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P 280958Z AUG 09
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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 001887 
 
STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEAPPD 
 
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM 
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PARIS ALSO FOR POL 
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E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OPRC KMDR IS
 
SUBJECT: ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION 
 
-------------------------------- 
SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
Mideast 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
Israel Radio quoted a senior American official as saying that the 
talks between Israel and the Palestinians could be resumed even 
without a complete freeze in settlement construction and that the 
U.S. insists on a complete freeze in settlement construction.  The 
radio reported that an Arab diplomat confirmed the U.S. officialQs 
statement and said that Israel should content itself with a symbolic 
thaw of relations with the Arab states, while the Palestinians would 
receive in exchange a partial freeze of construction in settlements. 
 Both officials were interviewed by a Reuters correspondent in 
Washington. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that two Likud rallies have been 
organized to express opposition to the settlement freeze PM Benjamin 
Netanyahu reportedly negotiated with U.S. Special Envoy for Middle 
East Peace George Mitchell in London.  The first, scheduled for 
Tuesday at Tel Aviv's Azrieli Tower, was organized by 
Minister-without-Portfolio Yossi Peled.  It is not officially an 
anti-Netanyahu rally but rather a "pro-Jerusalem event," and yet 
Knesset members who attend are expected to bash the deal the PM is 
negotiating with the Americans.  The second, set for September 9 at 
the Likud's Tel Aviv headquarters, openly opposes any freeze on 
construction in the West Ban and will launch a "National Forum" in 
the Likud that will actively oppose concessions to the U.S.  Three 
ministers have told organizers they will attend the event: 
Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan, Communications 
Minister Moshe Kahlon, and Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein. 
 Organizers still hope to attract Vice PM Moshe Ya'alon and 
Minister-without-Portfolio Bennie Begin to the rally.  In a related 
matter, The Jerusalem Post quoted Pinchas Wallerstein, the 
Director-General of the Yesha Council of Jewish Settlements in the 
Territories, as saying yesterday: "When Netanyahu talks of a 
Palestinian state, I hate it, but am not worried, because there will 
be no peace deal.  When Netanyahu speaks about a settlement freeze, 
it's a death sentence for the settlement enterprise." 
 
The media highlighted events organized yesterday to mark Gilad 
Shalit's 23rd birthday.  Israel Radio cited the London-based 
Al-Hayat that quoted Egyptian sources as saying that Hamas political 
leader Khaled Mashal will come to Cairo next week to finalize the 
Shalit deal. 
 
All media reported that yesterday in Berlin, PM Benjamin Netanyahu, 
who was presented the architectural blueprints of the 
Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps that will be permanently deposited at 
the Yad Vashem Museum in Jerusalem, hinted at the danger posed to 
Israel by the Iranian nuclear program.  The media also reported that 
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who ignored Netanyahu's 
Auschwitz-Iran comparison, reiterated the need for a freeze on 
settlement construction on a number of occasions during her joint 
press conference with the Israeli PM.  Israel Radio reported that 
Israel is resuming its strategic dialogue with Germany, and that 
Netanyahu and eight of his senior ministers are slated to visit 
Germany in one-and-a-half months. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported on more illegal building in northern 
West Bank settlements -- for instance in Kiryat Netafim. The 
newspaper also cited a report published yesterday by the Ir Amim NGO 
-- an Israeli organization founded in 2004 to promote 
Israeli-Palestinian co-existence in Jerusalem -- that the GOI is 
helping a plan to move an additional 750 Jews into Arab areas of 
East Jerusalem. 
 
Israel Radio reported that Bahrain denied a report in the British 
daily The Guardian that it will allow El Al planes to fly in its air 
space and that an Israeli Embassy and cultural mission will open in 
its capital, Manama.  Israel Radio cited an announcement by the 
Bahraini Foreign Ministry that there will not be normalization with 
Israel until just, full peace is established in the Middle East. 
The Guardian had reported that Bahrain, Qatar, Morocco, and the UAE 
has agreed in principle to overflights  by El Al airliners and the 
opening of diplomatic representations as part of a normalization of 
relations with Israel. 
 
Former Irish President and former U.N. Human Rights Commissioner 
Mary Robinson, a member of the 'Elders' delegation touring Israel 
and the Palestinian territories, was quoted as saying in an 
interview with The Jerusalem Post that if Israel does not freeze 
settlement construction, a two-state solution may no longer be 
possible.  Bishop Desmond Tutu, another member of the delegation, 
was quoted as saying in an interview with HaQaretz: 
The lesson that 
Israel must learn that the Holocaust 
is that it can never get 
security through fences, walls, and guns. 
 
HaQaretz reported that, standing in for the leaders of Israel, the 
U.S., the PA, and other regional and world actors, Israeli policy 
experts met this week at a Council for Peace and Security-sponsored 
simulation of the Obama peace initiative's launch.  The daily's 
Akiva Eldar reported that the results of the exercise resembled 
reality -- hopeful but fraught with risks. 
 
Citing FM Avigdor LiebermanQs upcoming trip to several African 
countries, Maariv reported that the Israeli Government is trying to 
fight Iranian rapprochement plans in Africa. 
 
HaQaretz and Maariv reported that Palestinian authorities in the 
West Bank, funded by USAID, have begun replacing Israeli-installed 
road signs bearing Hebrew script with new signs in just Arabic and 
English.  The move is in preparation for a future Palestinian state. 
HaQaretz cited an AP report quoting Howard Sumka of USAID as saying 
that the project is expected to take four years and cost $20 
million. 
 
HaQaretz quoted peace activist Prof. Leonard Fine as saying in an 
Internet blog that when the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy came to 
Israel in 1995 to attend the funeral of assassinated PM Yitzhak 
Rabin, he scattered on RabinQs grave earth from the graves of his 
brothers, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and President John F. Kennedy. 
 
HaQaretz (English Ed.) reported that U.S.-born Judge Neal Hendel, 
who has been appointed Justice in the High Court of Justice, Qbrings 
in U.S. legal experience, not just religion. 
 
Yediot reported that many Israeli residents of Los Angeles planning 
to return to their homeland as a result of the current economic 
depression have defrauded American citizens and businesses. 
 
Yediot reported that Beirut Mayor Abdel Mounim Ariss, who also 
chairs the Union of Mediterranean Cities (sic), has invited the 
Mayor of Haifa, Yona Yahav, to a congress on proper water usage. 
 
The Jerusalem Post cited the results of a Smith Research poll taken 
this week on behalf of the newspaper: The number of Israelis who see 
President Obama's policies as pro-Israel has fallen to 4% from 6% in 
a Jerusalem Post poll in June.  Fifty-one percent of Jewish Israelis 
consider Obama's administration more pro-Palestinian than 
 
pro-Israeli, according to the survey, while 35% consider it neutral, 
and 10% declined to express an opinion.  The poll asked Jewish 
Israelis whether they would support freezing settlement construction 
for a year as part of an American-brokered deal.  Fifty percent said 
Qno,Q 41% said QyesQ and 9% did not express an opinion. 
 
-------- 
Mideast: 
-------- 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  "Chain Reaction" 
 
Diplomatic correspondent Aluf Benn wrote in the independent, 
left-leaning HaQaretz (8/28): QThe issue of Iran's nuclear program 
... hovered in the background of [this week's Netanyahu-Mitchell] 
meeting.  After stripping the expected rhetorical flourishes from 
Obama's gesture -- the talk of peace and quotations from the Koran 
-- its strategic purpose is laid bare: the formation of a regional 
coalition against Iran, led by the United States and with the 
participation of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Jordan, 
Morocco, Saudi Arabia and the small Gulf states.  Every member will 
have to contribute something: the United States, the diplomatic 
cover and the military umbrella; Israel, the removal of checkpoints 
and a freeze on building in West Bank settlements; the PA, the 
renewal of the peace talks; Egypt and Saudi Arabia, intra-Arab 
legitimacy; while the Gulf and Maghreb states are to agree to an 
Israeli diplomatic presence on their soil and overflights by El Al 
Israel Airlines in their skies.  The discussion is about the details 
-- the scope of the construction freeze and the normalization -- not 
the essence.  The linkage between the settlements and Iran's nuclear 
program cannot be taken for granted.  Even if not a single new 
apartment is built in Ariel, Psagot or Ma'ale Levona, and even if 
 
all the settlements are dismantled, this will not stop the spinning 
of the centrifuges at the Natanz uranium-enrichment facility.  The 
converse is also true: the elimination of Iran's nuclear program, or 
even the collapse of Iran's Islamic regime and its replacement with 
a pro-Western, pro-Zionist government will not end the conflict over 
the Land of Israel.  The absence of a direct causal relationship, 
however, does not mean that there is no connection. There is a big 
connection, due to the strategic interests of the parties. 
 
II.  "Obama Gives, Obama Gets" 
 
Columnist Shmuel Rosner, who was HaQaretz's correspondent in 
Washington, wrote in the popular, pluralist Maariv (8/28): 
QMitchell, who always excelled in his practical caution, got another 
chance to help the president come down off his high horse.  On the 
way, it looks like he also helped the Prime Minister of Israel. 
Both of them have made mistakes over the past several months: Obama, 
who rightly saw the settlements as an Israeli weak point, which is 
hard to defend to the public, pushed a little too hard, in a 
too-aggressive tone, until he even made some of the people who abhor 
the settlement movement angry with him.  Netanyahu, who hoped to 
reset the political dictionary and erase the concept of the 
two-state solution from it, discovered that the price of such 
semantic ventures did not justify the gain.  This week, a very 
practical conversation took place -- a business meeting.  It was 
actually NetanyahuQs same old give-and-take, only this time it was 
directed toward the American ally rather than toward the Palestinian 
interlocutor.... The seeds of the next calamity are already planted 
in the interim reports about this weekQs meetings between Netanyahu 
and Mitchell.  The reason: it is not certain that Netanyahu will be 
able to deliver the goods that he has promised.  The settlers will 
certainly try to circumvent the slight freeze to which Israel has 
agreed and object to any evacuation.  Even the vague agreement about 
East Jerusalem invites trouble -- the Americans agreed that 
Jerusalem would not be frozen, but understood that Israel would 
try not to go too far in provocations.  This means, practically 
speaking, that right-wing organizations and their supporters will 
try to embarrass the government as much as possible by purchasing 
and populating (two days ago, one of the big donors to these 
organizations had a telephone conversation in which he promised to 
increase the pace), and that the Palestinians will continue to 
expect the American referee to call a foul every time such an 
incident occurs.  But even more than Netanyahu, it is not certain 
that Obama will be able to deliver the goods.  For all practical 
purposes, the U.S. President can be compared to one who promised 
Israel a shipment of goods that has a bill of lading that proves 
that he received them, but they are not yet in the warehouse.  In 
other words, the keeping of MitchellQs promises to Netanyahu -- and 
we are talking here about Qdefining goalsQ more than firm Qpromises 
-- depends upon the keeping of promises that other countries gave to 
Obama. 
 
III.  "Liberals and Israel" 
 
The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post 
editorialized (8/28): 
 
The pro-Israel liberalism embodied by [Edward] Kennedy, Hubert 
Humphrey, Henry Jackson, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and Jacob Javits 
seems archaic nowadays.  Their generation knew first-hand that the 
Arabs' rejection of Israel's existence was at the root of the 
conflict.  Today, calls for throwing the Jews into the sea have been 
replaced by reasonable-sounding Arab initiatives for a two-state 
solution.  Only the fine print -- pertaining to recognition, 
borders, militarization and refugees -- suggests something else. 
Once there were no settlements, and still the Arabs sought Israel's 
destruction.  Yet yesterday, a CNN primer of the conflict pointed to 
settlements as the stumbling block to peace.  Maybe the old Kennedy 
liberals were really centrists, and today's progressives are really 
leftists.  Or maybe, 60 years on, liberals have just grown 
uncomfortable and impatient -- after Lebanon wars, intifadas, 
checkpoints, barriers, and Gaza blockades.  The liberal catechism is 
¶1. All conflicts are soluble; 2. Israel is the stronger party; 3. 
And so it must take the greater risks for peace.  Liberals are 
exasperated by Israel's failure to embrace these principles 
categorically.  Yet we survive in this region because we don't. 
Edward Kennedy understood all this and more.  Israel feels his loss 
acutely. 
 
IV.  "Bibi the Sincere, or Bibi the Cynic" 
 
Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote in the 
independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz (8/28): At the very moment the 
world is waiting for not very far-reaching decisions on freezing 
construction in the territories and the removal of illegal outposts, 
Netanyahu finds himself in a tight spot.  He has to cheat either the 
Jews or the goyim, or he can hitch a ride on U.S. President Barack 
Obama's domestic troubles and do nothing.  But if he does that, the 
day may come when they say about us what Abba Eban said about the 
Palestinians, that they never miss an opportunity to miss an 
opportunity.... When Obama told Bibi that an important aspect of 
friendly relations was to behave honestly, Israel's political elite 
thought that double-talk in the confrontation with the Palestinians 
was over. But Bibi's conditioning his consent to the two-state 
solution on recognition of Israel as a Jewish state and the 
Palestinian state being demilitarized gave immediate cause for 
suspicin.  One state cannot say what another state shouldlook 
like.  For example, George W. Bush insistedon democracy in Gaza, 
thereby dumping it into Haas's hands.... Judging by Special Envoy 
George Michell's activities and messages from the State Deprtment, 
an American proposal will be forthcomingat the end of next month, a 
proposal that will be hard to reject.... 
Sincere or cynical, Bibi 
may still pull a surprise out of the cookie jar. 
 
¶V.  Not a Revolt -- an Awakening 
 
Likud Knesset Member Tzipi Hotovely wrote in the nationalist, 
Orthodox Makor Rishon-Hatzofe (8/28): Contrary to want might have 
been understood from the media, the struggle against construction 
freeze is not a humanitarian gesture to young couples who do not 
have the possibility of establishing their homes in Judea and 
Samaria [i.e. the West Bank].  It is the national struggle of those 
who believe in the right of the Jewish people to build everywhere in 
the Land of Israel [Israel, including the territories].... One 
should not get used to a reality in which leaders breach the voters 
trust regarding the core issues.  Tough diplomatic issues start with 
the erosion of principles and public silence.  We cannot be allowed 
to wake up too late. 
 
CUNNINGHAM