News From Israel:

Coalition Deal Near, Netanyahu Thanks Outgoing Ministers

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu bade farewell to his Cabinet on Sunday, expressing confidence in the imminence of a coalition deal that would usher in a new cadre of ministers.

“This is probably the final meeting of this government,” Netanyahu said at the opening of the weekly Cabinet session. “I wish to thank all of the ministers for their fantastic work over the past four years.”

The meeting was shunned by the outgoing ministers from the ultra-Orthodox Shas party — Eli Yishai, Ariel Atias, Yaakov Margi, and Meshulam Nahari — who have been fuming over their exclusion from a coalescing government that they perceive as being anti-Haredi.

At a meeting of Likud ministers before the Cabinet meeting, Netanyhau said that most of the policy principles for the next government had been agreed upon, and all that remained was to settle the matter of ministerial portfolios.

The prime minister said that representatives from his Likud-Beytenu, Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid, and Naftali Bennett’s Jewish Home parties would meet on Sunday afternoon to try to push through a final agreement that is apparently snagged on which party will fill the education minister’s chair. Likud is apparently determined to see party member and current Education Minister Gideon Sa’ar maintain his position, while Yesh Atid would like the post to go to MK Rabbi Shai Piron.

The coalition will likely comprise Netanyahu’s Likud-Beytenu (31 seats), Yesh Atid (19), Jewish Home (12), Hatnua (6) and Kadima (2), for a total of 70. Labor would lead the opposition, in which the two ultra-Orthodox parties, Shas and United Torah Judaism, would also sit, sources said.

The sources added that Lapid, who had hoped to become foreign minister, will instead serve as finance minister. The Foreign Ministry post will be kept open for former FM Avigdor Liberman, who resigned in December to fight corruption charges and hopes to return quickly to the post after clearing his name.

IDF On High Alert In The Golan Heights, Israel-Syrian Border

IDF forces are on high alert in the Golan Heights, carefully scrutinizing the border with Syria, as opposition forces begin to consider a new target: Israel.

Syrian rebels have penetrated the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating Syria from Israel. The status of the area respected by both Israel and Syria since the end of the Yom Kippur War, though both are technically still at war, is apparently respected no longer. 

In a video posted Saturday on the Internet by Syrian opposition forces, the rebels are seen in the Syrian side of the Golan Heights DMZ, firing guns right next to a U.N. sign specifically stating the area is a demilitarized zone. Another, similar video shows the rebel forces traveling in a vehicle within the DMZ, with a spokesperson saying, “We are now in front of the occupied Golan, the blessed land sold by [former President] Hafez Assad. “For 40 years, not a single gunshot has been fired on this land. For 40 years not a single gunshot has been fired towards Israel,” the rebel spokesman added.

Last week’s kidnapping of 21 United Nations Filipino peacekeeping soldiers within the DMZ by a group of 30 rebels made it clear that era is over.  Member nations are more skittish about allowing their troops, who carry light arms only, to remain in what is now clearly a danger zone. 

Meanwhile Israeli troops are providing security for military engineers and private contractors who are rushing to complete Israel’s new northern border security fence. New alarm systems armed with a special fiber that activates at the slightest touch are being added to the fence.

The barrier fence is being installed as an extra layer of security in the chaos that is expected to follow the probable fall of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Syrian rebel forces – many of whom are hostile to Israel – are advancing towards the Golan Heights, military sources have said, and are threatening to retake the region from Israel.

The rebel forces are comprised of two factions. 

One is the Free Syrian Army (FSA), represents the Western-backed mainstream Syrian National Council (SNC), which is supported by the United States, the UK and France.

The second, a radical jihadist group, is the 13-member Islamic Front for the Liberation of Syria. Many of its members are terrorist organizations, a number of which are linked to Al Qaeda and global jihad. They are dedicated to installing a government led by Shari’a (Islamic law), in much the same style as Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Neither is a friend of the Jewish State. It remains unclear as to whether either could have gained access to Assad’s chemical weapons arsenal, or has already done so.

Obama's Israel Visit Is On - To Sweeten Pill Of Nuclear Iran

This development is painfully predictable:

He arrives less than a month after the last Six-Power (US, Russia, UK, France, China and Germany) nuclear discussions with Iran ended in Kazakhstan. After those talks, US and Western media trumpeted “an unusual sense of optimism” or more cautiously allowed “a faint and perhaps fleeting light at the end of one of the world’s most durable tunnels.”

Western sources predicted on the strength of these assessments that the follow-up to Kazakhstan in April, shortly after Obama’s talks in Jerusalem, would be devoted to “cementing that progress,” which translated into rewarding putative nuclear concessions by Iran with the easing of economic sanctions.
However, according to DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources, this diplomatic fluff, while representing elation in Washington, London, Moscow, Paris and Berlin, caused serious disenchantment in Jerusalem, which viewed it as a smokescreen for concessions to, and not by, Iran.

They have found that the “fleeting light” appearing at the end of the Iranian nuclear tunnel obscures three dangerous US concessions to Tehran:

1. President Obama has given in to the Fordo uranium enrichment plant continuing to operate instead of shutting down, as demanded by Israel – even though its function is to turn out 20 percent pure (near-weapons grade) uranium;

2.  He has even consented to the Iranians continuing to manufacture uranium to that level;

3. Washington has dropped its insistence on Iran sending out of the country its stocks of 3.5-5 percent enriched uranium.

With these gains, the Iranian negotiators must have been laughing all the way home from their talks with the six big powers on 26-27 of February and crowing over what one Israeli official called "Tehran’s huge success and Israel’s total defeat.”

Conscious of how these concessions to the Islamic Republic are received in Jerusalem, it is no wonder that President Obama brushed off the invitation to address the Israeli Knesset, where lawmakers would likely put him on the spot. He has chosen instead to deliver a speech at Jerusalem’s Convention Center, so as to deliver his message straight to the Israeli public.

By going over the heads of Israel’s government and parliament to face a less informed audience, he believes he can get away with sweet-talking his surrender to a nuclear Iran.
Former military intelligence chief, Amos Yadlin stepped in with a timely comment last week when he said that an Israeli strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities would be no more than a one-night operation.

So when Air Force One lands in Israel March 20 and Israeli dignitaries push forward to greet the US president, a small group of anonymous Air Force pilots will be watching from a distance, waiting for the order to fly out and carry out their mission in a single night.

After Jerusalem, President Obama continues to the Palestinian Authority and then Jordan.