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P 141105Z DEC 09
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RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON PRIORITY 4059
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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 002709 
 
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 
JOINT STAFF WASHDC FOR PA 
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 
 
-------------------------------- 
SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT: 
-------------------------------- 
 
Mideast 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
The Hebrew language newspapers this morning all focused on two main 
stories: The first main story of the day is the cabinet approval of 
the newly proposed map of national priority areas that includes 90 
isolated Jewish settlements in the West Bank. The other major story 
is a decision by Defense Minister Ehud Barak to remove the Har 
Bracha Yeshiva, headed by Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, from the 
arrangement with the IDF that makes it a hesder yeshiva. 
 
All Hebrew-language newspapers reported that Israeli cabinet 
approved yesterday the map of national priority areas, by a majority 
of 22 to 5.  The Labor Party ministers, headed by Labor Party 
Chairman Barak, were in the minority, while the supporters consisted 
of ministers from the Likud, Yisrael Beiteinu, and Shas.  The map 
reportedly includes 90 isolated settlements, as well as communities 
in the Negev and Galilee and Arab towns and villages. 
 
On the decision to expel the Har Bracha yeshiva from the special 
arrangement with the IDF, Defense Minister Barak's office explained 
that Rabbi Melamed's statements in favor of insubordination in the 
ranks of the IDF undermined the foundations of Israeli democracy and 
incited his students. This step was taken by the defense minister 
after Rabbi Melamed refused to attend a hearing scheduled for him at 
the defense minister's office.  Sources close to Rabbi Melamed said, 
in explanation of his refusal, that he did not work for the defense 
minister.  Ma'ariv reports that over 60 graduates of hesder yeshivas 
who serve as IDF reservists signed a petition protesting the 
decision to cancel the arrangement with the Har Bracha Yeshiva, 
stating that if the decision was implemented, they would not be able 
to continue to serve. 
 
Yedioth Aharonot wrote that such a firm step by the army authorities 
was long overdue, adding that a yeshiva such as Har Bracha will "dry 
up" without the army's financial support. The article calls upon the 
political-security establishment to continue to stand firm and act 
against the supporters of disobedience and violent extremists. 
Ma'ariv suggests that Rabbi Melamed's actions were a calculated 
provocation intended to spark a crisis, and says that the security 
establishment fears a direct collision with the entire 
national-religious camp, which is the source of many infantry 
officers in the IDF. 
 
Block Quotes: 
----------- 
-------- 
Mideast: 
-------- 
 
¶I. "Finally" 
 
Military correspondent Alex Fishman wrote in the mass-circulation, 
pluralist Yediot Aharonot (12/14): "This is a blow in the padded and 
well-protected underbelly of the group of extremist rabbis in the 
heart of Samaria.... Now, for the first time, the defense minister 
has made it clear to them: ...You can no longer enjoy the best of 
both worlds- study, serve only half the compulsory service, enjoy 
the prestige of military service win the national-patriotic honor 
that you seek, enjoy all the privileges of discharged soldiers, 
receive financial support for the hesder yeshivas, and also spit in 
all of our faces.... A hesder yeshiva such as Rabbi Melamed's 
yeshiva will dry up without the army's financial support. Now the 
political-security establishment has to stand firm and show no fear. 
Continue this line.  Indict bodies that donate money to disobedient 
soldiers, employ an iron fist against the burners of cars, stage a 
pogrom against those who burned the mosque.  Yes, and we can doff 
our hats to the chief of staff and the defense minister, who finally 
did what should have been done many years ago." 
 
 
II. "Clash Feared with National-Religious Camp" 
 
Liberal columnist and television anchor Ofer Shelach wrote in the 
popular, pluralist Maariv (12/14): "The behavior of Rabbi Eliezer 
Melamed... evokes a sense of an act planned in advance, with the aim 
of bringing the relationship between the security establishment and 
the hesder yeshivas to a crisis.... Barak, who did everything to 
avoid this confrontation ... was left with no choice.... It is ... 
clear that (Rabbi Melamed) thinks that he has the power to make the 
security establishment fold and, on this matter, history is on his 
side. What Melamed knows with certainty is that more than a few of 
his colleagues... think as he does and may now face pressure to 
reveal their position.  Conversely, Barak will find it difficult to 
back down from removing the Har Bracha Yeshiva from the 
arrangement.... More importantly, Melamed's provocation could ignite 
the confrontation that the security establishment fears so badly: A 
direct collision not only with some of the hesder yeshivas, but with 
the national-religious camp in its entirety, the same camp from 
which such a large share of the officers in the infantry brigades 
comes." 
 
III. "Your Destroyers Shall Come Forth From Your Midst" 
 
Political commentator Shalom Yerushalmi wrote in the popular, 
pluralist Maariv (12/14): "During the settler demonstration that was 
held last Wednesday ... several demonstrators distributed an 
anonymous leaflet in hundreds of copies, under the heading "No 
entrance for inspectors."  The leaflet details the names and places 
of residence of the Civil Administration inspectors who distribute 
the freeze orders and come to enforce [the construction freeze] on 
the ground.  Most of these inspectors, apparently, are settlers 
themselves. "Your destroyers shall come forth from your midst," it 
said....The reader of the leaflet can reach several conclusions. 
Firstly, the incitement in the settlements has no limits, even when 
the people in question are their neighbors, within their own house. 
Whoever compares inspectors implementing government policy to a kapo 
and links the temporary freeze orders with anti-Semitism, is an 
inciter and an instigator.     Secondly, (it can be understood that) 
the settlers became accustomed to enslaving the law enforcement 
agencies to their own needs, until the government decided for its 
reasons to also work in the opposite direction.  Thirdly, a person 
who works in the civil service and follows democratic decisions has 
no place in the settlements. I, in their place, would be 
horrified.... For decades, the settlers have complained about the 
rift between them and other parts of the population.  They cannot 
understand why they never succeeded in settling in people's 
hearts.... Now it becomes apparent that they are actually doing 
everything possible to disengage from the state, which until today - 
and today, too - has turned them into its preferred sector and 
always placed them on the map of national priority." 
 
IV. "The price of the 'price tag'" 
 
The independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized (12/14): "The 
arson attack on the mosque in Yasuf, near Nablus, which by all 
indications was carried out by settler extremists from one of the 
neighboring Jewish settlements, should be an immediate wake-up call 
to law enforcement agencies in the territories. The words of 
condemnation... are not enough. Now is the time for action.... The 
burning of the mosque is a link in the chain... of actions the 
settlers themselves have deemed the "price tag." The police and the 
Israel Defense Forces faced the murky and threatening wave without 
taking any genuine action against it.... This seems to indicate that 
burned scriptures in Yasuf could be only the beginning, if the 
police and IDF do not respond immediately. The more time that 
elapses before the perpetrators are arrested, the greater the danger 
that they will continue with their misdeeds and that the relative 
calm prevailing in the West Bank will come to an end with 
Palestinians carrying out acts of revenge. The law enforcement 
agencies must respond immediately, unequivocally and with a heavy 
 
hand, in order to stop those who threaten to ignite a great fire in 
the territories. Now is the time to charge for the "price tag" 
policy." 
 
¶V. "The real price tag" 
 
The conservative, independent Jerusalem Post editorialized (12/14): 
"The motive behind the torching of a West Bank mosque early Friday 
morning was, as the graffiti left behind attested, "To exact a 
price." But the vandals who targeted the house of worship in Yasuf 
struck simultaneously at the sovereign authority of the state... the 
establishment of the Third Commonwealth in 1948 created an 
overarching Zionist authority. Those who reject it and turn to 
violence are flirting with treason. They are men without doubts. Yet 
there were also those who either refused to condemn the attack.... 
We want to hear more settler leaders and rabbis say... that the 
Yasuf attack... is despicable.... Obama (in his Nobel speech)drew no 
applause when he declared that evil was real and pacifism was not 
the way to confront it. He resurrected a Kennedy-esque Democratic 
defense of the use of force, making no apologies for U.S. 
behavior.... He also said that America reserved the right to act 
unilaterally - also a tenet of Israel's security doctrine. We were 
discomfited by the president's oblique implication, in referencing 
the Arab-Israel conflict, that Jews and Arabs fell back in the same 
manner on "tribe" and "religion" in confronting modernity. That's 
patently not true. Yet every time extremist settlers behave badly, 
the real price tag is that it becomes harder to make the case that 
the Jewish state is a beacon of enlightenment in a benighted Middle 
East. 
CUNNINGHAM