Israel submits latest Goldstone response to UN
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
By: ICEJ News

News in Brief

Israel’s Foreign Ministry has submitted a report to the United Nations describing ongoing probes of Israeli actions during Operation Cast Lead in 2008, which it hopes will defuse pressure and answer questions raised by the Goldstone Report which investigated that conflict. The 37-page report, which was delivered to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday, explains that the IDF has made several changes to its combat doctrine in the hope of minimizing civilian casualties. This includes restricting the use of white phosphorous in urban areas and integrating a Humanitarian Affairs Officer into each combat unit, as well as defining new regulations regarding when it may be necessary to destroy private property. Israel's military police have opened 47 criminal investigations into specific incidents relating to the incursion against the Hamas terror militia which rules the Gaza Strip, and has issued indictments in several instances of wrongdoing.
View the Foreign Ministry report at: http://www.mfa.gov.il/NR/rdonlyres/1483B296-7439-4217-933C-653CD19CE859/0/GazaUpdateJuly2010.pdf - The Foreign Ministry’s legal department explains the report in a video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Nx4bvb-3Us

Israel develops vehicles for combating non-conventional attacks
Israel's Hatehof industries is contributing towards the security of the US and many other Western countries by developing technologies for vehicles that will protect them from nuclear, biological or chemical (NBC) attacks. The company, which is based in Nazareth, has already developed three fully encased vehicles for command and control, chemical reconnaissance and decontamination. "Hatehof can now provide an effective response to new and emerging threats from weapons of mass destruction," said Shimon Shacham, Hatehof's CEO. "We've taken the strategic decision to vector our experience in vehicle design and ballistic and mine protection into new means for detecting, identifying and decontaminating in the face of non-conventional events." Some 70% of the company’s products are exported to other countries as military and homeland security departments around the world deal with the growing threat of non-conventional terrorist attacks and industrial pollution.

PMW: Palestinian incitement against Israel unabated
Palestinian Media Watch will present a report to lawmakers in Washington on Wednesday that accuses the Palestinian Authority of continuing to incite hatred against Israel and Jews, in spite of commitments it made when proximity talks started in May to end such incitement. While saying all the right things in English, PA statements in Arabic continue to de-legitimize Israel’s existence, deny Israel’s right to exist, define the conflict with Israel as a religious war for Allah, promote hatred through demonization, slander and libel, and glorify terror and violence, according to the PMW report. “All the official PA maps in offices, Web sites, in schoolbooks, and those appearing on official PA TV since the start of the proximity talks, continue the PA policy of defining all of Israel as ‘Palestine’,” concludes the report by the media monitoring agency.

Relations warm between Israel and Turkey's adversaries
Even as relations between Israel and Turkey have continued to sour since the May 31 Mavi Marmara flotilla incident, Israel’s relations with Turkey’s long-time adversaries Bulgaria, Cyprus and Greece have improved considerably, as evidenced by Wednesday’s arrival of Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou. It marks the first official visit of a Greek prime minister to Israel since 1992. Papandreou has meetings scheduled with Israeli government officials as well as  the Greek Patriarch of Jerusalem Theophilos III and Greek Holocaust survivors. He will also lay a wreath at the tomb of Theodore Herzl and visit the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum. On Thursday afternoon, he will go to Ramallah for a meeting with Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. Diplomatic sources are attributing the new Greek attitude towards Israel as a calculated attempt by economically depressed Greece to get closer to the US as well as a way to score points in its long-time rivalry with Turkey. Meanwhile, Kurdish rebels in Turkey’s restive southeast region killed six Turkish soldiers and wounded nine in an overnight raid on a military outpost near the Iraqi border on Tuesday. Another soldier died in a separate attack. Israel cooperated with Turkey for decades in containing the Kurdish violence and supported Turkey at the UN when it came in for censure over the ongoing conflict, but recently Israel has been silent on the issue even as Turkey has unilaterally discontinued military cooperation.

US judge finds North Korea guilty for massacre at Israeli airport
A US federal judgehas found North Korea guilty and fined it $300 million for supporting a radical Japanese terrorist group which carried out a brutal armed assault on Israel's main airport in 1972. The petition, which was filed by the family of an American citizen killed during the attack, charged that the Japanese Red Army and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, with financial support from North Korea, targeted the Lod Airport, now Ben-Gurion International airport, killing 26 people and leaving over 80 injured. "North Korea's demonstrated and well-known policy to encourage, support and direct a campaign of murder against civilians amply justifies the imposition of punitive damages against it," said Judge Francisco A. Besosa of the US District Court in Peurto Rico during his ruling last Friday. It is considered unlikely that Pyongyang will recognize the court’s decision and pay the fine.

South Africa returning ambassador to Israel
South Africa announced on Tuesday that its ambassador will return to Tel Aviv, a month and a half after recalling its envoy to oppose Israel’s raid on the Gaza flotilla on May 31. “We welcome the decision of the South Africans and believe the relations will go back to normal, as is fitting for ties important to both countries,” said an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman.  “South Africa has an important role to play in global political and social affairs.” South Africa, Ecuador and Turkey recalled their ambassadors after the flotilla clash, while Nicaragua cut off all diplomatic relations. Before returning its envoy, Turkey has said it is waiting for Israel to apologize, comply with an international probe and compensate families of those killed and injured in the clash at sea.