Hamas Will Never Recognize Israel

(Speaking to Palestinian news agency Ma'an, Mahmoud Zahar says recognition of Israel would deprive future Palestinian generations of the possibility to 'liberate' their lands. Hamas would be willing to accept a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, a leader of the militant group,Mahmoud Zahar, told the Palestinian news agency Ma'an on Wednesday, adding, however, that Hamas would never recognize Israel since such a move would counter the group's aim to "liberate" all of Palestine)

May 11….(Ha Aretz) Zahar's comments come amid Palestinian efforts to form a unity government that would include former rivals Fatah and Hamas, following a reconciliation agreement the two factions signed last week in Cairo. Speaking to Ma'an on Wednesday, Zahar, hinting at the possible political line of a future Palestinian unity cabinet, said that recognizing Israel would "preclude the right of the next generations to liberate the lands," wondering: "What will be the fate of the five million Palestinians in the diaspora?" The Gaza strongman went on to tell Ma'an that Hamas would be willing to recognize a Palestinian state "on any part of Palestine," as opposed to the group's proclaimed aim to form a state "from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean sea." Zahar also referred to the future of Hamas' military truce with Israel, confirming that the movement would continue to honor the cessation of fighting, following a joint decision made with its new Fatah partners. The Hamas leader, however, reiterated that the truce was "part of the resistance not its rejection," adding that a "truce is not peace."

    A top Palestinian official said on Tuesday that a new unity government between recently reconciled Hamas and Fatah will be formed in 10 days. In an interview with Ma'an news agency, Fatah leader Nabil Shaath said that although the prime minister of a future interim unity government has yet to be announced, current PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad is still in the running for the position. Fayyad has taken unprecedented steps in recent months toward Palestinian statehood, recently presenting proposal in Brussels delineating a three-year aid plan that would allow for the establishment of a Palestinian state in the foreseeable future. Palestinian leaders plan to ask the United Nations General Assembly in September to recognize a Palestinian state in all the lands Israel occupied in 1967. Fayyad has made it clear that in the event that Israel and the Palestinians do not reach a negotiated settlement, a Palestinian state will be declared unilaterally.

Hamas to Israel: 1 Year to Recognize 'Palestine,' or Else

May 11….(Israel Today) Damascus-based Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal this week warned Israel that it has one more year to recognize an independent Palestinian state. If Israel fails to do so, Hamas will "add new cards to the resistance," Mashaal told a group of young Egyptians who took part in the recent overthrow of dictator Hosni Mubarak. Palestinian news agency Ma'an further quoted Mashaal as saying the Palestinian state Israel recognizes must include 100 percent of Judea, Samaria and the entire eastern half of Jerusalem. And this must come about via a unilateral surrender to Arab demands by Israel, as Mashaal and Hamas, which last week signed a reconciliation agreement with the regime of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, continue to insist they will not negotiate with the Jewish state. Israeli leaders say the reconciliation agreement and the possible formation of unity government including Hamas and Abbas' Fatah faction has effectively killed all chances of a bilateral peace agreement. Israelis also argue that the deal is further evidence of the true goals of Abbas and his allegedly "moderate" leadership. Many Americans agree with that sentiment.

    Last week, 27 US Senators sent a letter to President Barack Obama demanding that American financial aid to the Palestinian Authority be halted if Hamas is brought back into the government. "It is imperative for you to make clear to Abbas that Palestinian Authority participation in a unity government with an unreformed Hamas will jeopardize its relationship with the United States, including its receipt of US aid," wrote the senators. All Republican senators and about half of Democratic senators support cutting aid to a Palestinian Authority that includes Hamas. The lawmakers reminded Obama that it is actually illegal to give US aid to those listed as terrorists by the US State Department, which Hamas is. It remains important to remember that Hamas was actually elected to power by the Palestinian public in 2006. In that election, Hamas won an strong majority in the Palestinian parliament. When Abbas tried to stifle the group's power, Hamas lashed out and seized control of Gaza.

Syria's bloody crackdown continues; Assad unfazed

May 11….(Jerusalem Post) Army tanks shelled a residential district in Homs on Wednesday, said a rights campaigner in Syria's third city which has emerged as the most populous center of defiance against President Bashar Assad's rule. "Homs is shaking with the sound of explosions from tank shelling and heavy machineguns in the Bab Amro neighborhood," said Najati Tayara. Assad's forces killed three anti-government protesters in southern Syria on Tuesday night, activists told AP.

    Assad initially responded to the unrest, the most serious challenge to his 11-year grip on power, with promises of reform. He granted citizenship to stateless Kurds and last month lifted a 48-year state of emergency. But he also sent the army to crush dissent, in Deraa where demonstrations first erupted on March 18 and then to other cities, making clear he would not risk losing the tight control his family has held over Syria for the past 41 years. Security forces have released 300 people detained in Banias and restored basic services in the coastal city stormed by tanks last week, a human rights group said. Water, telecommunications and electricity had been restored, but tanks remained in major streets, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday. Two hundred people, including pro-democracy protest leaders were still in jail, it said. "Scores of those released were severely beaten and subjected to insults. A tank deployed in the square where demonstrations were being held," Observatory director Rami Abdelrahman said. Human rights campaigners said at least six civilians, including four women, where killed in raids on Sunni neighborhoods and in an attack on an all-women demonstration just outside Banias on Saturday. Demonstrators in Banias had raised posters of Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who has had close ties to Assad, but disputed the official Syrian account of the violence. Erdogan said more than 1,000 civilians had died and he did not want to see a repeat of the 1982 Hama violence or the 1988 gassing of Iraqi Kurds in Halabja, when 5,000 people died. Officials have blamed most of the violence on "armed terrorist groups", backed by Islamists and foreign agitators, and say about 100 soldiers and police have been killed. In southern Syria, four civilians in the southern town of Tafas were killed as security forces widened a campaign of arrests, a human rights campaigner in the region said, adding 300 people had been detained since tanks entered Tafas on Saturday.

Cairo Moves Meshaal's Hamas Base to Gaza. Assad Threatens Israel with War

May 11….(DEBKAfile Exclusive Report) Egypt's military rulers promised Hamas' political leader Khaled Meshaal to let him transfer his base, command center and residence from troubled Damascus to a new haven in the Gaza Strip as an inducement for signing the Palestinian unity agreement with Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah on May 4. This is disclosed for the first time by debkafile's intelligence sources.  In Damascus, Bashar Assad's close confidante Rami Makhlouf threatened that Syria would go to war against Israel in reprisal for US and Europe backing for the uprising. Makhlouf, an international business tycoon, is on the US and EU sanctions lists. In an interview with the New York Times Wednesday, May 11, he said: "If there is no stability here, there's no way there will be stability in Israel. No way, and nobody can guarantee what will happen after, God forbid, anything happens to this regime." He advised the US and Europe not to "put a lot of pressure on the president, don't push Syria to do anything it is not happy to do."

    The Syrian president is examining two strategic options, he said: "Going to war against Israel, and/or sending weapons shipments to the West Bank and to Israeli Arabs for use in terrorist attacks against Israel. Debkafile's military sources note that Makhlouf, who is a cousin of Bashar Assad, built up his fortune from smuggling Saddam Hussein's underground fighters, weapons and funds from their havens in Syria to Iraq, as well as al Qaeda combatants and leaders to fight Americans into the wartorn country. He therefore has excellent connections with terrorist networks and is very familiar with their requirements for pursuing suicide bombing campaigns. The tycoon would not have made his remarks to the NYT without the Syrian president's nod. So they may be safely interpreted as a declaration that the Assad regime is holding Israel hostage for its survival against the groundswell of popular disaffection shaking it for more than two months. Those remarks were also addressed to Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon, the sources of weapons consignments to Syrian protesters which Damascus believes Saudi Arabia as well as the US and European nations are generating. If that influx is not stopped, therefore, the Syrian government threatens to respond in kind by secreting arms and money into the West Bank and Israeli Arab districts in order to foment an armed uprising against Israel. This step would also undermine another Western interest by menacing Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.

    According to Debkafile's intelligence sources, the transfer of Khaled Meshaal lock, stock and barrel, from Damascus to Gaza serves the diametrically opposite interests of the current Egyptian and Syrian rulers alike. It was agreed between them, out of totally different considerations, during several visits to the Syrian capital by the new Egyptian intelligence minister Gen. Murad Muwafi from mid-March to late April: For Cairo, the relocation of the Hamas epicenter to Gaza is pivotal to Egypt's return to an active role in the Palestinian arena, whereas Damascus sees the strengthened Hamas presence in Gaza as a key instrument for implementing Makhlouf's threats. Our sources say that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has responded to these disruptions with two discreet steps:

1. The defense ministry's political coordinator, Gen. Amos Gilad, was removed from the Israeli-Egyptian military-cum-intelligence track. The formal reason given for his exclusion was the removal from power of Hosni Mubarak's intelligence minister, Gen. Omar Suleiman, with whom Gilad developed strong personal ties. He is now under investigation and partial house arrest in Egypt. The real reason is that his evaluations and forecasts which formed the basis of Israel's security policy in recent years proved erroneous. The Israeli government must now go back to square one to chart new courses in the face of radical changes around its borders.

2.  Gilad's place is taken by Prime Minister Netanyahu's personal political adviser, Yitzhak Molcho, who earlier this week was sent to Cairo for talks with the new intelligence minister, Gen. Muwafi, to explore the new ties between Egypt, Syria and Hamas and find out what Cairo was aiming for by the reshuffle of these relationships.

Molcho returned to home just before Independence Day (Tuesday, May 10) with a very despondent report. The only ray of light he saw was the possibility of Syria and Egypt, each for its own reasons, leaning on Hamas to climb down on its price for setting the Israeli soldier Gilead Shalit free nearly five years after he was kidnapped on the Israeli side of the Gaza border. While Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak were putting their heads together on tactics for grappling with the explosive new situation Egypt is helping to put in place in the Gaza Strip, Makhlouf put a message from his masters up front: The real danger to Israel of a military flare-up lies in Damascus which continues to call the Palestinian shots.

US Will Forgive Egypt $1B Debt

May 10….(YNET) The Obama administration is planning to provide Egypt with $1 billion in debt relief, the Washington Post reported Sunday. The funds will go towards resuscitating the state after the recent uprisings and subsequent deposition of President Hosni Mubarak. The move is part of a larger aid package of incentives for commerce and investments. Cairo currently owes Washington $3.6 billion in procured agricultural products but the state is in financial dire straits, and its government asked that the debt be shelved. But Congress is engaged in a budget battle and Egyptian officials have expressed frustration with the cool response they received, the Post reported. The US has already supplied Egypt with $150 million in emergency aid after the uprisings paralyzed its tourism industry. The aid was justified by a clause citing establishment of democracy and economic development. The administration has also agreed to provide a billion dollars in loans, guarantees, and insurance for US firms willing to invest in the Middle East and North Africa. In addition, Senators Joe Lieberman, John Kerry, and John McCain are currently promoting a bill to create an Egyptian aid fund the likes of those given to eastern European countries after the fall of the Berlin wall. However the Washington Post quotes a Western diplomat as saying that the sums so far transferred to Egypt are miniscule. "We need a big scheme for helping Egypt and Tunisia. If things don’t turn out the right way in the region, the results could be very bad for all of us," he said.

Protest at Cairo Embassy Calls for Intifada

(Hundreds rally at Israeli embassy to call for annulment of peace, Jews to 'return to birthplaces)

May 10….(YNET) Hundreds gathered before Israel's embassy in Cairo on Friday to protest against the peace agreement with the state of Israel. Protesters waved Palestinian flags and called for another intifada on May 15, on which Palestinians in Israel mark the Nakba. Both men and women were present at the gathering, and participants were mostly young. They called to "return Palestine to the Palestinians" and held signs saying Jews should "return to their places of birth". Speakers at the rally said Jews who wanted to stay in "Palestine" should agree to live under Islamic rule. "On May 15 we should hold a convoy of Egyptian cars to Rafah," one young speaker said. Among the protesters were also those who demanded Egypt renege on its peace accord with Israel, and in addition refuse to sell natural gas to the state.

Israel's Next Challenge: Obama's Outreach to Muslim Brotherhood

May 9….(DEBKAfile  Exclusive Report) Israelis celebrate the 63rd anniversary of their independence this week in good cheer. Neither by word nor hint have its leaders referred to the challenge facing the country in the year to come:  Barack Obama, President of Israel's best friend and ally, has picked the Muslim Brotherhood movement of the Middle East as his chosen partner for promoting American interests in the Arab world in place of its ousted rulers. His courtship of this organization, which he regards as moderate, was the rationale, say debkafile's Washington and counter-terror sources, behind his bold decision to get rid of Osama bin Laden, a step which his two predecessors, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, held back from although they knew where he was. Many people forgot the vow Obama made in Cairo on June 4 to mend America's fences with the Muslim world, but he meant every word.  His White House has made forging a pact between the United States and the Muslim Brotherhood their ultimate policy objective, although they do not expect to achieve it in one fell swoop. Bin Laden's death was part of the US president's unfolding game plan:

1. He needed to demonstrate unswerving resolve to eradicate the terrorist threat posed by Islamic extremists;

2. The Muslim Brotherhood and its national chapters needed to be held back from falling into the arms of Islamic radicalism if it were to qualify as the centerpiece of America's new beginning with the Arab world.

    Another part of the Obama game plan was the "Arab Spring" for paving the way to that beginning by making decades'-old autocratic rulers redundant. Egypt's Hosni Mubarak had to go first, and he was therefore the only Arab ruler whom the US president told bluntly to leave, unlike Muammar Qaddafi or even Bashar Assad, very simply because Egypt is the center of the many-branched Muslim Brotherhood's and its Shura Council. More than any other Middle East party or organization, the Brotherhood holds powerful levers of influence in Libya, Syria, Jordan, the Palestinian arena and even in Saudi Arabia through its presence in national religious institutions and broad membership. It is therefore suppressed by all those regimes as it was in Egypt.

    Mubarak's fellow Arab rulers watched and noted how quickly and ruthlessly Obama disposed of him and mustered all their resources to defeat the US-backed revolts against their regimes before they too were tossed on the rubbish heap. Saudi King Abdullah fought back with a divorce from Washington. He is bitterly hostile to the Obama administration, not just over Mubarak's humiliating downfall, but because he believes that a US-Muslim Brotherhood pact would threaten the royal House of Saud by engulfing the clerical institutions which give the throne its legitimacy.

    Libya's Qaddafi tried to save himself by pointing to his common cause with the US against a rebellion penetrated by Al Qaeda and other Muslim extremists. When he realized that Washington did not share his view and favored the Muslim elements, he decided to fight back against the rebellion and defy their NATO backers. Syria's Bashar Assad, who represents a secular regime and creed, has resorted to tanks, artillery and live bullets for a ferocious crackdown to end what he regards as the continuation of the Muslim Brotherhood-led challenge to the Alawite Assad family rule launched first against his father 19 years ago. Another piece of the Obama game plan was put in place in Cairo Wednesday, May 4, with the inking of the Palestinian unity pact by Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas for Fatah and Khaled Meshaal for Hamas.

    After Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu warned Abbas that the Palestinians must choose between peace and Hamas, Abbas is reported by Debkafile's Cairo sources as privately asking why the Israelis complained to him. They should complain to Obama, he said. Hamas is an offshoot of the Egyptian and Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood branches. "I am only acting out his guidelines by helping the Brotherhood's integration in Middle East government." The US president has taken certain steps to get his plan in motion. It will be far from plain sailing. In Israel and in some Western capitals, the military junta which has succeeded Hosni Mubarak in Cairo is not expected to tamely open the door to the Muslim Brotherhood. The Egyptian generals have meanwhile taken the lead in steering Palestinian moves in the hope of focusing the Muslim Brotherhood's attention on the Palestinian issue rather than its drive for power. This device worked for Gemal Abdul Nasser in the 60s and 70s. But sooner or later, the Brotherhood and Washington will realize that the military rulers fully intend to hold onto power. Instead of standing aside for a Brotherhood presidential candidate, they will run one of their own. President Obama will then be confronted with a hard decision.

     Sensing the supportive winds blowing in from Washington, Muslim activists attacked a Coptic Christian church in Cairo Saturday, May 7, sparking a violent sectarian clash that raged through Sunday night  leaving more than 20 dead and raising fears of a Muslim power grab. With the White House busy juggling the balls of its primary Middle East policy, there is not much Israel can do. Therefore, Prime Minister Netanyahu's meeting with Obama on May 21and his speech to the joint Houses of Congress during his Washington visit are not expected to yield momentous changes. There is not much point in his unveiling any new peace proposal as long as the Palestinians are stuck betwixt and between their next moves, or trying to warn Obama against a US-Muslim Brotherhood rapprochement. While a Brotherhood takeover in neighboring Arab countries, however gradual, would pose a direct threat to Israeli security, Obama in the full flush of success of his initial steps will not be receptive to Israel's arguments.

Bin Laden Warned US over Support For Israel in Final Tape

(AFP, quoting an Islamist website, says the al-Qaida chief condemned US support for Israel in his final audio recording before he was killed)

May 9….(Ha Aretz) An Islamist website said that Osama bin Laden warned the United States they would not be secure until Palestine is secure, AFP news agency reported on Sunday. According to the news agency, the al-Qaida website Shamikh1.net quotes bin Laden as saying "America will not be able to dream of security until we live in security in Palestine. It is unfair that you live in peace while our brothers in Gaza live in insecurity." The quote is apparently taken from bin Laden's last audio tape that he recorded before being killed by American troops. "Accordingly, and with the will of God, our attacks will continue against you as long as your support for Israel continues," the al-Qaida chief said in the audio recording. "So the message we wanted to convey through the plane of our hero, the fighter Umar Farouk, may God be with him, confirms a previous message which had been sent to you by our heroes of September 11," bin Laden reportedly said in the minute-long recording.

Muslim Mobs Burn Egyptian Churches

May 9….(Yahoo) Hundreds of Christians and Muslims hurled stones at each other in downtown Cairo on Sunday, hours after Muslim mobs set fire to a church and a Christian-owned apartment building in a frenzy of violence that killed 12 people and injured more than 200. The deepening religious violence in military-ruled Egypt is exacerbating the lawlessness and disorder of the country's bumpy transition to democracy after three decades of autocratic rule under former President Hosni Mubarak was brought to an end in February. Muslim youths attacked a large crowd of Coptic Christian protesters marching from the headquarters of Egypt's general prosecutor to the state television building overlooking the Nile, said Christian activist Bishoy Tamri. TV images showed both sides furiously throwing stones, including one Christian who held a large wooden cross in one hand while flinging rocks with another. Scores were injured, but an army unit securing the TV building did nothing to stop the violence, Tamri said. Hours earlier, mobs of ultraconservative Muslims attacked the Virgin Mary Church in the slum of Imbaba on the opposite side of the Nile. The attack was fueled by rumors that a Christian woman married to a Muslim man had been abducted by the church. Residents said a separate mob of youths armed with knives and machetes attacked an apartment building several blocks away with firebombs. "People were scared to come near them," said resident Adel Mohammed, 29, who lives near the Virgin Mary Church. "They looked scary. They threw their firebombs at the church and set parts of it ablaze." The military deployed armored vehicles and dozens of troop carriers to cordon off a main street leading to the area. They halted traffic and turned away pedestrians. Men, women and children watching from balconies took photos with mobile phones and cheered the troops. Islamic clerics denounced the violence, sounding alarm bells at the escalating tension during the transitional period following Mubarak's Feb. 11 ouster by a popular uprising. "These events do not benefit either Muslim or Copts," Ahmed al-Tayyeb, the sheik of al-Azhar, told the daily Al-Ahram. Interfaith relationships are taboo in Egypt, where the Muslim majority and sizable Christian minority are both largely conservative. Such relationships are often the source of deadly clashes between the faiths.

Israel at 63: Population of 7,746,000

(Independence Day 2011: Central Bureau of Statistics data indicate 75% of population are Jewish, 178,000 babies born in past year, 24,500 immigrants made aliyah)

May 9….(YNET) On Israel's 63rd anniversary its population stands at 7,746,000 people, a 2% increase (150,000 residents) compared with 2010. In comparison, on the night of its establishment, the State of Israel consisted of only 806,000 residents. New data published by the Central Bureau of Statistics on Sunday indicate that nearly 5,837,000 of the population are Jewish (75.3%). The Arab population stands at 1,587,000 people (20.5%) and the remaining 4.2% are immigrants and their children, who are not listed as Jewish by the Interior Ministry. They comprise 322,000 residents. Since last year's Independence Day, exactly 178,000 babies have been born in Israel, and 43,000 people have died. Approximately 24,5000 immigrants arrived in the country, while nearly 12,000 chose to leave Israel. Another 7,500 people joined the general population, but CBS data do not state where they came from. Over 70% of the Jewish population are native-born Israelis, and more than half of them are at least second generation Israelis. In contrast, only 35% of the population were native-born in 1948. Also in 1948, there was only one city with more than 100,000 residents, Tel Aviv-Yafo. Today there are 14 cities with more than 100,000 residents each, six of which have more than 200,000 people, including: Jerusalem, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Haifa, Rishon Lezion, Ashdod and Petah Tikva.

PA State Endangers Israel’s Home Front

May 9….(Arutz) According to IDF Reserve Major Moshe Hisdai, a Palestinian state established in Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem would directly endanger Israel’s home front. In an article he wrote which he is distributing publicly these days, Hisdai, a well-known defense official who conducted numerous investigations of defensive systems and set up a special missions unit in Judea and Samaria, brings quotes by politicians and security officials who have warned in the past of the dangerous impacts a Palestinian state would have on Israel and its citizens. The article in its entirety was presented by Arutz Sheva’s Hebrew website on Sunday. Among the officials quoted in Hisdai’s paper is Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu himself, who in 2006, during a conference of Likud leaders in Kfar Saba, criticized the conduct of then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. Olmert had delivered a speech in Sde Boker, in which he offered to free terrorist prisoners and give up large areas of Judea and Samaria for a Palestinian state. Netanyahu said that concessions such as the ones offered by Olmert would allow Hamas to fire rockets deeper into Israeli territory, with an emphasis on the Ben Gurion International Airport. “Handing over more territories to the Arabs means giving them means for launching missiles at Ben Gurion Airport and at Kfar Saba,” Hisdai quotes Netanyahu as having said during the conference. “It is no coincidence that Netanyahu chose to emphasize in his speech the missile threat and mentioned not only the Dan region, but the Ben Gurion Airport,” writes Hisdai. “The Qassam rocket attacks from Gaza after the disengagement are considered by the Israeli public as the greatest failure of the Oslo Accords and particularly of Ariel Sharon’s plan. But this threat is now becoming very real, as the proclamation of a Palestinian state draws near.”

     Another official quoted by Hisdai is Education Minister Gideon Saar, who declared during a 2006 press conference in Tel Aviv that a withdrawal by Israel to the 1949 Armistice Lines would endanger the security of Israeli citizens. Like Netanyahu, Saar said that doing so will cause a direct threat of rockets being fired on Ben Gurion Airport, and added that it would also endanger Israeli passengers on Route 443 (on which many terror attacks have taken place and which was opened to traffic from the PA last year). Saar also noted that an Israeli withdrawal to the 1949 Armistice Lines would essentially bring the Hamas terror group directly into Jerusalem. Other experts quoted in Hisdai’s paper include Dr. Azriel Lorber of Tel Aviv University, who is an expert on missiles and rockets. Lorber wrote in a study entitled ‘The growing threat of Qassam rockets against Israel, that “although ostensibly the Palestinian ‘Intifada’ is directed against ‘the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory,’ Palestinians have no qualms about attacking civilian targets inside Israel proper. In fact, they even prefer that type of warfare over attacking military targets in the so-called ‘occupied territories.’” “From Dr. Azriel Lorber’s study we also learn that the strategic role designated by the Palestinians for the rockets in their possession is similar to that of the Hizbullah rockets on the Israel-Lebanon border,” writes Hisdai. “That is, a weapon of attack and deterrence. There is no doubt that the Palestinians want to see their rockets play a similar role within the Gaza Strip, and in the very near future, along the borders of the Palestinian state, the establishment of which is going to be announced within a few months, and that in preparation for it the two sworn enemies, Hamas and Fatah, come together.”

    At the conclusion of his article, Hisdai writes: “Therefore, I ask: Is the establishment of a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria not a strategic threat to Israel’s existence? Does the establishment of a Palestinian state not mean throwing the residents of Judea and Samaria right into the hands of Hamas and Fatah? Will the residents and communities in Judea and Samaria simply become areas of Palestinian military training for the purposes of conquering Israel with the support of enemy states? Hisdai calls on the Yesha Council to take action and “to protect Israel which is currently in mortal danger. There will be a war over Judea and Samaria because it is a spiritual, educational, Jewish, military and political security belt which protects all the people living in Zion.”

    During the interview Hisdai noted that the Israeli army, government and residents have to be ready in advance for a Palestinian state. “This is not an apocalyptic scenario, but we must rid ourselves of the viewpoint that such radical scenarios are far-fetched,” he said. “The mindset that we are well-defended is a false one.”

US Special Forces go after Mullah Omer, Ayman Zawahiri, Seif al-Adel

May 9….(DEBKA) In the wake of the Osama bin Laden operation, the US is sustaining the momentum of the war on terror by sending more Special Forces and drones into Pakistan after his top lieutenant, the Egyptian Ayman al Zawahiri, Taliban leader Mullah Omer and al Qaeda's chief operations officer, Seif al Adal. Debkafile's counter-terror sources report that on May 2, the day bin Laden was killed, the Taliban leader and his top staff were thought to be in Karachi, southern Pakistan and the two al Qaeda leaders in the tribal region of North Waziristan. All three are presumed to have since moved on. US intelligence suspects their whereabouts are known to Pakistan's Inter-Services-Intelligence agency (ISI). Our Washington sources report that Saturday night, May 7, President Barack Obama gave the Pakistani government, army and intelligence an ultimatum: Cooperate in the capture of the three wanted men or else we shall pump more American soldiers into Pakistan to take up the pursuit with or without your permission. US intelligence is convinced that Omer, Zawahiri and al-Adal have joined forces and are plotting a revenge attack on America dramatic enough to outdo the psychological impact of the bin Laden killing.

    Al-Adal, whom Iran released in Sept. 2010 and allowed to cross into Pakistan, is rated the most competent and innovative planner of large-scale terrorist attacks. The videos of bin Laden the Pentagon released Saturday from the raid on his Abbottabad compound show an aging man with a straggling gray beard, huddled under a blanket and watching his own performance on a TV screen, a far cry from the well-known tall, commanding presence. Still, US spokesmen are now insisting that the master-terrorist they killed was active, dangerous and preoccupied with plotting attacks on the United States. As the sifting through the computers, files and drives captured in the raid continued, a senior US intelligence source maintained: "The materials reviewed over the past several days clearly show that bin Laden remained an active leader in al Qaeda, providing strategic, operational and tactical instructions to the group. He was far from a figurehead. He was an actively player." This assessment radically contradicted everything Washington put out about the al Qaeda leader in the last four years. They scorned as "one man on the run" who was too busy chasing from one hideout to another under hot US pursuit to have time for setting up terrorist operations. Such operations were increasingly attributed to al Qaeda's regional "franchises." Now, US terrorist experts have clearly decided otherwise.