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1. Lebanon Says Three Soldiers Killed in Clash with IDF
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Lebanon said three of its soldiers and a journalist were killed in a rare clash with IDF forces at the northern border around noon Tuesday. None of the Israeli soldiers were injured.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry said it holds the Lebanese government responsible for what it called a “grave incident” when the Lebanese army fired on the IDF while its troops were patrolling within the Blue Line that the UN has marked out as the international boundary.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Avigdor Lieberman has instructed the Israeli diplomatic delegation to the United Nations to file a protest with the UN Secretary General and the Security Council. In a statement to media, he said that the IDF “was operating along the Lebanese border in coordination with UNIFIL.”
The Foreign Ministry added that and that the Lebanese fire was a severe violation of the UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the 34-day-old Second Lebanon War four summers ago.
Lebanon claimed that the Israelis were operating in its territory and were trying to uproot a tree that blocked a lookout on a Lebanese village. Lebanon also alleged its Lebanese soldiers fired warning shots at the IDF, which allegedly responded with rocket-propelled grenades and tank fire.\
Military spokesmen said that after the Lebanese army fired on the soldiers, the IDF “immediately returned fire with light arms and made use of artillery fire. Several minutes later an Israel Air Force helicopter fired at the Lebanese army battalion command center, damaging several LAF armored combat vehicles.”
Quiet has returned to the border, but Lebanese Prime Minister Sa’ad Hariri condemned what he called “Israeli aggression.”
2. Soldiers Safe after Helicopter Scare in Romania
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Two IDF Sea Stallion helicopters en route to Israel landed safely in Romania Tuesday morning after running into technical trouble a week after six soldiers died in a joint training exercise.
The IDF emphasized that the choppers did not have to make an emergency landing but touched down after discovering a malfunction. “The military's authorities have contacted the choppers' crews in order to help them fix the technical malfunctions and resume the flight,” spokesmen said.
Nevertheless, emergency rescue teams were on hand.
The joint training exercises in Romania have fueled speculation that they are geared to prepare Israeli pilots for a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. The IDF has stated the training is routine.
The helicopter that crashed into a rocky cliff last week in foggy weather carried four pilots, two mechanics and a Romanian observer.
An officer who was part of the body identification team that flew to Romania to find and retrieve the remains of the soldiers told Israel National News that there were two helicopters flying in the area. He explained that the weather was unstable and that the choppers were suddenly caught in a cloud as they neared a several-mile long cliff in the Carpathian Mountains.
Radar equipment was not able to operate in the cloud. One of the helicopters flew straight up and out of the cloud and then saw he had no visual contact with the other aircraft. The pilot of the other helicopter either did not maneuver in time or simply continued forward.
The officer also said that his team was unable to remain at the site overnight because of the weather. They used ropes to climb the cliffs in order to retrieve the body parts, which later were identified as those of the soldiers.
3. 3,500-Year-Old Bracelet Found Near Tzfat
by Hillel Fendel
Archaeologists in Israel are excited at their latest find: a bronze bracelet from 3,500 years ago, in southeast Tzfat in the Galilee.
The excavation of the first known village from the Late Bronze period – roughly the time of the Biblical Joseph – is taking place in the Ramat Razim neighborhood, with funding provided by the Ministry of Transport and Ministry of Housing. The work is being done in preparation for the construction of new neighborhoods, commercial areas, an access road and a medical school in the area.
"We discovered a rare, wide bracelet made of bronze,” said Karen Covello-Paran, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority. “The ancient bracelet, which is extraordinarily well-preserved, is decorated with engravings, and the top of it is adorned with a horned structure,” representing power, fertility and law.
One who could afford such a bracelet was apparently very well-off financially, Covello-Paran said, “and it probably belonged to the wife or daughter of the village ruler. In the artwork of neighboring lands, gods and rulers were depicted wearing horned crowns; however, such a bracelet, and from an archaeological excavation at that, has never been found here.”
The bracelet was found inside the remains of an estate house, part of an ancient settlement that existed in a rocky area overlooking the Sea of Galilee and the Golan Heights. Made of indigenous limestone, the building included a paved central courtyard surrounded by residential rooms and storerooms. The residents apparently engaged in barter.
Along with the bracelet, a Canaanite scarab was found that is made of stone and engraved with Egyptian hieroglyphs. In antiquity, scarabs were worn as pendants or were inlaid in rings, and were used as a seal or talisman with magical powers.
“This is the first time that a 3,500-year-old village has been excavated and exposed in the north of Israel,” Covello-Paran said. “To date, only the large cities have been excavated in the region, such as Tel Megiddo or Tel Hazor. Here we have gained a first glimpse of life in the ancient rural hinterland in the north, and it turns out that it was more complex than we thought. It seems that the small village at Ramat Razim constituted part of the periphery of Tel Hazor, the largest and most significant city in the Canaanite region at the time, which is located about 10 kilometers north of the settlement at Ramat Razim.”
The ancient inhabitants of Ramat Razim raised sheep and goats, and farmed. Numerous basalt querns that were used for grinding wheat into flour were found in the building. In addition, we also found large storage vessels that were used to store grain and liquids, which stood on the floor to a height of more than a meter. An ancient oven for cooking was found in one of the residential rooms alongside ceramic cookware and tools, including flint blades, and intact bronze implements such as a long needle (15 centimeters, or 6 inches) for sewing sacks or treating skins, and a long decorated pin that was used to fasten a dress or gown.”
The Israel Antiquities Authority is working to integrate the site in the extensive development plans for Ramat Razim, alongside the research institute and medical school, as an open place for visitors, together with the other nature assets in the region.
4. Partial US Withdrawal from Iraq as Al-Qaeda Strengthens
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
The “pullout” from Iraq announced by U.S. President Barack Obama Monday in truth is only partial, and the 50,000 remaining “anti-terror” troops face an increase in suicide bombings as Al-Qaeda’s strength increases.
President Obama said that the American troops would leave Iraq "as promised and on schedule," adding that that the United States’ commitment in Iraq is changing “from a military effort led by our troops to a civilian effort led by our diplomats."
However, a “transitional” force of 50,000 soldiers will remain, and they are likely to be involved in fighting as Iraqi commanders asked them for help on the front lines, the Associated Press reported Tuesday.
Despite the stated aims of the war to end terror and allow a stable government in Baghdad, the number of suicide bombings is higher than last year. In addition, elections have left the government without a clear winner, creating a political stalemate.
Obama claimed that “violence in Iraq continues to be near the lowest it's been in years" - but July was the deadliest in two years, according to Iraqi authorities.
Optimists in 2002 envisioned that the American invasion of Iraq would encourage protest groups in Iran to overthrow the regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and counter Syrian’s aid to anti-Israeli Hizbullah terrorists in Lebanon.
Instead, Israel faces increased threats, Ahmadinejad has maintained a tighter grip on Iran, Hizbullah has virtually merged with the Lebanese army and Syria has returned to be a dominant force in Beirut through Hizbullah's representation in the government. Furthermore, a lengthy political vacuum in Iraq might allow terrorists to forge a new alliance between Baghdad and the Syrian-Iranian-Hamas-Hizbullah axis.
Al-Qaeda terrorists have benefited from the Iraqi political vacuum, according to an ABC News report filed by Prof. Amin Saikal, Director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Australian National University.
He wrote that Al-Qaeda has increased “their violent activities for political, strategic and criminal gains,” adding that “the situation is most likely to worsen once the United States starts withdrawing its forces."
Prof. Saikal pointed out that the Kurds, who comprise 20 percent of the Iraqi population, “have created virtually an independent state of their own in northern Iraq." One of the hoped for results of the war in Iraq was to bring the Kurds into an Iraqi government, but “as American troops leave Iraq, an escalating conflict is emerging between Turkey and the Kurds,” he added.
5. Katz: Peres May Have Forgotten - But the Nation of Israel Hasn't
by Hillel Fendel
President Shimon Peres, greeting the most recent new immigrants to Israel on Tuesday, spoke briefly of the country’s pursuit of peace with its neighbors. MK Yaakov Katz countered his words sharply.
Peres said, “The IDF is a defensive army... We never wanted to fight, but we won the wars that were imposed on us. And when our neighbors are ready to make peace, we gave them back the land and the water…” Though Peres interspersed present and past tenses, his insinuation that the land and water are not ours did not go unnoticed.
MK Yaakov Katz, head of the National Union party, responded sharply. He issued a statement saying, “Every Jewish child throughout the generations who was raised on Jewish tradition knows that Shilo, Beit El, Nov, Anatot, Hevron and Shechem are our lands, and the water flowing in the Shiloah and Gichon [both in Jerusalem] are ours just as those flowing in the Kishon and Yarkon [near Tel Aviv].
“It is too bad,” Katz continued, “that Peres, who has already ended his political career and is now merely ‘holding on,’ greets new immigrants, of all people, and gives them the opinion of a radical, anachronistic, eccentric group, shared by perhaps 1 percent of the population, that the lands and waters here belong to foreigners. We are guided by the words of another Jewish leader named Shimon – Shimon the son of Matityahu the Hasmonean, who said about the Holy Land, ‘This is not the land of foreigners that we conquered.’"
"It could be that Shimon Peres, at the heights of his age (87), has forgotten," Katz concluded, "but the Nation of Israel throughout its generations does not forget.”
6. Jerusalem Answers Abbas‘ Demands with More Building
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Jerusalem announced Monday additional building in a large part of the capital where the Palestinian Authority, backed by U.S. President Barack Obama, has demanded that Israel halt new construction for Jews.
The city’s recent thaw of a de facto building freeze has turned into a meltdown with the approval of an additional 40 units. Jerusalem's latest action comes one day after Mayor Nir Barkat said that Jews will continue to receive building permits in all parts of the capital.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon stated on Friday that Israel must halt construction for Jews in all of the areas where the Palestinian Authority claim sovereignty. Barkat called Ban’s statement “racist.”
The United States does not recognize Israeli sovereignty over the entire city, and President Obama raised expectations in the Arab world last year by backing PA demands in Jerusalem.
The 40 housing units in four buildings approved Monday followed by two weeks the permission to build 32 apartments, all of them part of a planned 220-unit project in the Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood that is home to approximately 50,000 people, some of them Arabs.
The United States has not commented on the new construction approval, but reporters probably will bring up the issue at the daily press briefing at the State Department later Monday. Government spokesmen said two weeks ago they disapprove of the permits, but the issue did not cause a diplomatic crisis. Last March, relations between the United States and Israel were tense following the announcement of bureaucratic progress for a 1.600-unit project in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood but which is two years away from final approval.
Deputy Jerusalem mayor David Hadari told Arutz 7 Monday he voted in favor of building the 40 units even though he thinks a lot more should be approved. “What are 40 units for a city of 800,000 residents,” he said.
7. Rabbi Dances and Sings after Police Questioning
by Yoni Kempinski and Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburg, head of the Ohd Yosef Chai (Joseph Still Lives) yeshiva in Samaria, danced and sang with his students Monday after he was questioned by police in central Israel over a book in which he wrote a preface.
Rabbi Ginsburg told Israel National News TV that the police don’t even know what is written in the book, which raised suspicions among authorities that he was inciting followers. The volume is entitled "Torat HaMelech" and was written by Rabbi Yitzchak Shapira.
The book tries to show “the public, and especially soldiers in the army, the true ethics of self-defense according to the Torah,” he said. His message also is that people should “not be led astray and endanger lives of soldiers because of false ethical morals that are not coming from a Jewish place.”
The book includes in depth explanation of self-defense according to Torah and the importance of a Jewish soldier saving his life or the life of a fellow Jew even if the consequence is killing those who threaten Jewish lives. Rabbi Shapira has already been questioned and released without any charges being laid.
Rabbi Ginsburg said that one lesson to be drawn from the questioning by police is that “we have to clarify ourselves even better and we have to reach the general public. We have to address and relate to the public in pleasant ways in order to give the light of the Torah and the true ethics of the Torah to the general public and the whole world."
The Ohd Yosef Chai yeshiva is located near Shechem, where the Biblical Joseph was sent by his father Yaakov to meet his brothers who were shepherding flocks. The yeshiva is named after Joseph. Yaakov exclaimed his son still was alive after his brothers sold him to Egypt and then brought false evidence to their father to show he has been killed by an animal.
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