Kerry Says International Presence on Temple Mount is Not Needed
(JNS.org) U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry rejected calls for an international presence on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount holy site.
“We don’t contemplate any change, but nor does Israel,” Kerry told reporters in Madrid. “Israel understands the importance of that status quo. What is important is to make sure everybody understands what that means. We are not seeking some new change. We are not seeking outsiders or others to come in.”
“We need to have clarity,” he added.
France recently introduced a proposal at the United Nations to have an international presence on the Temple Mount to ensure the status quo at the site. But both Israel and Jordan rejected the move.
Kerry plans to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week in Berlin, and will also meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordan’s King Abdullah in Amman.
Israeli Transportation Minister Floats ‘Jerusalem Guard’ Plan to Secure City
(JNS.org) A proposal to create a “Jerusalem guard”—a special police force comprising several thousand officers permanently deployed in Israel’s capital—is being considered by the Israeli Diplomatic-Security Cabinet, according to Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz.
Katz said Monday that he presented the plan to the cabinet and expects it to be approved, but at the same time, a senior government official said he believes Katz’s plan had not actually been presented to the cabinet for a vote, Israel Hayom reported.
The proposed force would be subordinate to the Israel Police, which means Katz is infringing on matters that fall under the purview of his political rival within the Likud party, Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan (who declined to comment on the matter).
“A mass of force will make a difference. It is known that an ‘elephant is not to be trifled with,’” Katz said.
Katz also recently steered a decision to reinforce security for public transportation in Jerusalem, which included the immediate deployment of 300 soldiers.
Stephen Harper, Staunchly Pro-Israel Canadian PM, Defeated in Election
(JNS.org) Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, known for his staunch support of Israel, was voted out of office in the country’s election on Monday. Harper’s replacement will be Justin Trudeau of the Liberal party, which won 185 seats—a sufficient number to form a majority government.
Harper and his Conservative party government have frequently been outspoken in their support for Israel. Canada signed a “memorandum of understanding” with Israeli authorities earlier this year that commits to fighting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
In a January 2014 speech at the Israeli Knesset, Harper said Canada would stand by Israel “through fire and water.”
“Canada supports Israel because it is right to do so. This is a very Canadian trait, to do something for no reason other than it is right even when no immediate reward for, or threat to, ourselves is evident,” Harper said at the time, adding, “Support today for the Jewish state of Israel is more than a moral imperative. It is also of strategic importance, also a matter of our own long-term interest.”
During Harper’s tenure, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that Israelis believe the Jewish state has “no better friend than Canada.”
“Canadians have chosen a Liberal government, a result that we accept without hesitation. I spoke with Mr. Trudeau and gave my blessing to him and the blessing of all of us to his successful campaign,” Harper said in his concession speech.
Canada’s Prime Minister-Elect Justin Trudeau Tells Obama Canadian Fighter Jets Will Withdraw From Fighting ISIS
(Arutz Sheva) Canada’s Prime Minister-Elect Justin Trudeau on Tuesday told President Barack Obama that Canadian fighter jets would withdraw from fighting the Islamic State (ISIS) group in Iraq and Syria, but gave no timeline, AFP reported.
“About an hour ago I spoke with President Obama,” Trudeau told a press conference.
While Canada remains “a strong member of the coalition against ISIS,” Trudeau said he made clear to Obama “the commitments I have made around ending the combat mission.”
Canada last year deployed CF-18 fighter jets to the region until March 2016, as well as about 70 special forces troops to train Kurds in northern Iraq.
During the election campaign, Trudeau pledged to bring home the fighter jets and end its combat mission. He vowed to keep military trainers in place. His new Liberal government will be “moving forward with our campaign commitments in a responsible fashion,” Trudeau said, according to AFP.
“We want to ensure that the transition is done in an orderly fashion,” he added.
Trudeau on Monday won a landslide victory in the Canadian election, unseating Conservative Stephen Harper, who served for nine years.
Trudeau has consistently opposed Harper’s counter-terror moves, including proposed legislation last year to cancel the citizenship of terrorists.
He sharply criticized Harper’s decision last year to join the coalition against ISIS.
Trudeau at the time acknowledged that ISIS is a “threat to regional and global security” but said that “Mr. Harper has made no effort to build a nonpartisan case for war,” claiming a parallel to the 2003 Iraq war he termed the “Iraq fiasco.”
Israel Arrests Hamas Official in West Bank
(Middle East Monitor and combined sources) A large Israeli army contingent arrested Hamas official Sheikh Hassan Yousef early Tuesday morning at his home in Beitunia in the West Bank. The raid also included the home of an individual suspected of carrying out a stabbing in Jerusalem.
Yousef’s son, Owais, told alJazeera.net that at least five military patrol cars surrounded their home and arrested him in a quick operation in which dozens of soldiers participated. A video of the arrest was widely circulated on the Internet.
Yousef, who is 61 years old and is a Hamas spokesman in the West Bank, was released last June after being held in an Israeli jail for about a year.
He has previously been arrested as part of a widespread arrest campaign which included dozens of Hamas officials and members after two of its members from Hebron were accused of kidnapping and killing the three yeshiva students Eyal Yifrah, Gilad Shaer and Naftali Fraenkel, Hy”d, in June 2014.
Local sources in Beitunia also told alJazeera.net that the occupation forces raided the home of prisoner Younes Saleh Abu Zuweid, located in the southern area of the West Bank.
Israel accuses Zuweid of carrying out a stabbing operation which led to the wounding of an Israeli settler near Damascus Gate in occupied Jerusalem on October 9.
New Report Finds Mideast Christians Will Disappear in Less Than a Generation
(JNS.org) A report from the United Kingdom-based Catholic charity group Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) has found that Middle East Christians, especially in Iraq and Syria, are “on course for extinction” within a generation or sooner.
The cover of the Aid to the Church in Need report, “Persecuted and Forgotten? A report on Christians oppressed for their Faith 2013-2015.” Credit: Aid to the Church in Need.
The report—titled “Persecuted and Forgotten? A report on Christians oppressed for their Faith 2013-2015”— finds that the time period from October 2013 to July 2015 has been “catastrophic for many Christians in the regions where persecution is worst,” such as in the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
The report blames “religio-ethnic cleansing” that is being powered by the “well-publicized threat of genocide” as the main factor behind the persecution of Christians.
“Be it in Syria, Iraq, Nigeria or parts of east Africa, the growing threat of militant Muslim groups—notably Daesh (Islamic State)—has prompted hundreds of thousands to flee” and that is “the primary cause of the contraction of Christians—changing from being a global faith to a regional one, with the faithful increasingly absent from ever-widening areas,” said the report.
“Christianity is on course for extinction in many of its biblical heartlands within a generation, if not before,” the report concluded.
Joop Koopman, communications manager for ACN, told JNS.org that despite the report’s grim findings, “there has yet to be a popular outcry among Christians in the U.S or in Western Europe.”
“Part of the reason seems to be that Christian beliefs—when it comes to marriage, gay marriage and such—are seen as oppressive in the West, which neutralizes the outrage that should be evident at the treatment of Christians in the Middle East,” Koopman said.
Koopman went on to urge “top Christian leadership in the U.S. to marshal their grassroots constituencies and force genuine political action—in the form of more military action on behalf of Christians in Iraq and Syria, as well as a recognition that Christians are victims of persecution at home and therefore eligible for asylum in the U.S.”
Former BBC Chairman Criticizes Network’s Israel Coverage
(JNS.org) The former chairman of the BBC, Lord Michael Ian Grade, criticized the British news network for its coverage of the recent wave of terror attacks in Israel in a letter to the corporation’s director of news and current affairs, James Harding.
In the letter, Grade specifically criticized journalist Orla Guerin, whose report from Israel did not include the “wider context” of the attacks and equated “Israeli victims of terrorism and Palestinians who have been killed by Israeli security forces in the act of carrying out terror attacks,” according to the British advocacy group Conservatives Friends of Israel, which was the first entity to report on the letter.
