Sucking the joy: 7 things to know for April 2

1. The Hamas-run Palestinian health ministry announced Monday that a 29-year-old Gaza man died of injuries from IDF fire during last week’s mass protests along the Gaza border with Israel.

• His death brings the total number of Palestinians reported killed in Friday’s border clashes to 18, according to Hamas figures.
• Israeli defense authorities confirmed that Israel was holding the bodies of two alleged Hamas members killed in the Friday shootout after opening fire on troops at the border.
• Human rights groups have accused Israel of using excessive force, and both the UN secretary-general and the European Union’s foreign policy chief have urged an independent investigation into the Palestinian deaths. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman Sunday rejected the calls for an investigation, saying IDF troops acted appropriately and fired only at Palestinian protesters who posed a threat.
• Yedioth columnist Ben Dror Yemini says that Israel missed a public relations opportunity in how it handled the deadly clashes over the weekend. Yemini says Israel should have better publicized Hamas’s refusal to consider recent EU-backed offers to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in exchange for demilitarization, that would have “made clear to many that Hamas is to blame for the conditions in the Strip.”
• The left-wing daily Haaretz on Monday also features criticism of Israel’s handling of the weekend violence. Like Yemini, right-wing columnist Moshe Arens says the Friday clashes were a missed opportunity for Israel. While significantly fewer protesters came out than Hamas promised, Arens said the 30,000 demonstrators at the fence were “enough for inciting attacks against Israel at the United Nations,” suggesting that the terror group that runs the Strip had finally hit upon a successful strategy against Israel.

2. On Monday, tens of thousands of Jewish pilgrims made their way to the Western Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City for a twice-annual mass blessing ceremony, known in Hebrew as Birkat Kohanim.

• Under heavy police guard, descendants of the Kohanim gathered to bestow a benediction twice on Monday morning, one of the intermediate days of Passover.
• US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, a descendant of the priestly caste, was one of the hundreds who gave the blessing along with his son and grandson.

3. The ongoing spat over Israel’s official 70th independence day celebrations has devolved into “an ugly political battle,” according to Monday’s Yedioth Ahronoth.

• The report says that this year’s torch lighting ceremony will “take place in the shadow of embarrassing political clashes,” and that a number of cabinet ministers are ashamed of Culture Minister Miri Regev’s handling of the dispute.
• At the heart of the debate with Regev is Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein, who is objecting to a plan whereby Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address the ceremony, saying that by tradition he, the Speaker, must be the senior official at the event. But Regev insists that it has nothing to do with Edelstein and she will have Netanyahu and President Reuven Rivlin speak at the torch-lighting, bucking years of tradition.
• One senior government minister tells the daily that Regev is “determined to suck the joy” from the celebrations, while another said Regev and Netanyahu’s handling of the situation was a “disgrace.”
• Meanwhile, Rivlin reportedly indicated that he will not be attending the torch-lighting ceremony.

4. A top UK lawmaker is warning Labour that its failure to address systemic anti-Semitism within its ranks could cost Britain’s main opposition party the next election.

• The former speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin, told the Guardian he is “appalled” by the latest scandal, and rebuffed claims that the accusations of rampant anti-Jewish racism were a political witch hunt against party leader Jeremy Corbyn.
• “If you ran a restaurant, and it was dirty and there were cockroaches, you wouldn’t get away with saying ‘The restaurant down the road is dirty and has cockroaches too.’ You would be expected to sort out the problem,” he said.

5. Former Polish president Bronislaw Komorowski has publicly criticized his country’s recently legislated and highly controversial Holocaust Law as a “legislative failure” and a “political mistake.”

• The law, which criminalizes blaming the Polish nation or people for atrocities committed during World War II, was declared partly unconstitutional last month by the Polish attorney general’s office.
• It has caused a rift with Israel and drawn criticism from the United States and Ukraine.
• Komorowski told Channel 10 News on Sunday night that the law was “not only a legislative failure but a political mistake. It’s contrary to our aims and defending Poland’s good name has become impossible. On the contrary, the law has prompted a lot of criticism of Poland.”

6. Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan says reconciliation with Turkey in 2016 may have been a mistake in light of Ankara’s increasingly harsh rhetoric toward Israel.

• “Looking back, maybe the accord should not have been approved,” Erdan told Army Radio, calling Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “an anti-Semite who continues to support Hamas.”
• He says Israel must stand up “to the hostility and anti-Semitism of Erdogan.”

7. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina warns US President Donald Trump that pulling American troops out of Syria would be disastrous.

• Commenting on Trump’s new National Security Adviser John Bolton’s hawkish approach to foreign policy, Graham warned that leaving Syria would allow the Islamic State group to strengthen, the fighting between the Syrian Kurdish militia and Turkey would get out of hand, and Russia and Iran would go on to dominate Syria.
• “It would be the single worst decision the president could make,” Graham said.