Joe Biden gets his revenge on Netanyahu by forcing Ukraine to vote against Israel
YNet is reporting that
serial groper Joe Biden got his revenge for being '
humiliated' by Prime Minister Netanyahu six years ago by
pressuring Ukraine to vote in favor of a Security Council resolution calling Israeli 'settlements' 'illegal' on Friday.
Ukraine’s decision to vote in favor of the resolution appears to
demonstrate the extent to which US President Barack Obama was behind the
decision.
According to officials in Israel, Ukrainian Prime Minister
Volodymyr Groysman, a Jew who is thought of as one of Israel’s main
supporters, wanted that his country not be involved in the consultations
held on the resolution.
However, Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko decided to vote in
favor of its passage following a telephone conversation with US Vice
President Joe Biden.
"The text of the resolution is balanced," Kiev asserted. "It
calls for taking measures necessary for peaceful solution from both
Israeli and Palestinian sides: Israel should stop its settlement
activities while Palestinian authorities – to take effective measures
toward fighting against terrorism."
"Our country consistently advocates the respect for the
international law by everyone and everywhere as has experienced itself
the tragic consequences brought by its violation," the Ukrainian Foreign
Ministry added.
Perhaps this is why one of the first places in which the Netanyahu government has announced that
it will build in response to the United Nations is the scene of Biden's '
humiliation,'
Ramat Shlomo.
Labels: Binyamin Netanyahu, East Jerusalem, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Joe Biden, Ramat Shlomo, Ramot, Ukraine, United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334
20-year old 'Palestinian' terrorist confesses to Ramot stabbing attack
A 20-year old 'Palestinian' terrorist from the Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Ikhsa has
confessed to carrying out a stabbing attack in which a Jewish boy was
seriously wounded two weeks ago. He says that he did it for 'political reasons.' This is from the first link.
The suspect, 20-year-old Zaid Abd al-Rahman from the village of Beit Iksa near Ramot, was arrested several days ago in a joint, police, IDF and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) operation. A media ban on the arrest was lifted on Sunday.
According to police, the suspect confessed to the crime and reenacted the stabbing for police on Sunday morning.
The suspect told police that his decision to stab the Jewish youth was "politically" motivated.
Rahman was expected to have his remand extended at a military court in Jerusalem in the coming days.
The victim was sitting on the street with a friend when the attacker walked up, stabbed him and immediately fled, Jerusalem Deputy Police Spokeswoman Shlomit Bajshi said.
Police, soldiers and Shin Bet personnel combed the area around Ramot in search of the suspect, making an arrest nearly three weeks after the incident. The neighborhood is located in northwest Jerusalem, over the pre-1967 Green Line.
The victim was evacuated to Hadassah University Medical Center in Ein Kerem in serious condition. His condition later improved to satisfactory.
Unfortunately, it's been a long time since Israel destroyed a terrorist's home. Perhaps the time has come to do so again.
Labels: Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Palestinian terrorism, Ramot
It starts: 17-year old Jewish boy stabbed by Arab in Ramot
Shavua tov, a good week to all. This is the first live post of the night, and unfortunately, it is not a happy one. A 17-year old yeshiva student was stabbed and seriously wounded by an Arab in the Jewish neighborhood of Ramot on the Sabbath afternoon.
Israel Radio reports that there's a gag order on details of the incident, but a lot of the details can be found
here if you read Hebrew. Two brothers had gone for a walk in Ramot. Around 3:20 pm, they were approached by an Arab who stabbed one of them multiple times in the abdomen. The victim is in critical condition at Hadassah Ein Karem hospital. The Arab escaped to the nearby Arab village of Beit Ikhsa.
For those who know the area, the attack occurred in Ramot Bet.
You are asked to pray for Yehuda ben Ronit.
UPDATE 8:28 PMJPost adds:
The deputy Knesset speaker [Danny Danon] said that Israel "must find this terrorist and destroy his home. Only aggressive action will succeed in stopping incidents of this kind from occurring in the future."
Danon stated that "after the generosity of the Schalit deal, the time has come to be firm in eradicating terror. I have requested from the prime minister that we destroy the homes of terrorists."
YNet adds:
The police believe that the attack, which left the victim, 17-year-old Yehuda Ne'emad, with serious injures, was nationalistically motivated.
IDF troops were stationed at the entrance to Kfar Iksa, a nearby Palestinian village, and a police helicopter hovered above the region for hours in an attempt to locate the attacker. Large police forces from the Jerusalem District scoured the area as well in coordination with the IDF.
The forces arrived at Kfar Iksa, which is located west of Jerusalem, and searched the homes in the village, where the suspect is believed to be hiding. A joint army and police operations center was set up on the outskirts of the village to coordinate the manhunt.
Defense establishment officials estimate that the terrorist exploited the fact that the separation fence, which divides Israeli and Palestinian territories, does not extend to Kfar Iksa, which is located less than half a kilometer from Ramot. The attacker could have slipped in and out of the neighborhood unimpeded.
...
Magen David Adom emergency services said that the teen was stabbed twice, in the abdomen and in the back. He was rushed to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in Jerusalem in serious condition. The patient underwent a surgery and hospital officials said later that his condition had improved. His state was defined as moderate, and he appears to be out of immediate danger.
Waiting outside the operating room, the Ne'emad's father told Ynet that he was informed of the attack by his younger son. "It is a great scare, and we are trying to deal with it," he said. "We are mostly busy with praying for him right now."
...
A local resident said that many Palestinians from Beit Iksa frequent the Ramot neighborhood. He added that while the area hasn't seen hostile incidents lately, the Palestinians "often taunt us and the young women who pass by."
But Gilad is home.
Labels: Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, Palestinian terrorism, Ramot
The blame game
I can recall traveling to the Jewish neighborhood of Ramot (also known as Ramot Alon) in 1978. There was not an Arab in sight. At the time, Ramot was small - today it is much larger. But the closest Arab village is barely in sight and only from a small portion of Ramot. The neighborhood is huge.
Har Homa (also known as Homat Shmuel) was opened in 1996, and today houses over 4,000 families. It was built on vacant land on the southern outskirts of the city. Along with Ramat Shlomo, it is the only large-scale, reasonably priced (i.e. non-luxury) housing built in Jerusalem since the 1980's. We have a severe housing shortage in Jerusalem.
On Friday, an approval was granted for an additional 1,300 housing units in Ramot and Har Homa. It doesn't mean that construction will start tomorrow. It could take months or even years. And once construction of a new neighborhood starts, it's usually 2-3 years until people start moving in. Nevertheless, the US, the 'Palestinians' and the Europeans are making noise about Israel approving new construction in these neighborhoods in Jerusalem, which under any 'final settlement' scenario discussed before President Obama took office have been included in Israel.
The response should be, "Jerusalem is our capital city, these are existent Jewish neighborhoods in the city and there is nothing to be discussed here. We always said explicitly that we would not freeze building in Jerusalem." But instead, government ministers are playing the
blame game and trying to set each other up as the fall guy.
Mr. Netanyahu is in New Orleans to address the Jewish Federation of North America's General Assembly. On Sunday, he met with Vice President Joseph Biden in the city.
A similar announcement during Mr. Biden's visit to Jersualem last year, of Israel's intentionplan to build 1,600 units in another East Jerusalem development, plunged U.S.-Israel ties into one of its worst crises in decades.
After that incident, which Mr. Netanyahu said occurred without his prior knowledge, the prime minister's office quietly put out orders to government bureaucrats that any housing announcements in East Jerusalem required the approval of Mr. Netanyahu's military attaché, Maj. Gen. Yochanan Locker, said Jerusalem municipality officials and Western diplomats.
Mr. Netanyahu's office signed off on the latest settlement announcement, a senior Jerusalem municipality official said. A senior aide to Mr. Netanyahu declined to comment on whether or not the prime minister had known about the announcement ahead of time.
"Nothing in East Jerusalem can be approved before the prime minister's office approves it," said the official. "That's the regulations since the last Biden visit."
The Ministry of Interior, which is responsible for advancing planning for new housing units, is controlled by Eli Yishai, head of the religious Shas Party. Mr. Yishai is facing an internal challenge to his leadership of the party and analysts say he is trying to fend off that challenge by advocating increasingly hard-line positions.
YNet
adds:
An Israeli official addressed the US criticism of east Jerusalem housing construction permits, saying that "There is no doubt that the finger of blame is pointed at Eli Yishai and the Interior Ministry. They are the ones responsible for announcing the permits."
The official also noted that as per an earlier agreement between Interior Minister Yishai and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the announcement was to be made on October 20, but for some reason it was postponed until this past weekend. "The timing is unusual, no doubt, but it is uncertain that the announcement was made intentionally on this date," said a minister who did not want to be identified. "It is not impossible that it was made as result of inattention and carelessness."
But an assignment of blame is not what's called for here. No one should be apologizing.
I should add that the Wall Street Journal (the first link) throws two very subtle digs into its article that display the reporter's bias against Israel. This is the first one:
Today, Har Homa is home to more than 4,000 Jewish families and is often cited by Palestinians as one of the most egregious examples of how Israel continued massive settlement construction even at the height of the Oslo peace process and one of the reasons why they are today so insistent on a full freeze on settlement building.
What you're not being told here is that nothing in the Oslo accords requires Israel to freeze 'settlement construction.' That came up during the negotiations, Israel refused and the 'Palestinians' signed the agreements anyway. They have no right to come back and try to renegotiate them after the fact.
The second indicator of bias in the Journal article is the picture, which is not of Har Homa, Ramot or anyplace else in Jerusalem. It's Kiryat Arba. While I am in favor of building in Kiryat Arba, many Israelis are not and many Israelis would (unfortunately, in my opinion) give it away to the 'Palestinians.' But whatever the case, Kiryat Arba is not Jerusalem. Jerusalem is not a 'settlement.'
Labels: building permits, Har Homa, Jerusalem, Oslo accords, Ramot, settlement freeze
Embarrassed? He should be bursting with pride!
Haaretz reports that Prime Minister Netanyahu is 'embarrassed' by word that came while he is in the US of another 1,300 Jewish apartments being approved in the Ramot and Har Homa neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Ramot has been a Jewish suburb since the late 1970's, and Har Homa has been a Jewish suburb since the late 1990's. If new houses being built in these neighborhoods embarrasses Netanyahu, he ought to resign. True supporters of Israel feel
great pride at Jewish housing going up in Jerusalem.
New embarrassment threatened to cast a cloud over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's latest U.S. trip Monday as Israeli authorities approved construction of over 1,000 Jewish homes beyond the Green Line in Jerusalem.
Ruth Yosef, who chairs the Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee, published over the weekend details of a program that will allow 930 housing units to be built in the Har Homa C area, with another 48 units in Har Homa B.
An additional 320 units are planned for Ramot, also beyond the Green Line.
The news coincided with a trip to the United States by Netanyahu, which included a meeting with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden. It was during a trip by Biden to Israel earlier in the year that a diplomatic row erupted between the allies over Israeli plans for 1,600 new Jewish homes in another East Jerusalem neighborhood, Ramat Shlomo.
Israel Radio reported on Monday night that State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said that the State Department was 'deeply disappointed' by the announcement, but that at least one member of the cabinet said that Crowley could stick his objections where the sun doesn't shine. That cabinet member said (sorry, I didn't catch who it was), "we never said we wouldn't build in Jerusalem and we said all along that we would build in Jerusalem. These have been Jewish neighborhoods for many years." The plans for the apartments were actually approved two years ago.
Labels: 1949 armistice lines, Binyamin Netanyahu, Har Homa, Joe Biden, Ramot
