From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
Palestinian home attacked with firebomb
JERUSALEM (JTA) — A Palestinian home near Hebron was set alight by a firebomb in what is believed to be a price tag attack.
The Molotov cocktail was thrown through the living room window of the house at about 4 a.m. on Wednesday, while the home’s 10 residents were sleeping. Most of the living room was destroyed by the fire.
The father of the family told Ynet that two masked men threw the firebomb. The Hebrew word for revenge was spray painted on the outside of the house.
“Price tag” refers to the strategy adopted by extremist settlers and their supporters to exact retribution for settlement freezes and demolitions or for Palestinian attacks on Jews.
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From PressTV
Israeli settler runs over Palestinian child in Tuqu’
A ten-year-old Palestinian boy has sustained moderate injuries when a car driven by an Israeli settler ran him over as he was walking to school in the southern occupied West Bank.
Bethlehem emergency services official, Muhammad Awad, said the victim, identified as Amir Majed Ahmad Suleiman, was struck by the car while trying to cross a main road in the town of Tuqu’, located about 12 kilometers (7 miles) southeast of Bethlehem, on Wednesday morning local time.
Separately, a young Palestinian man was injured after a female settler ran him over with her vehicle in Bethlehem.
On December 28, an Israeli settler ran over a seven-year-old Palestinian boy in the village of Zif, located about seven kilometers (4.3 miles) south of al-Khalil (Hebron).
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Ex-Revlon Science Chief Sues Over ‘Jews Stick Together’ Slur
Alan Meyers Claims He Was Ousted for Whistleblowing
In a lawsuit filed on Tuesday in Manhattan federal court, Alan Meyers claimed that CEO Lorenzo Delpani accused him of raising “ghost” safety problems at recently acquired laboratories, resulting in slower production.
Meyers, who said he joined Revlon in 2010 and was fired this month, also claimed the Italian-born Delpani was hostile to him, frequently yelling at him in front of other executives and making anti-Semitic and anti-American comments.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
Netanyahu wins Likud party primary
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won the Likud party primary.
Some 55 percent of the Likud Party’s more than 96,000 members went to the polls on Wednesday, a record-low turnout.
Former Deputy Minister of Defense Danny Danon conceded the race for party head shortly after the close of polls on Wednesday evening.
In addition to deciding on the party leader, the party primaries determine its candidates’ list for the upcoming national elections. The March 17 election will determine the number of seats the party will receive.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
U.N. Security Council fails to pass Palestinian statehood resolution
NEW YORK (JTA) — A Palestinian-backed U.N. Security Council resolution setting a deadline for a peace deal with Israel failed to garner sufficient votes for passage.
The resolution, which was voted on Tuesday, was aimed at achieving a full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank by late 2017.
Eight nations on the 15-member council votes yes, two voted no and five abstained. Nine votes were required for passage. The no votes came from the United States and Australia.
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From PressTV
Hamas leader slams Palestinian government over Gaza reconstruction
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh says the Palestinian unity government has failed to meet its commitment to rebuild the blockaded and war-ravaged Gaza Strip.
Speaking late on Monday, Haniyeh accused the government of failing “to keep its commitments by not carrying out reconstruction.”
Haniyeh also strongly criticized the government for acting selectively in a manner that is “harmful” to Gaza.
“Unfortunately, the government has not managed to prove it is the government of the entire Palestinian people,” the senior Hamas official added.
The rival groups Hamas and Fatah took a major step to form a national unity government by hammering out a deal on new cabinet ministers in June. The Palestinian unity government operates from the the Israeli-occupied West Bank under President Mahmoud Abbas.
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From PressTV
Israel used Gaza as testing ground for new weapons: Palestine official
A senior Palestinian official says the Gaza Strip was used by the Israeli regime as a testing ground for its new weapons during the recent war on the besieged territory.
“There is conclusive evidence that it (Israel) used the Gaza Strip as a test bed for its deadly weaponry,” said Mustafa Barghouti, the secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative Party.
He added that the regime fired around 21,000 tons of weapons, which is equivalent to two nuclear bombs, on Gaza during the 50-day war in July-August.
Over 2,140 Palestinians, mostly civilians, were killed in the Israeli war, while some 11,000 were injured.
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From PressTV
Israeli forces kill another Palestinian in West Bank
The teenager was killed in the town of Beit Ummar, located near the city of al-Khalil (Hebron), while two others were injured there by Israeli forces on Monday.
One of the wounded was shot in the head and is said to be in critical condition.
The violence came shortly after a young Palestinian was shot to death and another suffered gunshot wounds when Israeli soldiers opened fire on them southeast of the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, on Monday.
From the Jewish Daily Forward
Palestinians Join International Criminal Court After U.N. Setback
Benjamin Netanyahu Threatens Pushback After Announcement
By Noah Browning
Ramallah — (Reuters) — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signed on to 20 international agreements on Wednesday, including the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), a day after a bid for independence by 2017 failed at the United Nations Security Council.
The move, which angered Israel and the United States, paves the way for the court to take jurisdiction over crimes committed in Palestinian lands and investigate the conduct of Israeli and Palestinian leaders over more than a decade of bloody conflict.
“They attack us and our land every day, to whom are we to complain? The Security Council let us down – where are we to go?” Abbas told a gathering of Palestinian leaders in remarks broadcast on official television.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Palestinian U.N. Bid Fails by 1 Vote. Was That the Plan?
By J.J. Goldberg
The Palestinian effort to have the U.N. Security Council set a deadline for Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank failed to win the necessary nine votes for approval this afternoon. Palestinian spokesmen had spoken confidently before the vote of winning nine or even 10 votes. But two nations whose support they said they expected, Nigeria and South Korea, ended up abstaining. In the end eight nations voted for the resolution, two voted no and five abstained.
The outcome ended up confirming what some Palestinian and Israeli spokesmen had said weeks ago: that the resolution would fall short if it came up for a vote in 2014. Palestinian chief peace negotiator Saeb Erekat had warned in a December 15 interview with an Arabic-language Israeli radio station that the resolution didn’t have nine votes.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
N.Y. lawmakers call on Jewish community to attend police officer’s funeral
(JTA) — New York State Assemblyman Dov Hikind called on the Jewish community to attend the funeral of a murdered New York police officer.
“The brave men and women of the NYPD risk their lives every day to protect us. We value them and stand with them,” Hikind, a Democrat who represents Brooklyn, said in a statement issued Monday. “We are more than appreciative of what New York’s Finest do and we should convey that. Their loss is our loss.”
The funeral for NYPD officer Wenjian Liu is scheduled for Jan.3 in Brooklyn.
Liu and his partner, Rafael Ramos, were shot to death inside their patrol car on Dec. 20 by a gunman who had posted online about plans to attack police.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
Israel’s population at 8.3 million at close of 2014
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Israel’s population on the eve of 2015 stands at 8.3 million.
Some 6.2 million of that population are Jewish and 1.7 million are Arabs as 2014 comes to a close, Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics reported Monday.
The population’s percentage breakdown is 74.9 percent Jewish, 20.7 percent Arab and 4.3 percent others, including Christians and people who do not identify with any religion or nationality.
Israel’s population grew by 2 percent in 2014, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics. Some 176,600 babies were born during the year and some 23,000 new immigrants arrived.
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From the Jewish Telegrapic Agency
USY and the interdating ban reexamined
Rabbi Michael Knopf of Temple Beth-El in Richmond, Va., writing in Haaretz: “What makes for good click-bait does not necessarily convey truth.”
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From PressTV
Hamas maintains strong relations with Iran: Haniyeh
Senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh says the Palestinian resistance movement maintains the strongest relations with Iran, underlining that the ties between the two sides are rooted in history.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with Arabic-language al-Aqsa TV in Gaza City on Monday, Haniyeh lauded Iran’s long and unswerving support for the resistance movement, saying Hamas seeks to further improve its ties with the Islamic Republic.
He added that the issues at the center of Hamas-Iran relations are the Palestinian cause, the Palestinian anti-Israel front and the liberation of the al-Quds (Jerusalem).
“We need strategic deepening (of relations). Hamas is pursuing close ties with all Arab and Muslim countries that support the rights of the Palestinian nation,” Haniyeh stated.
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Amir Abdollahian confirmed on December 27 that Hamas Political Bureau chief Khaled Meshaal is expected to visit Iran in the near future, without specifying an exact date.
Iran and Hamas have strengthened ties, especially after a recent visit of a Hamas delegation to the Iranian capital.
On December 17, a senior Hamas member said the Palestinian resistance movement seeks stronger ties with the Islamic Republic.
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From PressTV
Palestinian mourners blast Israel for killing youth
Palestinians have held a funeral procession for a teenager south of the West Bank city of Nablus, lashing out at Israel for the arbitrary killing of children and youth , Press TV reports.
The 17-year-old Palestinian teenager Imam Dweikat was laid to rest on Tuesday a day after Israeli forces killed him on his way home in the town of Beita, located about 13 kilometers (8.1 miles) southeast of Nablus.
“He had an exam at school and as usual left the school with his friends, but he didn’t return home,” one of the relatives of the teenager said.
“His friends said he went to a nearby park on his way. Then, we were informed that he’s dead in the afternoon. Actually, he was murdered,” she added.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
George Mosse Finds Himself in Comics
By Paul Buhle and Nick Thorkelson
George Mosse was a German-born, Jewish cultural historian best known for his studies on Nazism. This comic, devised by Nick Thorkelson for the occasion of a “Mosse Fest” in Madison, Wisconsin, is based upon Mosse’s many important books on European cultural and political history, but also his life as lecturer and public personality from Wisconsin to Tel Aviv. The artist, a sometime cartoon contributor to the Boston Globe and frequent comic art collaborator with Paul Buhle, was one of the thousands of students whose understanding of history and culture was shaped by Mosse’s lectures.
From the Jewish Daily Forward
Did Barack Obama Snatch Victory From Jaws of Victory in U.N. ‘Palestine’ Vote?
Israel and Jewish Leaders May Be Missing the Big Picture
By Chemi Shalev
(Haaretz) — American Jewish organizations utilized a rare opportunity to lavish praise on Tuesday night on the Obama administration, in general, and on John Kerry and Samantha Power, in particular, for their “leadership” in thwarting the Palestinian proposal to the United Nations Security Council. Malcolm Hoenlein of the Conference of Presidents extolled Kerry’s “tireless diplomacy” while the Anti-Defamation League’s Abe Foxman praised Power for pointing out “the serious defects in the one-sided substance of the resolution.” The Israeli government, of course, will soon follow suit.
Which only goes to show that everything is relative, times change and yesterday’s outrageous position can turn into today’s negligible banality. Because Power, in her powerful statement, also made a point of reiterating Barack Obama’s statement of May 19, 2011 that the two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians will be based on “the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps.” It was this formula that led Benjamin Netanyahu to publicly scold Obama at their meeting at the White House the next day, an unprecedented incident that has cast a long shadow over relations between the two leaders to this day.
Power included Obama’s formulation in order to make clear to the Palestinians that an understanding with Washington over a Security Council resolution was within their reach. But the harshness of her attack on their proposal, which she described as “unconstructive, irresponsible and risked a downward spiral” wasn’t meant exclusively or even mainly for Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah, but for Francois Holland in Paris: it’s not clear which of the two leaders angered the Americans more.
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