The skies belong to Amir Eshel

The appointment of a new commander for the Israeli Air Force dominates the front pages of today’s newspapers. With a military strike on Iran ostensibly on the table, extensive profiling of Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, the man who would lead any such attack, appears to be the order of the day.

“The skies belong to him,” reads the top headline in Yedioth Ahronot. “The leader” proclaims Israel Hayom, with the accompanying photo showing Eshel’s face juxtaposed with a picture of IAF fighter jets performing a fly-by over Auschwitz. Maariv features a quote from the new commander stating he is “Aware of the magnitude of the responsibility,” alongside a photo of Eshel wearing his aviation jumpsuit on his way to take his seat in the cockpit of a jet.

All three dailies also dedicate a double spread inside to the man and the wider mission of heading the IAF, running interviews with family members, colleagues and military experts. The consensus that arises is that Eshel is the right person for the job, possessing the necessary experience, the desired personal qualities and the right temperament to fill the highly sensitive position.

Maariv, inside, features a story on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calling on his ministers to stop giving media interviews on the subject of a strike on Iran, claiming that the “unnecessary chatter,” will create the perception that Israel is dragging the US into a confrontation against its will.

While Haaretz doesn’t feature anything on Eshel on its front page, another military appointment that does make it there is that of Yaron Dekel to be the commander of IDF Radio — Galei Zahal. Dekel, who started his broadcasting career at the station, has long worked for the rival Israel Radio public station and his appointment, by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, ends a long period of speculation over who will win the influential position.

Haaretz leads the paper with a story on Hamas gaining traction in the West Bank, describing how the terror organization’s influence is waxing in the wake of the prisoner exchange last year that saw Gilad Shalit return to Israel in exchange for the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

Other stories that appear on Haaretz’s front page deal with the international community’s pressure on Syria, US President Barack Obama’s calming message regarding an Israeli attack on Iran and an exclusive story on a letter submitted to the education minister by 250 teachers in which they refuse to take part in “Heritage trips” across the Green Line.

Yedioth Ahronot, under its main headline announcing Eshel’s appointment, features an expose on Israel’s purported lack of preparedness for an Iranian counterstrike. Headlined “Threatening Iran and cutting back on the homefront,” the story describes how, over the past four years, the government reduced its spending on homefront readiness by NIS 27 million.

Israel Hayom reports on the increased risk of attacks on high ranking Israeli officials as we approach the fourth anniversary of the assassination in Damascus of Hezbollah leader Imad Mughniyah, a killing many believe Israel had a hand in.

Also on its cover is a report on the death of David Dudai, yesterday, in the middle of a court hearing. Dudai is the ex-husband of Eti Dudai, who is currently starring in a popular reality television show. His public collapse in the courtroom during a hearing over millions of shekels he owes in debts, and his ex-wife’s celebrity status, earned him a prominent spot in all the print publications.

In ongoing news, new evidence in the police investigation into the death of an unnamed infant boy, allegedly at the hands of his parents, has all four papers referring to a “smoking gun,” quoting from one of the detective’s statement.

All the print outlets also report on Netanyahu’s bureau chief, Natan Eshel, extending his leave of absence following an investigation into his alleged harassment of a junior female employee in his office.

Lack of progress in negotiations between the Finance Ministry and the Histadrut Labor Federation, meanwhile, has Maariv reporting on “slim chances on preventing a general strike” set for Wednesday.

Another story in Maariv reports on a bus driver catering to autistic children who has been fired from his job for mocking his passengers. Parents complained that the driver was laughing at their children’s disabilities. The driver responded that he was “laughing with them.”

Maariv’s back page reveals a budding romance between two of the country’s top athletes. According to the report, tennis player Shahar Pe’er and Beijing gold medalist wind surfer Sahar Tzubari are now dating.

Yedioth Ahronot features an investigation into speeding detection cameras installed recently on the country’s highways. Although the official justification for the placement of the cameras is that they will prevent deaths on Israel’s most accident-prone roads, the actual placement suggests financial considerations over safety related ones, the paper indicates.

In its legal coverage, Yedioth Ahronot reports on an indictment filed against a teacher for sexually molesting one of her female students for four years, since the girl was 13. The child’s father claims that the teacher turned his daughter into a sex salve.

On wars cold and hot

In the opinion pages, Yedioth Ahronot columnist Sever Plotzker determines that, unless Iran backs down from its nuclear program, an Israeli attack is “inevitable.”

“’Cannot tolerate’ and ‘cannot live with,’ are diplomatic terms for a declaration of war. It will be a predictable war: already analysts and gamblers predict a 90 percent chance that it will happen, and therefore preparations for it must be precise. In practice they have already been completed,” writes Plotzker.

Haim Shine writes in Israel Hayom on the dangers of superpowers backing rogue states and terrorist organizations, in the wake of Russia and China’s veto in the UN Security Council last weekend. “A world that lacks moral clarity cannot exist for long. Deadly weapons scattered across the globe risk humanity at large. We cannot deceive ourselves into believing that the Cold War is over. It is only heating up,” writes Shine.

In Haaretz, Akiva Eldar backs Israeli nuclear disarmament as part of an accord for a comprehensive peace with the Muslim world, as proposed in the Saudi initiative. He writes: “It is no coincidence that Israeli (and American) speakers who regularly talk about ‘all options being on the table’ ignore that one. To advance it, Israel would have to surrender most of the West Bank, divide Jerusalem and offer a decent solution for the Palestinian refugees. But Israel wants to be the only country in the region with nuclear capability (according to foreign sources of course), hold on to the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and rid itself of the refugee problem.”