ISRAEL AT WAR - DAY 374
The Times of Israel liveblogged Tuesday’s events as they unfolded.
The Foreign Ministry is protesting rising antisemitism on Twitter and accuses owner Elon Musk of causing a flood of antisemitic conspiracy theories on the site
In a post, David Saranga, the head of the ministry’s digital diplomacy section, notes that “The Jews” is trending on the social media site.
“The Jews” is trending right now on #Twitter and it’s filled with AntiSemitic conspiracies and hate speech targeting Jews around the world,” he writes. “Unfortunately Twitter does nothing to address this problem.”
The post comes the same day Twitter owner Musk is himself accused of peddling antisemitic conspiracy theories on the site.
“The Jews” is trending right now on #Twitter and it’s filled with AntiSemitic conspiracies and hate speech targeting Jews around the world.
Unfortunately Twitter does nothing to address this problem.
It reminds me of Niemöller's words which are prominently featured on a wall of… pic.twitter.com/igT3RsrViq
— David Saranga (@DavidSaranga) May 16, 2023
In a separate post in Hebrew, the ministry specifically calls out Musk’s tweets about George Soros, who he said “hates humanity.”
Soros, 92, has long been a target of conservatives for backing progressive causes and politicians in the United States and worldwide. In the last decade or so, some of the attacks have echoed antisemitic conspiracy theories, depicting Soros as satanic, accusing him of seeking world control and falsely accusing him of helping perpetrate the Holocaust rather than surviving it as a child.
“Musk’s tweet instantly led to a flood of antisemitic conspiracy theories on Twitter,” the Foreign Ministry says.
The head of the IDF Central Command signs an order authorizing the demolition of the family home of a Palestinian gunman accused of killing a soldier in the West Bank last year, the army says.
The family of Abdel Kamel Jouri can still appeal the order to the High Court.
On October 11, 2022, Jouri and Osama Taweel, members of the Nablus-based Lion’s Den terror group, opened fire at Staff Sgt. Ido Baruch of the Givati infantry brigade’s reconnaissance unit, killing him. Baruch was shot by the gunmen while securing a march held by settlers near the Palestinian town of Sebastia. He was stationed by an interchange close to the nearby settlement of Shavei Shomron.
The pair were arrested on February 13, and a third member of the cell who allegedly helped plan the attack was killed in a raid on Nablus a week later.
Doug Emhoff, the husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris, meets with White House Jewish staffers as part of events to mark Jewish American Heritage Month.
Emhoff poses for a picture with the dozens of Jewish staffers and thanks them for their efforts to “carry our nation forward each day and are helping create a more inclusive tomorrow.”
Emhoff is the first Jewish spouse of either a US president or vice president and has worked to combat antisemitism around the world.
.@SecondGentleman met with Jewish White House staff in celebration of Jewish American Heritage Month.
Our Administration is proud to recognize the Jewish staffers who help carry our nation forward each day and are helping create a more inclusive tomorrow. pic.twitter.com/QxH0rIDC3e
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) May 16, 2023
MK Ayman Odeh, the head of the Hadash party, announces he is set to quit politics and will not run in the party’s next primary, preceding the next Knesset election.
Hadash, a left-wing party with a communist agenda, was part of the Joint List of Arab-majority parties, and Odeh has led the shifting alliance since 2015.
He currently heads the Hadash-Ta’al alliance.
Channel 12 reports that Odeh has become disillusioned with Israeli politics and also felt that the Arab leadership in Israel needed a change.
However, analysts tell the Times of Israel that he was losing influence.
“It’s not surprising because he doesn’t have a real chance,” says Arab political analyst Ehab Jabareen.
“He lost a lot of his power within Hadash. He was never very stable, he always moved between camps in the party,” Jabareen tells The Times of Israel.
Looking forward to the next primary, Jabareen predicts that Odeh’s stepping aside “strengthens the position of Yousef Jabarin for the party leadership.”
The Agudat Yisrael faction of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party is demanding an additional NIS 627 million ($171 million) in addition to money already allocated in the budget, Channel 12 reports.
Faction leaders, including Housing and Construction Minister Yitzhak Goldknopf, were meeting tonight with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, asking for the money to cover retroactive cuts to ultra-Orthodox schools and subsidies to Yeshiva students.
The demand comes despite the fact that the state budget for the next two years passed today in the Knesset Finance Committee ahead of a Knesset vote next week.
The budget already includes NIS 13.7 billion ($3.7 billion) in discretionary funds promised to parties in coalition-forming negotiations. The spending package will see significant chunks go to ultra-Orthodox institutions and programs.
The US Justice Department announced a series of criminal cases tracing the illegal flow of sensitive technology, including Apple’s software code for self-driving cars and materials used for missiles, to foreign adversaries like Russia, China and Iran.
Some of the alleged theft highlighted by the department dates back several years, but US officials are drawing attention to the collection of cases now to highlight the work of a task force created this year to disrupt the transfer of goods to foreign countries.
“We are committed to doing all we can to prevent these advanced tools from falling into the hands of adversaries who wield them in a way that threatens not only our national security but democratic values everywhere,” says Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen, who heads the Justice Department’s national security division.
In one case, a Chinese national is accused of conspiring to transmit isostatic graphite, a material that can be used in the nose of intercontinental ballistics, to Iran in violation of US sanctions.
The American Jewish Committee lashes Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for comparing Israel to Nazi Germany in a speech yesterday to the United Nations, calling the comments “disgusting remarks.”
Abbas said at the UN General Assembly’s first official “Nakba Day” event that Israel lies like Joseph Goebbels, the infamous Nazi propagandist.
“These baseless claims are a distortion of history and an affront to the memory of Holocaust victims,” the AJC says in a statement.
“President Abbas has a long history of distorting the Holocaust for his own political gain. His own Ph.D. dissertation denied the Holocaust and claimed Zionist collaboration with Nazis. It is not surprising that he would spout the same drivel at the UN.”
The malicious rhetoric of Abbas underscores the urgency of combating Holocaust denial and distortion.
The UNGA's resolution of January 2022 stands as a clear testament to the international community's commitment to combat Holocaust denial and distortion. https://t.co/aCyWCt7QPO
— American Jewish Committee (@AJCGlobal) May 16, 2023
“The comparison made by President Abbas to Joseph Goebbels, a key figure in Nazi propaganda, is abhorrent. It is crucial to reject such false analogies that trivialize the suffering of Holocaust victims,” the statement says.
“The malicious rhetoric of Abbas underscores the urgency of combating Holocaust denial and distortion.”
Two major international oil and gas companies have so far expressed interest in Israeli-Cypriot plans to build a pipeline that would convey offshore natural gas from both countries to Cyprus where it would be liquefied for export by ship, a Cypriot official says.
Cypriot Energy Minister Giorgos Papanastasiou tells The Associated Press in an interview that the plan will be pitched on May 29 to energy companies involved in hydrocarbon exploration off Cyprus’ southern coast and other firms involved in pipeline and gas processing plant manufacture.
Getting energy companies on board is essential to get the project off the ground, and Papanastasiou will also present it individually to each firm in order to secure their backing.
Papanastasiou says the project’s key drawing card for energy companies is its low cost relative to other exporting methods, such as an idea for a 6-billion-euro ($6.5 billion), 1,900-kilometer (1,180-mile) pipeline connecting east Mediterranean gas deposits directly to Europe.
The IDF says it will hold a rocket warning drill tomorrow in the northern town of Kfar Vradim.
Sirens will sound at 10:05 a.m., the army says, noting that the drill was planned in advance, as part of the home front readiness plan for 2023.
The military says that in the event of a real rocket attack, a second rising and falling siren will sound.
Prosecutors ask the court to have Arnon Milchan, an Israeli Hollywood film producer who is a key witness in former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ongoing corruption trial, begin his testimony next month.
Milchan will testify via video from London after the court rejected a demand from the defense to force him to testify in person.
The prosecution says Milchan’s testimony will take at least a week, excluding an expected cross-examination by the defense.
The judges will rule tomorrow on how to proceed with Milchan’s testimony.
Case 1000 — one of the three cases Netanyahu faces charges in — involves suspicions that he illicitly accepted gifts including cigars and champagne from two billionaires, Milchan and Australian magnate James Packer.
Milchan was not charged in the case, while Netanyahu was indicted for fraud and breach of trust. The ex-premier is also charged with fraud in the other two cases, and bribery in one of them. He denies all wrongdoing.
A French investigating magistrate today issues an international arrest warrant for Lebanon’s central bank chief Riad Salameh, a source close to the case says.
Salameh earlier failed to appear for questioning by French investigators who want to know how he amassed sizable assets across Europe, his lawyer says.
The investigators suspect Salameh of building his network of real estate and banking assets with the help of a complex fraudulent financial system and extensive misuse of Lebanese public funds during his three decades as central bank boss.
Today’s hearing would have been an opportunity to press charges against him.
His lawyer, Pierre-Olivier Sur, tells AFP that the summons had been sent too close to the day and was therefore “invalid.”
Two Palestinians are convicted of carrying out a deadly terror attack in the city of Elad last year and sentenced to life in prison.
On May 5, As’ad Yousef As’ad al-Rifa’i, 19, and Subhi Emad Sbeihat, 20, hacked and stabbed three people to death and severely wounded several others.
They were each handed four life sentences for murder and attempted murder and an additional 20 years for related terror offenses by the Lod court.
Al-Rifa’i confessed to security forces that he committed the axe attack with Sbeihat, killing Oren Ben Yiftah, a 35-year-old driver from Lod, and Elad residents Yonatan Havakuk and Boaz Gol, both in their 40s. The pair attacked civilians on city streets and in a park as Israelis celebrated Independence Day with outdoor festivities.
Elon Musk tweets that George Soros “hates humanity,” and writes that the billionaire and progressive megadonor “reminds me of Magneto,” a comic book villain who features in Marvel’s X-Men series.
The attacks on Soros come as Twitter has faced criticism over its lax hate speech policies in the months since Musk, one of the world’s richest people, bought the platform last year. Soros, the billionaire and progressive megadonor, is at the center of multiple antisemitic conspiracy theories.
Like Soros, the character of Magneto is a Holocaust survivor. Brian Krassenstein, a liberal Jewish journalist, noted that parallel in a reply to Musk’s tweet, writing, “Magneto’s experiences during the Holocaust as a survivor shaped his perspective as well as his depth and empathy,” and that Soros “gets attacked nonstop for his good intentions which some Americans think are bad merely because they disagree with [his] political affiliations.”
Musk responded, “You assume they are good intentions. They are not. He wants to erode the very fabric of civilization. Soros hates humanity.”
Since buying Twitter, Musk has reinstated neo-Nazis, antisemites like David Icke, & countless white nationalists. All while suspending journalists & anti-fascists.
Now he goes after George Soros (again). This time with the trope of a rich Jew trying to destroy civilization. pic.twitter.com/aJtDKzz7xb
— Elad Nehorai (@EladNehorai) May 16, 2023
While Musk has railed against progressive policies, what prompted his attack on Soros isn’t clear. On the same day as the tweets, however, Soros’s family investment office cashed out its investment in Tesla, Musk’s electric car company.
Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who became an aide to former US president Donald Trump, mocked Jews for observing Passover, according to a lawsuit filed yesterday by a former assistant who is accusing him of sexual assault and harassment.
“Jews want to go through their freaking Passover all the time, man oh man,” Guiliani once said, according to the complaint, which was filed in the New York Supreme Court and indicates that the comments were recorded. “Get over the Passover. It was like 3,000 years ago. The Red Sea parted, big deal. It’s not the first time that happened.”
The vast majority of the $10 million suit focuses on allegations by Nicole Dunphy, a former Giuliani associate, that he pressed her into sexual activity without her consent and harassed her continually almost as soon as she began working for him in January 2019.
The Jewish elements of the lawsuit were first reported by the Forward. In addition to mocking Jewish observance of Passover, Giuliani is also accused in the complaint of disparaging Jewish men’s penis sizes and commenting about the “‘freaking Arabs’ and Jews.” He also made racist comments about other groups, according to the suit.
The Jerusalem Police are in the throes of intensive preparations for securing the Jerusalem Day Flag March this Thursday, including exercises in case of rocket fire from Gaza, although such an attack is not thought to be likely.
More than 2,000 police officers will secure the controversial march, along with more than a thousand other security personnel, the police announce.
The parade organized by right-wing and religious organizations will as usual begin in Jerusalem’s city center, enter the Old City of Jerusalem from the Damascus Gate in the Muslim Quarter, and proceed toward the Jewish Quarter ending up in the Western Wall plaza.
Central streets in the city will be shut down during the parade Thursday afternoon, and public transportation will be redirected to alternative routes.
Jerusalem District Police Commander Doron Turgeman makes clear that the procession will not visit the Temple Mount and that Israeli flags would not be allowed at the sensitive site.
In response to a question about possible rocket fire on Jerusalem from Gaza during the Jerusalem Day events, Turgeman says the police prepare for every eventuality including rocket fire.
The police later clarified, however, that rocket fire was not considered to be a central threat at present.
Jerusalem Day’s Flag March sparks tensions annually and is usually preceded by calls to change its route. The timing this year is especially delicate in light of the fresh ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group after five days of deadly conflict.
In 2021, the Jerusalem march served as a pretext for the Hamas terror group to launch an 11-day conflict, which included rocket fire on Jerusalem during the march.
The Hamas terror group is calling on Palestinians to attend morning prayers at the Al Aqsa Mosque on Thursday and warning Israel not to “cross any red lines.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed yesterday that the controversial nationalist parade will take place in Jerusalem on its annual route through the Old City’s Muslim Quarter.
“Any violation of our red lines will mean that the resistance will have a say,” says the terror group’s representative in Lebanon, Ali Baraka.
Baraka calls for the masses to attend morning prayers in a show of strength and says the march is a “provocation to the Palestinian people and a violation of the sanctity of Al Aqsa.”
The march does not go to the Al Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount.
Jerusalem Day’s Flag March sparks tensions annually and is usually preceded by calls to change its route. The timing this year is especially delicate in light of the fresh ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group after five days of deadly conflict.
In 2021, the Jerusalem march served as a pretext for the Hamas terror group to launch an 11-day conflict, which included rocket fire on Jerusalem during the march.
Authorities are probing the suspected poisoning of fish in the Tzalmon estuary in the Sea of Galilee, the Agriculture Ministry says.
A joint investigation by the ministry and the Water Authority was launched after dead fish were found floating in the area.
Tests are being conducted in the area, but experts have ruled out any damage to the drinking water system.
The ministry says the public can continue to consume fish, but urges them to exercise caution and only purchase them from established shops.
Tunisian President Kais Saied has invited the head of the country’s Jewish community for a meeting, days after a deadly attack on a local synagogue, Israel’s Kan public broadcaster reports.
The report says Saied will host Chief Rabbi Haim Bitan at the presidential place tomorrow.
The meeting comes a week after a gunman killed five people in an attack on an ancient synagogue on the Tunisian island of Djerba during an annual pilgrimage.
Among the dead were two Jewish cousins, Aviel Haddad, 30, and Benjamin Haddad, 43, as well as three security guards.
The Finance Ministry trims its economic growth forecast for this year and next year amid projections for lower state revenues.
After positive growth of 6.5% in 2022 as Israel emerged strongly from the COVID-19 crisis, the ministry now forecasts 2.7% growth in 2023 and 3.1% in 2024 — down from its January estimates of 3% and 3.2%, respectively. The global economy is forecast to grow at 2.8% in 2023, according to the International Monetary Fund.
The Finance Ministry updated its macroeconomic forecasts as the government is pushing ahead to pass the proposed two-year, 2023-2024 state budget before its May 29 deadline.
The Finance Ministry expects Israel to collect NIS 463.6 billion in government revenue (from taxes and other income) in 2023, which is NIS 5.3 billion less than in its previous forecast in January. The ministry projects revenue of NIS 487.2 billion for 2024, which is NIS 10.9 billion below the January forecast.
Among the reasons for the update, the ministry cited a slowdown in tax revenue and a deep drop in investments in the local high-tech sector in the first quarter of this year, which it said is partly due to the global economy and a high interest rate environment and partly due to the market uncertainty surrounding the proposed judicial overhaul.
“The more the legal reform is perceived by the market as harmful to the strength of the independence of state institutions, in particular to the judicial system and in the checks and balances between the authorities, and increases uncertainty, the more it is expected to significantly harm growth and economic activity in the economy, and in particular in foreign investments,” the Finance Ministry’s chief economist Shira Greenberg writes in the macroeconomic update.
The Finance Ministry emphasized that the probability for downward risks to the forecast have made it more urgent for the government to maintain fiscal buffers that will allow dealing with future changes in forecast growth and state revenue.
A survey released today by the Anti-Defamation League finds that 75% of Americans are concerned that artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT could be misused to cause harm.
The ADL expresses concerns that it could exacerbate antisemitism.
“We join with most Americans in being deeply concerned about the potential for these platforms to exacerbate already high levels of antisemitism and hate in our society, and the risk that they will be misused to spread misinformation and fuel extremism,” says ADL chief Jonathan Greenblatt.
A total of 14 people are set to face trial in France over the beheading of a teacher by an Islamist extremist in 2020, a crime that shocked the country, legal documents obtained by AFP show.
The most serious charges — complicity in a terrorist murder — are being pressed against two friends of the Chechen refugee who murdered teacher Samuel Paty after he showed pictures of the Prophet Mohammed to his pupils, the case documents reveal.
The killer, 18-year-old Abdullakh Anzorov, was shot dead by police at the scene in the Paris suburb of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine.
Prosecutors believe his friends, Azim Epsirkhanov and Naim Boudaoud, accompanied Anzorov to buy a knife and Boudaoud traveled with him to the school.
Another six adults will be tried for associating with terrorists, including the father of a girl at Paty’s school, an Islamic preacher, as well as a Muslim convert in contact with Anzorov via Twitter.
Six teenagers will be brought before children’s courts for allegedly undertaking surveillance around the school and identifying Paty for his killer.
The Knesset Finance Committee approves the two-year budget for 2023 and 2024 after a stormy debate that lasted nearly 15 hours.
The budget will now go to the Knesset next week for a series of readings along with the accompanying Economic Arrangements Bill.
The plan calls for a budget of NIS 484 ($132) billion for 2023, rising to NIS 514 ($140) billion in 2024.
The Arrangements Bill, which determines how funds will be disbursed, currently includes the controversial Arnona Fund, which has sparked a strike and threats of a High Court challenge from many municipalities.
President Isaac Herzog interrupts ongoing discussions to reach a negotiated judicial reform in order to convey his sense of urgency.
“It’s money time,” the president says, according to his office.
Teams from opposition and coalition parties are again meeting at the President’s Residence to try to work toward agreeing on changes to the judicial system, a subject that has become Israel’s biggest source of political and social division in past months.
Yesterday, Justice Minister Yariv Levin, one of the coalition’s judicial overhaul champions said that the government may soon unilaterally advance changes, without specifying further. He is also said to be demanding the passing one of his core changes over the next two months of the Knesset’s summer session.
The judicial shakeup is expected to return to the political fore once the state budget passes at the end of May.
Although paused by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in March in order to calm criticism and to give politicians space to reach agreements, no tangible progress has been reported to date.
On Monday, opposition party chiefs Yair Lapid and Benny Gantz both said they want to continue with negotiations, but demanded that progress be made soon.
Police detained a Jerusalem man for incitement to violence against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In social media posts yesterday the man wrote, “We will rebel against Netanyahu and his government and prepare a guillotine for their supporters.”
In another post he wrote: “Rebel against Netanyahu who will meet his end under the guillotine.”
In a third post, he called for sending “a cell to kill Netanyahu and [Public Security Minister Itamar] Ben Gvir.”
Military prosecutors have filed an indictment against a former junior officer in the elite Egoz unit for killing two of his comrades in an incident of friendly fire a year and a half ago.
Lt. “Nun” is charged with negligent manslaughter for shooting Maj. Ofek Aharon, 28, and Maj. Itamar Elharar, 26, to death on January 12, 2022.
The two slain officers and two soldiers had left the Nebi Musa base in the Jordan Valley to search for thieves after night vision equipment was stolen from a firing range. Nun went on an independent search, and mistakenly identified the other troops as armed men, leading to the deadly encounter.
Nun was moved to another unit after the incident, and in May 2022, ended his military service at his request.
His lawyer, Ram Jeanne, says the indictment is unnecessary. “This is a serious disaster that also left Lt. ‘Nun’ with an unbearably heavy burden, and he shares in the enormous pain of the families,” he says.
Russia says that all the targets assigned by its military in an overnight missile barrage on Ukraine had been hit, after Kyiv announced it had downed nearly 20 Russian missiles.
The defense ministry in Moscow says long-range precision-strike missiles had targeted storage facilities hosting “ammunition, weapons and military equipment supplied by Western countries,” adding that “all assigned targets have been hit.”
An unexpected visitor spotted sunbathing on a beach in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv is turning heads and causing a media buzz.
But it’s not American film director and Tel Aviv mainstay, Quentin Tarantino, or another Hollywood celebrity — it’s Yulia, an endangered Mediterranean monk seal.
The seal cow first appeared south of Tel Aviv’s main beachfront last Friday. Today, Yulia drew clusters of curious onlookers to the rocky beach south of Jaffa’s historic center.
These seals are listed as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, with as few as 350 mature specimens estimated to exist in the wild. Its populations have dwindled due to historic seal hunting, fishing, and habitat destruction.
Rarely spotted on Israel’s shores, the dwindling Mediterranean monk seal populations are believed to survive only in a handful of places in the Mediterranean Sea.
Israel’s Nature and Park Authority has fenced off the section of beach where Yulia has come ashore to rest, and dispatched volunteers to monitor her from a distance.
