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DE RUEHTV #0089/01 0151016
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P 151016Z JAN 10
FM AMEMBASSY TEL AVIV
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RUEHAM/AMEMBASSY AMMAN PRIORITY 7135
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RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON PRIORITY 4187
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UNCLAS TEL AVIV 000089 
 
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: 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶1.  Mideast 
 
¶2.  Israel-Turkey Relations 
 
------------------------- 
Key stories in the media: 
------------------------- 
 
All media continued to report on, and most led with the aftermath of 
the earthquake in Haiti.  Following a five-hour hike across 
decimated Port-au-Prince.  Non-resident Israeli Ambassador to Haiti 
Amos Radian told The Jerusalem Post and other media that he has 
witnessed horrors the likes of which he has never seen in his life. 
The Israeli rescue delegation counts 230 persons.  Major Israeli 
media sent envoys to the devastated capital.  The daughter of the 
late Israeli peace activist Abe Nathan is among the missing people 
in Haiti.  Leading media reported that the U.S. has taken command of 
operations at Port-au-Prince Airport. 
 
The media reported that yesterday a roadside explosive device went 
off near a convoy of cars carrying three Israeli diplomats traveling 
from Jordan toward Israel.  (Yediot headlined: QAn attack 
foretold.Q)  The blast occurred at around 6 p.m. close to the 
Allenby Bridge crossing between Jordan and the West Bank.  No one 
was hurt.   Branches of al-Qaida or World Jihad are believed to be 
behind the attack.  Leading media reported that Jordanian FM Nasser 
Judeh subsequently called Israel's Ambassador to Jordan Daniel Nevo. 
 Judeh stressed in his conversation with Nevo that Jordanian 
authorities were investigating the incident and that every effort 
was being made to apprehend the perpetrators of the attack as soon 
as possible.  HaQaretz cited the Foreign MinistryQs emphasis that 
Nevo was not in the convoy, and was never in any danger.  HaQaretz 
and other media quoted Al Arabiya-TV as saying that Jordanian 
authorities arrested overnight in Amman a taxi driver suspected of 
involvement in the assault. 
 
Israel Hayom reported that Israel is not ruling out indirect, U.S. 
brokered negotiations with the Palestinians. 
 
In an interview with Maariv, liberal Professor Zeev Sternhell, who 
was targeted by QJewish terroristQ Yaakov QJackQ Teitel, says that 
the left wing has been waiting for years for an QIsraeli De Gaulle, 
and that Netanyahu has such potential. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that Gilad ShalitQs father Noam is 
expected to fly to Turkey next week to raise support among key 
Muslim clerics for his sonQs release.  All media reported that on 
Wednesday, Brazilian-American energy tycoon Guma Aguiar, the chief 
sponsor of the Beitar Jerusalem soccer team, told the Jerusalem 
weekly Kol Ha'ir that he had recently visited Gaza in a one-man 
attempt to bring Gilad Shalit back home.  According to media 
reports, Aguiar attempted to enter Gaza via the Erez Crossing but 
was turned back by soldiers.  He was later admitted in a psychiatric 
hospital. 
 
Maariv reported that former Shas leader Arye DerQi removed any doubt 
that he is preparing his political comeback last week when he tried 
to persuade Knesset Member Shaul Mofaz (Kadima) not to run for his 
partQs leadership. 
 
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post , outgoing Director-General 
of the Yesha Council of Jewish Settlements in the Territories, said 
that Palestinian statehood must be prevented, but not through 
violence against the IDF or innocent Palestinians. 
 
The Jerusalem Post reported that yesterday the Supreme Court 
accepted an appeal by Yitzhak Mondrovich against his extradition, 25 
years after he arrived in Israel and 24 years after U.S. authorities 
indicted him on suspicion of committing 13 sexual crimes against 
five boys aged nine to 13.  The newspaper noted that it took 23 
years for the extradition request to arrive. 
 
Every Friday starting February 24, HaQaretz will add a weekly insert 
of the Jewish American newspaper The Forward to its English 
edition. 
 
------------ 
¶1.  Mideast: 
------------ 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
¶I.  QGambling over U.S. Support 
 
Senior columnist and longtime peace advocate Yoel Marcus wrote in 
the independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz (1/15): QThe likelihood of 
Congress supporting dramatic sanctions against Israel is slim.  So 
it seems [Senator MitchellQs remark on a possible withdrawal of loan 
guarantees] was not a threat, but rather a to-the-point answer to a 
question -- namely, what the President can and cannot do on his own 
authority.  However, it turns out that in addition to [Deputy 
Foreign Minister Daniel] Ayalon, we have another macho in our midst 
-- Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, who immediately responded 
arrogantly that we don't need the American guarantees at all. 
Really?  And what if that sanction were to be only part of a larger 
removal of the U.S. security and diplomatic umbrella over Israel? 
The Israeli braggart neither sleeps nor slumbers. 
 
II.  QFailure to Relaunch 
 
Daniel Levy, a key Israeli drafter of the Geneva Initiative, wrote 
in HaQaretz (1/15): QThe main wild card in [resuming 
Israeli-Palestinian negotiations] is the Obama administration.  Year 
One combined early engagement and a strong declarative commitment to 
Israeli-Palestinian peace with a frustrating lack of new thinking or 
political daring from the George Mitchell team, while the President 
was not personally involved and did not take ownership of the issue. 
 The U.S. may be satisfied with a convenient and showy re-launch of 
negotiations, followed by the plodding predictability of process 
over substance.  President Obama may, however, take seriously his 
own admonition that this issue matters to American strategic 
interests.  That would translate into U.S. leadership in shaping a 
breakthrough, preferably with E.U. and Quartet support, creating 
real choices and deploying new incentives and disincentives with the 
parties, notably Israel.  Ultimately, for all the noise and 
speculation regarding their resumption, Israeli-Palestinian 
negotiations are likely to prove rather inconsequential.  Success or 
failure in achieving de-occupation and two states will depend 
primarily on the conversation between Obama and Netanyahu, their 
political calculations, priorities and persistence.  And that 
conversation has barely begun. 
 
III.  QDebunking Anti-Zionist Myths 
 
Amnon Rubinstein, Law Professor at the Interdisciplinary Center and 
a former education minister from Meretz, wrote in the conservative, 
independent Jerusalem Post (1/15): QFor Israel, the only alternative 
to being Jewish is not an enlightened Western multicultural society, 
but to be dominated by the Muslim ocean in which it lives as a 
menaced island.  If this happens, the only democracy in the Middle 
East would have disappeared, and the Jews of Israel would be forced 
into another exile from their historical homeland.... Jews, like 
other peoples of the world, have a right to their own narrative and 
their own state.  This right exists despite the ramblings from 
IsraelQs anti-Zionist brigade. 
 
---------------------------- 
¶2.  Israel-Turkey Relations: 
---------------------------- 
 
Block Quotes: 
------------- 
 
QDiplomacy Is not a Circus 
 
The independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz editorialized (1/15): QThe 
problem [in this weekQs official Israeli treatment of Turkey] was 
not a slip of the tongue or a comment leaked from a closed meeting. 
It was a deliberate act by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and 
his deputy Ayalon, and the finale is far from happy.  We have to 
turn it into the beginning of something else: the removal of 
Lieberman and Ayalon from the rickety flagship of Israeli 
diplomacy.... The anchor of Turkish-Israeli strategic ties is the 
Turkish army, which has seen itself as the constitutional keeper of 
the seal since Mustafa Kemal Ataturk established the modern Turkish 
regime after World War I.  For the past 50 years the two countries' 
defense establishments have had a useful relationship.... Israel has 
a justified argument with Erdogan's stance on Iran and Hamas.  An 
argument should be carried out using educated reasoning, without 
hyperbole.  In the same spirit, Erdogan's proposal to resume 
mediation between Israel and Syria should be reexamined. Diplomacy 
should not become a circus.... There is a substantive difference 
between being steadfast and aggressive.  In their foreign policy, 
Lieberman and Ayalon are displaying this second quality.  If 
Netanyahu leaves them in their posts, it means they are setting 
Israeli policy, not he. 
 
CUNNINGHAM