The great white hype

A foolish man once said the most important news in the paper is next to the weather report. He was likely referring to the obituaries or the comics, but on Tuesday morning, with a snowstorm bearing down on Israel competing for premium coverage with a major pre-election speech by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his words ring true at least now.

The main takeaway from Netanyahu’s speech in all three dailies is his vow to change the political system to allow for more stable governments, as well as his attacks on his political rivals and regional boogeymen.

Yedioth Ahronoth notes that this is not the first time Netanyahu has made such a suggestion, calling his speech a throwback to the archive. “Netanyahu’s promise to change the governing system, and within 100 days of his new government, is nothing more than reheating old noodles,” the paper writes in what is ostensibly a news piece. The article notes that Netanyahu has made similar suggestions last year, in 2011 and as far back as 2006.

Commentator Shimon Shiffer places little stock in Netanyahu’s words, challenging him to put his money where his mouth is and commit to some of the reforms if he really believes in them.

“If Netanyahu really wanted to strengthen governance, he would need to pledge that already in the upcoming elections the party that receives the most votes is that which would form the government. In short: this time, too, he won’t reform our government system,” he says.

Israel Hayom accentuates Netanyahu’s attack on Labor-Hatnua leaders Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni, quoting him asking whether “they are really who will guard over Israel’s security” and accusing the left of being “disconnected from reality.”

Cottoning to that theme, pen jockey Vladimir Putin Haim Shine writes that with Israel facing so many challenges, anything short of Netanyahu’s strongman system will imperil the country.

“At the start of the Likud primaries, the prime minister said it would require stamina and determination against the challenges the country faces. Determination that can be based on a vision and faith in the righteousness of the way, a vision that ensures the thriving existence of the only nation state of the Jewish people. Weakness, conceptual flaccidity and opportunism endanger the existence of the state. Many in Israel have already internalized that the left-wing candidates and their willingness for concessions cannot lead the country at a time like this,” he writes.

Broadsheet Haaretz puts front and center Netanyahu’s pun about a new Middle East, albeit with a slightly shifted reading so that “new” (“hadash”) is instead “ha-daesh,” a reference to the Arabic name for the Islamic State terror group.

The paper characterizes the speech as “full of disdain” for Herzog and Livni, but reports in a separate piece that Netanyahu himself took a broadside from an unexpected place, President Rueven Rivlin. Rivlin, speaking at a conference of diplomats, panned the decision to freeze tax transfers to the Palestinians as a punitive measure over their application to join the International Criminal Court in the Hague.

“Freezing the transfer of Palestinian tax funds does not benefit us and does not benefit them,” Rivlin is quoted saying. “Using these funds, the Palestinians sustain themselves and [keep] the Palestinian Authority functioning. Israel’s interest is a functioning PA.”

You know something, Jon Snow

Freezing funds give way to freezing rain and snow in the two tabloids, which go big and bold with their previews of a massive snowstorm bearing down on much of the country. (Haaretz makes do with a front page picture of a crowded supermarket in Jerusalem.)

Yedioth reports that 20 to 40 centimeters of snow are predicted in the northern mountains, and 10 to 20 centimeters in the mountains around Jerusalem.

Though the storm won’t truly begin until Wednesday, Israel Hayom simply cannot wait to use the “Zero (Degree) Hour” pun it its front page headline. The paper reports that even before the snow starts Wednesday morning, the main highways in and out of Jerusalem will be closed down, to avoid a repeat of last year, when hundreds of drivers were stuck and had to be rescued by the army.

Commentator Emily Amrousi writes that after 2013’s snowstorm (which she accidentally identifies as taking place in 2014) left her settlement of Talmon cut off from power, water and other infrastructure last year, and many people traumatized, residents are not taking chances this time around and have come out with a survivalist attitude.

“When they said on the news ‘a prospect of snow,’ I heard ‘peril of snow’ and geared up with a shovel and two rakes. I sent my husband to the store to buy a gas stove and last night we did a test run. I filled the pantry with food and water to last a few weeks. In the cabinet at the entrance to the house there are emergency lights, filled with batteries and a mobile cell charger,” she writes. “The experience of the snow and the downing of infrastructure in its wake in the 2014 storm taught us to prepare ourselves for any emergency situation and not to rely on the government but on ourselves.”

While much of the country is worried about the coming natural disaster, muckrakers at Haaretz have continued to look into the shady practices behind the Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline Company, which stood behind a massive oil leak in the south last month.

The paper’s Aluf Benn, making a return to reporting from the editor’s chair, writes that the company is shrouded in secrecy because of its earlier deal with Shah-era Iran, and goes through its web of subsidiary companies, which stretch from Panama to Canada to Liechtenstein.

The result of his sleuthing is the uncovering the secret cabal that sits on its board. Included in the list are former generals, a former Mossad head, and ex-government minister Yossi Peled.

“They are members of one of Israel’s most secret clubs – veterans of the security establishment, local businessmen and close associates of leading politicians,” Benn writes. “They sit on the board of the Eilat-Ashkelon Pipeline Company (EAPC), all personal appointments of various finance ministers, controlling the firm under cover of a confidentiality order that keeps information about its activities under wraps.”