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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 07 TEL AVIV 002347 
 
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.  Iran Nuclear Program 
 
¶3.  Release of Mordechai Vanunu 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
All media cited PM Sharon's downplaying, in a speech to 
the Knesset Thursday, of the upcoming Likud referendum 
on his disengagement plan.  This morning on Israel 
Radio, Vice PM Ehud Olmert said that if the party does 
not endorse the plan, this would have "very serious" 
diplomatic, economic and political consequences for 
Israel.  The radio reported that the French government 
has expressed skepticism about the plan's chances of 
success.  Ha'aretz reported that Minister without 
Portfolio Natan Sharansky has sent a letter to the 
19,000 Russian-language members of the Likud, calling 
on them to vote against the disengagement plan. 
Jerusalem Post quoted Herbert Zweibon, chairman of 
Americans For a Safe Israel, a U.S. Jewish organization 
fighting the two-state solution to the Israeli- 
Palestinian conflict, as saying that an Israeli 
withdrawal from the territories could lead to an anti- 
Semitic backlash among evangelical Christians who are 
today among Israel's strongest supporters.  Jerusalem 
Post notes that Zweibon has close ties with the 
evangelical community. 
 
Hatzofe reported that an unnamed "senior White House 
official" told the unlicensed right-wing Israeli radio 
station Arutz Sheva (Arutz 7) that the U.S. does not 
accept Israeli sovereignty over settlement blocs or the 
non-return of Palestinian refugees to Israel.  The 
official was quoted as saying: "The parties will decide 
on these issues in negotiations among themselves." 
 
Jerusalem Post quoted Farouk Kaddoumi, the PLO's hard- 
line "foreign minister," as saying in an interview with 
the Jordanian newspaper Al-Arab, that when PA Chairman 
Yasser Arafat talks about the need to pursue the 
struggle against Israel, he is referring to the armed 
struggle.  Kaddoumi reportedly said that the armed 
struggle is the only way to accept the Palestinians' 
demands.  He admitted in the interview that the PLO 
charter, which denies Israel's right to exist, was 
never changed. 
 
Jerusalem Post reported that Thursday the Popular 
Resistance Committees, an alliance of various armed 
Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip, announced that 
its members managed to free three Palestinians who were 
held in a Gaza City prison on suspicion of involvement 
in the attack on a U.S. diplomatic convoy last October. 
The Committees also said that a fourth suspect was not 
freed because he is being held in solitary confinement. 
Israel Radio reported that last night in Qalqilya three 
key Fatah/Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades activists were 
killed in a clash with IDF forces.  The media also 
reported that two Palestinian girls aged 4 and 7 were 
killed in the Gaza Strip. 
Maariv reported that Survey of Israel, the GOI's 
official mapmaker, has recently printed an updated 
edition of Israel's maps, which includes the separation 
fence.  Ha'aretz (English Ed.) reported that last 
Thursday, American-born Rabbi Arik W. Ascherman, 
executive director of Rabbis for Human Rights (RHR), 
was arrested while demonstrating against the route of 
the fence.  Ascherman is awaiting his day in court in 
connection with other charges related to his struggle 
for human rights. 
 
Israel Radio quoted Lakhdar Brahimi, the special UN 
envoy to Iraq, as saying on a French radio station that 
Israel is the "biggest poison" in the region.  Brahimi 
also reportedly blasted the U.S. support for Israel. 
Israel Radio quoted Fred Eckhardt, Spokesman to UN 
Secretary-General Kofi Annan, as saying that Brahimi's 
 
SIPDIS 
remarks do not represent Annan's views. 
 
Ha'aretz quoted Nigel Roberts, director of the World 
Bank office in the West Bank and Gaza, as saying: "We 
are ready to play a constructive role in the 
disengagement process if we are asked to do so by all 
the key parties -- Israel, the PA and the international 
community."  Roberts was referring to reports that the 
Bank had already agreed to buy the Gaza Strip 
settlements, or that it had already taken practical 
steps to that effect.   Jerusalem Post quoted a "high- 
level World Bank official" as saying Wednesday that the 
bank will not purchase or become temporary custodians 
of Israel assets in the Gaza Strip after an Israeli 
withdrawal, and that it is more likely to play an 
economic advisory role, helping the Palestinians manage 
and productively use the evacuated property. 
 
Leading media reported that Nabil George Razouk, the 
Israeli Arab from East Jerusalem who was abducted in 
Iraq on April 8, was freed Thursday by his captors. 
The media reported that the PA representative in Iraq 
was instrumental in securing his release. 
 
Ha'aretz reported that one of the two Israelis detained 
in New Zealand was carrying a forged Canadian passport. 
 
Ha'aretz cited a recently declassified CIA document, 
according to which in January 1975 then U.S. President 
Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were 
concerned that the U.S. could be made to intervene if 
the USSR had militarily backed a Syrian attack on 
Israel. 
 
All media highlighted reports that former energy 
minister Gonen Segev has been remanded into police 
custody as a suspect in an alleged international 
Ecstasy drug smuggling scheme that Israeli and Dutch 
police say involve millions of shekels (one shekel 
roughly equals USD 0.22).  Segev reportedly used a 
forged diplomatic passport.  Segev, who was number two 
in the defunct right-wing party Tzomet, joined the late 
PM Yitzhak Rabin's cabinet in the mid '90s. 
 
A Yediot poll conducted by Mina Zemach's Dahaf 
Institute found that 49 percent of registered Likud 
voters will vote for Sharon's plan; 39.5 percent are 
opposed; 11.5 percent are undecided. 
 
A Maariv/Teleseker poll found that: 
-Had it depended on them, 63 percent of Israelis would 
have favored a national referendum to decide on the 
issue of the disengagement plan; 5 percent would have 
preferred a referendum within the Likud; 25 percent 
favor a "different way." 
-41 percent prefer an evacuation of the Gaza Strip that 
would be coordinated with the Palestinians; 34 percent 
favor a unilateral withdrawal; 18 percent oppose a 
withdrawal altogether. 
-54 percent believe that the houses in the settlements 
to be vacated should be pulled down; 36 percent favor 
leaving them to the Palestinians. 
-76 percent of Israelis say that Israel was right in 
assassinating Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi. 
 
------------ 
¶1.  Mideast: 
------------ 
 
                       Summary: 
                       -------- 
 
Independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized: 
"[Sharon] has harnessed, in the diplomatic arena and 
within the government, significant support for a 
withdrawal.... Sharon owes the citizens of Israel ... 
an accelerated, and not sluggish, evacuation." 
 
Extreme right-wing columnist Caroline B. Glick wrote on 
page one of conservative, independent Jerusalem Post: 
"The entire rationale of moving ahead with Sharon's 
plan is that Sharon has claimed that the U.S. has given 
Israel something in exchange for implementing it.  And 
yet, over the past week, the U.S. has made quite clear 
that it will give Israel nothing." 
 
Jerusalem Post editorialized: " It may be a long time 
yet before Israel gets the borders it deserves.  For 
now, the best we can hope for is to get the borders we 
can realistically defend. Fortunately, that prospect is 
no longer distant." 
 
 
 
 
                     Block Quotes: 
                     ------------- 
 
¶I.  "Speed Up the Evacuation" 
 
Independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized (April 
23): "Regardless of where the weight of the votes in 
Sharon's party falls, he has harnessed, in the 
diplomatic arena and within the government, significant 
support for a withdrawal.  U.S. President George Bush 
was the first to back it and so have major leaders in 
Europe.  All the central ministers of the Likud, who 
are also candidates for Sharon's seat after he retires, 
have abandoned their doubts by announcing their support 
for the plan and established an undeniable political 
fait accompli.... Sharon has voiced two main arguments 
in favor of the plan, which he himself had opposed 
until recently.  The first argument is security-based: 
shortening the lines of defense and eliminating soft 
targets (settlements, military units and the movement 
of soldiers and civilians along roads in the Gaza 
Strip) so that the fighting, which is expected to 
continue both along Gaza's borders (attempts to carry 
out attacks and launch rockets) and in the West Bank. 
The second argument is diplomatic: in the absence of an 
Israeli initiative enjoying American support, Israel 
will be forced to fend off initiatives less palatable 
to the Likud and Sharon government.  Precisely because 
of these arguments, the evacuation should not be 
delayed.  The plans for compensation for the evacuated 
settlers can be approved quickly by the various 
ministries and the Knesset.  Sharon owes the citizens 
of Israel the opposite of what he willingly grants 
[Finance Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu: an accelerated, 
and not sluggish, evacuation." 
 
II.  "The Generals' Confusion" 
 
Extreme right-wing columnist Caroline B. Glick wrote on 
page one of conservative, independent Jerusalem Post 
(April 23): "The [Israeli] press has paid minimal 
attention to the fact that, in the days since Sharon's 
meeting with Bush, Bush and his people have repeatedly 
denied a shift in U.S. policy away from the 
Palestinians and toward Israel.  If our media was not 
firmly backing Sharon's plan, this would not be the 
case.  After all, the entire rationale of moving ahead 
with Sharon's plan is that Sharon has claimed that the 
U.S. has given Israel something in exchange for 
implementing it.  And yet, over the past week, the U.S. 
has made quite clear that it will give Israel nothing. 
Last Friday Bush explained, 'All final status issues 
must still be negotiated between the parties.'  What 
this means, as Colin Powell and others have been keen 
to point out, is that although Bush did state that the 
U.S. thinks it would be unrealistic to have the so- 
called Palestinian refugees overrun Israel in the 
framework of an agreement, Bush did not commit the U.S. 
to preventing it from happening.  Likewise, in spite of 
the fact that it may be unrealistic to expect that more 
than 250,000 Israelis would be driven out of their 
homes in a peace deal, it is not for the U.S. to say. 
If the media was not mobilized to support Sharon's 
plan, surely the fact that the U.S. gave Israel nothing 
would be given more than passing attention." 
 
III.  "Borders of Realism" 
 
Jerusalem Post editorialized (April 23): "For the 
better part of the past 30 years, the Right and the 
Left in Israel made two curiously mirrored arguments. 
The Right understood the need for secure and defensible 
borders with all our neighbors, except the 
Palestinians.  The Left understood the need for borders 
with the Palestinians, while fantasizing about a 'New' 
borderless Middle East, akin to the European Union.... 
On the all-important subject of borders, both sides 
were logically inconsistent.... With the Palestinians, 
the past 40-plus months of terror have convinced a 
majority of Israelis of two things.  First, that peace 
with the Palestinians is, for the time being, 
impossible; and second, that separation is necessary. 
We cannot forever rule over a people who violently 
reject that rule, however benign our intentions.  And 
we must have a border to better defend against suicide 
bombers, the only weapon in the Palestinian arsenal 
that can really bloody us.... It is ... objected that a 
border that lacks international legitimacy is no border 
at all.  But then, what was the Green Line?  What is 
the Line of Control in Kashmir?.... It may be a long 
time yet before Israel gets the borders it deserves. 
For now, the best we can hope for is to get the borders 
we can realistically defend. Fortunately, that prospect 
is no longer distant." 
 
------------------------- 
¶2.  Iran Nuclear Program: 
------------------------- 
 
                       Summary: 
                       -------- 
 
Senior columnist and chief defense commentator Zeev 
Schiff wrote in independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz: 
"Iran's Shihab-3 rockets have become operational, which 
means Iran can now reach Israel and other distant 
targets in the Middle East.... [But] the other side 
knows Israel can deal with that threat and set a heavy 
price for the enemy if the situation worsens." 
 
                     Block Quotes: 
                     ------------- 
 
"Despite Everything, an Improvement" 
 
Senior columnist and chief defense commentator Zeev 
Schiff wrote in independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz 
(April 23): "Despite the unceasing terrorist war, it is 
now clear there has been an improvement in Israel's 
strategic position over the past year. The military 
deployment in the Middle East has changed in our favor, 
and certain threats that appeared grave in the past are 
gone.... That does not mean all the dangers are gone. 
It is possible that some threats, particularly in the 
realm of terror, if actualized, will surprise 
Israel.... A year ago, the assessment was that Iran 
would be near nuclear independence in 2004, but that 
timetable seems to have been postponed.... There has 
been a worsening of conditions in another military 
realm -- but it should not be considered a strategic 
threat yet. Iran's Shihab-3 rockets have become 
operational, which means Iran can now reach Israel and 
other distant targets in the Middle East.  Combined 
with the missile systems that Iran and Syria set up for 
Hezbollah in south Lebanon, the threat is more 
tangible.  The other side knows Israel can deal with 
that threat and set a heavy price for the enemy if the 
situation worsens." 
 
 
-------------------------------- 
¶3.  Release of Mordechai Vanunu: 
-------------------------------- 
 
                       Summary: 
                       -------- 
 
Op-ed writer Rafi Mann observed in popular, pluralist 
Maariv: "As long as the president of the U.S. decides, 
for strategic, political or other reasons, to adhere to 
his country's commitment to Israel's security, the 
Americans are prepared to turn a blind eye to the 
doings on the underground floors of the Dimona-2 
institute." 
 
                     Block Quotes: 
                     ------------- 
 
"Bush's Bomb" 
 
Op-ed writer Rafi Mann observed in popular, pluralist 
Maariv (April 23): "Israel's security has been a 
recurrent motive in a long series of statements by Bush 
in recent years.... Like in almost every domain -- from 
economic assistance to the peace process -- [Israel] 
has one address: Washington.  More precisely: 1600 
Pennsylvania Avenue.  As long as the president of the 
U.S. decides, for strategic, political or other 
reasons, to adhere to his country's commitment to 
Israel's security, the Americans are prepared to turn a 
blind eye to the doings on the underground floors of 
the Dimona-2 institute.... When could the pattern of 
that relationship blow up and cause serious harm to 
Israel?  Only when something very basic goes wrong in 
U.S.-Israeli relations -- if, for instance a U.S. 
president is someday elected and wishes to shake off 
the 'special relationship' between the two countries, 
or if Israel makes policy that Washington would view as 
a clear danger to its interests.  To this day, even the 
most skeptical observers can only point to a tightening 
and deepening of ties, not to the opposite.  Meanwhile, 
Vanunu had better stop blabbing, but it is doubtful 
whether that eccentric guy actually represents a 
strategic threat.... The Iranian bomb worries Bush much 
more." 
 
KURTZER