Feb. 24 Headlines
Sunday
HA’ARETZ
1. Gasoline supplies in Gaza ran out over the weekend. Five Palestinians killed in incidents in the territories.
IDF PREPARING FOR MARCH BY THOUSANDS OF GAZANS TOWARDS FENCE.
2. KFIR BRIGADE SOLDIERS ABUSIVE AND OFFICERS ADMIT: "WE ARE IN A DIFFICULT PERIOD."
3. "IRAN IS CONTINUING TO ENRICH URANIUM."
4. Second edition: Historian Toaff changes his version of blood libel.
"THERE WAS NO MURDER OF CHRISTIANS BY JEWS."
MA’ARIV
1. Teheran preparing for UN sanctions.
IRAN'S NUCLEAR CAMPAIGN.
Moment before UN Security Council decision, Iran trying to reduce overwhelming majority against it. In its sights: South Africa, Indonesia, Libya, Vietnam and China.
YEDIOT AHRONOT
1. THIS IS HOW WE WILL HELP RESIDENTS OF SDEROT.
On Friday, thousands flooded shops in Sderot but once is not enough
2. "NATIONAL TRANQUILIZER" EN ROUTE TO UN.
Nahman Shai is leading candidate for post of Israeli Ambassador to the UN.
3. TONIGHT: ISRAEL WANTS AN OSCAR.
By morning, we will know if "Beaufort" has brought golden statuette back home.
[MAKOR RISHON-HATZOFEHwas unavailable today.]
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SUMMARY OF EDITORIALS FROM THE HEBREW PRESS
Yediot Ahronot ponders Israeli society's aversion toward Likud Chairman Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak. The editors refer to the two as "very talented" and "extremely ambitious" men who lack patience and forbearance. The paper concludes by saying, "It hurts to see and discover that one of these days, the public will have to choose, not the leader which it loves, but rather the one who it hates less."
The Jerusalem Post discusses the intended inspection of the President's Office, and criticizes President Shimon Peres' contention that his office is immune from any scrutiny, even by the state comptroller. The comptroller's inspection is nothing akin to prosecution. It is a legally mandated check not of the president's own actions but of Beit Hanassi's operations, such as the issuing of tenders, contracts with consultants and the hiring of employees. The editor states that this is a showdown that Peres is eventually bound to lose. "His obstinacy is inflicting more harm on the presidency, and on the president himself, than Lindenstrauss ever could."
Haaretz states that it is doubtful whether any single person has damaged the image of the court as much as the current justice minister, indeed bringing matters to only one step away from anarchy. The editor accepts that the justice minister is entitled to propose extraordinary changes to the legal system, but also that the president of the Supreme Court is entitled to express a different view. This dialogue cannot be conducted as a normal political struggle, and if the minister cannot comprehend this basic order of things, then he must go back to writing academic and journalistic criticism and leave the job of justice minister to someone who appreciates its gravity.
Ma'ariv suggests a scenario for the recent elimination of Hezbollah arch-terrorist Imad Mughniyeh. The editors hypothesize that a prime suspect is Saudi Arabia, noting both the June 1996 car bomb in Dhahran, which the Saudis believe was perpetrated by a Revolutionary Guard/Hezbollah sleeper cell, and the general threat posed by Iran and Hezbollah to the Sunni Muslim kingdom. The plot, so the paper's theory goes, included cooperation between the Saudi intelligence organization, the Mossad and the CIA to dispose of "the 'trouble maker' whom most Arab countries secretly wished to be rid of."
[Eitan Haber and Jacky Hugy wrote today’s articles in Yediot Ahronotand Ma'ariv, respectively. Makor Rishon-Hatzofehwas unavailable today.]
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