Israeli foreign ministry sets up team to combat boycotts
(JNS.org) Israel has established a new inter-ministerial team to fight efforts to boycott the Jewish state and products manufactured beyond the Green Line, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman announced Monday.
The creation of the inter-ministerial team, which includes Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and International, Intelligence, and Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz, was declared in the wake of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s controversial comments over the weekend warning of boycotts and isolation if Israel does not reach a peace deal with the Palestinians.
Netanyahu said at his cabinet meeting on Sunday, “Attempts to impose a boycott on the State of Israel are immoral and unjust. Moreover, they will not achieve their goal.”
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Netanyahu: No peace deal without Palestinian recognition of Israel as Jewish state
(JNS.org) Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday for his refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Netanyahu’s statements came after Abbas told The New York Times that Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state was “out of the question.”
At a Likud-Beiteinu faction meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu said, “[Abbas] knows that there will not be an agreement without recognition of the nation state of the Jewish people,” Israel Hayom reported.
Netanyahu said it would be “absurd” to expect Israel to recognize a nation state for the Palestinian people without reciprocal recognition of Israel as the nation state for the Jewish people.
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Nobel Laureate Dan Shechtman kicks of campaign for Israeli president
(JNS.org) Dan Shechtman, who won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2011, met with Israeli politicians Monday to garner support for his recently announced campaign for president of Israel.
Schechtman met with Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein (Likud), Yesh Atid leader and Finance Minister Yair Lapid, Education Minister Shai Piron (Yesh Atid), and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman (Yisrael Beiteinu). Combined, Lapid and Lieberman’s parties control a quarter of the Israeli Knesset. In order to run for president, Shechtman needs to win support from at least 10 MKs.
The Israeli presidency is a largely ceremonial post currently held by Shimon Peres. Shechtman announced his plan to run for president in January. If he wins, he would be the first non-politician to win the post since biophysicist Ephraim Katzir in 1973.
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Hundreds of rabbis to bolster Hungarian Jewry
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Hundreds of rabbis from all over Europe are planning to travel to Hungary in March for a conference meant to strengthen the Jewish community, as anti-Semitic nationalist parties gain traction in the country’s political scene.
The March 24-25 event—organized by the Rabbinical Center of Europe—will be attended by Israel’s chief rabbis as part of extensive cooperation with the Hungarian government to battle anti-Semitism. The extreme right-wing Hungarian party Jobbik, which has strengthened its hand in the Hungarian Diet, has proposed fascist laws. Hungarian Jews have reported gangs of thugs on the streets seeking to accost and assault minority groups, especially Jews and Roma.
Last week, Jobbik members announced plans to hold a political rally in the northern Hungarian city of Esztergom, in a building that once functioned as a synagogue.
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Hillary Clinton urges Congress not to increase Iran sanctions
(JNS.org) Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged Congress not to pass more sanctions against Iran that may interfere with current negotiations between the P5+1 powers and the Islamic Republic. Instead, Clinton said, lawmakers should work together with the Obama administration to send a unified message to Iran.
Iran received what the U.S. said was $7 billion in sanctions relief in the interim nuclear agreement that it reached with the P5+1 powers last November. While the deal says Iran cannot install any new centrifuges, in January the ongoing nuclear talks hit a snag with the revelation that Iran built a new advanced nuclear centrifuge.
“Now that serious negotiations are finally under way, we should do everything we can to test whether they can advance a permanent solution… As President Obama has said, we must give diplomacy a chance to succeed, while keeping all options on the table,” Clinton wrote in a letter to U.S. Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Yet Clinton added, “So long as Iran remains a sponsor of terrorism and a threat to global security, we will have to remain vigilant in defense of our allies and partners, including Israel.”
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Preceding provided by JNS.org