Palestinian negotiator calls Netanyahu ‘filthy war criminal,’ slams Abbas
(JNS.org) In a newly surfaced audio recording, Saeb Erekat—the top Palestinian negotiator in the collapsed Israeli-Palestinian peace talks—calls Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “filthy war criminal” and also harshly criticizes the leadership of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
“I don’t say shoot him. He isn’t worth the bullet … he’s ideologically corrupt, I’ve known him for 31 years,” Erekat said of Netanyahu, according to a Times of Israel translation of a recording posted on YouTube by the Awraq News Agency.
Erekat said the only way to extract concessions from Netanyahu is to pursue action against him in international courts.
“Why did Netanyahu engage in these random negotiations if not to build more settlements? … You, Abu Mazen (Abbas), have the ability to prevent Netanyahu from traveling anywhere in the world, except from Ben-Gurion airport to New York. He’s a despicable, filthy war criminal,” said Erekat.
The Palestinian negotiator said Abbas has lost his credibility in the Arab world.
“Quite honestly, the Arabs don’t believe you (Abbas),” Erekat said. “They either doubt you, or attack you, or are scared of you … He (Abbas) is 79 years old. How much longer will he live? All he must do is take a patriotic stand. He can do anything, but it seems like he wants to become like Bashar Assad or Saddam Hussein … this way of thinking is useless. There are cards in your hand—use them.”
*
Terrorists dig tunnel, plot prison escape in northern Israel
(JNS.org) Israel Prison Service guards foiled a potential prison break on Thursday after being tipped off by security prisoners in northern Israel’s Shata maximum-security prison, Israel Hayom reported.
After learning of the escape plan, prison personnel conducted intense searches throughout the compound. Guards discovered a tunnel some 13 feet deep and 1.5 feet wide under a cell occupied by terrorists belonging to global jihad groups.
Preliminary investigations point to the tunnel being dug in recent days, and investigators are looking into whether the prisoners were planning on escaping through it. The tunnel had not been completed, but it would have emerged in that wing’s courtyard.
During the search, guards also discovered a makeshift knife as well as plain clothes altered to look like warden uniforms in another cell. The fake uniforms were made using blue shirts with carton cutouts for badges and lettering drawn with toothpaste. Following the tunnel’s discovery, the wing was sealed and its occupants were moved to other cell blocs. Investigations are ongoing.
*
After victories in Iraq, jihadists threaten to invade Israel and Jordan
(JNS.org) Jihadists from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terror group are reportedly threatening to invade Israel and Jordan after their recent victories in Iraq.
According to the Gatestone Institute, ISIS leader Abu Baker al-Baghdadi “recently discussed with his lieutenants the possibility of extending the group’s control beyond Syria and Iraq.”
This includes invading Jordan, which shares a long border with Syria and Iraq, and extends to Israel and Egypt.
“The ISIS terrorists see Jordan’s Western-backed King Abdullah as an enemy of Islam and an infidel, and have publicly called for his execution,” the Gatestone Institute said.
A recent video posted by ISIS threatened to “slaughter” Jordan’s pro-Western King Abdullah, who the group called a “tyrant.”
ISIS this week took control of Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul, seizing the city’s central bank and $425 million worth of cash, while also taking control of U.S.-supplied military hardware that was donated to the Iraqi military, which fled ahead of the jihadist invasion.
*
Nazi seizure of stores garners Jewish family $68 million judgment
(JNS.org) A court in Berlin ordered Germany to compensate the descendants of the Jewish owners of a department store chain that was seized by Nazis with an additional 50 million euros ($68 million), The Associated Press reported.
The Schocken’s chain of stores in the Saxony region was seized by the Nazis in the 1930s. The descendants, who reside in Israel and the U.S., were already paid 15 million euros for one of the seized buildings in the 1990s.
One of the buildings that held one of the family’s stores, built in the city of Chemnitz by architect Erich Mendelsohn in 1930, now houses the German State Museum of Archaeology.
*
Palestinian envoy to Britain: PA should recognize Jewish state
(JNS.org) The Palestinian envoy to Great Britain has partnered with an Israeli professor to argue that the Palestinian Authority (PA) must recognize Israel as a Jewish state in exchange for Israel recognizing a Palestinian state.
Envoy Manuel Hassassian and Prof. Raphael Cohen-Almagor wrote an article for the quarterly publication Fathom in which they propose, “Israel shall recognize the State of Palestine. Palestine shall recognize the Jewish State of Israel.”
The authors also argue that Israel should be entitled to annex parts of the West Bank as part of a mutually agreed land swap deal.
“The major settlement blocs—Maaleh Adumim, Givat Zeev, Gush Etzion, Modiin Illit and Ariel—which account for approximately 70 percent of the Jewish population in the West Bank and for less than four percent of its territory, may be annexed to Israel upon reaching an agreement with the PA as part of the land swap equal in size and quality. Border adjustment must be kept to the necessary minimum and must be reciprocal,” they wrote.
The argument is a departure from the recent statements of PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who has said “there is no way” that the Palestinians would accept a Jewish state.
*
Preceding provided by JNS.org, which is sponsored on the pages of San Diego Jewish World through the generosity of Dr. Bob and Mao Shillman.