Out of date on Brexit

Hitting the newsstands hours before the UK’s dramatic vote to leave the European Union had been confirmed, Friday’s Hebrew-language newspapers once again demonstrate the serious drawbacks of print media, as the country’s dailies fail miserably at predicting the final results in Britain.

“Sample results: An advantage for the supporters of Britain remaining in the EU,” Yedioth Ahronoth’s headline reads. Israel Hayom’s headlines are much more reserved, and the daily notably inserts caveats whenever discussing the UK referendum. Nevertheless, the paper errs by projecting a victory for the UK’s ‘Remain’ camp.

Haaretz takes the easy route in terms of forecasting, and opts not to do any. “Regardless of the results of the referendum in Britain, the divide in Europe will be difficult to mend,” Haaretz correspondent Anshel Pfeffer, currently in London, writes. “After 60 years in which it grew larger and attracted more and more states, the European Union stands now in the face of a growing existential threat.”

Britain, at the end of the day, voted to leave the European Union by 51.9 percent to 48.1%, final results from all 382 of Britain’s local counting centers showed on Friday. Later in the day, Prime Minister David Cameron announced he would resign in the coming months, and said he would leave it to his successor to trigger the formal process for the UK to separate from the European Union.

Apart from Britain’s European Union vote, Yedioth also chooses to focus on Maj. Tom Na’aman, the commander of Sgt. Elor Azaria, the soldier on trial for killing a disarmed Palestinian assailant in Hebron. Na’aman testified in the Jaffa Military Court about the March 24 incident, during which Azaria was filmed shooting Abed al-Fattah Yusri al-Sharif in the head nearly 15 minutes after al-Sharif and another Palestinian man, Ramzi Aziz al-Qasrawi, stabbed an Israel Defense Forces soldier.

The commander provided damning testimony against Azaria, saying al-Sharif posed no threat and that after the shooting Azaria told him: “This terrorist was alive and he had to die.”

According to Yedioth, however, a second soldier who claimed to have been at the scene accused Na’aman of fabricating his testimony. The soldier, who is identified by the paper as D., criticized his commander in a lengthy Facebook post, suggesting that Na’aman lied about the shooting in order to secure his future promotion in the army ranks. In response, the Military Prosecution said that D. was not at the scene of the incident when it took place, and that he was engaged in a different mission far away. D. has since removed his Facebook post.

Meanwhile, Israel Hayom plays up Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s condemnation of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The prime minister accused Abbas of peddling lies and promoting blood libels after the Palestinian leader told European lawmakers in Brussels that terrorism worldwide would be eradicated if only Israel withdrew from the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

“Abbas showed his true colors,” reads Israel Hayom’s headline alongside an unflattering photo of the Palestinian Authority president. Invoking a debunked hoax report, Abbas claimed in his address that rabbis in Israel recently called for the poisoning of Palestinian water supplies in order to murder Palestinians. “The Israelis are doing this as well… Certain rabbis in Israel have said very clearly to their government that our water should be poisoned in order to have Palestinians killed,” Abbas said.

In response to these comments, Israel Hayom contributor Chaim Shine calls Abbas an “old fashioned anti-Semite.”

Haaretz dedicates numerous pages to a bombshell investigation into allegedly illegal overseas funding of Jewish settlements in the West Bank. According to the paper, tens of millions of dollars were funneled to bodies associated with Jewish settlements across the Green Line from an undisclosed tax haven by a 41-year-old Argentinian philanthropist named Diego Adolfo Mirenberg. The funds, according to the paper, were transferred to Amana, one of the major entities that oversees construction in the West Bank. Amana, on its part, insists that the funds were received in accordance with state laws.

Finally, back in Yedioth, reporter Tzipi Shmulovich writes about speculation surrounding US President Barack Obama’s plans after leaving office. White House spokesman Josh Earnest stated in a recent interview to ESPN that the president had discussed the option of taking control of a basketball team. Shmulovich says that if the rumors are true, Obama may purchase the Chicago Bulls NBA team, as he is known to be a fan. In order to do so, Shmulovich writes, Obama will need to raise upwards of $1.25 billion.