His death aged 102 was announced by the office of his son, prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, early Monday, April 30.  Prof. Benzion Netanyahu was a historian of note, editor of the Hebrew encyclopedia, professor and lifelong Zionist who believed that Jews would never be free of discrimination and that efforts to compromise with Arabs were bound to fail. Until a year ago, Prof. Netanyahu was academically active and had begun working on his memoirs.  He is survived by two sons, Binyamin and Iddo.
 

US Navy, Air Force, ground, intelligence and special forces units based at home, in Europe and the Middle East, took part this week in a special exercise ordered by President Barack Obama to simulate reactions to a potential US/Israel strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, debkafile reports. Advanced US stealth F-22 fighter bombers were also transferred to the Al Dhafra Air Base in the UAE. Washington is thinking of attacking core elements of Iran’s nuclear program to weaken its hand in negotiations. 

Because Israel received no answers from Washington about concessions Obama had made to Tehran in secret talks, and because Israel believes that Iran’s bomb-building capability will outrun progress in negotiations, Israel intelligence advise bringing forward the date for a military strike to stop Iran in its nuclear ...

Israel’s war preparations are based on the estimate that by the end of 2012, Iran will be able to produce a crude nuclear device as well as a dirty bomb. It calculates as high the risk that Tehran will decide to use those devices for war against Israel in the short term and not ...

By dragging the Iranian nuclear issues onto the hazardous ground of theological polemic on the value of Shiite fatwas, Obama has added to Israel’s mistrust and appalled the Arab world’s Sunni rulers and peoples, especially in the Gulf and Egypt, who accuse him of pro-Shiite bias which ...

After the “achievements” gained for its nuclear program from diplomacy with the West, Iran now wants sanctions lifted. European sources expect the Obama administration to soon start ending sanctions in stages. Israel’s drive against a nuclear Iran is assuming personal overtones: Three Israeli researchers question the evidence of a 2005 fatwa supposedly issued by Supreme Ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei prohibiting Muslims from building a nuclear weapon. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has held it up as “an entryway into negotiations.”

Israel is fed up with being kept in the dark, doesn’t trust American diplomatic maneuvers to stop a nuclear Iran and is getting ready to make its own decisions after the May 23 Baghdad talks between the P5-1 and Iran. That is the message coming from Binyamin ...

The head of Iran’s National Security Council Saeed Jalili suggested enigmatically Wednesday, April 11, that Tehran would present “new initiatives” at the negotiations with six world powers starting in Istanbul next Saturday. debkafile: The “Israeli dossier” tops the tactical agenda set out by Iran’s top strategic team for the negotiations ahead. Every demand the world powers make of Tehran will be twisted around and pointed at Israel’s alleged nuclear program. The Iranians are counting on this maneuver to keep their nuclear program intact.

Tehran, Moscow and Ankara are deeply concerned by the joint US-Israeli-Greek naval exercise this week. They are also troubled by the just signed secret Israeli-Cypriot-Greek Mediterranean energy cooperation pact, for control of which the US has beaten Russia to the draw. Russia and Turkey have staged their own naval ...

The energy accords secretly signed by Israel, Cyprus and Greece for cooperation in Mediterranean energy exploration and production target a new offshore field opposite Crete. This bloc envisions becoming the continent's main energy supplier with a big difference: They are examining plans to export electric power to Europe instead of ...

A new US intelligence position paper addressed to the Oval Office makes Tayyip Erdogan the linchpin of Obama’s Middle East and Iran policies after he showed the flag by accepting a US radar station, part of NATO’s anti-Iran missile shield. This won him a harsh dressing-down by ...

Omar Suleiman’s retirement from Egypt’s presidential race leaves the stage open to the Muslim Brotherhood and possible one other Islamist contender. Frontrunner Khairat El-Shater is offering his Salafist rivals perks for standing down. The Egyptian street will pick the winner.

Former Egyptian intelligence strongman Gen. Omar Suleiman’s decision Thursday, April 5 to drop out of the race for president in the June election shocked Washington and Jerusalem and dashed their hopes of a figure capable of challenging Khairat El-Shater and halting or at least offsetting the Muslim Brotherhood’s monopoly of power in post-Mubarak Egypt. The Supreme Military Council ruling Egypt was told that Islamist power had become unstoppable after starting to penetrate the young army elite taking over in July, debkafile reports.

Tehran is seeking a postponement of the nuclear negotiations with world powers set for April 13-14 in Istanbul, debkafile’s Iranian sources report. Washington and Jerusalem see Iran’s maneuvers as guided by two objectives: Having the venue removed from Istanbul and buying a couple more months before the diplomatic crunch - and so delaying any military option that Israel or possibly America may choose to exercise if last-chance diplomacy fails.  Russian rhetoric targets the US military and naval buildup around Iran.

Not 24 hours after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned that a pre-emptive strike (by the US and/or Israel) would violate international law, Moscow put muscle into his warning: Tuesday, April 3, the Russian guided missile destroyer Smetliviy arrived in the Syrian port of Tartus for a naval exercise. The ship, which carries anti-air, anti-ship and anti-submarine missiles, will hold drills with its support vessels in the same expanse of E. Mediterranean as the US-Israeli-Greek “Noble Dina” exercise.

Iran, Syria and Hizballah are celebrating Assad’s victory over the 12-month uprising against him and counting the advantages it confers on Tehran against the US and Saudi Arabia. The Iran-Syria-Hizballlah axis is now successfully shored up against the Obama administration’s strategy of isolation and sanctions for squeezing Iran into making concessions at the nuclear negotiations in two weeks.  Both are fading. It also serves as a warning to those Israelis who advocate passing the buck for preempting a nuclear Iran to Washington.

The most violent event of Palestinian-backed Earth Day Friday, March 30, was a battle around the Gaza-Israeli Erez crossing between Israeli forces and snipers of the Iran-backed Palestinian Jihad Islami, debkafile reports. The Jihad shooters were laying down fire to cover a mass Palestinian rush on the Israeli border so as to force Israeli soldiers to shoot into the crowd.  Intervention by Hamas internal security personnel helped IDF defuse the incident with one casualty. A planned or a spontaneous collaboration?

Despite Israeli warnings, the Palestinian Authority is for the first time making the annual Israeli-Arab Earth Day Friday, March 30 a joint Palestinian-Israel Arab event, organizing mass anti-Israel disturbances in Jerusalem, Jaffa and other places, while also instigating West Bankers to smash through Israeli border checkpoints. Syria too will bus thousands of Palestinians to storm Israel’s northern border on the Golan. Both also aim to shake up the Arab summit in Baghdad. The PA is broke after Arab aid was cut off.

After Binyamin Netanyahu was assured of an inner cabinet majority for a strike on Iran, he sent Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz to Washington with a clear timeline for attacking Iran. Three months are left to stop Iran’s nuclearization in its tracks, after which Israel will strike.

US President Barack Obama hauled Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas over the coals when they talked by phone Monday, March 19. He coldly demanded that the Palestinians return without further delay to the talks in the Jordanian capital of Amman which they quit abruptly after several rounds. Their conversation ended on a harsh note when Abbas refused to return to negotiations.
Monday, Palestinian ex-prime minister Ahmad Qurai (Abu Ala) proclaimed the death of the two-state solution in an Al Quds article.