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One postponement, many possible reasons: Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu announced he had postponed next week’s visits to Paris and Rome, with his aide claiming it was due to several pressing unresolved matters – passing the 2009-2010 state budget in the Knesset and appointing a new special envoy to oversee efforts to secure the release of Gilad Shalit.
Another PMO official stated the postponement was due to Netanyahu’s belief that preparations for the visit were incomplete, while other PMO sources claimed Netanyahu wanted to distance his recent meeting with US President Barack Obama from his relations with European countries.
However, there are those who believe the postponement is related to Israel’s anger at the frogs for its comments on Jerusalem’s final status.
But statements released by the French Foreign Ministry provided an alternative reason for the cancellation. Ministry spokesman Frederic Desagneaux said “The declaration which the Israeli prime minister issued yesterday derives from prejudice regarding the final status agreement,” referring to Netanyahu’s pledge on Jerusalem Day, last week, that Jerusalem would “never again be divided or partitioned.”
“In the eyes of France,” Desagneaux said, “Jerusalem needs to turn into a capital for two states,” emphasizing that French President Sarkozy made the same point last year.
“Activities like destroying Palestinian houses and expulsion of Arab citizens encourage violence,” the spokesperson said. “They are unacceptable, and against international law.”
Welcome to the Middle East, where nothing is simple.
Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)
10:48PM: Texas man Shukri Abu Baker will soon have to be extremely careful during prayer time, after being sentenced to 65 years in prison for funneling millions of dollars to Hamas.
And he’s not alone. Mohammad El-Mezain was sentenced to 180 months for one count of conspiracy to support a terrorist organization, and 3 other men – Ghassan Elashi, Mufid Abdulqader and Abdulrahman Odeh – were convicted of conspiracy and are still to be sentenced.
10:15PM: It has been reported that the 4 Jordanians arrested in Jordan last month had planned to perpetrate terror attacks in Israel in retaliation for Operation Cast Lead, and are expected to be charged with illegal possession of arms.
6:45PM: Return of the beloved “Jihad mission” accident.
Hamas’ armed wing said that one of its fighters was killed on a “Jihad mission” in Jabaliya, in the northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday morning.
According to an Al-Qassam Brigades communiqué, 25-year-old Muhammad Abed Al-Karim Al-Madhoun was killed. The statement did not specify the circumstances of the death or the details of the mission.
Muawiya Hassanein, the director of Ambulance and Emergency services in the Gaza Health Ministry, a dead body arrived at Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza. The body was recovered when a tunnel collapsed in the northern Gaza Strip.
Sources at the hospital also said that a second body had arrived from the same incident.
The Hamas military statement said that Al-Madhoun was killed “during his duty in a special task.
“He had a bright history full of exploits in his Jihad against the Zionist occupation,” the statement said.
6:23PM: Joke of the day: the UN of course.
Egyptian Culture Minister Farouk Hosni, a leading candidate to head UNESCO despite his vehement anti-Israeli rhetoric, has apologized for a number of his contentious statements claiming that they counter his own beliefs and devotion to culture.
Hosni, who has served as Egypt’s culture minister since 1987, has declared that if he could, he “would burn Israeli books in Egyptian libraries.”
“Let’s burn these books; if there are any, I will burn them myself before you,” Hosni was quoted as telling a member of parliament who had confronted him about the presence of Israeli books in Egyptian libraries last May.
Hosni told media at the time he had meant the comments as “hyperbole.”
Despite such rhetoric, Hosni is a leading candidate for the top spot in the UN’s education and cultural organization, having been recommended by Mubarak.
Sounds like a real winner. Hyperbolically speaking, of course.
2:36PM: Here is “moderate” PA President Mahmoud Abbas addressing women’s right activists.
The speech is interesting for a number of reasons. For one, Abbas actually cracks some jokes and smiles, a sure sign of the apocalypse. Then there’s his stinging criticism of Hamas. But for me, the thing to which you should pay the most attention is his gloating that “we are the ones who invented resistance” (from 04:40) – and the long applause this elicits.
10:00AM: Israeli President Shimon Peres has called National Union MK Aryeh Eldad’s proposal that Jordan serve as the palestinian state a “baseless hallucination.”
Club Med Gaza anyone?
6:20AM: Hamas is not just bad for the Jews.
6:07AM: As PA President Mahmoud Abbas says he will do everything to advance peace with Israel, senior Fatah members are debating whether or not to remove references to “resistance” from the Fatah platform.
It, of courses, bears reminding, that Abbas himself recently said that while he currently opposes “armed resistance”, he would not rule out returning to it, and was proud of trailblazing the path of “resistance.”
6:00AM: IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi yesterday told a Knesset committee meeting that Hizbullah has more rockets than before the Second Lebanon War and is boosting it’s power in South Lebanon ahead of the country’s upcoming elections.
How utterly surprising.
