By: David Isaac – Jewish News Syndicate; jns.org

“The truth is Israel’s government doesn’t know what will happen,” says an Israeli government source In the runup to August 19 hearing on the shuttering of the Agency in Russia.

The Jewish Agency, which helps Jews immigrate to Israel, stands on shaky ground in Russia, as a Moscow court is set to hold a trial on its dissolution August 19. Even though it’s operating under a cloud of uncertainty, and immigration to Israel has skyrocketed, the Agency continues to operate business as usual, JNS has learned from a government source familiar with the matter.

Since the outbreak of the war on Ukraine in February, 19,100 Russians have immigrated to Israel, a leap from the 7,733 immigrants that came in 2021, according to Jewish Agency numbers. It’s not a stretch to see immigration numbers triple over those of last year by year’s end, assuming the Agency isn’t shut down.

There is no consensus as to Russia’s motives for shuttering the Agency. Some analysts have pointed to the Ukraine war, arguing that Russia is either punishing Israel for speaking out against Russia’s invasion or attempting to warn Israel about taking more concrete action in Ukraine’s favor.

cont’d…

https://www.jns.org/jewish-agency-in-russia-soldiers-on-despite-tensions-immigration-surge/

By: Chris Mitchell – CBN News; cbn.com

JERUSALEM – Twenty years ago, a suicide bomber killed nine people and wounded dozens of others in an attack at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.  

The accomplices in that attack just got a pay raise.

The bombing which took place at the Frank Sinatra Cafeteria at Hebrew University on July 31, 2002, came in the middle of what was called the Second Intifadah, a four-year-long terror campaign against Israelis. The Israel Defense Forces arrested those responsible who have been in prison for 20 years. 

“Here we’re talking about nine murdered, over 80 injured. Five of those murdered were actually American citizens. And now the Palestinian Authority (P.A.) is literally paying additional rewards to those terrorists,” noted Palestinian Media Watch’s Maurice Hirsch.  

Hirsch explained to CBN News the Palestinian Authority law which standardizes payments to terrorists.

cont’d…

https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/israel/2022/august/20-years-later-palestinian-authority-still-handing-out-salary-raises-to-terrorists-in-pay-to-slay-policy

By: Julie Stahl – CBN News; cbn.com

JERUSALEM, Israel – A unique stone from an unearthed synagogue where Jesus could have prayed has returned to its home in the Galilee and the Magdala stone is expected to be a special draw for visitors.

Deemed by experts as one of Israel’s most important discoveries, the Magdala stone spent years with the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) and then went on an international tour with showings in New York and Rome. 

“I, myself, with some other workers here, put [the stone] in the truck that [removes] it from the site. So, I said, ‘Bye, see you soon’ to the stone in the beginning of January 2010. So, to see the stone coming back today is a big joy,” said Father Juan Solana, Director of the Magdala center.

Dozens gathered recently at the Magdala Center Hotel for the return of the Magdala Stone.

cont’d…

https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/israel/2022/july/magdala-stone-in-israel-rsquo-s-galilee-an-lsquo-oasis-of-encounter-rsquo-with-christian-jewish-history

By: Benjamin Weinthal – The Jerusalem Post; jpost.com

The video declared Iran’s regime can move its “peaceful nuclear program to a nuclear weapons program” at a fast pace.

Iran expert Ben Sabti tweeted that an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) “Telegram channel threatens to produce atomic warhead for missiles,” citing the channel’s message: “Iran can immediately return to Emad project and build an atomic bomb if Natanz facilities are attacked.”

The Emad, cited in the message, is an Iranian long-range missile.

The IRGC-linked Bisimchi Media (Radioman Media) Telegram channel published a video titled “When Will Iran’s Sleeping Nuclear Warheads Awaken,” according to the London-based Iran International news outlet.

cont’d…

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/iran-news/article-713512

By: Chris Mitchell – CBN News; cbn.com

JERUSALEM, Israel – When President Joe Biden came to visit Israel and Saudi Arabia, things began to change in the region as agreements for mutual defense between Israel and neighboring Arab countries built by the historic Abraham Accords began to fall apart.

“The security architecture publicly at least unraveled. It was canceled and the UAE instead is now trying to establish diplomatic relations with Iran as are some of the other countries. It seems as though they measured the commitment of the United States to confronting Iran up, measured it as too weak, and are trying to come to some terms with the Iranians,” says Middle East expert David Wurmser.

President Biden said while visiting Israel that he would use military force against Iran as a “last resort.”

cont’d…

https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/israel/2022/july/critics-warn-bidens-unwillingness-to-use-military-force-against-iran-could-unravel-abraham-accords

By: Ben Cohen – Jewish News Syndicate; jns.org

Iran and Russia further bind their ties—one an authoritarian regime claiming Divine sanction, the other an authoritarian regime promoting nationalist chauvinism, both of them sworn enemies of Western democracy.

Despite spending five months baiting Ukraine’s leaders as “neo-Nazis,” among them the country’s Jewish President Volodymyr Zelensky, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin didn’t bat an eyelid as he embraced a genuine Nazi sympathizer and Holocaust denier in the shape of Iran’s “Supreme Leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Putin visited Tehran last week on his first trip outside the borders of the former USSR since launching the invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. The immediate focus was not the war in Ukraine, but that other Russian-fueled bloodbath in Syria. The main meeting brought Khamenei and Putin together with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who is seeking Russian and Iranian backing for a renewed onslaught against Kurdish forces in Syria. Putin refrained from making a formal commitment to his Turkish counterpart, but he will have been reassured by Erdoğan’s reference to him as “my dear friend,” and gratified by Turkey’s shameful antics in holding up Sweden and Finland’s NATO membership applications because of the backing of those two nations for the Kurds.

cont’d…

https://www.jns.org/opinion/mr-putin-goes-to-tehran/

By: Caroline Glick – Jewish News Syndicate; jns.org

So long as the progressive base of the Democrat Party dictates Biden’s foreign policy, those policies will continue to fail, to the detriment of regional security and stability.

Ahead of U.S. President Joe Biden’s trip to Israel and Saudi Arabia, the president published an op-ed in The Washington Post, in which he placed his trip in the context of his overall Middle East policy. A few days later, Israel’s opposition leader, former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, made a brief statement on Biden’s then upcoming visit that spoke directly to the claims Biden made in his article. Taken together, the two communications explain why Biden’s visit was a failure before it even began—and what a successful policy looks like.

Biden’s article, “Why I’m going to Saudi Arabia,” was a political communication to his party’s progressive base. It served a twofold purpose. First, it was an apology to progressives, who are hostile to both Saudi Arabia and Israel. Second, Biden assured progressives that he was not changing course. His Middle East policy to date will remain his policy going forward.

That policy has three major pillars: hostility towards Saudi Arabia and particularly Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS); financial, nuclear and strategic appeasement of Iran; and support for the Palestinians, at Israel’s expense. Biden insisted in his op-ed that he remains true to these positions, but as president also has Russia and China to keep at bay.

cont’d…

https://www.jns.org/opinion/how-biden-ensured-his-trip-to-the-middle-east-would-fail/

By: Lazar Berman – The Times of Israel; timesofisrael.com

‘The only way to stop them is a credible military threat,’ PM argues; US president publicly disagrees, saying dialogue is still the best way to counter Tehran

In their joint comments Thursday on Iran’s nuclear program, visiting US President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Yair Lapid expressed a public disagreement over the best way to tackle the threat, with Lapid telling the American leader that “words will not stop them, Mr. President,” and urging him to “put a credible military threat on the table.”

The two leader’s interaction at the Jerusalem press conference was warm (full text here), and Lapid made clear that there was no daylight between the two countries regarding the ultimate goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

But the two did air their differences before the cameras as to the best way to handle Tehran.

“Words will not stop them, Mr. President,” said Lapid. “Diplomacy will not stop them. The only thing that will stop Iran is knowing that if they continue to develop their nuclear program, the free world will use force. The only way to stop them is to put a credible military threat on the table.”

“It should not be a bluff, but the real thing,” Lapid continued. “The Iranian regime must know that if they continue to deceive the world, they will pay a heavy price.”

cont’d…

https://www.timesofisrael.com/diplomacy-wont-stop-iran-from-going-nuclear-lapid-tells-biden-in-press-conference/

By: Yaakov Lappin – Jewish News Syndicate; jns.org

Israeli observers say if Israel Defense Forces were not in the West Bank, there is no doubt that another Hamas coup would occur, much like the fateful events that occurred in June 2007 in the Gaza Strip • Is Hamas preparing to make its move on the day after the departure of Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas?

Fifteen years ago, in June 2007, the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict underwent a seismic shift. The Islamist terror faction Hamas seized power in the Gaza Strip through a series of deadly raids, firing rockets and mortars at Fatah-run Palestinian Authority bases and storming their positions. In brutal executions, Hamas hurled P.A. personnel to their deaths from rooftops and conducted shootouts in hospitals, forcing many of the remaining P.A. personnel to flee to the West Bank.

Looking back at the Palestinian arena over the past generation, Col. (res.) David Hacham, a former Arab-affairs adviser to seven Israeli defense ministers and a senior research associate at the MirYam Institute, told JNS that “there is no doubt that the main, most significant and dramatic development has been Hamas’s takeover of the Gaza Strip and its forceful expulsion, through the use of violence, of the Palestinian Authority and its personnel from the area.”

This event had a long-term impact on all subsequent internal Palestinian developments, particularly on the balance of power between Hamas and Fatah, and on the nature of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, he said.

cont’d…

https://www.jns.org/15-years-since-hamas-took-gaza-most-dramatic-development-in-palestinian-arena/

By: Jordan Cope – The Jerusalem Post; jpost.com

The UN appears to have come to Hamas’s aid when it comes to absolving the group of wrongdoing and scapegoating Israel.

When retired British Col. Richard Kemp took the floor at the United Nations Human Rights Council on June 14, he did something controversial. He dared to accuse the UNHRC’s Commission of Inquiry (COI) on Israel and its disinformation campaign of furthering Hamas’s illegal war against Israel.

It’s unsurprising that the Palestinian Authority sought to interrupt Kemp by raising a point of order. Kemp’s comments triggered the representative for the PA, clearly Hamas’s rivals. By shifting the perceived paradigm of conflict from between Israel and the PA ruling the West Bank, to between Israel and Hamas, Kemp stole the spotlight from the PA, which has increasingly struggled to remain relevant as more Palestinians have entrusted Hamas to champion their cause.

Most importantly, Kemp exposed the UNHRC for seeming to advance Hamas’s agenda. However controversial his comments, Kemp is surely correct in his assessment that the UN and its agencies appear to be furthering Hamas’s agenda. By delegitimizing both Israel and the PA – Hamas’s sole competitor for power – while absolving Hamas of culpability, the UN has afforded Hamas the moral high ground and has paved the way for it to terrorize, rule and dictate with impunity.

cont’d…

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-711010