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Newsletter : 9fax0125.txt
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>PD
>Israel Faxx
>JN Jan. 25, 1999, Vol. 7, No. 16
Mordechai May Run Against Netanyahu
By David Gollust (VOA-Jerusalem)
Outgoing Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Mordechai -- fired from
his post Saturday by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu -- will
apparently head up a centrist challenge to Netanyahu in the may
elections.
Party sources say Mordechai has been chosen to head the new
centrist movement, which already includes several defectors from
the Netanyahu camp and is neck-and-neck with Israel's two
mainstream parties -- Likud and Labor -- in the opinion polls.
Netanyahu fired his defense chief when it became apparent his
departure from the government was imminent. Mordechai, a relative
moderate in the right-wing Likud government, had criticized
Netanyahu's suspension of the peace process with the Palestinians.
Mordechai added that he was sorry that the leader of the nation was
a man who was not worthy of the position and not worthy of his
trust. "The only thing I asked for from Netanyahu was to maintain
the diplomatic, security and social policies that we jointly led.
Netanyahu chose to deliberately endanger everything we achieved,
for his political needs. The people of Israel deserve better
leadership and my associates and I are planning to offer that
different leadership."
The termination takes effect tonight.
After departing early from his final Cabinet meeting Sunday,
Mordechai visited the Western Wall -- the holiest site in Judaism.
He quoted a biblical verse there implying that the prime minister
was a liar and an enemy of peace.
Analysts say Mordechai, a former army general who was born in Iraq,
could cut into the heavy support the prime minister's party has
traditionally enjoyed among the majority of Israeli Jews with
family origins in the Arab world.
The latest opinion polls indicate that both Mordechai and his
centrist colleague Amnon Lipkin-Shahak would narrowly defeat
Netanyahu in one-on-one contests. But the prime minister told
Israel Radio the centrists lack both an ideology and an
organization and are "a party of losers."
"They're not going to get anywhere. Because they don't have a
position. Their positions, their platform, is determined by polls.
Their leadership is determined by polls. It's the most absurd
phenomenon I've ever seen. We have a position. We have principles
for the safeguarding of israel's security. For safeguarding of
jerusalem. Of our country. Of our future. And a tough
negotiation for peace than can have a chance to bring peace. That
is not done by polls."
Netanyahu has offered the Defense Ministry job to veteran former
defense chief Moshe Arens, his rival for the Likud leadership in
primary voting to be held this week. Arens, who is unlikely to
unseat Netanyahu as party leader, has indicated he would accept the
defense portfolio.
One State for Israelis and Palestinians?
By Ed Warner (VOA-Washington)
One state is better than two for Israelis and Palestinians, says a
well known Palestinian author in an article in the New York Times.
He insists the one state proposed for Palestinians will be
insufficient. So let the two peoples merge into a single society
that will bring out the best in both.
The current peace process is blocking true reconciliation of
Israelis and Palestinians, writes Edward Said in the Times
magazine. A professor of literature at Columbia University, said
genuine peace can only come with a binational state.
In his opinion, Israel has taken so much of the West Bank that a
Palestinian state is no longer viable, and Israeli settlements
and roads continue to expand. But the process has pushed Israelis
and Palestinians more closely together than ever before. There is
no escaping one another. They may desire a homogeneous society, but
it is too late for that.
The real struggle, writes Said, is over equal rights for Arabs and
Jews. Both peoples need to develop the idea of citizenship in place
of racial or ethnic solidarity. This will not be easy to do, he
says. But he believes there are forward looking people in both
communities who are willing to make a start.
One Wedding Leads to Many
Israel Faxx Staff Report
A traditional Jewish wedding in Kazan, the capital of Tatarstan in
Russia, has had a "domino" effect: Many other Jewish couples in the
area have asked to be re-married, this time in a Jewish ceremony.
Ten days ago, the first-ever religious Jewish wedding there in many
years was held, involving a couple that had 'returned' to their
Judaism at separate times, under the guidance of different Chabad
emissaries.
HaTzofeh reports that guests at the wedding were so impressed with
the ceremony and its accompanying joyous dancing that many of them
asked the officiating rabbi, Rabbi Yitzchak Gorelik, to arrange a
similar ceremony for them. Of these, some of them requested that
the date be set only after the husband undergoes a ritual
circumcision ceremony.
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