Israel news

Israeli military chief warns Syria of 'consequences' over attacks

Zoe Winograd — Wed, 22 May 2013 10:26:18 +0100

Israeli military’s chief of staff Lieutenant General Benny Gantz has warned Syria’s President Bashar Al-Assad that he will “bear the consequences” if Syria continues to attack Israel.

Lt Gen Gantz told an audience at Haifa University on Tuesday: “We will not allow the area of the Golan Heights to become a comfortable place for Mr Assad.”

“If Mr Assad impairs the situation in the Golan Heights, he will have to bear the consequences.”

The military chief’s speech came hours after Syria attacked an Israeli army jeep in the Golan Heights. This was followed by an Israeli missile attack targeting the source of Syrian gunfire. It was the third incident across the border this week.

Israel and Syria exchange fire in the Golan Heights

Marcus Dysch — Tue, 21 May 2013 15:01:52 +0100

Israeli and Syrian forces have exchanged fire in the Golan Heights in the latest in a series of incidents on the border.

The Syrian army claimed it had destroyed an IDF jeep that it said had infiltrated into Syrian territory in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

No Israelis are thought to have been injured in the incident. An IDF spokesman confirmed a vehicle had been damaged by "light weapons fire" and that a rocket had been fired in retaliation, scoring a "direct hit" on Syrian forces.

It was the third time an Israeli Tammuz rocket was fired back into Syria.

The clashes follow a number of similar skirmishes and increasing tension in the border region in recent weeks.

Syrian shells have hit Israel twice this week. It is not known whether Syrian forces directly targeted Israeli army positions or had unsuccessfully aimed at rebels.

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon reiterated Israel's position and said: “We do not interfere in the civil war, but we will not allow it to enter our territory.”

Israel bank raider and victims identified

Sandy Rashty — Tue, 21 May 2013 14:16:35 +0100

Israeli police have identified the man responsible for the bank raid shootings that led to the death of four civilians in Be'er Sheva on Monday.

Itamar Alon, a reservist captain for the Israeli Defence Force, took a number of hostages during the attack at the Hapoalim Bank on Jabotinsky Street.

Alon, 40, had been refused an overdraft loan by the bank for around £1,000 (NIS 6,000).

The Be'er Sheva resident killed four people, released one woman hostage and then shot himself after failed negotiations with police.

Another victim, shot four times in the back and stomach, is said to be in critical condition.

The victims include two bank employees who are thought to have been specifically targeted by the shooter - branch manager Avner Cohen, a 44-year-old father-of-three; and deputy manager Meir Alon, a 40-year-old father-of-three.

Idan Savri, 22, was also killed. He had been opening an account at the bank. Mother-of-three Anat Ben-Haim, 34, was killed by the gunman as she attempted to deposit money into an account.

At least three people were injured and treated at the city's Soroka Medical Center. Magen David Adom emergency service workers attended the scene.

Alon, a former school security guard, was once decorated for shooting a terrorist who attacked an IDF base in 2002.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the incident as a “great tragedy”.

Five killed in bank raid in Israel

Sandy Rashty — Mon, 20 May 2013 12:42:58 +0100

At least five Israelis have been killed in what appears to be a bank robbery in Israel this morning.

Another person is in critical condition after the attack, in which hostages were held, at the Hapoalim Bank on Jabotinsky street in Be’er Sheva.

According to a report on Haaretz news, police are investigating the possibility that a Jewish man in his forties instigated the attack after being denied a loan for his mortgage by the bank manager.

Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino told Haaretz that the robber, who has shot himself, was a Be'er Sheva resident.

Civilians have been evacuated from the area.

One woman hostage was released.

At least three people are believed to be injured and are being treated at the Soroka Medical Center in Be'er Sheva. Magen David Adom emergency service workers were at the scene.

In historic ruling, judge calls Palestinian rock attack murder

Nathan Jeffay — Fri, 17 May 2013 19:00:28 +0100

Earlier this month, a Palestinian man began a 98-year jail term for murdering young father Asher Palmer and his baby son by throwing a rock.

The ruling against Waal al-Arja is unusual in the Israeli military courts that deal with Palestinian crime, and a coup for the British-born lawyer who represents the victims’ family.

While Palestinian stone-throwers are often prosecuted, they are rarely sentenced to murder because there is a lack of legal precedent for defining rocks as a murder weapon and, historically, judges have tended not to rule premeditation in rock attacks.

The attacker threw a rock from an oncoming vehicle at Asher Palmer’s car in the West Bank, injuring him and causing him to lose control of the car, which subsequently overturned.

“Only I believed there would be a sentence for murder,” said Adrian Agassi, lawyer for Michael Palmer, whose son and grandson were killed a year and a half ago.

Mr Agassi, a Carmel College graduate who made aliyah in 1986 and went on to stints as an army lawyer and a military judge, pushed the military prosecution to demand a murder sentence, instead of taking the normal approach that stone throwing is wrong but the aim is not to kill.

He believes that the sentence will have a deterrent effect on other stone throwers who realise that the stakes have been raised, sending out a message that “enough is enough”.

He also hopes that, with a stone defined in the Palmer case as a murder weapon, civilians will be provided with the same justification for opening fire on stone throwers as those who shoot back at those wielding guns — a suggestion that will meet with controversy in the Israeli legal establishment.

The sentencing of al-Arja at Ofer Military Court was unusually emotional, as the father of the victim took the unusual step of addressing the bench. He spoke of how he saw “Asher’s body wrapped in a tallit, and a little box on top, in the box was Yonatan’s body.”

Mr Palmer, who made aliyah from America, talked about how his grandson’s life was cut short just as he was starting to speak. In an interview after the hearing, he said: “When you have a murder trial, the victim can’t be there and I’ve seen that there’s a tendency for the murderer, with their family crying in the court, can be seen as a kind of victim.” He “wanted it to be clear what was now missing from the world,” and to humanise the victims before a sentence was passed.

Asher Palmer, a settler who lived in Kiryat Arba, had studied in yeshivah, married, and was starting to study engineering in Jerusalem, his father said.

Cost of ﬂights set to tumble

Fri, 17 May 2013 16:00:28 +0100

Holidaymakers received a double dose of good news this week with a prediction that the cost of flights to Israel are set to be slashed, and a U-turn by the Israeli government over its proposal to levy 18 per cent VAT on tourism.

According to a senior Israeli tourism official, the price of an air ticket from the UK to Israel may fall by up to 30 per cent when the new open-skies policy comes into force in April next year.

Naama Oryan-Kaplan, director of the Israel Government Tourism Office in the UK and Ireland, said she anticipated prices would be reduced by between 20 and 30 per cent under the new rules which will open up routes to airlines in the European Union.

Carriers are expected to reduce their prices to attract an additional 250,000 tourists from the EU.

“This is a positive development in the Israel tourism industry,” said Ms Oryan-Kaplan. “There will be many options for new carriers to enter the Israeli market, including low-cost airlines.”

A pre-booked return ticket from London to Tel Aviv on El Al currently costs between around £400 and £430 for an adult flying economy class. If the anticipated reduction takes place, the price could fall to as low as £280.

Ms Oryan-Kaplan said: “There has been already an interest from airlines, and new routes should be announced soon.”

The chief executive of Ryanair has told tourism industry figures that the budget airline would consider flying to Israel under the open skies agreement.

Speaking at a UK-Israel business event, Michael O’Leary promised to route Ryanair flights to Israel if there was a level playing field for competition. “We would like a significant portion of our growth to go to places where it needs it — like Israel,” he said.

He noted that more airlines flying to Israel would make travel more affordable for passengers and boost the tourism market. Because of high prices, “tourists avoid Israel”, he said. “It’s a shame because it’s a beautiful country with enormous opportunities.”

He complained that only two of the country’s six airports were being used for international flights. “Israel is a very rich country — build some jet runways and fulfil the enormous tourism potential. We want to open up bases in Israel and put our jets there.”

Meanwhile, UK groups organising trips to Israel have reacted with relief to the Israeli government’s decision to not push forward Finance Minister Yair Lapid’s proposal to levy 18 per cent VAT on hotels and travel services.

“We’re very happy,” said Ilan Scorah, UJIA co-ordinator for tours and gap year programmes. The cost of a UJIA tour, currently £2650, “would have leapt by 12 per cent”, he said.

Harry Jardine, national director of the Federation of Zionist Youth which runs educational tour groups to Israel, welcomed the decision which, he said, followed “great lobby work from organisations across the Jewish world”.

The proposed tax was expected to reduce tourism in Israel by 14 per cent. Last year, 200,000 British tourists out of a record total of 3.4 million visited the country — which was named the eighth most expensive tourist destination by a World Economic Forum report.

Prize author: Hawking is wrong over boycott

Jennifer Lipman — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:50:28 +0100

Two writers with links to the Hebrew University in Jerusalem have been nominated for a major British-based literary prize.

Croatian-born author Josip Novakovich, who is a visiting professor of creative writing at the university, and Israeli novelist Aharon Appelfeld, who studied there, are among the 10 nominees in the running for the £60,000 international Man Booker Award, which is due to be presented in London next week.

The prize was last claimed by Phillip Roth and is open to writers working in any language.

Speaking ahead of the award ceremony, Mr Novakovich said he disagreed with fellow academic Stephen Hawking’s decision to boycott a conference in Jerusalem next month.

“In general I don’t believe in boycotts,” he said.

“No matter what anyone thinks of the politics the only way to resolve an impasse is through dialogue, so it is always better to come and discuss it.”

Mr Nova-kovich, who teaches both Hebrew- and Arabic-speakers at the university, added that academics would do better to adopt a policy of talking to everyone.

“It would make it easier to reach a common solution,” he said. “Going to Israel is far better than saying no to dialogue — no dialogue actually resolves nothing.”

Living in Jerusalem, he said he was struck by how well the different religious groups co-existed in the Old City — something, he noted, which was too rarely acknowledged by the media.

“My attitude in literature is to look at a story and see what is working and then do it more, and I think politically it should be the same — let’s see what is working and let’s try to make it stronger.”

He said he did not expect to win the award, because the other nominees “have been published way more than I have”, but he was looking forward to meeting other writers, including Mr Appelfeld.

Arab anger as BDS targets their festival

Ben Hartman — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:00:44 +0100

The Palestinian and Jordanian organisers of a music festival in the Golan Heights have spoken out against a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign that is targeting their event.

The two-day MAN — Music, Art and Nature — festival is scheduled for June 7 and 8 on the shores of Lake Ram next to the Druse village of Majdal Shams. Theatre, art exhibits and workshops are planned, as well as performances by Palestinian and Jordanian DJs and bands, including Akher Zapheer from Jordan.

BDS activists have called on Akher Zapheer to boycott the festival, arguing that visiting Israel is a form of normalising relations with the country. The fact that the festival is due to take place in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights makes matters worse for some opponents.

Muhammad Jabali, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, is one of the organisers of the festival, where he will also be performing as a DJ. He said that boycotting Palestinian and Arab cultural events of this nature will only have a detrimental effect. “We don’t think that it’s logical for Arabs inside of Israel to carry out a cultural boycott against themselves,” he said.

Mr Jabali, 33, added that Arab cultural events like the MAN festival increase Israel’s Palestinian citizens’ cultural connection to the wider Arab world, and help prevent “Israelisation” of the Palestinian minority by the wider Israeli culture.

He added that “we all support the boycott of all official Israeli institutions”.

Yazid Sadi, a Palestinian guitarist living in Haifa, told the Economist that BDS was similar to chemotherapy. “It doesn’t distinguish between cancerous and good cells… It kills them all.”

In what has been declared as one of the BDS movement’s biggest victories in recent years, physicist Stephen Hawking said last week that he would not attend the President’s Conference next month in Jerusalem, by way of protest against Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians.

Jerusalem road ‘obstacle to peace’

Anshel Pfeffer — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:00:44 +0100

The inauguration of a new road in northern Jerusalem last week has alleviated traffic jams but also drawn criticism over its implications for the peace process.

Route 20 is a mile-long dual carriageway connecting the north-eastern neighbourhoods of Pisgat Zeev and Neve Ya’akov with the main north-south Begin Highway and the western exit from Jerusalem towards Tel Aviv.

The road, which significantly reduces traffic jams in the north of the city, took over two years to build due to objections filed by residents of the Palestinian neighbourhood of Beit Hanina, which it bisects.

In addition to the local opposition, peace groups claim that Route 20 is the first part of a larger project to the north and south of Jerusalem’s centre: to connect Jewish neighbourhoods built beyond the Green Line with the main transport network.

Two more similar roads are to be built over the next three years and, according to the campaigners, their existence will make it much more difficult to divide Jerusalem’s municipal area into two capitals in a future peace deal.

Senior Israeli officials denied that the road had any political implications. “The transport infrastructure in Jerusalem, just like in the other large cities in Israel, needs special attention,” said Transport Minister Yisrael Katz.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the road’s inauguration ceremony last week: “We are continuously and methodically working to connect Jerusalem to itself and to connect it to the rest of our country, because it is important to us.”

The main interchange on Route 20 is named after Professor Ben-Zion Netanyahu, the late father of the prime minister.

Prof Netanyahu died last year and, while streets in Jerusalem are normally only named after people at least three years after their death, the decision to name the interchange was fast-tracked. Opposition members of Jerusalem City Council said that Prof Netanyahu, a celebrated historian of the Spanish Inquisition, deserved to be commemorated but criticised the decision to bend the rules.

Thousands vent fury over Israeli budget

Anshel Pfeffer — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:15:44 +0100

Nearly two years after hundreds of thousands of middle-class Israelis joined social justice protests against the government, the new state budget prompted further demonstrations last weekend.

Ten thousand people took part in the Saturday-night demonstration in central Tel Aviv, with smaller protests in other cities.

The protesters, who were joined by opposition MKs from Labour, Meretz and Hadash, called on the new Finance Minister, Yair Lapid, to revise the budget which he presented to the Knesset last week.

The budget, which is being passed nearly five months late due to the elections, has been roundly criticised in the media for placing most of the burden of cutting the deficit on the middle class while leaving corporation taxes and the wages of workers belonging to powerful unions largely untouched.

All levels of income tax have seen a rise of 1.5 per cent and VAT has been put up by one per cent. Workers with academic degrees will lose part of their tax exemptions, housewives will have to make national security payments, pensions will be taxed and child benefits cut.

In a press conference last Thursday, Mr Lapid said: “I would have preferred to give out sweets but we all understand the deficit must be closed. Everyone wants someone else to close the deficit.” He denied the budget came mainly at the expense of the middle class, saying: “For the first time, the working person is not the only one hurting. We raised corporate taxes and duties on luxury goods, and cut ministers’ and MKs’ salaries. This budget cuts sectors which were untouchable in the past.”

So far, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has backed Mr Lapid’s budget but, in an attempt to assuage public anger, he will probably attempt to reduce some of the tax-hikes and cuts.

One change to the budget has already been made — on Monday ministers decided to reduce by a quarter the planned cut of NIS 4 billion (£730 million) to the defence budget.