From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
French PM: Keep troops at Jewish sites for as long as possible
(JTA) — Prime Minister Manuel Valls of France asked his country’s defense minister to keep soldiers deployed outside Jewish institutions for as long as possible.
Valls informed members of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish American Organizations, an umbrella group that represents 50 national Jewish organizations in the United States, of the request Thursday during a conference call.
“Today, I asked the minister of defense to prolong for as long as possible the deployment of armed forces around Jewish institutions,” Valls said in reference to the measure, which was taken last week following the slaying of four at a kosher shop near Paris — one in a series of terrorist attacks that left 17 dead.
Valls added that the protection by 10,000 troops “will remain necessary for many months, as long as there is a fear that not all of the accomplices of the assailants are in custody, and as long as the threat remains.”
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From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Give some Jews guns, Jewish group urges EU ministers
(JTA) — A Jewish lobby group asked European governments to facilitate the issuing of weapons permits for guards from within Jewish communities.
Rabbi Menachem Margolin, director of the Brussels-based European Jewish Association, or EJA, made the plea in a letter he sent Tuesday to the interior ministers of the European Union, he told JTA.
“We hereby ask that gun licensing laws are reviewed with immediate effect to allow designated people in the Jewish communities and institutions to own weapons for the essential protection of their communities,” he wrote.
The call was issued following the slaying of four last week in a terrorist attack by an Islamist on a Jewish kosher shop near Paris. Since 2012, a total of 12 people have been killed in similar attacks in France and Belgium.
From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Turkish prime minister compares Netanyahu to Paris terrorists
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Turkey’s prime minister compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the terrorists in the Paris attacks that left 17 people dead.
“Netanyahu has committed crimes against humanity the same like those terrorists who carried out the Paris massacre,” Ahmet Davutoglu said Thursday in televised responses to reporters’ questions. He noted the Israeli raid in May 2010 on a boat bound for Gaza in an attempt to break Israel’s blockade of the coastal strip that left nine Turkish citizens dead.
Davutoglu made the comments three days after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters that he did not understand how Netanyahu “dared” to march in the rally against terrorism last weekend in Paris. Davutoglu also attended the march.
Netanyahu responded to Erdogan on Wednesday, telling a group of visiting AIPAC leaders on Wednesday that “I believe his shameful remarks must be repudiated by the international community because the war against terror will only succeed if it’s guided by moral clarity.”
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From PressTV
Israeli soldiers shoot Palestinian youth in West Bank
Israeli soldiers have shot and injured a young Palestinian man during a raid on a number of houses at a refugee camp north of the occupied West Bank.
Palestinian security sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said scuffles broke out between dozens of Palestinian youths and Israeli troops after the latter stormed a refugee camp in Jenin, and arrested four young Palestinians.
The Palestinians hurled stones and empty bottles at Israeli forces, who in return, fired tear gas canisters, stun grenades and rubber-coated bullets as well as rounds of live ammunition to disperse the Palestinians. Ahmad Jarbou, 23, was injured by Israeli gunfire.
In recent months, Israeli forces have frequently raided Palestinians’ homes in the West Bank, arresting dozens of Palestinian people, who are then transferred to Israeli detention centers, where they are kept without any charges brought up against them.
There have been many reports about the deteriorating health of several Palestinian prisoners held inside Israeli jails.
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From PressTV
UN urges Israel to unlock tax revenues for Palestinians
The United Nations has called on the Israeli regime to release millions of dollars in tax collections owed to the Palestinian Authority (PA) that Tel Aviv withheld after the PA decided to join the International Criminal Court (ICC).
A senior UN official stated Thursday in the UN Security Council (UNSC) that the blocking of nearly $130 million in tax revenues since January 3 was in clear violation of the US-sponsored Oslo Agreement between the Israeli regime and the Palestinians.
“We call on Israel to immediately resume the transfer of tax revenues,” said United Nations Assistant Secretary-General Jens Anders Toyberg-Frandzen, addressing the council members.
Israel’s biggest backer, the United States, and the European Union have also censured Tel Aviv’s retaliatory measure in response to the Palestinian application to join the ICC, which would facilitate the investigation of Palestinian complaints of Israeli war crimes in the occupied territories.
Toyberg-Frandzen also told the UNSC that the recent developments had further undermined prospects for the revival of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
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From PressTV
Israeli forces kill two Palestinian in West Bank
Palestinian media say Israeli forces have shot and killed two Palestinians in two separate incidents in the occupied West Bank and Negev.
The first incident took place near a junction between the cities of Bethlehem and al-Khalil (Hebron) on Wednesday.
Israeli forces claim that the two Palestinians were involved in what they called a “criminal incident” and that soldiers opened fire after the 20-year-old victim, Sami al-Ja’aar, tried to flee the area.
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From Ynet News
Nasrallah confirms Israeli spy, threatens Israel over Syria strikes
Hezbollah says terror group has missiles that can reach deep into Israel, confirms Israeli spy infiltrated group. Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah threatened in an interview Thursday to retaliate against Israel for repeated strikes on Syria and said he has missiles that can hit the Jewish state.
He also confirmed that a senior operative in the organization has been apprehended for spying for Israel. “He was responsible for one department inside one of the security units of Hezbollah,” Nasrallah said, adding that the man in question held a senior position in a “sensitive” Hezbollah security unit and was detained five months ago.
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From the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
At least 2 dead in counterterrorism raid in Belgium
(JTA) — At least two people were killed in Belgium in a police raid on an apartment used by suspected Islamic radicals.
Belgian media said Thursday’s action in Verviers, a town in eastern Belgium, was part of a coordinated crackdown on terrorists prompted by last week’s deadly attacks in Paris, Reuters reported.
Eric Van der Sypt, spokesman for the office of the Belgian federal prosecutor, told The New York Timesthat Belgian police had “intervened on a terrorist cell planning attacks in Belgium.”
One person also was seriously injured in the counterterrorism raid and several arrests were made.
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From PressTV
Netanyahu symbol of terrorism in world: Hamas
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is the very epitome of terrorism in the world, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas says.
“Netanyahu will remain a symbol of terrorism in the world,” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said on Tuesday, lashing out at the Israeli premier for partaking in an anti-terrorism rally in, Paris.
On Sunday, thousands of anti-terrorism protesters gathered for a rally in Paris. The event came after days of deadly attacks, which claimed the lives of 17 people and three gunmen in France.
Netanyahu’s participation in the anti-terrorism rally in the French capital “will not exonerate him from his crimes in the Gaza Strip,” Abu Zuhri added.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan also hit out at Netanyahu for attending the anti-terrorism protest.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Presidents Conference Eases Membership Rules After J Street Flap
Umbrella Group Lowers Admission Requirements
The Jewish community’s umbrella organization is about to undergo structural changes following complaints by members that in its current makeup fails to fully represent the community.
Under the proposed changes, which will be brought to a vote next week, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations will lower the threshold for membership, provide more representation to Jewish federations, and will create an executive committee to guide the group’s policy making.
“This action sends a message to the broader Jewish community that what the Conference says comes out of a consultation process and does reflect the Jewish world,” said Alan Solow, a past president of the Conference of Presidents who co-chaired the committee debating these procedural changes.
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From the Jewish Daily Forward
Rand Paul Makes Headway in Longshot Bid To Win Jewish Support
Can GOP Presidential Wannabe Get Kosher Stamp of Approval?
Senator Rand Paul’s still unofficial presidential campaign reached a small but significant milestone in early January: The executive director of the Orthodox Union’s advocacy center, Nathan Diament, publicly praised him in an official press release.
For many candidates, that might not mean much. But for Paul, the O.U.’s January 6 statement, lauding his sponsorship of a bill to defund the Palestinian Authority, marked something new. Long shunned by the organized Jewish community as hostile to Israel, Paul is attaining a degree of acceptability, if not yet embrace, in at least some quarters of American Jewry.
It has been a steep learning curve for the up-and-coming libertarian. On top of his own longtime views against foreign aid to any country, the Kentucky Republican labors, justly or not, under an additional burden in the eyes of some Jews as the son of a former congressman who has been associated with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Yet within less than two years, the Kentucky senator has gone from pariah to pareve in the eyes of many Jewish GOP supporters. And the O.U.’s statement meant something more: a first-time nod from an avowedly nonpartisan national Jewish group. The group stressed, however, that its statement was limited only to Paul’s legislative initiative and should not be viewed as an endorsement.
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