This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 06 TEL AVIV 006416 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEA/PPD 
 
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM 
NSC FOR NEA STAFF 
 
JERUSALEM ALSO FOR ICD 
LONDON ALSO FOR HKANONA AND POL 
PARIS ALSO FOR POL 
ROME FOR MFO 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: IS KMDR MEDIA REACTION REPORT
SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION 
 
-------------------------------- 
SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶1.  Mideast 
 
¶2.  Syrian-Lebanese Track 
 
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Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
All media quoted PM Sharon as saying at the Herzliya 
Conference last night that 2005 will be a "year of 
great opportunity" for Israel, and that the 
disengagement plan is the "foundation and cornerstone 
for the great opportunities that lie before us."  For 
the first time, Sharon proposed to "coordinate various 
elements relating to our disengagement plan with the 
future Palestinian government -- a government which is 
ready and able to take responsibility for the areas 
which we leave."  The media quoted Sharon as saying 
that disengagement from Gaza does not tear the nation 
apart, but that it unites it.  Jerusalem Post reported 
that the PA reacted angrily to Sharon's comments, 
saying he would not find a partner on the Palestinian 
side for his vision.  The newspaper quoted Mahmoud 
Abbas (Abu Mazen) as saying, during a visit to Qatar, 
that the Palestinians completely reject Sharon's 
statements.  He stressed that the Palestinians will 
never surrender the right of the refugees to return 
home. 
 
Ha'aretz web site quoted senior GOI sources as saying 
Friday that Israel supports a Middle East peace 
conference planned by British PM Tony Blair for 
February, but that it will not participate in it.  They 
said Israel sees the conference as a forum for 
encouraging reforms in the PA.  Palestinian, European 
and American representatives will be attending the 
conference. 
 
Israel Radio reported that IDF forces made an incursion 
into the Khan Yunis refugee camp last night, in an 
attempt to neutralize rocket launchings.  The radio 
quoted Palestinian sources as saying that two 
Palestinians were killed and eight were wounded in the 
operation.  The station cited the IDF as saying that 
"five terrorists" were killed.  The radio this 
afternoon reported that five Palestinians were killed 
in the collapse of a tunnel along the Gaza-Egypt 
border, and that five others are missing.  The IDF is 
assisting the rescue operation. 
 
Maariv (Ben Caspit) reported that the cabinet vote on 
the evacuation of settlements as part of the 
disengagement plan will take place next month instead 
of in mid-June 2005, and that it will apparently be 
conducted in a single show of hands regarding all 
settlements in question, and not in separate votes 
concerning four groups of settlements.  Caspit says 
that senior Justice Ministry officials told Sharon that 
the High Court of Justice would contest a vote on the 
evacuation of 7,500 settlers two weeks before the 
actual evacuation.  In another article, Caspit reported 
that the Israeli authorities could allow members of 
Palestinian security forces to carry weapons beyond the 
date of the upcoming elections, if those turn out well. 
 
Ha'aretz, Yediot and other media reported that the U.S. 
Department of Defense -- according to Yediot and 
Jerusalem Post, the department's deputy spokesman Bryan 
Whitman -- denied Thursday that U/S of Defense Douglas 
Feith is demanding the resignation of Defense Ministry 
D-G Amos Yaron.  However, Ha'aretz quoted Israeli 
sources as saying that Gen. Jumper, chief of staff of 
the USAF, recently canceled a planned visit to Israel 
because he was unwilling to meet with Yaron.  Ha'aretz 
quoted the sources as saying that the Pentagon 
instructed Jumper to refrain from meeting with Yaron, 
and when Israel refused to accept the boycott, the 
visit was canceled. 
 
All media reported that last night Sharon suspended 
coalition talks with the Labor Party, infuriated by 
comments made by Labor's chief negotiator, MK Dalia 
Itzik, that Sharon was "groveling" to get Labor in the 
government. 
 
Ha'aretz and Israel Radio reported that the State 
Department intends to declare Hizbullah's Al Manar-TV a 
terrorist organization today, because of the anti- 
Semitic contents of its programs. 
 
Ha'aretz reported that eleven families have recently 
moved into the northern Gaza Strip settlement of 
Nissanit with the assistance of the settlers' movement 
Amana.  Jerusalem Post reported on a budding crisis at 
the Council of Jewish Settlements in the Territories as 
settler leaders said they were split over whether to 
call on the public to escalate the struggle against 
Sharon's disengagement plan. 
 
Ha'aretz, Jerusalem Post and Globes quoted the High 
Court of Justice as saying Thursday that the government 
must "thoroughly" examine the problems raised by a law 
denying citizenship to Palestinians who marry Israelis. 
 
Leading media reported that Maj. Gen. (res.) Yaakov 
Amidror, a former deputy head of army intelligence, 
lambasted the disengagement plan at the Herzliya 
Conference Thursday, saying it would turn Gaza into a 
"shelter for Al Qaida."  In a separate development, the 
media quoted National Union party leader and former 
cabinet minister Avigdor Lieberman as saying at the 
conference Thursday that he supports the transfer of 
some of Jerusalem's Arab neighborhoods and Israeli Arab 
communities in Wadi Ara (between Hadera and Afula) to 
Palestinian control, in conjunction with the 
establishment of a Palestinian state. 
 
Palestinian lawmaker Hanan Ashrawi was quoted as saying 
in an interview with Jerusalem Post that the 
Palestinians should have accepted the 1947 UN partition 
resolution. 
 
Visiting President of Harvard University Prof. Larry 
Summers was quoted as saying in an interview with 
Yediot that anti-Semitism has taken a new, anti-Israeli 
form. 
 
Hatzofe cited leading Internet service Ynet as saying 
that nuclear whistleblower Mordecai Vanunu has been 
elected rector of Glasgow University.  In the past, 
Benjamin Disraeli and Winnie Mandela had held this 
position. 
 
Hatzofe reported that former Ashkenazi chief rabbi 
Israel Meir Lau is expected to tell American Jews 
during his current visit to the U.S. that only in 
Israel will they be able to guarantee their Jewish 
identity. 
 
All media reported that Shinui MK Prof. Yehudit Naot, 
environment minister in 2003-2004, died of cancer 
Thursday.  Yediot reported that Erela Golan will 
succeed Naot in the Knesset. 
 
Ha'aretz (English Ed.) reported that the chairman of 
Republicans Abroad in Israel, Kory Bardash, celebrated 
Hanukah with President Bush and the First Lady at a 
White House party last Thursday.  Bardash, who received 
an invitation for his work on behalf of the Bush 
election campaign earlier this year, registered more 
than 10,000 new Republican voters in Israel in 2004. 
 
The Maariv/Teleseker poll: 
-"Should Israel withdraw from the Gaza Strip even if 
the terrorist organizations continue to carry out 
attacks?"  Yes: 55 percent; opposed to a withdrawal in 
any case: 22 percent; no withdrawal as long as terror 
goes on: 18 percent. 
-"In which of the following countries is there the most 
hostile attitude to Israel?"  France: 86 percent; 
Germany: 46 percent; Russia: 32 percent; Britain: 13 
percent; U.S.: 5 percent.  (Each respondent named two 
countries.) 
 
------------ 
¶1.  Mideast: 
------------ 
                       Summary: 
                       -------- 
 
Independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized: "The 
Jewish settlements are the main obstacle today to an 
agreement with the Palestinians.  To this historical 
injustice, not one further settlement should be added." 
Conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized: 
"Abbas apparently genuinely opposes the kind of 
violence espoused by Hamas and executed by 
Barghouti.... [Alas, he] now appears reluctant to just 
face his opponents in a free and open election." 
 
                     Block Quotes: 
                     ------------- 
 
¶I.  "Not One Single Settlement" 
 
Independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized 
(December 17): "The wall-to-wall support that Ariel 
Sharon has been enjoying recently is based on his 
decision to turn over a new leaf in the diplomatic 
arena.  This is not unconditional support.  The 
suspicions regarding Sharon still exist and have often 
been expressed on this page.  There is still the 
possibility that the disengagement from Gaza is nothing 
but a maneuver aimed at strengthening the Jewish 
settlements in the West Bank.  The recent silence of 
the settler leadership makes one wonder whether they 
have been given promises about which the public does 
not know.... The suspicion is that the government is 
trying to draw up a new map strewn with Jewish 
settlement points before the Americans come to the 
region to draw their own map of the settlements.  In 
addition to this, about 100 outposts that were slated 
to be evacuated long ago are thriving undisturbed.... 
any future investment in the development of settlements 
and their surroundings is unacceptable.  This must be 
the first and most important provision in the coalition 
agreement with the Labor Party.  Anyone who has been 
following the settlement project since its inception 
knows that most of it has come about using the method 
of promises are one thing, winks are another thing and 
construction is quite another, which is not unfamiliar 
to Sharon.  The time has come to put an end to this. 
The Jewish settlements are the main obstacle today to 
an agreement with the Palestinians.  To this historical 
injustice, not one further settlement should be added." 
 
II.  "The PA's Non-Contest" 
 
Conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized 
(December 17): "It is widely hoped that the Palestinian 
Authority's general election next month will herald a 
new era, one that will contrast the decades that 
preceded it and be dominated by reason, freedom and 
prosperity.  Unfortunately, the facts offer little 
evidence that news of this transition has arrived where 
it was hoped to take place.... As events are in fact 
unfolding, we suspect that at the end of the day, 
Mahmoud Abbas will face the same predicament that 
Yasser Arafat did in his time, when his "election" 
meant a lot less to the extremists than their extremism 
meant to him.  Abbas apparently genuinely opposes the 
kind of violence espoused by Hamas and executed by 
Barghouti, even if his critique is tactical rather than 
moral.  Alas, not only is there no indication that he 
is actively going from village to village in order to 
share his vision with the people, and thus touch off a 
long-overdue re-education process; Abbas now appears 
reluctant to just face his opponents in a free and open 
election.  As if to shed further light on this setback 
to the Palestinian democratic process, PA lawmaker 
Hanan Ashrawi, in this issue [of The Jerusalem Post], 
tells [a reporter] that democracy is not a prerequisite 
for Palestinian independence.... We hope to be proven 
wrong the morning after next month's election, but 
prospects are high that, like Arafat before him, Abbas, 
too, will be intimidated by opponents who will enjoy 
the benefits of maximum authority and minimum 
responsibility." 
 
-------------------------- 
¶2.  Syrian-Lebanese Track: 
-------------------------- 
 
                       Summary: 
                       -------- 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Ben Caspit wrote in popular, 
pluralist Maariv: "Those who say that the Americans are 
now preventing Israel from talking with Assad are 
wrong, and deceiving too." 
 
                     Block Quotes: 
                     ------------- 
 
"The Americans Actually Encourage Talks" 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Ben Caspit wrote in popular, 
pluralist Maariv (December 17): "The more signs [of 
Syrian willingness to engage in talks with Israel] and 
emissaries are increasing, so is the belief that the 
survival of the Alawite regime is even more important 
to Bashar [Assad] than the Golan.  In other words, 
there may be an historic possibility that a peace deal 
could be made with Syria that would leave in Israel's 
hands strategic security assets in the Golan.... The 
Americans could have been enlisted for this purpose.... 
Those who say that the Americans are now preventing 
Israel from talking with Assad are wrong, and deceiving 
too.... Not only isn't the [U.S.] Administration not 
preventing Israel from doing so, but it is even 
encouraging her.  The President of Israel knows this, 
so does her Foreign Minister (he illustrated this in a 
courageous speech in Herzliya Wednesday), the Chief of 
Staff knows this -- all relevant people know this. 
Ariel Sharon does not have the will, or the capacity, 
or the energy to pursue two peace tracks 
simultaneously.  This is his right; this is a truth 
that can't be avoided.  This is his perception.  One 
should be aware of it -- for the coming generations or 
for upcoming commissions of investigation (after the 
next war)." 
 
KURTZER