FURTHER UPDATE: 10 pm Israel time Wednesday: The latest toll is 8 Israelis killed and another 5 critically wounded in the bombing in Bulgaria. It is also believed that it was not a suicide bomber–but a bomb that was placed in a suitcase when taken off the charter plane carrying the Israelis–or a bomb put into the cargo hold of the main bus that was hit. More info tomorrow.
URGENT UPDATE 7:50 pm Israel time Wednesday: At least 7 Israelis killed by homicide bomber on tour bus ferrying tourists from Burgas, Bulgaria airport to hotels. Death toll continues to rise. At least 20 seriously wounded.
UPDATE 9 am Israel time Wednesday:
At 11:35 pm last night, the southern Israeli residents of Ofakim had to run to their bomb shelters as incoming rocket sirens signalled a missile launch by the Palestinian terrorists in nearby Gaza. No further information is available. At 2:05 am, an IDF patrol in Shechem (Nablus) came under a “rock throwing” assault by Palestinians.
TODAY’S BLOG:
Wow! The last 24 hours have seen an extraordinary confluence of good news here in Israel–so much so that the subject that I had proposed to write about in yesterday’s blog will be delayed for a couple of days.
Where to start?
***1. Kadima is gone.
The unity government between Netanyahu (Likud) and Mofaz (Kadima): gone with the wind.
Likud’s ill-considered coalition with the left wing Kadima Party is finished–and not a second too soon. Regular readers of this blog may remember that on May 8th, the day after Kadima joined the Likud coalition, your humble servant titled the israelstreet blog (click to read) A Dark Day Dawns In Israel: A Likud-Kadima Unity Government Takes Over because of his assessment that Kadima is a party of appeasement to the Palestinians.
One day later, on May 9th, I posted (click to read): Cracks in the Likud-Kadima “Unity” Government Begin To Form. That blog referenced the Tal Law but focused on the Ulpana neighborhood of Beit El which Shaul Mofaz and Kadima were determined to raze. In what turned out to be the first nail in the new Coalition coffin, PM Netanyahu (much to Kadima’s dismay) managed to work out a compromise with the residents of Ulpana that involved moving their homes–and building 300 new apartments.
In the meantime, it became ever more evident that Shaul Mofaz and Benjamin Netanyahu could not get along. First Mofaz gallivanted off to the U.S. where he was warmly received by President Obama; upon his return he apparently tried to embark upon his own diplomacy with Mahmoud Abbas–arranging a meeting which Netanyahu eventually played a part in canceling.
But the straw that broke the camel’s back was the committee that Kadima headed to find a replacement to the Tal Law that exempts some yeshiva students from IDF service. Mofaz’s public condemnations of Netanyahu for disbanding that committee and not following its recommendations (which did not even include a provision for Israeli Arab conscription) made Kadima’s staying in the government untenable.
Specifically, Mofaz would not accept Netanyahu’s phased-in approach: fifty percent of haredim between the ages of 18-23 would be drafted by the IDF and another 50% would be drafted into national service between the ages of 23-26 (though there is reportage today that Mofaz would not even have agreed if the age for induction had been 18 for all). For Kadima it was “our way” or “no way”–all or nothing.
And so they have nothing. Shaul Mofaz may have made Netanyahu look bad in the short term (because of Netanyahu’s attempting to compromise with the ultra-orthodox), but once again Mofaz is relegated to the political wilderness–and there is much talk this morning that Kadima may disappear altogether as a party (a few Kadima MKs may even switch party allegiance to Likud). The talk now is that new elections may be held as early as February of 2013–but maybe not until October of 2013.
(PS. Even though Mofaz has submitted his resignation, it is not effective until Thursday–and remember, never say never in Israeli politics.)
***2. The Ariel University Center of Samaria was certified yesterday as Israel’s 8th “university.”
Israel's 8th university: the Ariel University Center of Samaria.
Three weeks ago on June 28th, the israelstreet blog of the day was (click to read): Academic Disgrace: The Attempt To Boycott the Ariel University Center of Samaria. That piece described in detail how the attempt of the seven presidents of Israel’s existing universities to thwart the 13,000 student Ariel University Center of Samaria (Israel’s largest public college) from being “university” certified was a disgusting collusion with those who seek to boycott, divest, and sanction Israel (see the Jerusalem Post main editorial from yesterday).
I also predicted that “In a few weeks, despite the sordid efforts of those in Israeli academia on the extreme “left”, the Ariel University Center of Samaria (AUC) is expected to be granted “full university status.”
Yesterday evening, the Council on Higher Education had voted 11-2 to make Ariel Israel’s 8th university–and its first university over the green line.
Congratulations to the AUC!
***3. Migron will not be razed (at least not completely).
An aerial view of the Jewish community of Migron.
A quick refresher course from my blog of July 26, 2011 (one of more than 10 blogs your humble servant has written about Migron) Israel’s Migron Headache In Samaria:
Today, Migron is a hilltop Israeli village consisting of 50 families located approximately 5 kilometers north of Jerusalem. Though it has never been officially ‘authorized’, Migron is considered a strategic location by the Israeli government . . .”
Beginning in 2006, two left-wing NGOs, Peace Now and Yesh Din, filed petitions at the Israel Supreme Court that Migron should be demolished because of the disputed claim that Migron was built on private Palestinian land. And so, unsurprisingly, the Court ordered some months ago that Migron had to be destroyed by the end of next month.
However, 17 families, one third of the families in Migron, submitted documentation two weeks ago to the Court that the land on which their homes stand has been legally purchased from Palestinians through the Al Watan company owned by the Binyamin Regional Council. Yesterday, the Attorney General of Israel, Yehuda Weinstein, concurred and stated that the Court decision must now be reconsidered.
The fight to save Migron continues (click here to join that fight)!
***4. Israeli law over the Temple Mount in Jerusalem must be respected.
This is the picture that has inflamed the Temple Mount Faithful: the Islamic Wakf desecrates the Foundation Stone inside the Dome of the Rock (built on the site of the First and Second Jewish Temples)--by dumping construction materials on it.
Yesterday, it was also revealed Attorney General Weinstein has written a letter to the Jerusalem Municipality and the Antiquities Authority in response to a petition to the Israel Supreme Court. That petition, which is being brought by the “Temple Mount Faithful”, asserts that Islamic Wakf is undertaking construction within the Dome of the Rock which is harming the Foundation Stone on which the Ark of the Covenant once rested.
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Weinstein’s letter stressed that the Islamic Wakf must respect the fact that “the Temple Mount is under Israeli law.” At the same time, Weinstein emphasized that application of the law must be carried out “in a sensitive way.”
In your humble servant’s opinion, it is high time for the Jerusalem Police to get this message and stop arresting people who go up on the Mount for wearing kipas, carrying Bibles, and waving Israeli flags.
In a related development, the attempt by the police to stop the annual Tisha B’Av march of the Women in Green around the walls of the old city because of fear that Muslim sensitivities would be disturbed has been reversed–after the Women in Green filed a petition with the high Court.
Your humble servant plans to be in that march in Jerusalem on July 28th (click here to find out more information).
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