RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://pjmedia.com/trending/shocker-israel-heading-back-to-the-polls-as-knesset-votes-to-dissolve-itself/

Seven weeks ago a right-wing and religious coalition headed by Benjamin Netanyahu handily won the Israeli elections, gaining 65 seats of the 120-seat Knesset—and just missing 69 seats as another right-wing party fell a tiny bit short of the four-seat minimum.

On Wednesday night the new Knesset—sworn in a month ago—voted 74-45 to dissolve itself, and Israel is heading back to the polls on September 17. Seven weeks ago, no one at all saw it coming.

Basically one man—former defense minister Avigdor Liberman—is behind it.

Liberman—a mercurial politician who has also been foreign minister and deputy prime minister among other posts—is a longtime Russian immigrant who gets most of his votes from the Russian-Israeli community. This time around his party, Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home), won five mandates. Without Israel Our Home, Netanyahu’s would-be coalition had 60 seats—one short of a Knesset majority.

Liberman, in the end, refused to bring his five-seat party into the new coalition, and the house came crashing down.

Why did Liberman do it?

The Russian-Israeli community is unique in Israel in tending heavily both to hawkishness and secularism. Generally and statistically, religiosity correlates with right-wing hawkishness, secularism with left-wing dovishness (though secular right-wingers are not unusual; the right generally has the upper hand).

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14298/palestinians-vs-trump-peace-plan

In the past few days, the Gaza-based groups have issued several statements hinting that they would use all means, including terrorism, to foil the US peace plan.

What is perhaps most worrying for the Arab leaders are the threats coming from Iran’s puppets — Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah. It now remains to be seen whether the Arab heads of state will be deterred by these threats or ignore them at the risk of becoming the Palestinians’ terror targets.

Clearly, the very Palestinians who are boycotting a conference — whose aim is to help them move beyond their leadership-imposed economic devastation — will wind up the big losers in this spiteful scenario of hate. This time, however, it also seems that the Palestinians will not only deprive themselves of billions of dollars, but will also damage — perhaps irrevocably — their relations with influential Arab countries. By all accounts, the Palestinians appear to be heading toward another “nakba” (catastrophe).

The Palestinians seem to be moving on two fronts to thwart US President Donald Trump’s plan for peace in the Middle East, also known as the “Deal of the Century.”

The Palestinian Authority and its political allies in the West Bank have launched a diplomatic and media campaign to rally worldwide support for their rejection of Trump’s upcoming plan. Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other Palestinian extremist groups, for their part, are already hinting that they will resort to violence in an effort to thwart the “Deal of the Century.”

Last week, Hamas called on Bahrain not to allow the “Zionist enemy to defile its lands” by attending the economic conference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXy4NXbuE-k

https://pjmedia.com/trending/palestinian-authority-tv-series-features-uncle-teaching-nephew-how-to-shoot-at-the-jews/

Official Palestinian Authority TV is running an ahistorical and blatantly anti-Semitic series that features an adult man teaching a child how to shoot “the Jews,” and characterizes the Jewish people as “cowards,” rapists, “impure schemers,” and “the enemy.”

This evil propaganda is being broadcast during the month of Ramadan, which is considered the holiest month of the year for Muslims.

The series, called “Children of the Village Chief, portrays Arab life in a “West Bank” village around the time of the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 until the 1980s, according to Palestinian Media Watch.

The first episode starts with the so-called Palestinian nakba—the “catastrophe” of the establishment of modern-day Israel—and the series takes the audience up to the 1980s.

In one episode, a cherubic young boy asks his uncle to teach him how to use a rifle so he can shoot at “the Jews” if they come to his village. Happy to oblige, Uncle Ibrahim instructs his nephew to only aim at “the enemy,” who the boy then again identifies as “the Jews.”

In another episode, a woman wonders how the Arab forces were defeated by the Jews since “the Jews are cowards.” The man replies that “the British are a snake in the grass … they gave [the Jews] everything.” (Britain did not arm Jewish forces during Israel’s War of Independence.) CONTINUE AT SITE

https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Breaking-the-Silence-smears-Israel-in-The-Guardian-again-590654?

With the emergence of the hard Left in the UK in recent years, many British Jews are worried about the rise of antisemitism. 

At the same time as claiming to be anti-racist, papers like The Guardian and The Independent have normalized the language of delegitimization. The constant stream of anti-Israel articles, unparalleled in intensity and level of scrutiny, have done much to create an atmosphere in which any justification of Israel’s right to self-defense is regarded as beyond the pale.
 
The Guardian displays a Pavlovian loathing for Israel. Anything, even something as simple as holding an international music contest, becomes an opportunity to censure Israel while exempting the Palestinians from even a modicum of criticism. 
This is the newspaper selected by Yehuda Shaul, co-founder of the Israeli anti-occupation group Breaking the Silence (BTS), as the most appropriate place to publish an op-ed criticizing the presence of Israeli civilians and the IDF in Hebron, calling it “legal discrimination.”
 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/startupnationcentral/2019/05/27/530-multinationals-from-35-countries-innovating-in-israel/#c8bbdd33f5d1

Israel is emerging as a leading innovation destination for a growing number of multinational corporations looking to the country’s 6,000 plus startups for new ideas, quick prototyping ability, and infectious entrepreneurial culture, a new report shows.

The PwC report, commissioned by tech NGO Start-Up Nation Central, maps for the first time the activities of some 539 multinational companies (MNCs) representing 35 countries, who are currently active in Israel. It tracks the evolution of their innovation activity, showing that companies tend to increase and diversify their innovation activity with time in market, for example, going from tech-led R&D centers to operating startup accelerators and engaging in joint ventures. Download the full report here.

An unexpected benefit: many of the MNC’s themselves say they’re starting to take on some of the characteristics of the startups they’re working with, including regular pivots to new technology focus areas, faster execution of projects, and a higher tolerance for failure. “The Israeli way of approaching risk and failure, and the importance of giving startups independence and space to innovate – these core characteristics of the Israeli ecosystem allow MNCs to step outside of their comfort zone, re-think their approach to innovation and effectively tap into Israeli innovation,” the report states.

It is no longer just technology companies expanding innovation footprint but MNCs from a wider blend of industries. Deutsche Telekom, for example, regularly host management teams in Israel to absorb startup thinking. Pfizer, Genpact, Flex and Johnson Controls all have senior executives located in Israel who manage their companies’ global scope of technology scouting, product development, or open collaboration activities. Siemens’ Dynamo and Innogy’s Innovation Hub are unique innovation vehicles, not replicated anywhere in those groups’ global innovation portfolios.

https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/05/28/florida-governor-forges-new-ties-makes-history-on-israel-visit/

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signs Memorandum of Understanding between Florida State University and Ariel University, becoming the first sitting governor to establish a relationship between a U.S. state and an Israeli university in Judea and Samaria. De Santis tells audience: “I say here: BDS has no place in Florida.”

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a historic Memorandum of Understanding between Florida State University and Ariel University on Monday, becoming the first sitting governor to establish a relationship between a U.S. state and an Israeli university in Judea and Samaria.

The majority of the international community considers Israel’s presence in Judea and Samaria as illegal, and shuns, or even boycotts, Israeli institutions located there, such as Ariel University.

In appreciation, DeSantis received an Honorary Fellowship Award from the university. At the ceremony were philanthropists Sheldon and Dr. Miriam Adelson, Ariel Mayor Eli Shaviro, and Ariel University President Yehuda Danon.

“I promised to be the most pro-Israel Governor in America and I sincerely thank Ariel University for presenting me the Honorary Fellowship Award,” DeSantis said at the event. “This recognition means a lot and I am humbled to be the recipient. Let it be known that Florida will always stand with Israel, our greatest ally in the Middle East.”

https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/05/28/syrian-army-shoots-at-israeli-jet-idf-returns-fire/

IDF: Our aircraft “was carrying out a routine flight in Israel. The projectile landed in Syrian territory. In response, we targeted the Syrian launcher that was responsible for firing it.” Syrian army says one of its soldiers was killed, another wounded in the Israeli response strike.

Israel’s military said it attacked a Syrian anti-aircraft position that fired on one of its warplanes on Monday, and Syrian state media reported that a soldier had been killed in what it called “Israeli aggression.”

A statement from the IDF said that earlier Monday a Syrian anti-aircraft system fired at one of its aircraft “as it was carrying out a routine flight in Israel. The projectile landed in Syrian territory. In response, we targeted the Syrian launcher that was responsible for firing it.”

The IDF “sees any threat against its aircraft with great severity and takes measures to defend them.”

A Syrian military source was cited by state news agency SANA as saying “the Israeli enemy targeted one of our military positions” in Quneitra province, which is adjacent to the Israeli Golan Heights.

It said one soldier was killed, another wounded and a military vehicle damaged.

The back-to-back statements come amid heightened regional tension over Iran’s role in Syria and other parts of the Middle East. They also follow a number of reported Israeli strikes on Syria in the past ten days, according to state-run media.