From The Independent
From PressTV
Israeli forces fatally shoot Palestinian youth in West Bank
Israeli military forces have opened fire and killed a young Palestinian man who they say stabbed two Israeli soldiers close to an illegal settlement in the northern occupied West Bank.
The incident took place near the entrance to the Ma’ale Levona settlement and the Palestinian town of Sinjil, located 21 kilometers (13 miles) northeast of Ramallah, on Wednesday morning, English-language Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.
According to the report, one of the Israeli soldiers was seriously wounded in his upper body, while the other was said to have sustained light injuries to his back. The Palestinian youth was shot and killed on the spot.
Both Israeli troopers were initially treated by medics on site, and then transferred to Shaare Zedek Medical Center in al-Quds (Jerusalem).
More than half a million Israelis live in more than 120 settlements built since Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem al-Quds in 1967.
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From PressTV
Israeli forces shoot, wound Palestinian fisherman off Gaza coast
Israeli forces have shot and injured a Palestinian man with a rubber-coated steel bullet off the coast of the northern Gaza Strip.
Fisherman Khalid Zayid was shot on Wednesday evening while he was fishing off the coast of the town of Beit Lahiya, Ma’an News Agency quoted local sources as saying.
The Israeli military has declined to comment on the incident.
Under a ceasefire deal reached in 2014, Israel agreed to immediately expand the fishing zone off Gaza’s coast, allowing fishermen to sail as far as six nautical miles off the shore. The agreement also stipulated that Israel would expand the area gradually up to 12 miles.
Palestinian fishermen, however, say that the Israeli navy opens fire before they reach the agreed limit.
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From PressTV
Israelis destroy 150 olive trees in West Bank
Israeli settlers have attacked Palestinian olive farms in a village near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, cutting down more than 150 trees.
The Israeli settlers attacked the olive orchards in the al-Jab’a village outside of Bethlehem, the International Middle East Media Center reported on Wednesday.
Resident Mahmoud Masha’la said “this is the fifth attack in a row, they are waging a war not only on us, but on our daily bread, our livelihood,” adding, “They repeatedly attack our lands and orchards, my orchards, my cousins, and many other villagers; this is a systematic policy.”
Masha’la continued by saying “We really do not know what to do; this is an ongoing war, ongoing aggression.”
The olive industry provides a livelihood for about 80,000 Palestinian families in the West Bank. Israel has uprooted over 800,000 olive trees in the occupied territories since 1967.
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From PressTV
Gazans’ lives at risk if Israel siege continues: Ministry
The Palestinian health ministry has warned of a humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip if Israel does not lift its crippling siege on the region.
The ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qidra said in an interview on Tuesday that the health situation was worsening in the impoverished coastal enclave due to Israel’s siege.
The official said that hundreds of patients in the coastal sliver were in life-threatening condition as they were in urgent need of medical treatment, warning that their lives will be at risk if Israel continues its siege on the region.
The Gaza Strip has been under a crippling Israeli siege since 2007. The blockade, which has cut off the territory from the outside world, has led to an economic and humanitarian crisis in the densely-populated enclave.
In March, the UN expressed concerns about the economic situation in the Gaza Strip, saying the lifting of the Israeli siege on the coastal enclave is the “prerequisite” for reviving its economy.
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From The Times of Israel
One-third of US Republicans back nuclear deal, poll finds
Results indicate partisan rift on Iran talks as party leaders intensify opposition to framework agreement
Roughly one-third of Republican voters favor the framework nuclear deal reached between Iran and the six world powers, a Reuters poll published Wednesday found. This figure contrasts with GOP lawmakers’ staunch opposition to the agreement.
Thirty-one percent of Republican respondents approved of the agreement, while 30% said they opposed it, the Reuters/Ipsos poll showed. The remaining 39% said they weren’t certain.
Republican lawmakers in recent weeks have intensified their vocal opposition to the deal, which is being pushed by President Barack Obama, a Democrat.
While the Obama administration has invested considerable efforts in trying to convince those Republican lawmakers who are skeptical of a framework agreement with Iran — stating that a detente between the two countries is essential — many within the party’s leadership see the deal as a capitulation to an enemy state, and have threatened to unilaterally change the terms of the agreement after Obama leaves office in 2017.
So far, Obama has resisted calls from Republican lawmakers, as well as some Democratic legislators, who are demanding congressional oversight over the terms of a final deal with Tehran.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Jockeying Starts in Congress on Iran Deal Consent Bill
Senators Seek To Tweak — or Kill — Measure
By Reuters
A Democratic U.S. senator on Wednesday offered an amendment to a an Iran nuclear bill that would remove the measure’s tie to Iranian-sponsored terrorism, a change that could attract more support for the legislation from his party.
Despite President Barack Obama’s threat to veto the bill due to concerns it would undermine final talks with Iran, many Democrats are lining up with Republicans to pass the legislation giving Congress a say in any final pact.
Senator Chris Coons plans to have his amendment called up for debate on Tuesday, when the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is set to work on the bipartisan legislation.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Will Chuck Schumer Side With Republicans Over President Obama on Iran Nuclear Deal?
Future Senate Leader and Ben Cardin Hold Key for White House
The path to a bill that would effectively scuttle President Obama’s deal with Iran on its nuclear development program runs through two Jewish senators: Ben Cardin of Maryland and Chuck Schumer of New York.
A month ago, neither Cardin nor Schumer would have been the first name on the list of Democrats on whose support the fate of Tennessee Republican Bob Corker’s Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act turns. Yet recent developments have thrust both these lawmakers into the hot seat on the Corker bill, which would set up a vote on ending sanctions against Iran after a was signed with its government.
On April 2, Cardin was suddenly anointed ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee after a federal bribery indictment caused Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey to step down from the post. And Schumer was all but formally named to succeed Senate minority leader Harry Reid when Reid announced on March 27 that he will not run for re-election when his term ends in 2016.
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From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Marine Le Pen seeks to prevent father’s run for office
(JTA) — French politician Marine Le Pen said she would oppose allowing her father to run for office as a member of the far-right party he founded and she now leads.
Marine Le Pen, who heads the National Front party, announced on Wednesday that she would oppose the candidacy of her father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, in regional elections in December, The Wall Street Journal reported. Her move came after the elder Le Pen slammed his daughter in an interview for criticizing his remarks diminishing the Holocaust.
Last week, Jean-Marie Le Pen told the far-right weekly Rivarol that he stood by his remark that the Nazi gas chambers were a “detail” of World War II, and accused his daughter of betrayal for criticizing him, according to The Guardian. He also defended the French Nazi collaborator Phillipe Petain and called on France to join Russia to defend the “white world.”
Marine Le Pen, who has sought to gain mainstream acceptance for the anti-immigrant National Front by eliminating her father’s anti-Semitic rhetoric, responded by saying of her father, according to The Wall Street Journal, “His role as honorary president (of the party) doesn’t authorize him to take the National Front hostage, with crude provocation that seemingly aims to harm me but unfortunately deals a heavy blow to the whole movement.”
From Russia Today
Saudi bombing campaign in Yemen led by financier prince with an eye on the throne
The two-week bombing campaign in Yemen led by Saudi Arabia has already claimed hundreds of lives with no end in sight. Spearheading it is Mohammed bin Salman, the son of King Salman, a 34-year-old defense minister with no previous military experience.
Saudi Arabia launched its military campaign in bordering Yemen after the country’s president was ousted from power by Shia Houthi rebels and fled to Riyadh.
Mohammed bin Salman was appointed defense minister by his father just after he became Saudi Arabia’s new monarch in January. He now also acts as chief of royal protocol and chair of the country’s economic development council, having a say on the national budget.
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From Russia Today
‘Accusing Russia is now a sport’: Putin aide debunks CNN report on Russians hacking White House
“In regard to CNN’s sources, I don’t know who their sources are,” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.“We know that blaming everything on Russia has already turned into some sort of sport.”
“But what’s most important is that they aren’t looking for any submarines in the Potomac River like has been seen in other countries,” he added ironically, apparently referring to the Swedish hunt for an alleged Russian submarine in October 2014.
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From Ynet News
IDF officers get special visit to US aircraft carrier
Seven IDF officers, led by Chief of Operations Major General Yoav Har-Even, visited USS Theodor Roosevelt off coast of Sicily in order to learn and deepen cooperation with US Navy. Seven Israeli IDF officers were given a special tour of the USS Theodor Roosevelt (CVN-71), a four-acre long aircraft carrier, while it was stationed of the coast of Sicily.
The group of officers, led by Chief of Operations Major General Yoav Har-Even, visited the US aircraft carrier last week in order to observe and hold discussions with the US Navy.
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From The Times of Israel
New York Times calls Israel ‘unrealistic’ on Iran
Editorial says framework agreement reached on Tehran’s nuclear program better than no deal at all
The New York Times on Wednesday said Israel was “unrealistic” in its demands for the terms of a nuclear deal between world powers and Iran, saying Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s protestations offered no reasonable alternatives.
In an editorial titled “Israel’s Unworkable Demands on Iran” the paper asserted that Netanyahu, who has insisted on the dismantling of key aspects of Iran’s nuclear program as well as Tehran ending hostilities toward Israel, is chasing a deal to which the the Iranians would never agree.
“The new demands are unrealistic and, if pursued, would not mean a better deal but no deal at all,” the newspaper said, criticizing Netanyahu’s insistence that world powers could achieve a better result than the one announced after a year and a half of negotiations.
“Mr. Netanyahu is acting as if he alone can dictate the terms of an agreement that took 18 months and involved not just Iran and the United States but Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China.”
Furthermore, despite the Israeli leader’s rejection of the framework deal — announced after a week of marathon talks last week — “he offers no workable options.”
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Rand Paul Faces GOP Criticism for Nuance Stand on Iran
Iconoclast Blasted for ‘Dangerous’ Approach to Nuclear DealBy Andy Sullivan
Milford, New Hampshire — (Reuters) — When Kentucky Senator Rand Paul travels across the country this week as a newly minted presidential candidate, he will be greeted by $1 million worth of attack ads accusing him of being “wrong and dangerous” on Iran.
It is an early sign that the unorthodox Republican is likely to encounter fierce resistance within his party when he argues that its limited-government ideals should apply to foreign policy as well as within the United States.
In contrast to many other likely Republican candidates for the 2016 race, Paul has taken a skeptical approach to foreign wars. He argues that actions like the U.S. participation in NATO air strikes on Libya that helped rebels overthrow former leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 can lead to unintended consequences and tie the country down to years of expensive and fruitless nation-building.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
How Ed Miliband Lost Britain’s Jewish Voters
By Liam Hoare
With Britain’s general election just one month away, a new poll of Jewish voters makes brutal reading for the Labour Party and their leader, Ed Miliband.
The poll, published by the Jewish Chronicle, shows that if British Jews were to vote tomorrow (and if we remove undecided voters from the equation), 69% would vote for the Conservative Party, while only 22% would go with Labour. The support in the community for both UKIP and the Liberal Democrats is negligible, each polling around 2%.
