Israel and the Middle East News Update

Monday, December 9

Headlines:

• No Talks Set as Coalition Deadline Approaches • Third Israeli Election Expected in March 2020 if Dissolves • Likud Cancels Party List Primaries • Luxembourg Said Pushing for EU States to Recognize Palestine • U.S. House Passes Resolution Breaking with Trump on policy • Biden: Netanyahu Is Drifting to the 'Extreme Right' to Stay in Power • Norway to Withhold Funding to PA Over Inciteful Curriculum • Foreigners File Many Lawsuits Against Israeli Binary Options Companies

Commentary:

• Ha’aretz: “Netanyahu Is Heading for a Plea Dealow” - By Avi Tiomkin and Alon Pinkas • The Hill: “West Bank Annexation Would Endanger Israel's Security” - By Ami Ayalon, , and

S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace 633 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, 5th Floor, Washington, DC 20004 www.centerpeace.org ● Yoni Komorov, Editor

News Excerpts December 5, 2019 Jerusalem Post No Talks Set as Coalition Deadline Approaches Prime Minister , Blue and White leader and their parties’ coalition negotiating teams will all be at the Knesset on Monday, but sources close to them all said there would be no negotiations to end the political quagmire. An agreement must be reached by Wednesday at midnight to prevent the Knesset from dispersing itself automatically. If no MK obtains the support of a majority of the Knesset to form a government by then, Israelis will go to the polls for the third time in under a year. “In the three days that are left, there is still hope that we can avoid an unnecessary election,” Gantz told the Makor Rishon conference in Jerusalem. “But it will not happen through political spin about changing the voting technique, which would only bring us back to this same mess.” See also, “Gantz: Elections can still be averted, but no forgiveness for corruption” (TOI)

Ha’aretz Third Israeli Election Expected in March 2020 if Knesset Dissolves Israel's next election is expected to take place in March 2020 if the country's parliament dissolves this week after both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his rival Benny Gantz failed to form a coalition. In the event of a failure to obtain the 61 signatures required to back a lawmaker who would receive the mandate to form a coalition, the Knesset will dissolve by Wednesday and Israelis will head back to the polling booth, with the vote supposed to take place on March 10. The chairman of the Knesset Arrangements Committee, MK Avi Nissenkorn plans to convene the committee on Monday in order to approve an amendment with the new date before the Knesset's dissolvement on Wednesday. See also, “Likud, Blue and White spar over election date” (JPost)

Ynet News Likud Cancels Party List Primaries The Likud Central Committee voted on Sunday in favor of canceling the premieres for the party's list at a party conference in . The Committee also decided that elections for party leadership will only take place if elections are declared. Netanyahu's main rival for Likud leadership MK Gideon Sa'ar gave a speech at the conference, claiming that party officials are trying to besmirch him for challenging Netanyahu for the Likud premiership. "There are people who try to smear those who want to run for Leadership," said Sa'ar." See also, “Saar attacks Netanyahu: Settlement future secured not with words” (JPost)

Times of Israel Luxembourg Said Pushing for EU States to Recognize Palestine Luxembourg is pushing the European states to recognize Palestine in response to the recent US declaration that it no longer views Israeli settlements in the West Bank as illegal under international law, Channel 13 news reported Sunday.The report said Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn sent a letter to new EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and to EU foreign ministers, saying the only way to save the two-state solution was to create “a more equitable situation” between Israel and the Palestinians. “It is time to start a debate within the European Union on the opportunity of a recognition of the State of Palestine by all its Member States,” Channel 13 quoted him as writing. See also “Luxembourg urges EU to recognize Palestinian state” (JPost)

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Reuters U.S. House Passes Resolution Breaking with Trump on Israel policy The U.S. House of Representatives passed a symbolic resolution on Friday backing a two-state solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, following initiatives from President Donald Trump seen as heavily favoring the Jewish state. The Democratic-led House voted 226 to 188, largely along party lines, for a non-binding resolution saying that only a two-state solution can both ensure Israel’s survival as a Jewish state and fulfill the Palestinians’ “legitimate aspirations” for their own state. Since he became president in January 2017, the Republican Trump has been condemned by Palestinian and some Arab states’ leaders for reversing long-held U.S. policies to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in 2017, move the U.S. embassy to the city in 2018 and cut U.S. aid to Palestinians. See also, “House moves ahead on long-stalled resolution supporting two states for Israelis and Palestinians” (The Hill)

Ha’aretz Biden: Netanyahu Is Drifting to the 'Extreme Right' to Stay in Power Former Vice President Joe Biden, who is currently seeking the Democratic nomination for president, said over the weekend that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has drifted to the "extreme right" in order to survive politically. While Biden called Netanyahu’s political direction “a serious mistake," he reiterated his opposition to cutting or limiting U.S. military aid to Israel. Biden spoke at an event in Iowa, and was asked about calls by other Democratic presidential hopefuls, such as Senator Bernie Sanders, to withhold or condition military aid to Israel. Biden said it was a “bizarre” idea and compared it to “telling France we disagree with you so we’re kicking you out of NATO.” See also “Biden slams Sanders’ pitch to leverage Israel aid 'bizarre' “ (Israel Hayom)

Ynet News Norway to Withhold Funding to PA Over Inciteful Curriculum The Norwegian Parliament decided last week to cut funding for the education system of the Palestinian Authority, due to evidence of the existence of materials inciting violence, terrorism, and martyrdom in school curricula across the Palestinian territory. This unprecedented announcement follows a report made by the Jerusalem based Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), that brings to light the widespread radicalization rampant within the Palestinian education system. Coalition lawmakers issued a statement sharply criticizing the violent and inciteful material found within the textbooks. "Examples of content found in Palestinian school books include references to violence, martyrdom and terror," read the statement. "The coalition considers this to be devastating to the peace process and the development of democracy.”

Times of Israel Foreigners File Many Lawsuits Against Israeli Binary Options Companies Amid the failure of Israeli police and prosecutors to effectively investigate and prosecute perpetrators of online fraud, Israeli courts are seeing a slew of civil lawsuits by alleged victims overseas against Israelis they allege have defrauded them through binary options and related schemes.Israeli court filings show that dozens of lawsuits have been filed against Israeli binary options companies by former clients in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, India, Belize and Singapore, as well as numerous alleged victims of investment fraud from Israel itself. See also, “Israeli binary option site owner faces indictment” ()

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Ha’aretz- December 9, 2019 Netanyahu Is Heading for a Plea Deal By Avi Tiomkin and Alon Pinkas

• Benjamin Netanyahu is on his way to a plea deal. This is why he so badly needs “a few months” to negotiate from the position of prime minister. It is the only liquid asset he has to sell, his only security, his lifesaver. He knows it. He wants it. He is aware of the fact he has no other choice. His family and those around him have realized that there is no other reasonable alternative. The reasons for his decision to stay in his current role as long as possible are not political. They certainly aren’t ethical or moral. They are legal, and mainly financial. • The stage of denial and defiance has ended. His incessant talk of “there won’t be anything because there was nothing” are over, as are his arrogant boasts of “wait and see.” We waited, we saw. • Three serious indictments were filed against Netanyahu. Moreover, the spillover from the submarine affair known as Case 3000 has not reached its full potential, and the damage could be great. From the moment Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit announced his decision to file indictments, the game stopped being a political and media game, and became a race for a bargain with the law. • Netanyahu will likely remain the eternal victim in his own view and will continue acting that way. He is Alfred Dreyfus on steroids. He will keep believing that a historical crime was perpetrated, an attempted coup against a prime minister, a crass overthrow of government, a putsch waged by the treacherous leftist elites, the corrupt state prosecutor, the media, the president, dubious state witnesses, the police commissioner, the attorney general, former and Shin Bet leaders, Barack Obama, George Soros, etc., etc., against him. None of this changes the fact that he faces a plea deal. He has no other option. Perhaps it won’t work — but no doubt he will strive for one. • The first inkling of his fragile condition came, not from the growing list of the Likud local leaders and major members switching their support to rival Gideon Sa’ar, but rather from the international arena, which he seemed to rule for years. U.S. President Trump is ignoring him, Putin is letting him wait for hours, Boris Johnson and Emmanuel Macron don’t find the time or see a point in meeting with him at the NATO summit, which he tried to crash without invitation. • His calculation is fairly simple. In “the State of Israel versus Benjamin, son of Zila and Benzion Netanyahu,” not presenting himself as “Prime Minister Netanyahu” means four to five years of court hearings. The fresh septuagerian will be 75 or older if it ends in his acquittal, and 78 to 80 if it ends with a conviction and prison time. The cost of his defense will be $5—10 million, given the reasonable consideration that he will hire a sizeable defense team, more senior and more expensive than the team that has worked for him until now. Can anyone conceive Netanyahu and his family willingly take such a huge and uncalculatable risk? Can anyone conceive that someone who asked to pay a 50,000-shekel ($14,400) fine in installments will pay $10 million? • Raising money for his defense is nearly impossible, but a plea deal, as unpleasant as it is, will allow Netanyahu to do three things. First, it will avoid the embarrassment of a Likud primary, and the even greater embarrassment of an election come February or March. The polls that Netanyahu sees for the race against Sa’ar in the primary and against Benny Gantz in the general 4

election are not optimistic. Second, it will reinforce his narrative of a “coup” — that he "had no choice” but to confess and express regret. Third, the plea bargain will enable him to fall comfortably into the embrace of the American right, which sees him as a victim, like Trump, a righteous person that the elites conspired against to overthrow. Netanyahu can lecture, can sit on the boards of corporations and think tanks owned by American right wingers, who always saw him as one of them, earn millions of dollars and write an autobiography that countless Evangelical Christians will buy. • Since the April election, political commentary has concentrated on Netanyahu's two defeats – a relative failure at the ballot box and an absolute failure to form a coalition. This is no longer relevant. Netanyahu hoped to legislate the bill colloquially known as the French Law, which shields a sitting prime minister from having to stand trial. He believed that the Knesset would award him immunity after establishing a government after the April election, and again after September. It didn’t happen, and it won’t happen. • The legal and ethical arguments over his status as prime minister, or only as a legislator heading a transitional government, are crucial regarding the substance of Israeli democracy but miss the point, as do the scholarly debates over Sections 18 and 30 of the Basic Law: The Government. They keep constitutional legal experts and political analysts busy, but only offer partial solutions to the constitutional mess that has dragged on since April. Crucially, they have not managed to intelligently forecast which direction Netanyahu is heading — however, his path is now clear: Benjamin Netanyahu will not waste a fortune and risk three to five years in prison. Alon Pinkas was an adviser to four foreign ministers and the consul general in New York. Avi Tiomkin is an adviser to international hedge funds.

Summary: Since the April election, political commentary has concentrated on Netanyahu's two

defeats – a relative failure at the ballot box and an absolute failure to form a coalition. This is no longer relevant. Netanyahu hoped to legislate the bill colloquially known as the French Law, which shields a sitting prime minister from having to stand trial. He believed that the Knesset would award him immunity after establishing a government after the April election, and again after September. It didn’t happen, and it won’t happen. The legal and ethical arguments over his status as prime minister, or only as a legislator heading a transitional government, are crucial regarding the substance of Israeli democracy but miss the point, as do the scholarly

debates over Sections 18 and 30 of the Basic Law: The Government. They keep constitutional legal experts and political analysts busy, but only offer partial solutions to the constitutional mess that has dragged on since April. Crucially, they have not managed to intelligently forecast which direction Netanyahu is heading — however, his path is now clear: Benjamin Netanyahu will not waste a fortune and risk three to five years in prison.

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The Hill – December 5, 2019 West Bank Annexation Would Endanger Israel's Security By Ami Ayalon, former director of Shin Bet, Gadi Shamni, former commander of the IDF , and Danny Yatom former director of Mossad • Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s recent declaration that the U.S. no longer considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank as illegal propelled Israel’s annexationist lobby into action, which, if the lobby has its way, would endanger Israel’s security. At the same time, we are encouraged by a step that Congress is taking. • On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu made public his conversation with President Trump, in which they discussed several issues, among them, “historic opportunities that we have in the coming months, including recognizing the Jordan Valley as Israel’s eastern border.” Also on Sunday, reports in Israel on negotiations over the next government indicated that Netanyahu seeks to serve as premier first in a rotation with rival party Blue and White for “only as long as it takes him to … annex” the Jordan Valley. • A few days earlier, Israel’s Knesset discussed four “urgent points of order” calling for the annexation of the Jordan Valley. As Likud Minister Yariv Levin explained, “Having now received the declaration of Secretary of State Pompeo … it is our duty … to act on this … so as to seize upon this window of opportunity.” • Fearing such moves, we recently signed onto a letter from 25 Israeli former high-ranking security officials calling for U.S. congressional action to oppose unilateral West Bank annexation — whether full or partial — and expressing our gratitude to Congress for the overwhelming bipartisan support for two states encapsulated in H.Res. 246. • Pompeo’s announcement and the annexationists’ actions underscore the urgency of our call. That’s why we were encouraged that H.Res. 326 warning about the dangers of annexation and emphasizing the need for a two-state solution was added to this week’s House calendar. Like 246, it represents the very embodiment of a pro-Israel position and merits bipartisan support. We hope that additional bipartisan legislative initiatives that clearly reinforce the message of opposition to unilateral annexation and support for two states are forthcoming. • Israel is capable of addressing its many military challenges. However, the last thing Israel needs is to create another major security problem that will contribute to regional instability, occupy the ’ (IDF) energy and resources, and undermine vital security coordination with neighbors near and far. Yet that is the likely outcome of the annexationists’ embrace of Pompeo’s declaration as further evidence that the Trump administration green-lights accelerated annexation of West Bank areas. • We are under no illusions about the ease of separating from the Palestinians. But Israel cannot have long-term security or remain both Jewish and democratic if it annexes the West Bank and absorbs its millions of Palestinians. Should Israel take any unilateral step toward annexation, such as applying sovereignty to communities beyond the Green Line or annexing settlement blocs, we fear there will be no way to control what comes next. And what comes next could very well be the end of military coordination with the Palestinian Authority (PA), if not the collapse of the PA itself.

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• Once the symbol of Palestinian national aspirations, military coordination has lost its glamour. In the absence of hope for statehood anytime soon, Palestinians now view it as serving the Israeli occupation, not their aspirations. Should Israel take the unilateral step of annexing any part of the West Bank, security synchronization will lose any residual legitimacy. Whether it will be terminated by a leadership decision or because the rank and file yields to street pressure and no longer shows up for work, Israel will have no choice but to take over the entire West Bank to prevent extreme armed groups from exploiting the ensuing security vacuum. Once that happens, Gaza cannot be expected to remain quiet, forcing the IDF to re-occupy it too, and, as with the West Bank, with no exit strategy. • To expect Palestinians to accept remaining stateless forever, and to consent to an eternal Israeli military control, is to bury your head in the sand. A more realistic assessment would anticipate stifled Palestinian hope to trigger waves of violence, the spark for each, its duration and, most important, the extent of casualties on both sides can only be assumed. • But even in the absence of violent eruptions, Israel would incur significant financial costs — by the most reliable estimate, the equivalent of over four times the generous annual U.S. military assistance to our country. Israel would be required to deploy sizable standing and reserve IDF forces, undermining training and preparedness for all our other security challenges — north (Syria and Lebanon), south (Gaza) and east (Iran). The likely ensuing erosion, if not termination, of regional security cooperation would adversely affect Israeli security and increase instability in the region, which would also be detrimental to U.S. interests. • We support Israeli sovereignty over the main settlement blocks adjacent to the Green Line and expect Israel to insist on their incorporation within our borders in any future two-state negotiations. However, what is a legitimate demand in negotiations is not only not legitimate, but outright counterproductive, when done unilaterally. • We appreciate the resounding two-party support for two states that Congress has voiced and believe Congress should send an equally forceful bipartisan message opposing unilateral annexation — whether full or partial. These congressional steps would be particularly important now, as our annexationist minority, emboldened by the change in U.S. policy, seeks to jeopardize Israel’s security and future as a Jewish democracy by making good on its destructive, messianic vision.

Summary: Pompeo’s announcement and the annexationists’ actions underscore the urgency of our call. That’s why we were encouraged that H.Res. 326 warning about the dangers of annexation and emphasizing the need for a two-state solution was added to this week’s House calendar. Like 246, it represents the very embodiment of a pro-Israel position and merits bipartisan support. We hope that additional bipartisan legislative initiatives that clearly reinforce the message of opposition to unilateral annexation and support for two states are forthcoming. Israel is capable of addressing its many military challenges. However, the last thing Israel needs is to create another major security problem that will contribute to regional instability, occupy the Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) energy and resources, and undermine vital security coordination with neighbors near and far. Yet that is the likely outcome of the annexationists’ embrace of Pompeo’s declaration as further evidence that the Trump administration green-lights accelerated annexation of West Bank areas. 7