U.S. says its policy on Israeli settlement product labeling hasn’t changed
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) U.S. policy on labeling Israeli settlement products has not changed, the State Department said Thursday. Last week, the U.S. reissued guidelines on the labeling requirements for products manufactured in Judea and Samaria. The guidelines, which have been in effect since 1995, note that under U.S. law, “it is not acceptable to mark the aforementioned goods with the words ‘Israel,’ ‘Made in Israel,’ ‘Occupied Territories-Israel,’ or any variation thereof.”
The decision to republish the guidelines raised some eyebrows, as it came several days after U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro criticized Israel’s conduct in Judea and Samaria and accused Israel of discriminating against Palestinians there. But State Department spokesman Mark Toner insisted Thursday that the reissuing was designed to clarify U.S. policy on the matter following reports of mislabeling.
“U.S. Customs and Border Protection reissued guidance on their marking requirements,” Toner told reporters. “It in no way supersedes prior rulings or regulations and nor does it impose additional requirements with respect to merchandise imported from the West Bank, Gaza Strip, or Israel.”
According to an Israeli Channel 1 report on Thursday, the reissuing came in response to Palestinian complaints that some Judea and Samaria products were being labeled as “Made in Israel,” in violation of U.S. law. Toner appeared to confirm that report.
“Our understanding is that there were allegations of mislabeling, around nine or 10 complaints,” Toner said. “As you know, U.S. guidelines don’t differentiate between products produced in settlements or anywhere else in the West Bank.”
Israeli officials confirmed Thursday that there was no change in U.S. policy.
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25% of Israeli Jews fear another Holocaust, poll shows
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) More than half (59 percent) of Israelis are afraid to travel outside the country, with 25 percent saying they are usually afraid to do so and 34 percent saying they have become more afraid this past year, a new poll commissioned by the World Zionist Organization shows.
According to the poll, which was conducted by the Midgam Consultants and Research Institute, more women than men say they are afraid to travel abroad (62 percent compared to 55 percent). Sixty-five percent of respondents say their concerns prompt them to play down signs of Israeli or Jewish identity while abroad, a group among whom 36 percent say they do so regularly and 29 percent say they have changed their habits and have recently started hiding their Jewish/Israeli identities.
Additionally, 25 percent of the Israelis polled say they believe there is reason to fear that another Holocaust will be perpetrated against the Jewish people, and 24 percent believe there is a chance that the State of Israel will cease to exist. More than two-thirds (67 percent) are worried about the safety of Jewish communities outside of Israel.
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Palestinian stone-throwers jailed for 15 years over car crash that killed toddler
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Five Palestinian stone-throwers were convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to 15 years in prison Thursday for their involvement in the death of 4-year-old Israeli girl Adele Biton in February 2015, two years after she was seriously injured in a terrorist attack on her family’s car.
The Palestinians—who were minors at the time of the attack—were convicted as part of a plea bargain approved by the Samaria Military Court. Each of the defendants was ordered to pay the Biton family $7,500 in restitution. On March 14, 2013, they caused a gruesome car crash after stoning Israeli vehicles traveling on Route 5 in Samaria.
Biton’s mother, Adva, was driving her three daughters home when their car collided with a truck as a result of the stoning attack. Adele was critically wounded, while her mother and two sisters were moderately wounded. The toddler was hospitalized for many months before eventually being brought home. She suffered from multiple complications as a direct result of her injuries, and died from a lung infection in February 2015.
The sentence “offers us no comfort” and the five Palestinians “ should have gotten a life sentence or a death sentence,” Adva Biton told Israel’s Channel 2.
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Israel unveils armored vehicle equipped with anti-missile system
(JNS.org) Israel’s Defense Ministry on Thursday unveiled the first of its Namer armored troop carriers that will be equipped with the Trophy anti-missile system. The Namer vehicles themselves have been in service since 2008.
“At the end of a series of tests that are taking place in these days, we will begin serial installation of the system on additional vehicles. As such, we will implement MoD (Ministry of Defense) policy of equipping every Namer that leaves the production line with the only operational active defense system in the world,” said Brig. Gen. Baruch Matzliah, director of the ministry’s Tank Production Office.
“Namer with Trophy will provide the highest level of protection to war fighters of the Israel Defense Forces, and will grant them security and a significant edge on the field of battle,” Matzliah added.
The Trophy system, developed by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, was already installed on the less-expensive Merkava MK 4 battle tanks to protect infantry soldiers against Palestinian attacks during the 2014 Gaza war. The anti-missile system is designed with a 360-degree protection against multiple launchings, while maintaining “a pre-defined safety zone for friendly dismounted troops,” the Defense Ministry said.
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Campaign accuses left-wing Israeli artists of being ‘foreign agents’
(JNS.org) The right-wing Zionist group Im Tirtzu, known for its campaigns that expose anti-Zionist activity by Israeli NGOs, on Wednesday launched a new campaign accusing left-wing Israeli artists of being disloyal to the country.
The Israeli actors, writers, directors, and “intellectuals” in posters published online by Im Tirtzu are accused of acting as “foreign agents in the cultural world.”
“They are members of foreign agent organizations operating with foreign government funding…against the State of Israel,” one poster says. The campaign names about 100 people from the worlds of cinema, theater, publishing, and television, including famous Israeli authors Amos Oz and David Grossman.
“We’re sick of funding ‘artists’ who support mole organizations. This is disregard for the state of Israel and its values,” said Matan Peleg, the director of Im Tirtzu.
Critics of Im Tirtzu’s new campaign have dubbed the initiative “Israeli McCarthyism.” Although some media reports are trying to connect recent Im Tirtzu campaigns with Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett and Justice Minister Ayelt Shaked, both members of the Jewish Home political party, Bennett and Shaked have distanced themselves from Im Tirtzu. Shaked recently authored a controversial Israeli Knesset bill on NGO transparency. The bill’s comparison of some Israeli NGOs to “foreign agents” mirrors the language of Im Tirtzu’s NGO campaigns.
“The campaign against the artists is embarrassing, needless, and disgraceful,” Bennett wrote on Twitter.
“It does not serve any agenda and I do not think this is a proper campaign,” Shaked told Army Radio, according to Reuters.
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Israeli mining company discovers rare minerals near Haifa
(JNS.org) Shefa Yamim, an Israeli exploration and mining company, announced that it has discovered rare minerals near Israel’s port city of Haifa.
A report prepared by geologist William Griffin of Australia’s Macquarie University examined the mineral samples of corundum stones sent to him by Shefa Yamim, which found the stones in several sites in the Kishon River. The corundum stones contain a variety of rare minerals, including Moissanite and tistarite.
“Until now, [tistarite] has been found on a single meteorite that came from outer space; this has been the first find in nature of this mineral, whose source is deep inside the Earth,” Shefa Yamim said, Haaretz reported.
Almost half of the components found inside the corundum stones are not yet identifiable. Shefam Yamim’s shares went up 6.5 percent on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange following the company’s announcement on the mineral.
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New ‘Israel Is On It’ ad campaign shines a light on Israeli inventions
(JNS.org) A new advertising campaign promoting Israeli inventions—dubbed “Israel Is On It”—launched this week, with its first ad appearing in the New York Times.
The campaign said it aims “to raise mass-market awareness of one tiny country whose citizens are curing cancer, making the ocean drinkable, freezing breast tumors, preventing hospital infections, stopping airport terrorism, and changing all our lives for the better.” The New York Times ad spotlights Israeli innovation in water desalination and water recycling.
“Israel Is On It” (www.israelisonit.com) is a project of Untold News, a non-profit organization that highlights Israeli contributions in technology, science, medicine, environment, and humanitarian work. The ads will run in digital media, particularly focusing on websites reaching millennials such as Slate.com, Vice.com, and Mic.com. Untold News is seeking to raise $1 million to fund more ads.
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New Holocaust-denying video released by Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei
(JNS.org) On International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau on Wednesday, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei published a video (see below) titled “Are The Dark Ages Over,” expressing doubt whether the Holocaust took place and complaining about European nations’ ban on Holocaust denial.
Khamenei laments that the Holocaust denial bans are not justified by European laws regarding free speech. In the video, which was translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute, the Iranian leader also calls on Muslims to fight Israel and the Jewish state’s Western allies. The video includes images of major European Holocaust deniers such as Roger Garaudy, Robert Faurisson, and David Irving, highlighting their alleged persecution in the West.
Iran is also in the midst of organizing its annual Holocaust cartoon contest. This year, the first-place prize money is $50,000, more than quadruple last year’s $12,000. There will also be a separate portrait contest focusing on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“We’re really concerned this contest is used as a platform for Holocaust denial…and anti-Semitic speech,” Ira Forman, the U.S. State Department’s special envoy to combat and monitor anti-Semitism, told JNS.org.
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Israel, Greece, Cyprus plan to lay connected gas pipeline
(JNS.org) Israel, Greece, and Cyprus will set up a committee to decide how to lay a pipeline among the three countries in order to export gas to Europe.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades, and Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras announced the decision together on Thursday following their first-ever tripartite meeting in Nicosia.
“It is imperative to work collectively through coordination,” said Anastasiades, who hosted the summit.
Netanyahu said he believes “this meeting has historic implications” and that “the last time Greeks, Cypriots, and Jews sat around a table and talked about a common framework was 2,000 years ago.”
Netanyahu also spoke of another plan to connect the electric grids of all three countries. Tsipras added that cooperation with Israel and Cyprus was a “strategic choice” for Greece.
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U.N.’s Ban Ki-moon stands by comments that justify Palestinian terrorism
(JNS.org) U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday stood by his criticism of what he called Israel’s “stifling occupation” of the Palestinian people, rejecting remarks by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he was “encouraging terrorism.”
On Tuesday, Ban said the current wave of Palestinian terror in Israel—in which the attacks are predominantly, though not exclusively, occurring in the vicinity of Jerusalem and across the 1967 lines—is understandable because it is “human nature to react to occupation.”
Israel’s settlement activities are “an affront to the Palestinian people,” Ban said. In response, Netanyahu issued a statement that “the comments of the U.N. secretary-general encourage terror. There is no justification for terror.”
On Wednesday, Ban would not back down from his earlier comments, saying that Palestinians “watch as Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including east Jerusalem, expand and expand…[and] after nearly 50 years of occupation—after decades of waiting for the fulfillment of the Oslo promises—Palestinians are losing hope.”
Ban’s criticism echoes the recent comments of U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro, who said that too much “vigilantism” goes unchecked by Israeli authorities, and that in the disputed territories, “at times there seems to be two standards of adherence to the rule of law—one for Israelis and another for Palestinians.”
Since last fall, 30 Israelis have been killed in terrorist shootings, car-rammings, and stabbings, including the latest victim, 23-year-old Shlomit Krigman. She was killed after being critically wounded on Monday in a Palestinian stabbing attack in Beit Horon, where she was on her way to a visit with her grandparents. Krigman was laid to rest Tuesday at Jerusalem’s Har Hamenuchot cemetery beside the grave of Dafna Meir, an Israeli mother of six who was the Palestinian terror wave’s 29th victim.
Meanwhile, Hamas admitted that it lost contact with eight diggers after a tunnel the Palestinian terror group was digging collapsed due to bad weather. The admission shows that Hamas, which took control of the Gaza Strip in 2007 after Israel’s withdrawal from the coastal enclave in 2005, is working to rebuild the network of terror tunnels running underground into southern Israel, a network that was largely destroyed by the IDF during 2014’s Operation Protective Edge.
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Articles from JNS.org appear on San Diego Jewish World through the generosity of Dr. Bob and Mao Shillman.