podesta_email_00559.txt

podesta-emails 3,045 words email

P17 V11 V15 P21 V16

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http://www.centerpeace.org ** Israel and the Middle East News Update ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Thursday, March 5 ------------------------------------------------------------ Click here for a printer-friendly version. (http://centerpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/March-5.pdf) Headlines: * Herzog: The Bottom Line is that the Speech Will Achieve Nothing * Kerry: Simply Demanding that Iran Capitulate Is Not a Plan * Israel Asks Congress for Missile Defense Aid despite Public Row * Ya'alon: Likud Hasn't Ruled Out Coalition with Zionist Union * Channel Ten Poll: Likud Gains Two Seats * As Election Nears, Women March to Put Peace on Agenda * Abbas: We’ll Work Toward Peace with Whoever Wins Israeli Vote * U.S. Syria Strategy Falters with Collapse of Rebel Group Commentary: * USA Today: "Netanyahu Has Reasons to be Worried" - By Dennis Ross * Wall Street Journal: "What Went Wrong Between the US and Israel - and How to Fix the Alliance" - By Brian Katulis and Michael Singh ** Ma'ariv ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Herzog: The Bottom Line is that the Speech will Achieve Nothing ------------------------------------------------------------ The political establishment continues to buzz one day after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress, and the opposition is continuing its attack on the prime minister. Opposition and Zionist Camp Chairman Herzog responded yesterday to the speech and said, “Netanyahu is known to be a good orator and I am always happy when we receive applause in Congress. However, it has no connection with the result. The bottom line is that this speech will achieve nothing.” “The citizens of Israel can be very pleased for a moment with the applause, but in the long run, Netanyahu is out of the picture, Israel is out of the picture. At the end of the day, the US has a presidential regime. The person who makes the rules on these matters is the president,” said Herzog. ** Ha'aretz ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Kerry: Simply Demanding that Iran Capitulate Is Not a Plan (http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.645369) ------------------------------------------------------------ The United States and Iran completed another round of talks in Switzerland on Wednesday, within the framework of ongoing attempts to reach a deal on the latter's nuclear program. After the talks, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry responded to the speech made in Congress on Tuesday by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and said "simply demanding that Iran capitulate is not a plan." Kerry has been trying in recent days to reach an understanding with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on two primary issues – the amount of enriched uranium Iran will retain after the deal with the world powers is signed, as well as the pace at which sanctions in place on the Iranian republic will be rescinded. ** CNN ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Israel Asks Congress for Missile Defense Aid despite public row (http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/04/politics/israel-missile-defense-funding-congress-pentagon/) ------------------------------------------------------------ Publicly the U.S. and Israel have been clashing over Iran's nuclear program, but quietly Israelis have been making another appeal: getting more U.S. funds for missile defense systems to defend against Iran's growing ballistic missile program. A Republican congressional source told CNN that the Israelis are asking lawmakers to approve more than $300 million in additional U.S. funding for missile defense systems, above the $155 million the Pentagon is already requesting from Congress. For the first time, the source said, Israel is asking the U.S. for procurement funding for the Arrow 3 missile, designed to counter longer-range Iranian ballistic missiles, and the David's Sling missile defense system, for shorter-range Iranian weapons. ** Jerusalem Post ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Ya'alon: Likud Hasn't Ruled Out Coalition with Zionist Union (http://www.jpost.com/Israel-Elections/Yaalon-Likud-hasnt-ruled-out-coalition-with-Zionist-Union-393005) ------------------------------------------------------------ Likud has not ruled out sitting in a government with the Zionist Union party, Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon told Army Radio on Thursday morning. He said however that the party would not agree to a rotation in the prime minister's office. "We haven't said no to anything, but it is clear that first we need to create a natural bloc, a natural coalition that is Right, and after if someone wants to join they can." ** Channel 10 News ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Channel Ten Poll: Likud Gains Two Seats ------------------------------------------------------------ Was Netanyahu’s “speech of a lifetime” ultimately electorally worthwhile? That depends on one’s vantage point. While the Likud under Netanyahu’s leadership rose by two seats to run neck-and-neck with the Zionist Camp, only seven percent of respondents said that Netanyahu’s public statements about the Iranian threat had prompted them to change their minds as to which ballot to cast in the elections. Furthermore, nearly half of the Israelis believe after the fact that Netanyahu’s speech did not justify the crisis in relations between Israel and the United States. Meanwhile, the joint Arab list has continued to gain ground, and is tied as the third-largest party in Israel along with Yesh Atid. The Jewish Home continued its downward trend and received only 11 seats in this poll. Among the smaller parties, Moshe Kahlon’s Kulanu picked up another seat, and is now polling at 10 seats. See also, “Polls: Netanyahu's Congress speech boosts Likud, but no game changer” (Ha’aretz) (http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/1.645358?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter) ** Times of Israel ------------------------------------------------------------ ** As Election Nears, Women March to Put Peace on Agenda (http://www.timesofisrael.com/as-election-nears-women-march-to-put-peace-on-agenda/#ixzz3TWVpQ5v3) ------------------------------------------------------------ Braving a persistent Jerusalem drizzle, some 3,000 women from across Israel circled the Knesset on Wednesday to demand that peace take center stage in the next government ahead of elections on March 17. Rallied by Women Wage Peace (http://womenwagepeace.org.il/about-eng/) , a grassroots organization created last August, the women — wearing turquoise ribbons and carrying signs reading “choosing a diplomatic agreement” — chanted “It’s reality, not a dream, women make peace.” Yael Elad, head of the group’s media team, said Women Wage Peace was formed in the wake of Operation Protective Edge in Gaza by two prominent lawyers, Irit Tamir and Michal Barak, who felt that “women cannot just sit at home, complain, and hope for the best, without actively doing something to change the situation.” “It’s time for us to be part of the dialogue that revolves around security and peace,” Elad told Times of Israel. ** Times of Israel ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Abbas: We’ll Work Toward Peace with Whoever Wins Israeli Vote (http://www.timesofisrael.com/abbas-well-work-toward-peace-with-whoever-wins-israeli-vote/#ixzz3TWZk1WYB) ------------------------------------------------------------ Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday that he was willing to work with whichever party wins the upcoming Israeli elections and that achieving peace is central to regional stability. At the opening of a two-day meeting of the Central Council of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Abbas warned that the status quo of occupation in the West Bank is a provocation and cannot continue, the official WAFA news agency reported. Abbas said Israel had eroded the authority of his self-rule government in the West Bank to the point where it has “no real power here over anything.”Abbas said the Arab Peace Initiative would be the best framework for peace talks. “Now is the time for Israel to wake up from its sleep … the ball is in its court,” Abbas said. ** Reuters ------------------------------------------------------------ ** U.S. Syria Strategy Falters with Collapse of Rebel Group (http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/05/us-mideast-crisis-syria-hazzm-idUSKBN0M10GV20150305) ------------------------------------------------------------ The Hazzm movement was once central to a covert CIA operation to arm Syrian rebels, but the group's collapse last week underlines the failure of efforts to unify Arab and Western support for mainstream insurgents fighting the Syrian military. A blow to U.S. moves to aid rebels, the dissolution of Hazzm also highlights the risks that a new Department of Defense program could face in training and equipping fighters in Jordan, Turkey (http://bit.ly/1stXQop) and Qatar. ** USA Today - March 4, 2015 ------------------------------------------------------------ ** Netanyahu Has Reasons To Be Worried ------------------------------------------------------------ By Dennis Ross Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a strong case to the Congress about why he thinks the potential agreement with Iran on its nuclear program is a "very bad deal." Leaving aside his fears that lifting sanctions will provide Iran more resources to pursue trouble-making in the Middle East, the prime minister worries that a deal that permits Iran to be a threshold nuclear state will not prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons but actually pave the way for it to do so. Netanyahu believes that the break-out time for producing weapons-grade uranium will inevitably be too short -- indeed, less than the year President Obama speaks about -- and that inspections of the Iranian program will necessarily be too limited and, in any case, promise no action in the face of violations. Worse, Iran will be treated like Japan or the Netherlands after the agreement expires in 10-15 years, permitting it to build tens of thousands of centrifuges and enabling it to produce a weapon at a time of its choosing. Accepting the mantra that "no deal is better than a bad deal," Netanyahu offers the alternative of insisting on better terms and increasing the pressure on the Iranians until a more credible agreement is reached. He does not fear the Iranians walking away from the negotiating table because, in his words, they need the deal more than the U.S. and its partners. While the Obama administration is unlikely to accept his argument that it should simply negotiate better and harder, it should not dismiss the concerns he raises about the emerging deal. Indeed, the administration argument that there is no better alternative than the deal it is negotiating begs the question of whether the prospective agreement is acceptable. And, here, the administration needs to explain why the deal it is trying to conclude actually will prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons for the life-time of the agreement and afterwards. It needs to explain why the combination of the number and quality of centrifuges, their output, and the ship-out from Iran of enriched uranium will, in fact, ensure that the break-out time for the Iranians will not be less than one year. Either this combination adds up or it does not, but there should be an explicit answer to Netanyahu's charge that Iran will be able to break-out much more quickly. Similarly, there should be an answer on how the verification regime is going to work to ensure that we can detect, even in a larger nuclear program, any Iranian violation of the agreement. The issue of verification is critical not just because Iran's past clandestine nuclear efforts prove it cannot be trusted but also because the administration has made a one year break-out time the key measure of success of the agreement. But we can only be certain that Iran will be one year away from being able to produce a bomb's supply of weapons-grade uranium if we can detect what they are doing when they do it. Obviously, detection is only part of the equation. We cannot wait to determine what we will do about violations when they happen. Iran must know in advance what the consequences are for violations, particularly if we want to deter them in the first place. And this clearly goes to the heart of Netanyahu's concerns: if he had high confidence that we would impose harsh consequences in response to Iranian violations, including the use of force if we caught Iran dashing toward a weapon, he would be less fearful of the agreement he believes is going to emerge. But he does not see that, and he fears as with past arms control agreements that we will seek to discuss violations and not respond to them until it is too late. So the administration should address this fear and prove it means what it says by spelling out different categories of violations and the consequences for each -- and then seek congressional authorization to empower this president and his successors to act on these consequences.If applied also to Iranian moves toward a nuclear weapon after the expiration of the deal, the administration would truly be answering the most significant of the concerns that Netanyahu raised. Maybe then, this episode of U.S.-Israeli tension would be overcome. Dennis Ross, the counselor and William Davidson Distinguished Fellow at The Washington Institute, served as a senior Middle East advisor to President Obama from 2009 to 2011. This article was made possible in part by support from the Irwin Levy Family Program on the U.S.-Israel Strategic Relationship. ** Wall Street Journal - March 4, 2015 ------------------------------------------------------------ ** What Went Wrong Between the U.S. and Israel–and How to Fix the Alliance ------------------------------------------------------------ By Brian Katulis and Michael Singh U.S.-Israel relations hit their lowest point in decades in the fracas (http://www.wsj.com/articles/netanyahus-speech-divides-israel-too-1425420860) that enveloped Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress (http://www.wsj.com/articles/israel-benjamin-netanyahu-urges-congress-to-block-iran-nuclear-deal-1425392094) . Yet the foundation for bilateral ties is still stable. It includes a long list of shared security goals, continuous and deep engagement across government and society, and strong public support in both countries for working together. These features are in short supply among U.S. partners in the Middle East, and Israel needs all the help it can get–which is why U.S. and Israeli leaders should take steps to repair relations after Israel forms its new government, no matter who leads it. The crisis in U.S.-Israeli relations is often attributed to an ideological or personal conflict (http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/03/03/obama-responds-lets-wait-until-theres-actually-a-deal-on-the-table/) between President Barack Obama (http://topics.wsj.com/person/O/barack,-obama/4328) and Mr. Netanyahu. But the roots of the crisis run deeper. The United States and Israel have struggled to adapt their national security strategies to a changed regional landscape. Strategic shocks to the Middle East in the past decade include the rise of Iran’s regional influence after the 2003 Iraq war; growing threats from Islamist terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and Islamic State (ISIS or ISIL); and the 2011 uprisings that opened the door to a series of transitions in Egypt and Syria’s civil war. Israel and the United States reacted to these shocks differently. President Obama prioritized diplomacy toward Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict but otherwise sought distance from regional issues. Israel, having no option to withdraw, hunkered down. Mr. Netanyahu saw U.S. policy as imposing burdens on allies while relieving pressure on adversaries, and paving the way for a deeper disengagement that would leave Israel to fend for itself. Mr. Obama saw Israel as resisting U.S. ideas without offering viable alternatives. Despite these dynamics, the cliché that the relationship is “indispensable” is true. Israel is a rare sort of ally in today’s Middle East: It not only shares U.S. interests but also is willing and able to advance them, easing our burden. For Israel, the U.S. alliance is a national security pillar, conveying strength and support to adversaries that might otherwise be tempted to try to take advantage of Israel’s small size and isolation. This makes repairing the U.S.-Israel relationship a security priority as well as a political matter. Repair efforts should happen in a channel of empowered aides trusted by each side, much as French ambassador Jean-David Levitte and U.S. national security adviser Stephen Hadley were able to repair Franco-American relations in the wake of the Iraq war. Efforts should focus on three key fronts: 1. Iran. The White House must recognize that while Mr. Netanyahu may be the most vociferous critic of U.S. diplomacy with Iran, Israeli concerns are shared by other allies in the region (http://www.wsj.com/articles/like-israel-u-s-arab-allies-fear-obamas-iran-nuclear-deal-1425504773) –and this is not the only issue that divides us from allies. A nuclear deal is not assured, nor would one resolve our concerns about Iranian support for terrorism or other destabilizing activities. In addition to securing a worthwhile agreement, we need to reassure allies about continuing U.S. commitment to address these threats. Devising joint strategies for doing so and bolstering our allies’ capacity to contribute is a start. The United States has lacked a broader regional strategy for a long time and would benefit from one, regardless of the outcome with Iran. 2. Counterterrorism on Israel’s borders. The panoply of terrorist networks operating in Syria, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, southern Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza pose a threat to Israel and to the U.S. Israel used to worry about Arab strength; now, it fears Arab disarray and weakness. We should not only confront these groups directly but also offer to mutual partners such as Jordan support in the form of military and intelligence cooperation as well as close and early consultation on a shared regional agenda. 3. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A steadier approach is needed. Washington’s ability to advance peace is a function of the extent to which it enjoys the trust of all sides–Israel, the Palestinians, and the Arab states–and influence in the region. That trust and influence have receded on every front as each party despairs of reaching a negotiated two-state solution. The U.S. must be willing to engage in the incremental, unglamorous work of restoring trust–among all sides–to halt the regression of the peace process and rebuild its foundation. For its part, Israel must recognize that bad ideas will continue to fill the diplomatic vacuum as long as it neglects to put forward a plan to resolve the conflict. Hanging over our agenda is doubt among U.S. allies about our commitment to the region, to our allies and their interests, and to action. The U.S.-Israel alliance is a leading indicator of this commitment and is of surpassing value to U.S. security. Repair efforts will require leaders in both countries to take constructive steps together.Brian Katulis is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress (http://www.americanprogress.org/) . Michael Singh is managing director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (https://owa.dowjones.com/owa/redir.aspx?C=pNDUJBHmUEO96htsgFGR7sFXwVghrdEI64mxyn5iUtbvZx8-7WraC0pHPJ-Nq0iobdzMsGB1QiM.&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.washingtoninstitute.org%2f) . From 2005 to 2008, he worked on Middle East issues at the National Security Council. ============================================================ S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace 633 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, 5th Floor, Washington, DC 20004 ** www.centerpeace.org (http://www.centerpeace.org) 2015 S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, All rights reserved. YOU ARE RECEIVING THIS EMAIL BECAUSE YOU SIGNED UP FOR OUR NEWS UPDATES. ** unsubscribe from this list (http://centerpeace.us7.list-manage.com/unsubscribe?u=232a4a45176fccacab865e520&id=929d521884&e=a7f9100a75&c=69277c9eb7) ** update subscription preferences (http://centerpeace.us7.list-manage.com/profile?u=232a4a45176fccacab865e520&id=929d521884&e=a7f9100a75)