Top news stories from Israel/Palestine: January 11, 2018

What We’re Reading

US-Israeli/Palestinian relations

Trump caused violence in Israel, West Bank to spike with Jerusalem embassy move,

The number of attacks in Israel and the West Bank has tripled since President Donald Trump’s announcement to relocate the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, according to new figures. Israel’s Shin Bet, the country’s domestic security agency, said that there were 249 attacks in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza during December.

'Fire and Fury': Trump's Israel Policies Crafted by Ultra-right Bannon-Adelson-Netanyahu Axis,

Wolff’s book form a picture of an extreme right-wing cabal, one that could find its place on the right fringes of the Likud, that has been guiding if not running Trump’s Middle East policies.

Netanyahu Asked Obama to Consider Giving Palestinians Land in Sinai, Former U.S. Officials Say,

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked the Obama administration in late 2014 to consider a plan in which Israel would annex large parts of the West Bank, and the Palestinians would in return receive land from Egypt in the northern part of Sinai, according to four former senior U.S. officials.

Palestinian politics

ISIS Declares War on Hamas, and Gaza Families Disown Sons in Sinai,

ISIS accuses Hamas of betraying Palestinians by imprisoning extremists in Gaza, failing to prevent the American recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and being supported by Iran.

Abbas looking to fill US-sized hole with more support from EU — report,

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will visit the headquarters of the European Union in Brussels later in January, where he will present a “package of demands” that will set a new course to achieve Palestinian statehood, according to a report Thursday.

Occupation/Human rights

'There is no justice in Israel — it’s always postponed',

The Nawara family expected to hear the sentence of the Israeli soldier who killed their son, Nadeem. Instead, they were forced to sit quietly while the soldier’s lawyer argued that it was not his client but Nadeem who was guilty of a crime.

Israeli committee approves 1,122 new West Bank housing units,

The Civil Administration, the military body that enforces Israeli policy on citizens in the West Bank, on Wednesday approved the 1,122 new housing units in 20 settlements and outposts in the West Bank, according to Peace Now. On Wednesday tenders for 651 housing units were published.

Hundreds of Jewish clergy urge Netanyahu not to demolish Palestinian village,

More than 300 Jewish clergy wrote Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urging him not to demolish nearly half the buildings in a Palestinian village that Israel has deemed unauthorized.

Frustration boils into calls for revenge at funeral of slain rabbi,

Irate and mournful, hundreds of mourners attended the Wednesday funeral of a rabbi who was slain by a Palestinian in a drive-by shooting attack in the northern West Bank, eulogizing the father of six and calling for revenge.

Israeli politics

Meretz reshuffles Israeli left's political deck,

Israel’s Meretz Party decided to change its internal election system Jan. 7, transferring power from the 1,000 members of its Central Committee to a primary system open to all the party’s members.