Israel

12 Jan 2019; MEMO: Former Israeli communication minister, Ayoob Kara, has called for the Gulf States to form a security and economic “union” with Israel, to stand against Iran at all level, Shehab News Agency reported on Friday.

09 Jan 2019; MEMO: Israel’s third election in a year is set to continue the longstanding political stalemate, according to the results of a new poll conducted for Israeli news site Walla.

08 Jan 2019; MEMO: Two Israeli centre-left opposition parties, Labor and Meretz, are “expected to discuss the possibility of running together in the upcoming Knesset election”, reported Haaretz, citing “sources familiar with talks between the two parties”.

08 Jan 2019; MEMO: The comprehensive annual Israel Democracy Index found that the majority of Israelis think that their leadership is corrupt or very corrupt, the Jerusalem Post reported yesterday.

According to the newspaper, the index, which was conducted by Guttman Centre for Public Opinion and Policy Research at the Israel Democracy Institute, presented the results to the Israeli president.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday, after an Iranian missile strike on U.S.-led forces in Iraq, that Israel would hit back hard against anyone who attacked his country.

Netanyahu reiterated his praise for U.S. President Donald Trump for the killing of Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani last week, calling it a bold move.

The Israeli leader said Soleimani had tried to destabilize the region for decades and was “planning much worse.”

07 Jan 2019; MEMO: Undercover Israeli police officers arrested prominent Israeli anti-occupation activist Jonathan Pollak at his workplace yesterday morning, reported +972 Magazine, “after he repeatedly refused to appear in court over a private prosecution filed against him by a far-right organisation”.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - In an apparent slip of the tongue on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Israel as a nuclear power before correcting himself with a bashful nod and an embarrassed smile.

Israel is widely believed to have an atomic arsenal but has never confirmed or denied that it has nuclear weapons, maintaining a so-called policy of ambiguity on the issue for decades.

Netanyahu stumbled at the weekly cabinet meeting while reading in Hebrew prepared remarks on a deal with Greece and Cyprus on a subsea gas pipeline.

03 Jan 2019; MEMO: The Israeli military has closed a ski resort in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights due to concerns over what it calls possible threats from Iranian-backed groups in Lebanon and Syria, or Palestinian resistance movements Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza.

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel put its military on heightened alert on Friday and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cut short a trip abroad after the U.S. killing of Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani drew promises of revenge from Iran.

Israel, America’s closest ally in the Middle East and Iran’s top regional foe, has not publicly responded to the death of Quds Force chief Soleimani and Iraqi militia commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in the U.S. air strike in Baghdad.

02 Jan 2019; MEMO: Israel’s former Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said on Wednesday that the right-wing bloc led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been dissolved, Quds Press has reported.

Speaking to Israeli General Radio, the leader of Yisrael Beiteinu said that he had information from the Haredi parties that the bloc no longer exists. Furthermore, Lieberman said, there will be “a lot of surprises” during the next two months.