Free Republic

“In every aspect, it seems the world is losing its patience for us,” Finance Minister Yair Lapid told Ynet on Friday, following reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued tenders for 1,400 new settlement homes. […] Lapid said he believed the world’s impatience with Israel is manifested in many aspects. “In the case of Horizon 2020, we’ve managed to prevent the damage, and then we were suddenly faced with the ASA boycott. We couldn’t generate any effect around the Iranian deal, because we weren’t loud enough, and that is due to the fact that our status is not as it...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is being mocked in a new video, part of a campaign by nationalists warning against Kerry’s plans to impose an agreement with the Palestinian Authority (PA) on Israel. The campaign is being co-sponsored by the Yisrael Sheli (My Israel) movement, along with the Yesha Council and the Binyamin Regional Council. The video which was produced as part of the campaign mocks Kerry for his “creative” but useless solutions to Israel’s security problems. Kerry is presented as running a company called “John Kerry Solutions Ltd.”, the motto of which is, “We don’t have good solutions,...

A majority of both Israelis and Palestinians support a peace agreement based on the two-state solution formula, a Hebrew University poll found, though many respondents reported that they were skeptical as to the sustainability of such an agreement in the long term. The study, conducted jointly by the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah, found that 63 percent of Israelis and 53% of Palestinians support the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, the university said in a statement...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has blamed the Palestinians for the apparent stalemate in their peace talks, accusing them of creating "artificial crises" and incitement. He spoke after talks with US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is attempting to revive the peace process. The direct negotiations launched in July have shown little sign of progress and are due to end next April. Mr Kerry will later meet Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The secretary of state has denied media speculation that he may propose a new interim peace deal. Kerry confident Mr Netanyahu said Israel stood by the terms...

Secretary of State John Kerry and an elite US diplomatic team met with a small group of American Jewish leaders at the White House Thursday night to discuss the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that resumed last month. edit Kerry told the leaders that one of the lynchpins of the current peace process is the separation of Israel’s security assurances from the general negotiations, assurances he said would be guaranteed in a separate agreement with the US. The security track is being worked out under the auspices of retired Marine Corps general John Allen, who is currently Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s special...

U.S. President Barack Obama welcomed the imminent start of renewed peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians on Monday, but urged both sides to approach them with honesty, AFP reported Monday evening. "The most difficult work of these negotiations is ahead, and I am hopeful that both the Israelis and Palestinians will approach these talks in good faith," he said. Obama thanked his own top diplomat, Secretary of State John Kerry, for organizing the talks, which were to begin later Monday in Washington with an initial exchange between top negotiators. "I am pleased that Prime Minister [Binyamin] Netanyahu and [Palestinian...

Tony Blair was in Jerusalem ­yesterday to urge Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu: “Give peace a chance.” The ex-Labour Prime Minister, now a go-between in new Middle East peace talks, told Israel’s leader to get a move on with ­concessions to the Palestinians. Mr Netanyahu agreed to free at least 100 Palestinians who have been held in Israeli jails for more than 20 years. In return it is expected that the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas will relax his demand that a future Palestinian state must be based on the border from before the 1967 Six-Day War. Hopes of lasting peace in...

I think we are all in a bit of shock over Bibi’s plan to release 104 Arab terrorists. While Bibi is surprised at the push-back he’s getting. After all, this isn’t the first time that Israel has released terrorists, nor the first time that Israel has released terrorists in a lop-sided deal. So while Bibi expected lip-service attacks, he wasn’t expecting this all-out full-frontal revolt, including from his most closest associates. But this is the first time that Israel has released terrorists in exchange for nothing. Literally nothing. Not Gilad Shalit, not dead soldier’s bodies, not even a signature. Simply...

Israeli and Palestinian leaders will resume face-to-face peace talks on Monday in Washington, the State Department said Sunday. The restart of the long-stalled talks is being attributed to Secretary of State John Kerry's six months of frenetic shuttle diplomacy. Agency spokeswoman Jen Psaki said both sides had accepted invitations from Kerry to come to Washington "to formally resume direct final status negotiations" that are scheduled to begin Monday evening and continue Tuesday. Psaki said in a statement that Kerry on Sunday called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and that the leaders agreed the talks would...

While the BDS movement calls for an international boycott of Israel for its alleged brutal occupation of Judea and Samaria, and its “siege” of Gaza—farmers from Gaza took part last week in a seminar for farmers inside Israel. The office of the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), a part of the IDF, reported this week that last Wednesday and Thursday, two groups of Arab farmers totaling 60 people left Gaza in order to attend an agricultural seminar in northern Israel, designed to advance the Gaza agricultural sector. …

Palestinians have a hidden history of appreciating Israel that contrasts with their better-known narrative of vilification and irredentism. The former has been particularly evident of late, especially since Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert, floated a trial balloon in October about transferring some Arab-dominated areas of eastern Jerusalem to the Palestinian Authority. As he rhetorically asked about Israeli actions in 1967, "Was it necessary to annex the Shuafat refugee camp, al-Sawahra, Walajeh, and other villages, and then to state that these are part of Jerusalem? One can ask, I admit, some legitimate questions about this." In one swoop, this statement transformed...

There is no denying that by applying for Israeli citizenship, in defiance of PLO and Hamas warnings, they are actually making clear that they would rather live under Israel than any Arab rule. The Palestinian Authority says it is worried because of the rise in the number of Palestinians from Jerusalem who are seeking Israeli citizenship ...

According to face-to-face surveys conducted according to the highest international standards, more Palestinians in east Jerusalem would prefer to become citizens of Israel rather than citizens of a new Palestinian state. In addition, 40 percent said they would probably or definitely move in order to live under Israeli rather than Palestinian rule. 44 percent of the Palestinians in Jerusalem say they are very, or at least somewhat, satisfied with their standard of living. This is a very high percentage compared to other populations in the Arab world. Only about 30 percent sympathize with either Fatah or Hamas or with the...

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni warned on Monday that Israel runs the risk of a European economic boycott if it fails to advance peace talks with the Palestinian Authority. "You cannot deal only with economic issues and ignore the political issue and the importance of a two-state solution," she told delegates at an accountancy conference in Eilat, according to AFP. "Europe is boycotting products. And, true, it is starting with the settlements but their problem is with Israel, which is perceived as a colonial state, so it won't only stop with the settlements, but will (reach) Israel as a whole," warned...

JERUSALEM — Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, known for his rigid negotiating positions, has been sending signals that he is ready for significant compromises in a peace deal with the Palestinians — and that he accepts the narrative increasingly favored by his opponents that says ending the West Bank occupation is essential for Israel itself. While some of Netanyahu's political allies say he is serious, the Palestinians remain skeptical. This week's visit by Secretary of State John Kerry could show which way things can go. In recent speeches, Netanyahu has stressed the importance of reaching a peace deal, saying it...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday issued a stark warning to Israel to resume long-stalled peace talks with the Palestinian Authority, saying that if efforts fail now they may never get another chance. "We are running out of time. We're running out of possibilities... If we do not succeed now, we may not get another chance," Kerry told a forum held by the American Jewish Community, according to the AFP news agency. Kerry’s warning came amid reports that he is planning to return to the Middle East region within days, for his fifth trip to Israel since he...

Delaying the so-called “two-state solution” is an historical mistake, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni claimed on Monday. Livni, who is in charge of the peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, spoke at the American Jewish Committee 2013 Global Forum in Washington, D.C. She warned in her speech of “devastating consequences” for Israel in case U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s latest attempt to renew peace talks fails. “Time is working against those who believe that two states is the only Zionist way to maintain our identity,” Livni said. “There are those who want to postpone this decision, but it would be...

Bayit Yehudi leader slams Peres' speech calling for two-state solution, says withdrawal from land leads to deaths. Withdrawal from land leads to deaths, Economy and Trade Minister Naftali Bennett said on Monday in a response to President Shimon Peres’s speech calling for a two-state solution. “I value our president, but the concept of withdrawals failed and brought thousands of victims,” Bennett said at a Bayit Yehudi faction meeting. “Every time we give up land, people are killed.” Bennett called for the government to declare that “this is our land, and it is not for sale.” The government’s job is to...

AL SHUNAH, Jordan: US Secretary of State John Kerry unveiled on Sunday a plan to boost the Palestinian economy by attracting $4 billion in private investment, saying it could transform the lives of the people. As he seeks to bring Israel and the Palestinians back to the table to negotiate a peace deal, Kerry said it was also imperative to create jobs and meet the hopes of young people for a better economic future. He has tasked Tony Blair, the Quartet's special envoy to the Middle East, with drawing up a plan to revitalise the West Bank through boosting industries...

British Foreign Secretary William Hague, who is currently visiting Israel, said in an interview with Sky News that Israel has lost some support in Britain and in other European countries due to its settlement construction policy. He warned that the window of opportunity for Israel and the Palestinians to agree to form a two-state solution was closing fast. …