Israeli media is reporting that US President Donald Trump will extend the executive order to postpone moving the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem when it comes up for renewal. This is following campaign promises and post-inauguration vows by Trump to return the US Embassy to the Israeli capital, a move that would bolster Israel’s claims to the entirety of Jerusalem. According to unnamed US sources, it is the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that is actually holding up the move. They say Netanyahu doesn’t want to deal with the expected diplomatic blowback. At the same time, local…
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US President Donald Trump is expected to visit Israel later this month, and many believe he’s going to use the occasion to drop a couple of diplomatic bombshells. First, according to Israel’s Yediot Ahronot daily, Trump will renege on his election promise to move the US embassy back to Jerusalem. Many speculate that it is, in fact, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government that are blocking the move, which Trump would make if the matter were entirely up to him. But, the second bombshell should assuage some of Israelis’ disappointment over the first. Yediot further reports that Trump plans to…
North Korea is determined to beat President Trump and the US, and that means beating America’s allies, too. At the top of that list for the North Koreans are two countries: Japan and Israel. Observers will remember that when Israel destroyed Syria’s nascent nuclear program, it was quickly discovered that North Korea had provided the know-how and hardware to the defiant Arab dictatorship. It is also known that North Korea is in league with some of the Middle East’s more unsavory players, all of which want to see Israeli annihilated. As such, few Israelis tears would be shed if Trump…
UNESCO has chosen Israel’s 69th Day of Independence to deliver another one of its many infamous anti-Israel resolutions. A year ago, UNESCO erased any Jewish link to the Temple Mount, leaving only its Muslim legacy. On May 2nd, this council expanded the area to which it says Jews have no claim: the entire Old City of Jerusalem. The resolution, entitled “Occupied Palestine,” is devoted to condemning the Israeli “occupation” of East Jerusalem, Old City included, and it finds the need to include Gaza in “occupied Palestine.” Invoking the Geneva Conventions, the Hague Resolutions on Warfare, the Hague Convention for protection…
Israel’s Minister of Intelligence Israel Katz strongly hinted last Thursday that the Jewish state had carried out a large aerial strike on Damascus International Airport earlier in the day. Various regional and international media reported massive explosions on the outskirts of Syria’s main airport early Thursday morning. Hours later, Katz told Israel Radio: “We are acting to prevent the transfer of sophisticated weapons from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon by Iran. When we receive serious information about the intention to transfer weapons to Hezbollah, we will act. This incident is totally consistent with this policy.” Arab media noted that warehouses…
The White House notified the U.S. Congress last Tuesday that Iran is complying with the 2015 nuclear accord negotiated by former President Barack Obama, and that sanctions relief would be extended to Iran in return for the curbing of its nuclear program. However, the U.S. Department of State maintained that an inter-agency review of the Iran deal was being conducted due to concerns regarding the Islamic Republic’s continued role as a state sponsor of terrorism within the Middle East and surrounding areas. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson raised the concerns in a letter sent to Speaker of the House of…
Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said the persecution of Middle East Christians is “a stain on humanity” during a meeting Wednesday with the head of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the Greek Orthodox Patriarch and other Christian leaders. Rivlin noted ongoing persecution of Christians such as the Islamic State attacks against Egyptian Coptic Christians in the Sinai Peninsula as well as attacks in Syria by Islamic State and other Muslim extremist groups. “I say to you here, our Christian brothers of Jerusalem, our thoughts are with you at this difficult time,” Rivlin said during the Jerusalem meeting, which came several days…
Fighters with the Lebanon-based terror organization Hezbollah have reportedly begun retreating from Lebanon’s southern border with Israel, according to a Syrian news agency. The Syrian news agency Al-Ittihad reported on April 13th that the border was being evacuated following demands made by the U.S. State Department. On April 11th, State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the terror organization must cease its “military operations in Syria in support of the Syrian regime,” adding that, “Hezbollah forces have helped the Syrian regime implement its brutality against its own people and also caused instability in Lebanon.” According to the Syrian news agency, Hezbollah…
Irina Bokova, the director-general of UNESCO, who last year passed a motion denying the Jewish connection to Jerusalem, shocked many last week when she publicly affirmed the Jews’ historic connection to the Holy City. “In the Torah, Jerusalem is the capital of King David, where Solomon built the Temple and placed the Ark of the Covenant,” Bokova reminded the European Parliament in a session last Thursday. “The protection of the heritage of Jerusalem is part of a broader vision for peace and the fight against all forms of denial of Jewish history, delegitimization of Israel, and anti-Semitism,” she continued. No…
Last weekend, the Israeli army brought a family of Syrian civilians into the Jewish state for refuge and medical treatment. One man, four women, and at least two children were granted entry on the Golan Heights and then taken to a nearby field hospital. One of the children, a 3-year-old girl, was evacuated with her mother to Rambam Medical Center in Haifa. She had suffered a serious shrapnel injury to her head and required emergency treatment. These seven Syrians are only the latest of thousands that Israel has taken in amidst a bloody civil war that is tearing apart Israel’s northeastern…