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P 191014Z OCT 07
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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 003030 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEA/PPD 
 
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM 
NSC FOR NEA STAFF 
 
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LONDON ALSO FOR HKANONA AND POL 
PARIS ALSO FOR POL 
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SIPDIS 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OPRC KMDR IS
 
SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION 
 
 
-------------------------------- 
SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶1.  Mideast 
 
¶2.  Iran 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that President Bush is sending National 
Security Advisor Stephen Hadley to the Middle East next week and 
that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will return soon after 
that.  The Jerusalem Post also reported that Secretary Rice was 
encouraged by what she heard in the region, while still 
acknowledging splits between the two sides. 
 
All media reported on PM Ehud Olmert one-day visit to Moscow to see 
Russian President Vladimir Putin.  The Jerusalem Post quoted a 
senior official in Olmert's office that Olmert returned "with an 
understanding that Russia is concerned about Iran having nuclear 
weapons."  Olmert told Yediot: QWe held a very thorough, impressive 
and encouraging conversation. I was very encouraged by what 
President Putin said to me on the Iranian issue and also about other 
issues that are causing us profound concern, such as the expected 
arms deals between Russia and Syria. 
 
Major media reported that on Thursday President Bush met Defense 
Minister Ehud Barak in Washington.  The radio reported that Barak 
thanked Bush for increasing military aid to Israel and that 
diplomatic pressure on Iran should be increased.  The Jerusalem Post 
reported that Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs 
Nicholas Burns told the newspaper on Wednesday that the UN Security 
Council is taking too long in introducing additional sanctions 
against Iran. 
 
All media reported that the Winograd Commission announced that it 
will publish its final report by the end of the year.  The IDF 
Advocate General still plans to petition the High Court of Justice 
for a delay to allow those individuals whose reputations may be 
tarnished to respond before the report is issued.  Makor 
Rishon-Hatzofe quoted senior Labor Party members as saying that they 
will topple the government after the publication of the report. 
Ha'aretz reported that Amos Gilad, the head of the 
Political-Military Bureau at the Defense Ministry, turned down a 
proposal by UN envoy Geir Pedersen that Israel enter into 
negotiations with Lebanon over Sheba Farms.  Pedersen noted that the 
evidence boosts Lebanese claims to the area. 
 
Leading media reported that a majority of Knesset members -- 
including 13 from Kadima -- signed a petition this week calling for 
Jerusalem to remain undivided in a move that could tie Olmert's 
hands ahQd of the Annapolis meeting.  Ha'aretz reported that Shas 
party leader and Industry, Trade, and Employment Minister Eli Yishai 
told the newspaper in Washington that any mention of Jerusalem in 
the document will lead to Shas leaving the government coalition. 
The Jerusalem Post quoted Shas sources as saying that their mentor 
Rabbi Ovadia Yosef made similar remarks on Thursday. 
 
Israel Radio quoted the Washington based Internet newspaper World 
Tribune as saying that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's health has 
deteriorated over the past 24 hours, but that his life is not in 
danger. 
 
Yediot reported that on Thursday President Shimon Peres compared 
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Hitler and Stalin.  Major 
media quoted Peres as saying that there is unquestionable evidence 
that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.  Major media quoted Peres 
as saying that six would-be suicide bombers have been caught in the 
past three weeks. 
 
Yediot reported that Arab and Islamic countries, including Egypt and 
Iran, have recently introduced an amendment to a proposed UNESCO 
resolution encouraging Holocaust education around the world.  The 
amendment, which is supported by 70 countries, says that the 
Holocaust is not unique. 
 
Major media reported that the IDF reprimanded Brig. Gen. Yair Golan, 
the former IDF West Bank commander, for making use of the "neighbor 
procedure" (using human shields). 
 
Yediot and The Jerusalem Post reported that on Thursday Finance 
Minister Roni Bar-On left for the annual convention of the IMF and 
the World Bank to try to convince these organizations to support 
Israel's bid to be admitted into the OECD. 
 
Yediot and other media reported that Israel knew for years that the 
body of Ethiopian-Israeli Gabriel Dawit was in Lebanon, but that it 
did not inform the family.  Dawit's body was returned to Israel in 
this week's "small deal" with Hizbullah. 
 
Various media cited comments by Larissa Trimbovler, the wife of 
Yitzhak Rabin's assassin Yigal Amir, that contrary to media reports, 
she does not plan to give birth to the couple's son on the 
anniversary of the assassination. 
 
Leading media reported that on Thursday four Palestinian activists 
-- two from Fatah and two from Hamas -- were killed in factional 
violence in Gaza. 
 
Major media reported that FM Tzipi Livni protested against 
anti-Semitic remarks last week by Belarus President Aleksandr 
Lukashenko. 
 
The Jerusalem Post cited an AP wire report quoting US mayors 
visiting Israel that they are interested in joint projects, 
following a tour of leading biotechnology companies. 
 
Maariv and The Jerusalem Post reported that Israeli surgeons have 
performed circumcisions on hundreds of males in Africa as part of 
AIDS prevention.  Today Channel 2-TV will start broadcasting a 
documentary series on Israelis working in international 
organizations around the world. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
------------ 
¶1.  Mideast: 
------------ 
 
Summary: 
-------- 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn and Washington correspondent 
Shmuel Rosner and wrote in the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz: 
"[Secretary Rice] understands Israel's security concerns, but ... if 
the current opportunity is missed, Israel will find itself facing 
the forces of radical Islam -- and also a less friendly 
administration in America." 
Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of the 
mass-circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot: "[Secretary Rice's] 
apocalyptic vision is simple and chilling.... Rice is not 
[anti-Israel] -- far from it.... Still, the continuation of the 
occupation is perceived by her not only as a political and military 
problem, but also as a moral problem." 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  "Rice's Marketing Trip" 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn and Washington correspondent 
Shmuel Rosner and wrote in the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz 
(10/19): "Secretary Rice devoted her visit to the Middle East this 
week to aggressive marketing of her initiative.  Her message was 
that it is very much worth Israel's while to achieve an agreement 
with the Palestinians while Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud 
Abbas and PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad are still on the scene, and 
while the friendly Bush administration is still in power.  She 
understands Israel's security concerns, but statesmanship is 
sometimes about making a choice between the bad and the awful, and 
if the current opportunity is missed, Israel will find itself facing 
the forces of radical Islam -- and also a less friendly 
administration in America." 
 
II.  "Rice's Truth" 
 
Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of the 
mass-circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot (10/19): "In meetings 
[Condoleezza Rice] held here, she compared the Israeli-Palestinian 
conflict to her academic area of specialization: the Soviet Union. 
'The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.  Five years before the 
collapse, no one thought it could happen.  Two years before the 
collapse, one year before the collapse, no one predicted the 
collapse.  The international arena is influenced by all kinds of 
factors that can be monitored and analyzed.  What cannot be 
predicted is the moment in which all these factors come together and 
create a change.'  She believes that the Palestinians and the 
Israelis face a similar juncture.  Nothing is certain, but it is 
worth trying.  We must try.  A comprehensive arrangement will not 
come of this, apparently, not now and perhaps not by the end of the 
current administration's term, but we must prove to the Palestinians 
that there is a chance for an arrangement, otherwise.... Her 
apocalyptic vision is simple and chilling.  'If we do not prove that 
there is a chance for an arrangement,' she said to her Israeli 
interlocutors, 'you will not get Hamas in the West Bank.  You will 
get a different Hamas, with widespread Iranian infiltration, with 
al-Qaida.  Who would have imagined five years ago, that there would 
be cooperation between Hamas and Iran?  Today it is part of the 
reality in Gaza'.... The moralizing attitude, generated by Sunday 
sermons of Evangelist preachers in southern churches, led President 
Jimmy Carter to achieve a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt, 
and then led him to blind identification with the Palestinian 
suffering, to the verge of hating Israel.  Rice is not there -- far 
from it.  She is too loyal to Bush's basic approach.  She is too 
pragmatic.  Still, the continuation of the occupation is perceived 
by her not only as a political and military problem, but also as a 
moral problem." 
 
III.  "Why Failure Is Not an Option at Annapolis" 
 
David Kimche, former director-general of the Foreign Ministry, in 
the conservative, independent Jerusalem Post (10/19): "A one-state 
solution is rapidly gaining supporters among Palestinian radical 
elements.  A failure in Annapolis could eventually tip the balance 
in its favor.... Eventually we will have to make the choice -- to 
make the most of the opportunity that exists to end the conflict, or 
to be drawn, willy-nilly, into the unknown of a one-state solution, 
with all its dire consequences." 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
--------- 
¶2.  Iran: 
--------- 
 
Summary: 
-------- 
 
The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized: " The 
'anti-war' camp has to wake up and realize that, by blocking 
effective non-military measures, it is paving the road to war." 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
"Pacifist Warmongers" 
 
The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized (10/19): 
"Ostensibly, the world is dividing into two camps: those warning of 
war and those warning against war.... In such a division, those 
willing to contemplate war or saying that Iran must be stopped are 
being painted as the 'pro-war' camp, while those speaking against 
force or for tolerating a nuclear Iran are the 'anti-war' faction. 
But is it really how an astute observer should look at things, as if 
there are pro-war and anti-war camps?  In fact, these labels should 
be reversed.  The 'pro-war' camp not only does not want war, but is 
working to prevent war much more than is the 'anti-war' camp.  By 
the same token, it is the 'anti-war' camp that is misguidedly 
ensuring that war will come.... The 'anti-war' camp has to wake up 
and realize that, by blocking effective non-military measures, it is 
paving the road to war." 
 
JONES