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Senate confirms Jack Lew as US ambassador to Israel
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The U.S. Senate approved Jack Lew, the Jewish former treasury secretary, to be ambassador to Israel, a process that Democratic leaders sought to accelerate as Israel wages war with Hamas.
The 53-43 vote was mostly along party lines, with two Republicans — Rand Paul and Lindsey Graham — joining 51 Democrats.
Both sides cited the urgency of the moment in making their cases. Democrats noted Lew’s close ties to Israel, and Republicans said his work on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal made him a poor choice during a time that Iranian proxy groups are engaging in direct warfare with Israel.
Sen. Ben Cardin, a Jewish Maryland Democrat who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. Chuck Schumer, the New York Jewish Democrat who is the majority leader, rushed Lew’s nomination to the floor over Republican objections.
“The Senate has now taken an extremely important step in its support for Israel,” Schumer said after the vote. “This confirmation is as important and as timely as any confirmation in recent times.”
Schumer said two-way communication was critical when an ally was at war.
“It means Israel’s messages will be relayed appropriately to our government but it also means our messages will be sent appropriately to Israel’s government,” he said.
An accredited ambassador in place will facilitate the delivery of emergency defense assistance to Israel, which is now under consideration in Congress. The office will also play a central role in freeing the dozens of Americans believed to be among the 240 or so hostages held by Hamas after its Oct. 7 invasion of Israel.
Lew would additionally help negotiate the terms of delivering humanitarian relief to Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip, which is under Israeli attack.
Lew, who also served as President Barack Obama’s chief of staff before leading the Treasury Department, has drawn words of support from Jewish leaders in Washington who pointed to his experience in public office, his skills as a negotiator, his involvement in Jewish life and his close relationship with Jewish organizations.
He earned a reputation for resolving complex negotiations during his two stints as director of the Office of Management and Budget under Obama as well as President Bill Clinton. He has spoken publicly about balancing his Orthodox observance with government work and has encouraged young observant Jews to go into public service,
Republicans who opposed Lew cited his role as treasury secretary when Obama brokered the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.
“I understand it’s important to move as quickly as we can to have an ambassador in Jerusalem,” said Sen. James Risch, the Idaho Republican who is the top Republican on the committee. “We are at an important moment in history with the events in Israel. This makes the stakes so much higher and important that we get it right.”
Risch and other Republicans said that as treasury secretary, Lew’s oversight of the Iran nuclear deal, which traded sanctions relief for a rollback of Iran’s nuclear program, overly favored Iran.
“Hamas would not exist if it was not for Iran,” Risch said. “Iran arms and trains them, it finances and directs them.”
Risch said Lew deceived Congress about the degree to which he facilitated sanctions relief to Iran. “I want to support Israel,” he said. “I think everybody on this floor wants to support Israel. The last thing we need is somebody who is very contrary to our view on how Iran should be handled.”
Cardin, known for his laidback approach to legislation, exhibited rare fury with his colleagues, whom he said distorted Lew’s record and falsely accused him of lying.
“It’s just not right to say he misled us!” Cardin shouted. “He did not!”
Cardin noted that Lew was backed by a broad range of organizations, including the Anti-Defamation League and the Orthodox Union, a group whose constituents trend politically conservative. He also cited Lew’s long involvement in pro-Israel and Jewish groups. Lew’s confirmation “gives us the person as our representative to Israel that has the gravitas to stand shoulder to shoulder with Israel,” Cardin said.
Cardin added that when he visited Israel in the days after the war started as part of a bipartisan delegation, he heard from Israeli officials that they were eager to work with Lew.
“Israel needs a strong U.S. ambassador who will represent America and be their partner intaking on one of the greatest struggles in their history, from the terrorist Hamas and what they did on Oct. 7,” he said.
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Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
i24 News – Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday that the government would establish an administration to encourage the voluntary migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” he said at a Land of Israel Caucus at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. “The budget will not be an obstacle.”
Referring to the plan championed by US President Donald Trump, Smotrich noted the “profound and deep hatred towards Israel” in Gaza, adding that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it’s impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone’s throw from the border.”
The administration would be under the Defense Ministry, with the goal of facilitating Trump’s plan to build a “Riviera of the Middle East” and the relocation of hundreds of thousands of Gazans for rebuilding efforts.
“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “The logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.”
The post Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30
A general view shows the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – The Knesset’s (Israeli parliament’s) Special Committee for Foreign Workers held a discussion on Sunday to examine the needs of wounded and disabled IDF soldiers and the response foreign caregivers could provide.
During the discussion, data from the Defense Minister revealed that the number of registered IDF wounded and disabled veterans rose from 62,000 to 78,000 since the war began on October 7, 2023. “Most of them are reservists and 51 percent of the wounded are up to 30 years old,” the ministry’s report said. The number will increase, the ministry assesses, as post-trauma cases emerge.
The committee chairwoman, Knesset member Etty Atiya (Likud), emphasized the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy for the wounded and to remove obstacles. “There is no dispute that the IDF disabled have sacrificed their bodies and souls for the people of Israel, for the state of Israel,” she said. Addressing the veterans, she continued: “And we, as public representatives and public servants alike, must do everything, but everything, to improve your lives in any way possible, to alleviate your pain and the distress of your family members who are no less affected than you.”
Currently, extensions are being given to the IDF veterans on a three-month basis, which Atiya said creates uncertainty and fear among the patients.
“The committee calls on the Interior Minister [Moshe Arbel] to approve as soon as possible the temporary order on our table, so that it will reach the approval of the Knesset,” she said, adding that she “intends to personally approach the Director General of the Population Authority [Shlomo Mor-Yosef] on the matter in order to promote a quick and stable solution.”
The post Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during an interview with Sky News Arabia in Damascus, Syria in this handout picture released by the Syrian Presidency on August 8, 2023. Syrian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Over 1,300 people were killed in two days of fighting in Syria between security forces under the new Syrian Islamist leaders and fighters from ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect on the other hand, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Sunday.
Since Thursday, 1,311 people had been killed, according to the Observatory, including 830 civilians, mainly Alawites, 231 Syrian government security personnel, and 250 Assad loyalists.
The intense fighting broke out late last week as the Alawite militias launched an offensive against the new government’s fighters in the coastal region of the country, prompting a massive deployment ordered by new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace as much as possible and… we will be able to live together in this country,” al-Sharaa said, as quoted in the BBC.
The death toll represents the most severe escalations since Assad was ousted late last year, and is one of the most costly in terms of human lives since the civil war began in 2011.
The counter-offensive launched by al-Sharaa’s forces was marked by reported revenge killings and atrocities in the Latakia region, a stronghold of the Alawite minority in the country.
The post Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.