a concrete example of the nation's ability to establish...

NEW YORK (AP) _ In the days leading up to Israel's pullout from the Gaza Strip, American Jewish philanthropists donated some $14 million to ensure Israeli greenhouses would pass into Palestinian hands unharmed, one of the donors said. While the Israeli government has paid for the land and buildings settlers are leaving behind, the American donation is meant to purchase the equipment that keeps the greenhouses running. The move could preserve some 3,500 Palestinian jobs, as well as one of the region's main sources of export income. The donors included billionaire Mortimer Zuckerman, who publishes the New York Daily News,...

Following hours of waiting, the army/police have nearly completed the violent expulsion of over 1,000 youths from N'vei Dekalim's main synagogue. At 3:20 PM, the local police commander announced by megaphone, "Your stay here is illegal. In ten minutes, we will enter and remove you. Buses will take you to Merkaz Shapira and Jerusalem." The large forces began to enter from two, possibly three, different sides some 15 minutes later. The intense prayers continued inside all the while. In the boys' synagogue - the Sephardic one - several of them linked arms and legs in a last attempt to make...

Per foxnews alert. Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu resigns after Gaza pullout.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel could launch a ground offensive in the occupied Gaza Strip "within hours" unless the Palestinian Authority cracks down on Islamic militants there, a senior government official was quoted as saying on Sunday. Israel Radio quoted Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim as saying tanks and troops that massed near Gaza over the weekend would begin a sweep of the coastal strip "within hours" if Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas failed to meet the crackdown demand. Abbas urged Hamas and kindred Islamic militants on Saturday to halt attacks on Israel and return to a ceasefire seen as key to...

IDF intelligence sources have learned that the Arabs of Judea/Samaria are at the height of general preparations for the battles widely expected to follow the planned expulsion/abandonment of Gaza. The reports say that food and medicine - and weapons - are being stockpiled in villages and cities throughout the PA-controlled areas in Judea and Samaria. The Arabs expect the increased terror and other attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers to lead to army-imposed closures and encirclements around the cities and centers of combat. This stockpiling is of special concern, army elements say, because it is reminiscent of the measures...