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DE RUEHTV #0613/01 0721011
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P 131011Z MAR 09
FM AMEMBASSY TEL AVIV
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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 000613 
 
STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEA/PPD 
 
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM 
NSC FOR NEA STAFF 
 
SECDEF WASHDC FOR USDP/ASD-PA/ASD-ISA 
HQ USAF FOR XOXX 
DA WASHDC FOR SASA 
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CDR USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL FOR POLAD/USIA ADVISOR 
COMSOCEUR VAIHINGEN GE FOR PAO/POLAD 
COMSIXTHFLT FOR 019 
 
JERUSALEM ALSO ICD 
LONDON ALSO FOR HKANONA AND POL 
PARIS ALSO FOR POL 
ROME FOR MFO 
 
SIPDIS 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OPRC KMDR IS
 
SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION 
 
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SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
Mideast 
 
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Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
Media reported that yesterday IDF Chief-of-Staff Gabi Ashkenazi left 
for an official visit to the U.S.  HaQaretz said he is expected to 
warn American military officials about Iranian efforts to develop 
nuclear weapons.  During his five-day visit, Ashkenazi is scheduled 
to meet National Security Advisor James Jones, Chairman of the U.S. 
Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen, and Dennis Ross, Secretary of 
State Hillary ClintonQs Special Advisor for the Gulf and Southwest 
Asia.  YediotQs Washington and Rome correspondents  reported on 
meetings that took place last week in Europe, in which Dennis Ross 
and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns met 
with European officials dealing with Iran.  Yediot reported that, 
during these meetings, U.S. officials assessed that, should Iran 
proceed to the next stage of uranium enrichment, Israel would 
respond in a complex military operation, in which it might use 
land-based commando forces. 
 
All media reported on the speech delivered yesterday by former 
president Moshe Katsav, which lasted over two and a half hours.  The 
speech covered numerous targets: Attorney General Moshe Mazuz, the 
State Prosecutor's Office, the police, the women who filed the 
complaints against him, and the media. In particular, however, he 
assailed Mazuz's integrity (He said: QMy Noose Is MazuzQs LifelineQ) 
and presented himself as a victim of law enforcement agencies.  The 
large-circulation media depicted the event in very harsh terms: 
Yediot bannered its senior columnist Nahum BarneaQs op-ed piece: 
QKatsavQs Circus,Q and Maariv its columnistQs Rino TsrorQs 
commentary: QThe Shame. 
 
Israel Radio reported that a rocket landed in southern Israel this 
morning. 
 
HaQaretz quoted Palestinian sources in Cairo as saying yesterday 
that Israel has agreed to free all 450 of the prisoners demanded by 
Hamas in exchange for Gilad Shalit, and that the dispute now 
revolves around Israel's demand that some of these prisoners be 
deported rather than returned home.   Senior Hamas leader Dr. 
Mahmoud al-Zahar was quoted as saying in an interview with the 
Arabic-language Kull Al-Arab that no progress has been made on the 
prisoner-exchange issue and that the information that Israel 
publishes on the matter is false. 
 
Former U.S. diplomat Fred Hof, who is Qtapped to be a top adviser to 
Middle East special envoy George Mitchell,Q suggested yesterday in 
an interview with The Jerusalem Post that demanding Syria formally 
break with Iran, Hizbullah, and Hamas as a precondition to a peace 
treaty with Israel could be counterproductive.  Hof sees Syria 
receiving sovereignty over Golan territory up to the Sea of Galilee 
and Israelis being able to visit the area without visas. 
 
Israel Radio reported that Fatah demanded of Hamas at their Cairo 
talks that it recognize in Israel.  Hamas reportedly demanded that 
the right to fight Israel be agreed upon.  The Jerusalem Post quoted 
negotiators on both sides as sayng that they are having difficulty 
reaching an agreement over the makeup and political program of a 
Palestinian unity government. 
 
Leading commentators called Prof. Yaakov NeQeman, who is slated for 
the justice ministerQs post, a sophisticated version of incumbent 
minister Daniel Friedmann, 
 
In a FRC story from Quantico, The Jerusalem Post features Hannah 
Feuerstein, granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor, who found 
acceptance and equality with the U.S. Marines. 
 
Former German MP Jamal Assi was quoted as saying in an interview 
with the Arabic-language Assennara that Iran is ready to support and 
establish an Islamic party that would run in the European 
ParliamentQs elections. 
 
Citing the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, The Jerusalem Post reported 
that Steven Rosen, the former policy chief of AIPAC charged with 
receiving classified information, is suing the lobbying group for 
defamation, seeking $21 million. 
 
The Jerusalem Post quoted an Israeli rabbinic delegation as saying 
that the latest crisis with the Vatican is over.  Its members spoke 
after a papal audience. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that the Jewish National Fund is looking 
to revive a plan to import water from Turkey. 
 
HaQaretz reported that the recent GOI decision to introduce 
biometric identity cars is stirring a debate over privacy. 
 
HaQaretz reported that, for minorities, military service is an entry 
ticket into Israeli society. 
 
HaQaretz (English Ed.) reported that, while foreign diplomats find a 
variety of ways to join in local Purim celebrations, the U.S. 
Embassy did not plan special events. 
 
The Jerusalem Post bannered the Bernard Madoff story and made it the 
topic of its editorial. 
 
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Mideast: 
-------- 
 
Summary: 
-------- 
 
Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote in the 
independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz: QThis is a last-minute appeal 
from a worried citizen to Tzipi Livni: Give Bibi a call and tell him 
you are ready to join a unity government under him. 
 
Dr. Ron Breiman, former chairman of the conservative group 
Professors for a Strong Israel, wrote in HaQaretz: QThe Qtwo-state 
visionQ has to be thrown into the garbage bin of history.  It will 
never give rise to peace. 
 
Conservative Op-Ed Page Editor Ben-Dror Yemini wrote in the popular, 
pluralist Maariv: QIf the Construction MinistryQs plans are 
completed, the anti-Zionist vision will be implemented by 
ultra-Zionists.  The binational state will become a fact. 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  "Last-Minute Appeal to Livni" 
 
Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote in the 
independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz (3/13): QThis is a last-minute 
appeal from a worried citizen to Tzipi Livni: Give Bibi a call and 
tell him you are ready to join a unity government under him.... The 
skeleton of the Bibi government, which is now taking on flesh and 
form, recalls a central character in a horror movie.  A faction of 
15 members, most of them unknowns, will shape the character of 
Israel's next government.  The thought that the central figure here, 
Avigdor Lieberman, tried to dictate who Israel's next justice 
minister will be, while he himself faces a hefty indictment, is 
intolerable.... When Begin, who throughout his life talked about 
Greater Israel, came to power, he appointed Moshe Dayan foreign 
minister. When asked why he gave the coveted post to someone from 
Mapai [the precursor of the Labor Party], of all people, he replied: 
QI want someone for whom the world's greats will rise in respect 
when our foreign minister enters their officeQ.... However one looks 
at the situation, Tzipi Livni, Bibi's government in this format is 
not the answer to the grave problems the country faces at this 
time. 
 
II.  "No Room for Two States" 
 
Dr. Ron Breiman, former chairman of the conservative group 
Professors for a Strong Israel, wrote in HaQaretz (3/13): QWe do not 
know what Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu will say to 
U.S. President Barack Obama during their first meeting, but let us 
hope that it will be something along the following lines.... QSince 
Oslo, Israel has been ruled by suicidal tendencies and has been 
brainwashed into believing that peace can be achieved by means of 
suicide: the lie of the establishment of a Palestinian state.  The 
truth is that the Israeli and American interest obliges 
disengagement from the lies that have plunged Israel and its 
neighbors into a downward spiral ever since.  The "two-state vision" 
has to be thrown into the garbage bin of history.  It will never 
give rise to peace. 
 
III.  "The End in Sight" 
 
Conservative Op-Ed Page Editor Ben-Dror Yemini wrote in the popular, 
pluralist Maariv (3/13): QWe are at the last moment.  The Zionist 
vision is dying.... With the advent of the narrow right-wing 
government, which depends on the kindness of supporters of Greater 
Israel, plans to build 73,000 housing units beyond the Green Line 
might materialize.... [In another development,] 900 mostly American 
academics wrote an open letter to the President of the U.S.  They in 
effect asked him to dismantle Israel as a Jewish state and replace 
with a single state.  We are asleep.  If the Construction MinistryQs 
plans are completed, the anti-Zionist vision will be implemented by 
ultra-Zionists.  The binational state will become a fact.... This is 
not all.  The second-largest Spanish daily, El Mundo, recently 
published a totally anti-Semitic article, which does not distinguish 
between Jews and Israel.  The item says that the Jews are to blame 
for all the trouble in history.... Will Israel have a majority to 
withstand the impending disaster?  Will Israeli democracy stop the 
creation of the binational state, which wonQt actually be 
binational, but yet another entity that will amount to a 
bloodbath?.... If we donQt stop this process, it will be the end of 
the Zionist vision. 
 
CUNNINGHAM