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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that any government-backed commission of inquiry into the catastrophic Hamas onslaught of October 7, 2023 must examine decisions and developments stretching back decades — including the 1993 Oslo Accords, the 2005 Disengagement from Gaza, and the 2023 protest movement against his government’s judicial overhaul. The remarks, reported by Channel […]

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U.S. Pentagon officially enters into an agreement with xAI, building on the “rapid deployment of cutting‑edge AI across the Department’s 3 million military and civilian personnel.

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Israel’s High Court of Justice has ordered the state to submit its long-awaited response to a petition demanding media access to Gaza by early January, sharply criticizing the government for what it described as a pattern of stalling.

In a ruling issued Sunday, Justice Ofer Grosskopf made clear that the court would not tolerate another postponement in the case brought by the Foreign Press Association. The judge set January 4 as the final deadline for the state to present its position, rejecting a request for an additional three-week extension.

“Now the respondents [the state and the defense minister] are requesting another extension, this time of three weeks, and they [may yet] ask for more. It is not possible to agree to this,” Grosskopf wrote, adding that if the state does not comply, the court will issue a ruling without waiting further.

The petition, filed in 2024, challenges Israel’s sweeping ban on independent journalistic access to Gaza since the outbreak of the war. The state initially informed the court in June last year that it could not allow journalists into the territory due to security concerns, a position it has not formally updated since.

Grosskopf noted that the government had previously committed to submitting its response by November 23, but then sought and received two extensions that pushed the deadline to Sunday. Those delays were granted despite the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that came into effect on October 10, a development the court expected the state to address.

The FPA welcomed the court’s decision, saying, “After two years of the state’s delay tactics, we are pleased that the court’s patience has finally run out.”
“We renew our call for the State of Israel to immediately grant journalists free and unfettered access to the Gaza Strip. And should the government continue to obstruct press freedoms, we hope that the Supreme Court will recognize and uphold those freedoms,” the organization added.

Since the war began, policy set by the defense minister and the Israel Defense Forces has barred all journalists from entering Gaza independently. Israeli reporters, and a smaller number of foreign correspondents, have been permitted into the enclave only as embedded journalists accompanying IDF units.

The state has argued that allowing independent media access would endanger both soldiers and reporters, citing operational and personal security risks. Those justifications, the petition maintains, are far less compelling in light of the cessation of hostilities.

According to the FPA, the government has requested eight separate deferrals since the petition was submitted, all of which were approved by the court. A hearing was also postponed earlier this year due to the June conflict with Iran.

In its filing, the association argues that the blanket prohibition on independent reporting from Gaza “contravenes the foundational principles of the state as a democratic country, and represents a severe, unreasonable and disproportionate injury to the freedom of the press, freedom of expression, and freedom of employment for journalists and the right to information.”

The petition further claims that foreign journalists have been given fewer opportunities to embed with the IDF than their Israeli counterparts, that decisions on who is allowed to enter Gaza are made largely without coordination with the FPA, and that embedded reporting is so tightly supervised that it prevents comprehensive and meaningful coverage of the war.

{Matzav.com}

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Saudi Arabia has no interest at present in formalizing relations with Israel, and any such shift would require a fundamental change in Israel’s conduct, according to Prince Turki al-Faisal, the kingdom’s former intelligence chief.

In a rare interview with Israeli media published Sunday, Prince Turki told The Times of Israel that normalization is not on the table under current circumstances. “Saudi Arabia is not considering a normalization deal with Israel. Should Israel become a normal country with normal acceptance of international law, then Saudi Arabia will consider normalization,” he said.

The comments underscored how distant Riyadh remains from establishing ties with Israel, despite sustained efforts by Washington to expand the Abraham Accords framework. Although Prince Turki no longer holds office, his views are widely seen as aligned with Saudi Arabia’s official position, even if he often voices them in blunter terms.

Prince Turki headed Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence Directorate from 1979 to 2001 and later served as ambassador to the United Kingdom and the United States. Since leaving public office, he has remained active in foreign policy discourse and currently chairs the King Faisal Foundation’s Center for Research and Islamic Studies.

Saudi officials typically avoid direct engagement with Israeli outlets, making the interview itself unusual. Asked to spell out Riyadh’s conditions for normalizing relations, Prince Turki rejected claims of ambiguity between Saudi references to a Palestinian state and talk of a mere “pathway” toward one.

“Realizing the two-state solution requires a serious and trusted pathway that leads to the end goal, which is a viable Palestinian state as envisioned by the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002 and the vision of peace presented for a final settlement of this protracted conflict in that initiative,” he said.

That initiative, endorsed by Saudi Arabia, calls for an independent Palestinian state based on pre-1967 lines and a negotiated resolution to the refugee issue — parameters long rejected by successive Israeli governments.

“Normalizing ties with Israel was conditioned by reaching that final and fair solution to the Palestinian cause,” Prince Turki continued. “Therefore, Saudi statements on a ‘pathway’ mean the need for a reliable peaceful process that leads to [that] final solution, with the understanding that such a process requires involvement of many international and regional countries, including Saudi Arabia, to engage in such a process.”

Reflecting on past diplomatic efforts, he cited the period following the 1991 Madrid Peace Conference, when Saudi Arabia and other Arab states engaged in negotiations. “Alas, all went in vain. Israel was not ready to pay the price of peace. The man of peace in Israel at the time was assassinated and his partner from the Palestinian side was poisoned,” he said, referring to former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat.

Israel has denied Palestinian claims that Arafat was poisoned, and multiple international investigations have not definitively concluded that his 2004 death was caused by poisoning.

The remarks come as the Trump administration seeks to revive momentum for Saudi-Israeli normalization and hopes Riyadh will eventually join the Abraham Accords, brokered in 2020 between Israel and several Arab states.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, however, dampened expectations during a recent White House visit, saying, “We want to be part of the Abraham Accords, but we want also to be sure that [we] secure a clear path [toward a] two-state solution.”

Saudi officials have since added qualifiers to that demand, including that the process be “time-bound” and “irreversible.” Prince Turki argued that Israel’s current leadership makes such assurances implausible.

“Unfortunately, with the ruling mentality in Israel nowadays, every step toward peace is reversible and not ‘time-bound,’” he said, accusing the government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of blocking Palestinian statehood.

He pointed to Israeli military actions in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as operations in Syria and Lebanon, and accused Israel of reversing commitments related to ceasefires and the Abraham Accords. “Israeli aggressive behavior in the region — in Gaza and the West Bank, in Syria, in Lebanon — reversing on the commitments to the ceasefire during Gaza war and reversing its verbal commitment to the Abraham Accords about not changing the status on the ground, along with the statements on Biblical Greater Israel do not call for trust in Israel,” he said.

Prince Turki added that trust would require Israel to adhere to international norms. “Gaining trust requires Israel to conduct itself according to rules and norms of international law and the resolutions of the UN Security Council and abide by them,” he said.

Asked whether rejecting normalization risks damaging relations with US President Donald Trump, Prince Turki dismissed the idea that Riyadh would bend under pressure. “Saudi Arabia bases its foreign policy on its own national interests, not according to the wishes and pressures of others,” he said.

He also denied reports that Saudi Arabia had been close to normalizing ties with Israel before Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack. “All the speculation about normalization before Oct. 7 was out of wishful thinking on the part of mostly Israeli or American pro-Israeli sources,” he said, reiterating that “there is no normalization without a peaceful resolution to the Palestinian issue that entails the two-state solution.”

Addressing claims that weakening Iran and its proxies might incentivize closer Saudi-Israeli cooperation, Prince Turki said there was no benefit in engaging with an Israel that has not accepted peaceful coexistence. “There is no strategic benefit for Saudi Arabia’s normalization with Israel that is not yet a normal country that is peaceful and lives with its neighbors according to rules and norms of natural relationships between countries,” he said.

He also rejected arguments that corruption or dysfunction within the Palestinian Authority excuses the lack of progress. “I believe Israel is responsible for the failure of the PA, since Israel is in control of all aspects of life in the Palestinian territories,” he said. “Therefore, the failure of the PA is not a justification to avoid the real issues of peace.”

Prince Turki concluded by saying that any future Israeli leader seeking peace with Saudi Arabia would need to embrace a two-state framework. “Whoever succeeds Netanyahu should accept the two-state solution. That is for the Israeli people to decide.”

{Matzav.com}

In a heartfelt collaboration, Tantzers and the NYC Police Benevolent Association came together to host a special Chanukah program at the NYC PBA headquarters, honoring children known for facing ongoing medical challenges and the families who support them every day. The initiative was hosted with the support of NYC PBA President Patrick Hendry, reflecting the […]

Israel’s political system moved a step closer this week toward establishing a new investigative body to probe the failures surrounding the Hamas assault of October 7, 2023, after a ministerial panel endorsed controversial legislation redefining how such a commission would be formed.

The bill, a private proposal sponsored by Likud MK Ariel Kallner, passed the Ministerial Committee for Legislation on Monday and is slated for a preliminary vote in the Knesset plenum on Wednesday. Unlike a traditional state commission of inquiry, whose members are appointed by the president of the Supreme Court, the proposed framework would place the power of selection in the hands of the Knesset.

Under the bill’s provisions, commissioners would be approved by a supermajority of at least 80 lawmakers. Should the opposition refuse to cooperate, the coalition and opposition would each be entitled to appoint an equal number of members. If the opposition fully boycotts the process, however, the authority to select the entire panel would fall to the Knesset speaker, Likud MK Amir Ohana.

At the committee meeting earlier in the day, Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu laid out what he believes the scope of any investigation into October 7 must include. According to a government source, Netanyahu argued that the inquiry cannot be confined to immediate operational failures but must examine decisions and developments stretching back decades, “from Oslo, through to the [Gaza] Disengagement, and up to [reserve duty] refusal.”

His reference to “refusal” alluded to threats made in 2023 by some opponents of the government’s judicial overhaul, who said they would stop reporting for IDF reserve service in protest.

In a video statement released later Monday, Netanyahu defended the idea of a specially constituted commission, saying that a catastrophe on the scale of October 7 demands an exceptional mechanism. He compared the proposal to the special US commission formed after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

“No one then complained about political bias, and I must say that its conclusions received broad legitimacy precisely for this reason. That is exactly what we are doing,” he said.

Netanyahu insisted that alternatives would lack broad public confidence. “The government could have established a governmental review committee, whose entire composition would be determined solely by the government,” he said, adding that such a body would only be trusted by part of the public. He then rejected an opposition-backed model in which appointments would be made exclusively by Supreme Court President Yitzhak Amit, arguing it would similarly enjoy the confidence of only a narrow segment of society.

“I say to the opposition: Go ahead — bring whatever experts you want, ask whatever questions you want, investigate whomever you want — including me,” the prime minister said. “All issues will be examined, without exception. The political, the security, the intelligence, the legal — everything.”

Despite those assurances, polling consistently shows broad public support for a classic state commission of inquiry, whether appointed solely by Amit or jointly with his conservative deputy, Noam Sohlberg — options Netanyahu has firmly ruled out.

The proposal drew internal criticism even within the coalition. Ze’ev Elkin, a minister in the Finance Ministry, was the lone vote against the bill in the ministerial committee. Elkin warned that the clause empowering the Knesset speaker to appoint commissioners in the event of an opposition boycott would effectively turn the panel into a government-appointed body, something already permitted under existing law.

Opposition figures responded with sharp denunciations, accusing the government of trying to avoid accountability for the October 7 failures. Opposition Leader Yair Lapid said the initiative was designed to “bury the truth” and deceive the public.

“Those directly responsible for the disaster will appoint a cover-up commission whose sole purpose is to clear them of guilt. It will not help them. They are guilty,” Lapid said. He went on to call the proposed body “a death certificate for the truth,” warning that political control would allow testimony to be distorted, evidence undermined, and the public misled.

Democrats party chairman Yair Golan echoed that criticism, describing the effort as “a pathetic attempt to engineer a political investigation” and saying it amounted to an admission of guilt.

Netanyahu’s comments about Oslo and the Gaza disengagement also revived scrutiny of his own past record. As finance minister under Ariel Sharon, he voted repeatedly in favor of measures advancing the 2005 withdrawal from Gaza, before resigning days ahead of its implementation in protest. And while he opposed the Oslo Accords before their signing, he did not move to dismantle them during his terms as prime minister, later endorsing and partially implementing further agreements such as the Hebron Protocol and the Wye River Memorandum.

{Matzav.com}