‘We build in Jerusalem,’ Netanyahu says after Jerusalem Day
(JNS.org) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday said he has a “clear position” that the Israeli government will “build in Jerusalem.”
“I ordered the construction of the Har Homa neighborhood, and today there are tens of thousands of residents there, making it a city within a city,” Netanyahu said during a special Knesset session marking Jerusalem Day, which was celebrated a day earlier on May 17. “I ordered the construction of the Maaleh Hazeitim neighborhood. We are building in Ramot, we are building in Gilo, we are building in Pisgat Ze’ev, and we are building in Ramat Shlomo. We are building inside [Jerusalem] and we are building in its peripheral neighborhoods.”
Netanyahu vowed that Jerusalem “will never return to being a frontline or a border city.”
“We removed the fences, walls, fortifications, and mine fields. … We have put its parts back together,” he said. “This is not to say the unification is perfect, but we will not go back to the past. Jerusalem is located in the heart of Israel and we will not permit any enemy who seeks our destruction to be there.”
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Seeking greater integration, IDF to disband Druze-only unit after 41 years
(JNS.org) Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot on Monday decided to disband the IDF’s Druze-only unit, the Sword Battalion, 41 years after its inception.
The IDF said the decision followed lengthy deliberations, extensive preparatory work, and consultations with heads of the Druze community. Recent data indicates that the majority of Druze military recruits explicitly ask to serve in other combat units, with only 5 percent of Druze recruits expressing a preference for the Sword Battalion.
Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said the decision “reflects the fact that the IDF facilitates the integration of every soldier, regardless of their origin.”
“The integration of Druze soldiers in the ranks of the IDF is a stellar example of that,” said Ya’alon, Israel Hayom reported.
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Illinois legislature passes bill banning pro-BDS companies from state pension funds
(JNS.org) The Illinois State House of Representatives on Monday unanimously passed a bill that prohibits state pension funds from including in their portfolios companies that participate in the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner said on Twitter that he will sign the bill into law.
The measure’s 102-0 House passage follows its 49-0 passage in the Illinois State Senate. State legislatures in Indiana and Tennessee last month passed resolutions condemning BDS, but those measures were non-binding, as opposed to the Illinois bill’s specific economic action.
“Illinois is the first state to take concrete, legally binding action against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign, providing a legislative model for the rest of the country,” said Jacob Baime, executive director of the Israel on Campus Coalition.
The Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago (JUF) said that it “strategized closely with the Governor’s Office and Sen. Ira Silverstein and Rep. Sara Feigenholtz, the bill’s chief co-sponsors, to help ensure its successful passage.”
“At the core of the BDS movement is a quest to delegitimize Israel as a sovereign, democratic and Jewish state,” said JUF President Steven B. Nasatir. “This bipartisan legislation sends a strong message that Illinois will not tolerate such efforts.”
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U.S. condemns death sentence for former Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi
(JNS.org) The United States condemned the death sentence handed down over the weekend to former Egyptian president and Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Morsi.
In a statement, the U.S. State Department said the sentence is “unjust and undermines confidence in the rule of law.” On May 16, an Egyptian court gave Morsi the death penalty for his part in a mass prison break during the uprising against former president Hosni Mubarak in January 2011. More than 100 other people were sentenced to death in the case.
Under Egyptian law, the death sentence is not final until it is reviewed by Egypt’s Grand Mufti for his non-binding opinion. The mufti’s decision on this verdict is scheduled for June 2.
Morsi was already serving a 20-year sentence for an April 21 conviction over the role he played in the deaths of protesters outside his presidential palace in December 2012.
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Greek mayor blasted for desire to nix Star of David from Holocaust memorial
(JNS.org) A Greek town is mired in controversy after its mayor asked to remove the Star of David from a Holocaust memorial before it could be unveiled.
Kavala Mayor Dimitra Tsanaka asked for the star to be removed after a majority vote on the issue by the city council. Tsanaka originally said that members of the council objected to the size and placement of the symbol on the memorial, but she later denied that she had ever wanted the star removed.
The Jewish community and members of the Greek community at large expressed outrage at the request.
“How can it be that the eternal symbol of the Jewish people—the very symbol that the Nazis required Jews to wear in the death camps and ghettos of Europe during the Second World War—is deemed unfit for public display in Kavala?” said American Jewish Committee Executive Director David Harris.
Greek Media and Culture Minister Giorgos Kalantzis said that “as an Orthodox Christian, I feel deeply insulted by this issue, because it would be as if someone asked us to erase or modify, for ‘aesthetic reasons,’ the symbol of the cross on the tombs of our grandfathers executed by the Germans.”
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Natalie Portman: Israel-themed ‘A Tale of Love and Darkness’ not political
(JNS.org) Natalie Portman, who directs and stars in the new Hebrew-language film adaptation of author Amos Oz’s “A Tale of Love and Darkness,” says that despite Oz’s record as a vocal left-wing critic of Israel, her film is not political.
Like the book on which it is based, Portman’s film is about a young boy at the time of the founding of the state of Israel.
“I think the movie is very much about this very particular, specific family story. Of course, it happens at a crazy moment in history, which I think is a big sort of weight on their backs. It’s sort of a pressure cooker for the family, but there’s not really a political agenda behind it,” Portman told the Associated Press on Sunday after the film’s premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
Portman added that making the film in Hebrew was very important to her. The actress was born in Israel and speaks fluent Hebrew.
“Someone said to me once, ‘Americans always want to make foreign movies and have French characters or Spanish characters speak English, but with a French accent or Spanish accent and it’s so silly.’ Could you imagine making a movie about George Washington in French and having him have an American accent in French?” she said.
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Palestinian Authority submits request to file lawsuits against Israel at ICC
(JNS.org) The Palestinian Authority (PA) submitted an official request with the International Criminal Court (ICC) to set a date for filing documents to investigate Israel over war crimes allegations.
“I have submitted a request to the court to set a date for us to present the files of settlements and Israeli war crimes,” PA Foreign Minister Riad Malki told the Voice of Palestine radio station. “We’re now awaiting the court’s response. This could take place in mid-June.”
The Palestinians joined the ICC on April 1 in an effort to prosecute Israel for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity stemming from the Jewish state’s conduct in last summer’s war in Gaza. Israel responded to the Palestinians’ unilateral action by withholding tax revenue transfers to the PA. But Israel recently resumed the transfers.
Israel and the U.S. consider unilateral Palestinian moves in the international arena to be detrimental to the achievement of a negotiated two-state solution.
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Reports: Saudis may purchase nukes from Pakistan over Iranian program
(JNS.org) Reports indicate that Saudi Arabia is exploring the option of purchasing nuclear weapons from Pakistan.
“For the Saudis the moment has come,” the British newspaper The Sunday Times quoted a former senior U.S. defense official as saying. “There has been a long-standing agreement in place with the Pakistanis and the House of Saud has now made the strategic decision to move forward [with the purchase of nuclear weapons].”
Like Israel, Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf states have been wary of the P5+1 powers’ negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program. The latest reports comes as Saudi Arabia and other Arab leaders suggested last week that they plan to match Iran in nuclear enrichment capability.
Arab leaders from the Gulf Cooperation Council met with President Barack Obama last week at the White House and Camp David to discuss the Iranian nuclear program and other regional issues. But a number of Arab leaders, including King Salman of Saudi Arabia, did not attend the summit in an apparent sign of displeasure with Obama’s Middle East policies.
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Articles from JNS.org appear on San Diego Jewish World through the generosity of Dr. Bob and Mao Shillman
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