Jewish news briefs: July 28, 2015

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Majority of Americans want Congress to reject Iran nuclear deal, poll says

(JNS.org) A majority of Americans want Congress to reject the Iran nuclear deal, a new survey has found.

According to a CNN/ORC poll—which interviewed 1,017 adults from July 22-25—52 percent of Americans believe Congress should reject the agreement, including 66 percent of Republicans and 55 percent of Independents. Furthermore, 56 percent of respondents age 35 or older said the deal should be nixed. Meanwhile, a majority of Democrats, young adults, and those with college degrees all supported Congress approving the deal.

After the deal was reached July 14, Congress began a 60-day period during which it can review the agreement. Congress can approve, disapprove, or take no action on the deal. President Barack Obama has vowed to veto any disapproval of the deal.

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PM: Israeli government opposes demolition of disputed Jewish homes in Beit El

(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) After months of legal battles, Israeli police forces clashed with Jewish residents as two disputed structures in the Dreinoff neighborhood of the Beit El community in Samaria were evacuated before dawn on Tuesday.

The clashes erupted as hundreds of residents barricaded themselves at the site—two buildings slated for demolition under an interim Israeli High Court of Justice order—to prevent any action. The residents had set up barbed wire and prepared piles of tires to burn in a planned protest against the demolition order, which they believe they can still overturn. About 50 protesters were detained during the evacuation, which turned violent.

The so-called “Dreinoff houses” were built on private Palestinian land that was appropriated under a security injunction. About eight months ago, the High Court of Justice ruled that the construction was conducted without the proper permits and that it was illegal, issuing a demolition order for July. On Tuesday, the Beit El Council filed an appeal to overturn the demolition order.

A security source told Israel’s Channel 2 news that “since the construction of 24 housing units at the site has been approved by the [Israeli government’s] Civil Administration, and since the residents have filed an appeal with the High Court of Justice to prevent the demolition, the demolition will be carried out only if the High Court orders it. There is still a legal process underway.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that his government opposes the demolition of the Beit El homes and is taking legal action to prevent it. Netanyahu stressed that “we are working to support the settlement enterprise, and we will do so in compliance with the law.”

 

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Indian president to make historic visit to Israel, echoing prime minister

(JNS.org) Indian President Pranab Mukherjee will become the first holder of his office to Israel later this year, a further illustration of the growing ties between the two countries. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will do the same this year.

Mukherjee plans to begin his Middle East trip on Oct. 9. According to Indian media reports, his first stop will be Jordan, followed by the Palestinian Authority. He will then arrive in Israel.

Since its founding, India has had close relations with the Arab world. But recent years have seen a gradual rapprochement between Jerusalem and New Delhi, manifested by increased security cooperation. In February, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon visited India, where the two countries finalized a major defense deal worth more than $1.5 billion.

Modi also met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last year on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. Reports have indicated that Modi is considering a shift in his country’s pro-Palestinian stance at the U.N.

 

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ZOA says it agrees with Huckabee on Iran-Holocaust analogy

(JNS.org) The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) said Monday that it agrees with Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee’s Holocaust analogy on the Iran nuclear deal. Huckabee had said that President Barack Obama’s trust in the Iranians “will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven,” a reference to the Nazis’ crematoria.

ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said that while the organization “has generally criticized Holocaust analogies, because they usually bear no relation to unique horrors of the Nazi era,” a nuclear-armed Iranian regime, given its repeated threats to destroy Israel, “does bear some relationship to the Nazi era and Governor Huckabee, therefore, did not speak out of place.”

“An Iranian regime that believes in, works for, prioritizes—and, indeed, goes further than the Nazis in trumpeting publicly—its genocidal intentions will be tempted to act on them if it acquires nuclear weapons,” Klein said, adding that Huckabee “is therefore speaking the truth, as have others who have described the danger for Israel as being existential.”

Huckabee told Breitbart News on Saturday that President Barack Obama’s foreign policy “is the most feckless in American history. It is so naive that he would trust the Iranians. By doing so, he will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven.”

Jonathan A. Greenblatt, the new national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said that “whatever one’s views of the nuclear agreement with Iran—and we have been critical of it, noting that there are serious unanswered questions that need to be addressed—comments such as those by Mike Huckabee suggesting the president is leading Israel to another Holocaust are completely out of line and unacceptable.”

U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, said Huckabee’s Holocaust reference “has no place in American politics.”

 

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ICC prosecutor appeals request to re-open Gaza flotilla case

(JNS.org) International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has appealed a decision by a panel of judges to re-open an investigation of Israel for alleged war crimes over the 2010 Mavi Marmara incident.

The incident left nine Turkish militants dead after they had attacked Israeli commandos on a vessel that tried to break the naval blockade of Gaza. In her appeal, Bensouda said the judges did not consider “the unique context of violent resistance abroad the Mavi Marmara.

Earlier this month, in a 2-1 ruling, a panel of ICC judges granted a request by the Comoros Islands to reconsider the case after the discovery of “material errors in the prosecutor’s assessment” of the matter.

In November 2014, Bensouda concluded that the Mavi Marmara incident did not have “sufficient gravity” to be investigated by the ICC despite a “reasonable basis to believe that war crimes” were committed by Israel. As such, many considered the case to be closed until the recent judicial order to re-open it.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry welcomed Bensouda’s decision to appeal, saying the ICC “never had any business to deal with this event to begin with.”

“Israel acted out of self-defense according to international law,” the Foreign Ministry added.

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Kerry to skip Israel during Mideast visit focused on Iran deal

(JNS.org) U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is scheduled to travel to Egypt and Qatar next week to alleviate concerns about the Iran nuclear deal with Arab leaders, but will not visit Israel during the trip.

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said Kerry will visit Egypt on Aug. 2 and then travel to Qatar to meet with the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council to discuss the nuclear deal, before heading to East Asia.

When asked by reporters why Kerry won’t be visiting Israel, Kirby said, “It is just not part of the trip.”

“It is an around-the-world trip,” said Kirby. “[Kerry] has been in touch with Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu many times in the last several weeks to discuss the parameters of [the Iran deal]. We are in constant consultants with our Israeli counterparts about this.”

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Israel eases patient access to medical marijuana

(JNS.org) Israel’s deputy health minister, Member of Knesset Yaakov Litzman (United Torah Judaism), on Monday announced new measures to make it easier for Israelis to obtain medical marijuana by allowing pharmacies to dispense prescriptions for it to patients.

“Today pharmacies give out all kind of drugs, including narcotics such as morphine, and it’s done in a perfectly orderly fashion. So marijuana will be handled the same way,” Litzman told the Knesset Committee on Drug and Alcohol Abuse, the Times of Israel reported.

“It will be prescribed and monitored by the same standards as other medications,” he added.

Currently, tens of thousands of Israelis who have been prescribed medical marijuana can only receive it through marijuana dispensaries, which struggle to meet popular demand and to overcome bureaucratic hurdles. Litzman hopes the new process will ease access.

Many medical professionals and scientists regularly visit Israel to learn about the country’s innovations in medical marijuana research and development. Efforts to decriminalize marijuana are also underway in the Jewish state. A recently introduced Knesset bill would make the cannabis plant legal for private use and allow users over the age 21 to possess small amounts of marijuana.

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