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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 001384 
 
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E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OPRC KMDR IS
 
SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION 
 
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SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
Mideast 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
With slight variations in style, all media reported that PM Ehud 
Olmert is challenging some of the conclusions attributed to him in 
the Winograd Commission's interim report on the Second Lebanon War. 
According to his aides, Olmert is examining ways of presenting his 
concerns to the Winograd panel, either in written form or if he is 
asked to appear in front of the commission for a second time.  The 
sources also expressed their puzzlement at what they describe as a 
gap between the encouragement the panel gave Olmert during his 
testimony and the harsh conclusions in the report, which spoke of a 
"failure."   On Thursday the Winograd Commission released the 
transcripts of the testimonies of Olmert, Defense Minister Amir 
Peretz and former IDF chief of staff Dan Halutz. In his testimony, 
Olmert criticized the performance of the Israel Defense Forces and 
gave his backing to Peretz.  Peretz, meanwhile, argued that he had 
not been told by the IDF that there were problems in the army's 
preparedness.  Halutz said the IDF failed in the war in two areas: 
by not shortening the war and by not putting an end to the 
short-range Katyusha rockets attacking the North.  Olmert's 
objections to parts of the report relate to a number of issues.  The 
commission wrote about a conversation between Olmert and FM Tzipi 
Livni on the second day of the war in which she recommends "to start 
thinking about a diplomatic way of ending the incident."  Livni 
testified that Olmert told her to "relax" because the army has 
"targets for 10 days."  Olmert is challenging the facts as they had 
been presented by Livni.  He is critical of the commission for not 
asking him about the foreign minister's testimony, while the 
commission quotes her testimony in the report without asking for his 
response. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that Deputy National Advisor Elliott 
Abrams recently told a group of Jewish Republicans that the Bush 
administration is undertaking much of its current 
Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy to appease the Arabs and Europeans. 
 
All media reported that an Arab League delegation, comprising the 
foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan, will visit Israel in the 
 
coming weeks to discuss the Arab peace initiative.  The Arab 
League's decision to dispatch the team -- a groundbreaking 
development in Arab-Israeli affairs -- was made during FM Livni's 
visit to Cairo on Thursday.  Livni met with Egyptian President Hosni 
Mubarak for two hours and discussed the diplomatic process with the 
Palestinians and the Arab peace initiative.  The FM also met with 
her Egyptian counterpart, Ahmed Ali Abu al-Gheit, and their visiting 
Jordanian colleague, Abdelelah al-Khatib.  Israel Radio quoted 
Foreign Ministry sources as saying that this was a "historic" 
development.  The two Arab ministers pledged that they would not 
present Israel with any preconditions or ultimatums during their 
meetings, but they also stressed that the Arab League delegation is 
not an alternative to direct contacts between Israel and the 
Palestinians.  Ha'aretz said that a senior GOI source concurred, 
warning that "the process on the new regional track will not move 
forward if there is no progress on the Palestinian track."  The 
impending visit by the Egyptian and Jordanian foreign ministers is a 
continuation of the decision made at the Arab League summit in 
Riyadh in March, under which the two Arab countries with whom Israel 
has full diplomatic relations would be responsible for advancing the 
Arab peace initiative.  Maariv quoted Jordan's King Abdullah II as 
telling an Israeli delegation on Thursday that chances for peace are 
dwindling. 
 
All media reported that Syrian President Bashar Assad told his 
Parliament on Thursday that the Israeli government is too weak to 
make peace with Syria, stressing that negotiations must resume from 
the point they reached in 2000.  "There is no progress in the peace 
process and there is no contact with Israel over this issue, neither 
secret nor overt, because Israel is not ready for a just and 
 
SIPDIS 
comprehensive peace that requires, to be implemented, strong 
leadership that could make decisive decisions," Assad was quoted as 
saying.  He warned that "weak governments in Israel are capable of 
launching aggression."  He said the "return of the Golan is 
nonnegotiable for us," and that the policy of isolating Syria "has 
faced nothing but failure." 
 
Ha'aretz and other media reported that on Thursday in Nablus IDF 
gunfire hit a Palestinian who was seven months pregnant, wounding 
her severely and killing the fetus.  The IDF said the woman was shot 
in an exchange of fire with gunmen in the city's refugee camp.  An 
Israeli soldier and a 16-year-old Palestinian were also wounded. 
Israel Radio reported that this morning two Qassam rockets were 
launched at the western Negev.  Makor Rishon-Hatzofe quoted 
Transportation Minister and former defense minister Shaul Mofaz as 
saying as saying that Israel should resume targeted assassinations. 
 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that on Thursday the Jerusalem 
Municipality announced that it is weighing the construction of three 
Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem. 
 
Alvaro de Soto, outgoing UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East 
Peace Process, was quoted as saying in an interview with Ha'aretz 
that he cannot understand "how Jews can surround people with wall 
and fences." 
 
Likud MK Gilad Erdan was quoted as saying in an interview with The 
Jerusalem Post that Israel is not doing enough to utilize the 
growing Evangelical support for Israel at a time when a 
Christian-Jewish alliance is vital in the battler against Islamic 
extremism. 
 
Yediot reported that PM Olmert and his wife Aliza are personally 
involved in reaching an agreement with the UN that would grant 
refugee status to 90 refugees from Darfur, while the UN would help 
find asylum countries for 310 other people. 
 
Maj. Gen. (res.) Amiram Levin (former OC Northern Command and former 
deputy chief of Mossad) was quoted as saying in an interview with 
Maariv that former PM Ehud Barak's withdrawal from Lebanon had been 
a "catastrophe," that panic had dictated how Israel went to war in 
Lebanon last year, and that the occupation corrupts IDF officers. 
Ben Caspit of Maariv commented that leading Labor Party leadership 
MK Ami Ayalon was trying to sully Barak through Levin. 
 
Maariv reported that American Jews are threatening to stop sending 
money to Israel, saying this is a "country of beggars." 
 
Maariv reported that a new book by Yossi Melman and Meir Javedanfar, 
QThe Nuclear Sphinx of Tehran: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the State of 
Iran,Q reveals that Abdul Qadeer Khan, who had been in charge of 
Pakistan's nuclear program and later sold its secrets, was in the 
crosshairs of Israeli intelligence in the 1990s, which failed to 
define him as a target for assassination. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that the Board of Deputies of British 
Jews, the representative body of the UK's Jewish community, paid 
tribute to outgoing British PM Tony Blair -- a "friend and ally." 
 
Leading media reported that Brig. Gen. Miri Regev, the IDF 
Spokesperson, will retire from her job in the summer.  No 
replacement has yet been named. 
 
Ha'aretz quoted PM Olmert as saying on Thursday that he will not 
blur the fact that there is discrimination in Israel.  Speaking 
before the Israel Democracy Institute, Olmert was referring to the 
Israeli Arabs. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that Interior Ministry Director-General 
Ram Belnikov, in response to a The Jerusalem Post query on Thursday, 
immediately approved entry to Israel for a three--week-old Iraqi boy 
in need of lifesaving heart surgery to be treated at Rambam Medical 
Center in Haifa. 
 
Ha'aretz (English Ed.) reported that Mideast Piece, a new web site 
for gay men in the Middle East, is hoping to promote unity with 
messages of peace and coexistence.  The project is the brainchild of 
John Leonard and Matt Lebow, two American gay men living in Israel 
who met as volunteers at the Jerusalem Open House, the city's gay 
and lesbian community center.  The site, which has been nominated in 
two categories for the Jewish and Israeli Blog Awards, is in 
English, but may eventually be translated into Arabic, though it 
would be a "long way down the road," its creators were quoted as 
saying. 
 
Ha'aretz (English Ed.) ran a feature about Joel Covington, an 
African-American hip-hop singer from Baltimore, who together with 
his wife Shoshana, visited Israel in 1999 and fell in love with the 
country.  Various media had written about Covington and his 
successful legal fight to remain in Israel. 
 
 
 
-------- 
Mideast: 
-------- 
 
Summary: 
-------- 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn and Washington correspondent 
Shmuel Rosner wrote in the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz: "The 
attitude toward Olmert's domestic problems is being seen in 
Jerusalem as an insult and as a reflection of the differences in 
approach within George W. Bush's administration." 
 
Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of the 
mass-circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot: "The transcript of 
 
 
[Olmert's] testimony to the Winograd Commission, which was published 
on Thursday morning, includes very few words that could embarrass 
him." 
 
Editor-in-Chief Amnon Dankner wrote on page one of the popular, 
pluralist Maariv: "The near-complete media consensus for the 
dismissals stems from the media's thirst for drama." 
 
Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote in Ha'aretz: "A 
leader who doesn't know how to run a war and doesn't know how to 
make peace should go home." 
 
Senior columnist and chief defense commentator Zeev Schiff wrote on 
page one of Ha'aretz: "The Israel Defense Forces has too big an 
impact on decision making." 
 
Prof. Amnon Rubinstein, President of the Interdisciplinary Center 
Herzliya, who served as (Meretz) education minister, wrote in 
Maariv: " The 'public opinion makers' must free themselves from the 
fetters of daily events and look at the true threats lying at 
Israel's doorsteps and in-house." 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  "Olmert's Not a Partner" 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn and Washington correspondent 
Shmuel Rosner wrote in the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz 
(5/11): "Leading Israeli sources in Washington heard the following 
assessment from the US administration: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert 
will end his term next spring, at the latest, and even if he embarks 
on a political process now, he won't have time to finish it.  The 
public is against him -- both on the left and the right -- and 
anyway, he will not be able to take any significant steps.  In other 
words, Olmert is a lame duck.  Hence, it would be a shame to waste 
time and money speaking with him before he proves that he will 
survive the Labor Party primaries and the final Winograd Commission 
report on the Second Lebanon War.  One could find evidence of this 
perception in the cancellation of US Secretary of State Condoleezza 
Rice's planned visit to Israel.  The cancellation itself was less 
insulting than the reason publicly given for it: the political 
situation in Israel.  Diplomatic language could have disguised the 
rationale as a scheduling conflict, but the US State Department 
insisted on mentioning the problems the prime minister is facing at 
home.  Democracies have their own way of resolving political 
problems, Rice herself told Al Arabiya-TV; she didn't provide 
details.  The attitude toward Olmert's domestic problems is being 
seen in Jerusalem as an insult and as a reflection of the 
differences in approach within George W. Bush's administration. 
Just a week has passed since the President expressed his support for 
Olmert, only a few hours after the release of the Winograd report. 
Rice has reasons to be angry at Olmert, who has not really been 
enthusiastic about her diplomatic efforts in the region; before one 
of her recent visits, he embarrassed her by publicizing a phone 
conversation that he had had with the President." 
 
II.  "The Witness and the State" 
 
Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of the 
mass-circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot (5/11): "Olmert heaved a 
sigh of relief on Thursday:  The transcript of his testimony to the 
Winograd Commission, which was published on Thursday morning, 
includes very few words that could embarrass him.  The burden of 
embarrassment falls mainly on the shoulders of some of the 
commission members.... The members of the commission were not there 
to conduct a journalistic interview with Olmert.  Anyone who reads 
the praise showered upon him by [commission member] Prof. Ruth 
Gavison, and here and there, in slightly less polished terms, by 
Prof. Yehezkel Dror as well, finds it difficult to understand how 
they conform to the final text of the report....  The commission 
chose to disqualify for publication a substantial portion of the 
exchanges of words between its members and the witnesses.  Sources 
in the Prime Minister's Office who received the full transcript on 
Thursday argue that the sections that were shelved included a 
further set of compliments for Olmert.  Gavison praised him for his 
decision to continue the warfare after the cease-fire resolution, 
and also praised him for the content of UN Security Council 
Resolution 1701." 
 
III.  "The Hysteria" 
 
Editor-in-Chief Amnon Dankner wrote on page one of the popular, 
pluralist Maariv (5/11): "For a few days it appeared as if the 
Winograd Commission was a court in which Olmert and Peretz were 
found guilty of terrible acts of malice, such as collaborating with 
the enemy or pouring sugar into the fuel tanks of the IDF tanks.... 
Of course, had the fruits of such a consultation [with the chief of 
staff and high-ranking officers] been, God forbid, ground operations 
that would have caused hundreds of fatalities, imagine what sharp 
words the commission would have used for the fact that the Prime 
Minister preferred external misguided counsel over the levelheaded 
 
and restrained proposal of Dan Halutz to settle for aerial activity 
for the time being.  But who feels like considering such things when 
a general fanfare is heard of cleansing ourselves in the blood of 
leaders, of slaughtering scapegoats and of the foolish and false 
hope that we can solve the problems by dismissals?.... The 
near-complete media consensus for the dismissals stems from the 
media's thirst for drama, from the smugness of self-aggrandizing 
writers who have become kingmakers and king-deposers, and from theQense of bitterness of journalists who praised the decision to go to 
war, and called for a comprehensive ground operation that could have 
ended in heavy disaster and are now reorganizing reality backwards 
and forwards in order to come out looking good." 
 
IV.  "Let Olmert Not Botch Peace, Too" 
 
Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote in Ha'aretz 
(5/11): "The Winograd Commission will take care of teaching Olmert 
how to run a war.  But how to prevent the next one is something 
he'll have to learn on his own.  The one escape hatch left to Olmert 
after his inevitable fall is to keep the next war from breaking out. 
 As someone who supported Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan and 
promised to continue in his path by means of convergence (to the 
1967 borders), the question is whether he is prepared to start 
immediate talks with the Arab countries, including Syria, on the 
basis of the Saudi plan.  This is the best plan the Arabs have 
offered us to date because all the details need mutual consent. 
Moderate Arab states are just as worried about confrontational Islam 
as we are, and Israel should take advantage of that to reach an 
agreement.  If Olmert has the guts, let's see him do something. A 
leader who doesn't know how to run a war and doesn't know how to 
make peace should go home." 
 
¶V.  "In the Shadow of the Army" 
 
Senior columnist and chief defense commentator Zeev Schiff wrote on 
page one of Ha'aretz (5/11): "The main conclusion emerging from the 
testimony given to the Winograd Commission by the three most 
important players -- Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister 
Amir Peretz and former chief of staff Dan Halutz -- is that the army 
dominates in its relationship with the government.  This was 
especially true in view of the political leadership's lack of 
security-related experience.  The conclusion is that the Israel 
Defense Forces has too big an impact on decision making." 
 
VI.  "The Next Elections" 
Prof. Amnon Rubinstein, President of the Interdisciplinary Center 
Herzliya, who served as (Meretz) education minister, wrote in 
Maariv (5/11): "The big fear is that the crisis over the Lebanon War 
will bring forth an extremist nationalist-religious-ultra-Orthodox 
government.... This would be a government without maneuvering room 
that would increase Israel's isolation and create an economic 
disaster.... The resignation [of Olmert and Peretz] is indispensable 
for one main reason: To strengthen the moderate forces in Israeli 
society -- the Labor Party and Kadima -- and to avert an extremist 
right-wing-ultra-Orthodox government.  The 'public opinion makers' 
must free themselves from the fetters of daily events and look at 
the true threats lying at Israel's doorsteps and in-house." 
 
CRETZ