Erdogan: ‘So Much the Region Could Gain’ From Turkey-Israel Normalization

(JNS.org) Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that improved relations with Israel can occur once Israel compensates victims of the Gaza flotilla raid and lifts the blockade on Hamas-ruled Gaza, the Turkish daily newspaper Yeni Safak reported Monday.

“There is so much the region could gain from such a normalization process,” Erdogan said.

Yedioth Ahronoth reported that officials in Jerusalem responded, “The ball is in their court. We apologized [for the flotilla incident] and were ready to pay damages. He should stop talking nonsense about the removal of the Gaza blockade, because Turkey knows that there is no such thing, and we are not about to pay more for normalization.”

In May 2010, the Mavi Marmara flotilla attempted to break the naval blockade on Gaza. After Turkish militants attacked Israeli forces on board, nine Turkish citizens were killed in clashes, leading to strained Israeli-Turkish relations.

Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz on Monday said that Erdogan’s comments are related to his interest in a recent natural gas deal brokered by Israel.

Hamas Terror Group Marks 28th Anniversary, Boasts Bloody History

(JNS.org) Mass rallies, speeches, and military parades are among the events planned this week by Hamas government in Gaza to mark the Islamist terror group’s 28th anniversary.

Boasting a bloody history, Hamas recently uploaded a six-minute video montage to its website, featuring the “highlights” of terrorist attacks carried out by its “military wing,” the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, and touting the group’s readiness for a fresh round of hostilities with Israel.

The terrorist group bragged that the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades’s rocket unit has fired 16,377 shells at Israel. Hamas said its rocket production capabilities have vastly improved over the years, that the majority of its projectiles are now domestically produced, and that Haifa was the northernmost Israeli city it was able to target during 2014’s summer war against Israel.

Touting other gruesome details, Hamas said that since its inception in 1987, its operatives have carried out 86 suicide attacks, 36 stabbing attacks, more than 500 border infiltrations and raids, 250 shooting attacks, the neutralization of more than 80 armored vehicles, and the abduction of 26 Israelis (dead or alive).

PA’s Abbas calls Palestinian Terror Attacks ‘Justified Popular Uprising’

(JNS.org) Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said that the ongoing wave of Palestinian terror attacks in Israel is a “justified popular uprising.”

The violence has come due to “the despair of young Palestinians over the lack of a political horizon for the two-state solution, the [Israeli] invasion of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the continuation of settlement building and military checkpoint deployment,” Abbas said in a speech in Ramallah on Monday.

Abbas’s repeated claims that Israel is seeking to change the status quo on the Temple Mount has been a major source of Palestinian rage directed at Israelis, despite statements by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel will not change the status quo.

EU Doubles Down on Labeling of Israeli Products From Beyond 1967 Lines

(JNS.org) Federica Mogherini, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said the EU is standing firm behind its recently implemented initiative to remove “Made in Israel” labels from Israeli products originating beyond the 1967 lines.

The EU is “united on these technical guidelines on the indication of origin, which is in no way a boycott,” Mogherini said during talks with EU foreign ministers on Monday.

Mogherini added that the EU will remain engaged in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and in “broader bilateral relations with Israel,” despite the Israeli government’s own decision to halt the EU’s peace process involvement.

“There is full unity and solidarity among member states and among European institutions on that,” said Mogherini.

Texas A&M to Open $6 Million Marine Research Center in Israel

(JNS.org) Texas A&M University in February will open a $6 million marine research center in Israel in partnership with the University of Haifa, rather than a previously planned $200 million campus in Nazareth.

Texas A&M System Chancellor John Sharp told The Associated Press that plans changed on the Nazareth-based “peace university,” intended to help bring Arabs and Jews together, after a meeting with former Israeli president Shimon Peres revealed that elected officials in Nazareth would shift the direction of the peace campus.

“We’re not going to put our name on something we didn’t have total control over,” Sharp said.

Sharp said the University of Haifa partnership is the beginning of a relationship with Israel that he expects will “grow exponentially.”

“They don’t call it ‘start-up nation’ for nothing,” he said.

Family of Fallen IDF Soldier Believed to Be Held by Hamas Demands Answers

(JNS.org) Marking a year and a half since IDF soldier Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul was killed in action during Operation Protective Edge in Gaza, and subsequently classified as a fallen soldier whose burial place is unknown, Shaul’s parents Zahava and Herzl held a press conference at their home in northern Israel to call for answers.

Shaul’s body is believed to be held by the Hamas terror group.

“Despite the efforts that have been made or not made, we have not seen a change in the situation and Oron has not been returned home,” Zahava said, Israel Hayom reported. “To this day, the family has no concrete and verifiable evidence that Oron is alive or not, wounded or dead, and we are in a situation of complete uncertainty.”

Addressing the Israeli government, she said, “A year and a half and the situation remains the same. This situation cannot continue.”

She also addressed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, saying, “Ismail Haniyeh, I am turning to you again…I want to believe you. Give me concrete evidence on the true condition of Oron.”

U.S. Envoy Outraged Over Planned Statue Honoring Hungarian Anti-Semite

(JNS.org) Ira Forman, the official U.S. government envoy for monitoring and combating anti-Semitism, on Sunday expressed outrage over plans in Hungary to erect a statue of Balint Homan, a Holocaust-era anti-Semitic historian and politician.

“From the U.S. government perspective we feel very strongly that history and the damage that this man did to Hungarian citizens who happened to be Jewish cannot be ignored, and to put up that statue seems incomprehensible,” Forman told Reuters.

Through the statue, Hungary’s Balint Homan Foundation is honoring a man known for creating anti-Jewish laws and being a Nazi supporter.

“We think it’s important to know what this man did to Hungarian citizens in the 1930s and ‘40s, taking away their citizenship rights and then arguing for them to be deported, which eventually meant going to Auschwitz,” Forman said.

“Honoring a man like that—we’re shocked by it,” he added.

New Israeli Medical Guidelines May See Terrorists Treated Before Victims

(JNS.org) New guidelines announced Tuesday by the Israel Medical Association (IMA) may dramatically change the way paramedics treat wounded individuals following terrorist attacks, potentially prioritizing terrorists over victims.

The directive, issued by the IMA’s Ethics Committee, effectively changes existing triage guidelines. Under the current directive, patients are not to be prioritized solely on the basis of injury severity but also on the principle of “charity begins at home,” meaning treating the victims of a terrorist attack before the terrorist himself, even if it appears the attacker’s wounds are more serious.

Under the revised directive, patients are to be prioritized on the basis of medical considerations only. This means first responders may face situations where they must treat a terrorist before tending to the victims.

Rav Yuval Cherlow, head of the Ethics Committee of Israel’s Tzohar Rabbinical Organization, criticized the new guidelines.

“In all cases of terrorist attacks, the medical teams should treat the victims and only thereafter the attacker,” Cherlow told JNS.org. “Only in those instances where there is confusion to the extent that it cannot be easily determined who is the terrorist and who is the victim should the medics choose to first treat the most heavily injured.”

The IMA’s Ethics Committee is the only body in Israel authorized to set the ethical standards for medical care, and medical and other emergency personnel on all levels are bound by its guidelines.

“Doctors are not judges….It’s very easy to make mistakes when dealing with a mass-casualty event, and a doctor at the scene cannot be expected to pinpoint victims’ identity—he has to focus on saving as many lives as possible,” IMA Ethics Director Tammy Karni told Israel Hayom on Tuesday. “It’s unfair to burden doctors with additional triage criteria that have nothing to do with patients’ welfare.”