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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 001925 
 
STATE FOR NEA, NEA/IPA, NEA/PPD 
 
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE, SIT ROOM 
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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 
 
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SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
Mideast 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
YediotQs Nahum Barnea and Shimon Shiffer reported that yesterday a 
senior U.S. official told the newspaper that understandings are 
shaping up between the Obama administration and the GOI: Israel will 
pledge to a moratorium on a postponement of at least Qa few months 
of new construction in settlements, in exchange for gestures on the 
part of the Arab states; if the latter do not do so, Israel will be 
able to resume construction in settlement blocs with American 
approval.  Electronic media cited the State Department as saying 
that U.S. Special Envoy for Middle East Peace George MitchellQs New 
York meeting with two emissaries of PM Benjamin Netanyahu had been a 
good one.  Quoting diplomatic sources in Jerusalem as saying that 
the round of talks between the Americans and NetanyahuQs envoys is 
expected to result in a compromise, Maariv speculated that a 
three-way summit is on the way. 
 
The Jerusalem Post quoted Silvan Shalom, Vice PM and Minister for 
Regional Development and the Development of the Negev and the 
Galilee, and the PAQs Economy Minister Bassem Khoury as saying that 
their meeting this yesterday in Jerusalem focused solely on 
day-to-day issues and did not constitute negotiations.  However, 
speaking on Israel Radio this morning, Shalom reported that his 
meetings might lead to a diplomatic dialogue.  The Web site 
nana10.co.il wrote that yesterday the Palestinian Web site Quds-net 
reported that a high-ranking source in the PA told Quds-net that 
preparations were underway for a meeting between Palestinian PM 
Salam Fayyad and Israeli DM Ehud Barak that would be held some time 
in the course of the current month. The PA source was quoted as 
saying that Fayyad would present Barak with the Palestinians' 
requests for further relief measures, such as opening the border 
crossings into the Gaza Strip.  The two men are expected to discuss 
a number of other issues as well. 
 
HaQaretz quoted the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat. As saying 
that the Russian cargo ship that disappeared on its way from Finland 
to Algeria came up in talks between Finnish PM Matti Vanhanen and 
Russian PM Vladimir Putin, who met yesterday in the Polish city of 
Gdansk to discuss energy and the environment.  HaQaretz reported 
that a spokeswoman for President Shimon PeresQs residence declined 
to respond to TIME MagazineQs questions about a possible connection 
between the affair and Peres's meeting with Putin.  (Peres made a 
sudden visit to Russia the day after the ship was found.)  Ron 
Ben-Yishai of the leading Web news site Ynet reported that Russia 
staged the hijacking of the ship following a tip it received from an 
unnamed country.  Ben-Yishai said that that country revealed to 
Russia that S-300 missiles were concealed in the ship.  Speaking on 
Channel 2-TV this morning, Ben-Yishai named the country in question 
as Israel. 
 
Israel Radio reported that this morning two mortar shells landed in 
the Negev, near Gaza.  The radio later said that the shells actually 
landed in Gazan territory. 
 
Israel Radio quoted the Kuwaiti newspaper Alseyassah as saying, 
based on defense sources in Europe, that there were chemical weapons 
in HizbullahQs weapons warehouse that blew up on southern Lebanon 
around six weeks ago and that three members of the group were killed 
by those materials, in addition to eight Hizbullah militants who 
were killed in the explosion.  According to Alseyassah, Hizbullah 
started stockpiling chemical weapons in south Lebanon last 
December. 
 
HaQaretz reported that the State Prosecutor's representative twice 
hinted that construction in West Bank settlements might be 
retroactively legalized Wednesday, seemingly representing a major 
policy turnaround.  The two responses are a departure from the 
state's usual response that the structures are illegal and are 
expected to be demolished.  HaQaretz says that the responses, coming 
three weeks after Vice PM and Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe 
Ya'alon said that the State Prosecutor is not faithfully 
representing the current government's view on settlements, seem to 
signal a change in policy.  The Jerusalem Post reported that 
yesterday Peace Now charged that pressure exerted on the State 
AttorneyQs Office by politicians, including Justice Minister Yaakov 
NeQeman, had caused it to suddenly change its approach to illegal 
construction by settlers in the West Bank.  Leading media reported 
that MaQaleh Adumim Mayor Benny Kashriel plans to lay a cornerstone 
on the controversial West Bank hilltop of E-1 on Monday to protest 
continued international pressure in that unbuilt area of his city. 
 
IDF Radio cited a survey carried out by the Israeli GovernmentQs 
Central Bureau of Statistics that in the first half of 2009, a 33% 
drop was recorded in the start of new construction work in the West 
Bank, in comparison with the equivalent period last year. 
Construction in the territories is carried out on the basis of 
permits issued in the terms of previous governments, prior to 
Netanyahu's government. 
 
Israel Radio cited the U.S. newspaper (?) Politico as saying, Qbased 
on American sources,Q that President Obama will demand that Israel 
not evacuate Palestinians from Jerusalem. 
 
Makor Rishon-Hatzofe reported that Israel has released nine Hamas 
Parliament members at the end of their jail term. 
 
Yediot: and Maariv reported on an exhibition starting today at Tel 
AvivQs Journalists' House (Beit Sokolov) depicting seven female 
suicide bombers who carried out attacks in Israel.  The womenQs 
faces are inserted in reproductions of famous paintings representing 
the Virgin Mary and the Child.  Yediot reported that bereaved 
families protested.  Yediot also cited one of the artists as saying 
that the show actually condemns those womenQs actions. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that yesterday the Supreme Arab 
Committee declared tha the Israeli Arab sector will hold a one-day 
weeknd general strike on October 1, marking the annivesary of the 
October 2000 riots in which 13 Israei Arabs were killed. 
 
The Jerusalem Post and othr media reported that yesterday Israel 
AerospaceIndustries revealed a new missile system called JUMER 
that can function as an autonomous artillery ystem for infantry 
forces operating behind enemylines. 
 
HaQaretz and Yediot reported that yesterday an organization that 
works to strengthen ties between Israel and Diaspora Jews launched a 
scare-tactic campaign that urges Israelis to combat assimilation in 
North America by working to prevent the "loss" of their own Jewish 
acquaintances there.  The 10-day Hebrew-language campaign, to be 
shown on television and online, was prepared by a leading 
advertising firm at the behest of MASA, a partnership between the 
Jewish Agency and the Israeli Government that helps finance and 
market semester- and year-length Israel programs for Diaspora Jews. 
 
 
Leading media reported that yesterday the IAF grounded its QSufa 
F-16I fighter planes, after one of the aircraft made a forced 
landing.  The planes will be able to fly again today or tomorrow. 
 
Leading media (lead stories in HaQaretz and Makor Rishon-Hatzofe) 
reported that the rabbis of the Edah Haredit, a prominent 
anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox communal organization, who have led the 
Jerusalem protests throughout the summer, will today issue new 
guidelines for their struggle against the opening of the municipal 
Karta parking garage on the Sabbath.  While not calling for an end 
to the disputes, the rabbis are calling to avoid violence and damage 
to property.  An Arab taxi driver was lynched and badly injured in 
JerusalemQs ultra-Orthodox quarter of Mea Shearim on Tuesday. 
 
HaQaretz reported that extensive fortifications recently discovered 
in the archaeological excavation in Silwan in East Jerusalem (in the 
area known as the City of David) go back about 3,700 years, to the 
biblical period of the Patriarchs, revealing that Jerusalem at that 
time was significantly larger and stronger than previously 
believed. 
 
Maariv reported that the Bank of Israel's updated growth projection 
for the Israeli economy, which brought anticipated growth for 2009 
up to 0% and 2.5% for 2010, places Israel as the only country among 
the developed countries not to have negative growth in 2009.  Out of 
a long list of 45 countries, Israel is ranked sixth in the global 
economic growth chart.  This result if achieved if one 
cross-references the Bank of Israel's projections with the growth 
projections for 45 other countries (Israel was not included) that 
was provided by The Economist. 
 
The Jerusalem Post cited a Tel Aviv University study made public 
yesterday, according to which Israel is at the bottom of the chart 
that records the relative amount of aid given by industrialized 
nations to developing countries. 
 
Maariv reported that South African President Jacob Zuma called on 
Jews originating in his country to come back. 
 
Yediot reviewed the results of a QsurprisingQ survey conducted by 
American pollster Stanley Greenberg, which show an increase in 
support of the American public for Israel -- especially among 
supporters of the Democratic Party.  According to Yediot, which does 
not supply figures from the poll, Greenberg presented it to senior 
officials in the State Department. 
 
-------- 
Mideast: 
-------- 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  "Tell the Settlers the Truth" 
 
The independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized (9/3): 
QAccording to the minutes distributed by the Prime Minister's Office 
after Netanyahu's meeting with the heads of the Yesha Council of 
[Jewish] Settlements [in the Territories] last month, the Prime 
Minister stated that QWe are all interested in the same thing,Q and 
then added, QBut we must act wiselyQ.... There is no magic spell to 
clear the way to an agreement with the Palestinians based on a 
partition of the land that will also satisfy the ideological 
leadership of the right.  If Netanyahu is committed to a Qtwo states 
for two peoplesQ solution, clearly he and the Yesha Council are not 
Qinterested in the same thing.Q  If the Prime Minister really wants 
to resume talks with the Palestinians, he must tell the settlers 
boldly that negotiations on the future of the occupied territories 
are not reconcilable with creating facts in those territories.  We 
can only hope that when the Prime Minister spoke of the necessity to 
Qact wiselyQ he was not hinting at an intention of abusing the 
effort by the American President to find a compromise on the 
settlement issue or of evading his commitments to freeze 
construction over the Green Line and to remove the outposts. 
 
II.  "The Enemies Who Protect Us" 
 
Middle East affairs commentator Dr. Guy Bechor, a lecturer at the 
Interdisciplinary Center, wrote in the mass-circulation, pluralist 
Yediot Aharonot (9/3): QAn odd thing is happening, something almost 
unprecedented, and it has unfolded without official Israel having 
paid it any attention whatsoever: the enormous Sunni-Shiite 
conflict, as well as the rise of political Islam, have turned into 
implements that serve Israel.  The work of the righteous is done by 
their enemies [a play on a Hebrew phrase], and Israel's enemies are 
so busy trying to survive between themselves that they have become 
Israel's best border guards, and they do a good job at that too -- 
better than us.  Instead of Israel serving as an implement for them, 
as usual, they have become an implement in Israel's hands.  Hamas is 
guarding Gaza closely, and mainly the rocket launching grounds and 
the border areas with Israel.  When the members of a militia more 
radical than Hamas violated the arrangement and fired at Israel, 
Hamas butchered them mercilessly.... Hizbullah is guarding southern 
Lebanon closely, lest Sunni forces, such as Palestinians or 
al-Qaida-affiliates, should penetrate it.  Ironically, Hizbullah has 
turned into the great stabilizing force of southern Lebanon and, 
consequently, of the border with Israel as well.... Fatah has been 
operating against Hamas in Judea and Samaria [i.e. the West Bank] as 
never before, knowing full well that if it fails to do this 
constantly, Hamas will rise up and destroy it, as it did in Gaza. 
In this case too, the most fundamental human rights are trampled 
underfoot in the arrests and the random executions.  Syria too has 
kept the area closest to the border with Israel purged of any 
hostile elements because it does not want to have the border erupt. 
It also knows that its border with Israel could be its soft 
underbelly, an implement in the hands of its enemies.  Egypt and 
Jordan are not enemies of Israel at all, but they too operate in the 
same way.... Here is the paradox: ... the deeper we penetrated into 
Arab territory in order to fight terrorism, the deeper we sank into 
the Arab mud and the mud of our disagreement among ourselves, and 
that only served to intensify terrorism.  Once upon a time we used 
to use internal Arab disputes as leverage; now Israel (unwittingly 
so) is utilizing internal Arab differences as leverage for its own 
benefit. 
 
III.  "Abu MazenQs Vision of a Freeze" 
 
Settler leader Israel Harel wrote in the independent, left-leaning 
HaQaretz (9/3): QJust now, however, when Netanyahu is pursuing a 
total construction freeze, [PA President Mahmoud] Abbas has issued 
an ultimatum to him via Al Jazeera-TV: Without a construction freeze 
in the settlements, he won't meet with Netanyahu.... Abbas has 
apparently come to the conclusion that as a result of the low point 
to which Israel's status has sunk in the world and the 
disintegration of Israeli solidarity, it is not worthwhile at this 
point to renew talks with Israel.  It is preferable in his view that 
Israel be in a situation in which it is attacked from all directions 
and continues to lose status, societal cohesion and self-confidence. 
 And when the siege tightens on all sides, and we see governments 
and non-profit organizations dealing with this intensively all over 
the world, it will be possible to begin to implement the real 
vision: a Palestinian state from the Mediterranean to the Jordan 
River. 
 
CUNNINGHAM