Re: Netanyahu row with Obama administration deepens

**lily** Sun Mar 08, 2015 7:13 pm

Totally agree with you Bonny.

This is an interesting comment on ZH and I can agree with the basic points.

Don't be fooled, this is another one of those color revolutions. The big money to replace Netanyahu is coming from nonaligned non-profits funded from international sources with the sole aim to replace the current regime. One of the main players is Obama's former campaign manager who now runs V15 (Victory 2015), one of those 'grass roots' organizations. I'm not much of a fan old Bibi boy but I'm less thrilled about yet another attempt to overthrow a government using the money of Soros and friends. Likud will be ousted and another more pliable government will replace it but two questions will remain, what color will they name this one and will there be snipers?

**bb1** Sun Mar 08, 2015 7:20 pm

Ah, I missed that, Lily, but the business of the campaign manager rings a bell...

If that is indeed the case, and it sounds quite possible, then it's bad news for Israel, and just about everyone else in the Middle East.

Found this:

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/01/26/obama-campaign-team-arrives-in-israel-to-defeat-netanyahu-in-march-elections/

Just days after the Obama White House accused House Speaker John Boehner of “breaking protocol” by inviting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, a team of up to five Obama campaign operatives has reportedly arrived in Israel to lead a campaign to defeat the Israeli Prime Minister in upcoming national elections scheduled for March 17.

The anti-Netanyahu, left wing Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports a group called “One Voice,” reportedly funded by American donors, is paying for the Obama campaign team. That group is reportedly being led by Obama’s 2012 field director Jeremy Bird.

As Jerusalem Post columnist and putative Knesset candidate Caroline Glick reported on her Facebook page, “Obama won’t meet Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington when he addresses the Joint Houses of Congress in March because of Netanyahu’s visit’s proximity to the Israeli elections. And Obama, of course believes in protocol and propriety which is why he won’t get involved.” And yet, Glick adds, “He’s just sending his 2012 field campaign manager to Israel to run a campaign to defeat Netanyahu.”

More at link.

So, they aren't genuine demos, they're 'community organised' demos?

**bb1** Sun Mar 08, 2015 7:23 pm

http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/look-who-is-behind-the-new-us-democratic-style-campaign-in-israel/2015/01/28/

V15 sent out a press release in which it described itself as a “a non-partisan movement founded by young adults just as the 2015 Israeli elections were announced, V15 members have set aside party affiliation to disrupt the status quo.” But just about everybody else is calling it the “Anybody but Bibi” campaign.

So who is behind this V15, in addition to Obama’s former campaigns director? Well, as we learn from J.E Dyer, over at Liberty Unyielding, when OneVoice was formed in 2003, its inaugural board of advisers included Gary Gladstein. And who is Gladstein? He used to be the chief operations officer of Soros Fund Management. As in George Soros. Doesn’t it feel as if everything really, really awful has Soros’ fingerprints somehow, someway?

**lily** Sun Mar 08, 2015 8:21 pm

Good find, Bonny. So, it isn't too surprising is it?

**bb1** Sun Mar 08, 2015 8:26 pm

No, it isn't, Lily. The only blessing is that I don't think his puppets will get away with the 'snipers on the roof' trick, Mossad will be expecting something along those lines.

Here's an idea that might help bring peace to the world - everyone from Ferguson to Donbass, via Israel, etc., who has seen their lives destroyed by that vile man should join together and DEMAND he face justice for what him and his accursed 'foundation' have done.

Don't forget, he brought ruin to many in the UK a few years ago when he manipulated sterling till it crashed.

**lily** Sun Mar 08, 2015 9:00 pm

He may have bought too many people off.

**bb1** Wed Mar 11, 2015 7:57 pm

http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel-election-2015/1.646390

Senior Likud sources: Netanyahu may not win election
'Speech to Congress should have strengthened Likud, but we didn’t achieve the desired outcome.'
By Jonathan Lis | Mar. 11, 2015 | 2:52 PM

Senior Likud figures are increasingly acknowledging that party leader Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may not win Tuesday’s national election.

“Something isn’t going the way it should. Netanyahu’s speech to Congress last week should have created a turning point for us and strengthened Likud in the polls. It’s clear that we didn’t achieve the desired outcome,” a senior figure in Likud told Haaretz.

“We came to these elections thinking Netanyahu had no real rival. Now we understand that the picture is much more complex,” another Likud source said.

“I don’t discount the possibility that [Zionist Union co-leader Isaac] Herzog will win the election,” added another high-ranking Likud figure. “If that happens, I believe his coalition will hold out for a year and then Likud will come back to government.”

Likud must simultaneously tackle two major problems: One, a constant trickle of voters out of the party toward the centrist Yesh Atid and Kulanu. The second is the lack of motivation among Likud voters to get out and vote. “We have a major concern that a few Knesset seats will [be lost] due to voters who support Likud but just won’t vote, and it’s not clear if we will overcome this, the party figure said adding: “The problem is not Likud. People just don’t want to vote Netanyahu.

Meanwhile Prime Minister Netanyahu and others close to him have repeatedly blamed “outside forces” for his lack of popularity.

“There is a huge global effort to bring down the Likud government,” Netanyahu told supporters at a meeting Monday in the Haifa Bay suburb of Kiryat Motzkin. “This is a very close battle,” he added. “Nothing is assured.”

Over the past few days members of Netanyahu’s inner circle have echoed his charges, citing foreign businesspeople who have invested funds to bring about a change of government in Israel, by funding organizations like V15, which is conducting a campaign against Netanyahu, or One Million Hands, the group that organized the anti-Netanyahu protest in Rabin Square in Tel Aviv on Saturday night.

Political parties in Israel are banned from accepting money directly from overseas donors during an election campaign. But such funding is allowed under Israeli law for non-profit organizations espousing political viewpoints, and U.S. consultants have advised Israeli candidates for years.

Strategic and Intelligence Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz spoke on the same issue on Tuesday, enumerating what he believed were the elements stacked up against Netanyahu: “The media is enlisted against him, the Palestinian Authority as well as elements in the United States. I see something that looks like support for the other side.”

Speaking in an online chat on Tuesday with Haaretz readers, Steinitz said: “All these forces come to bring about the absurd situation in which Netanyahu gives up his place to someone who has never proven anything,” he said.

“I think that most of the opinion polls show that despite this delegitimization, most of the public still prefers Netanyahu and his leadership talents,” said Steinitz.

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 12:27 pm

http://www.thelocal.no/20150313/scandinavia-accused-of-meddling-in-israel-vote

'Scandinavia' accused of meddling in Israel vote
Published: 13 Mar 2015 16:55 GMT+01:00

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Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused 'Scandinavian governments' of spending millions of dollars on a campaign to remove him from power, as the Middle Eastern country prepares for elections next week.

In an interview with an Israeli radio station, the head of the right-wing Likud party who faces a tough challenge from the centre and left in the upcoming vote, said he believed that Nordic politicians did not want him to remain in office.

"Scandinavian governments have spent millions of dollars on a campaign to remove me from power," he said on the station Kol Israel.

"Western governments, but mostly Scandinavian...They know perfectly well why they prefer Buji and Livni to me," he added, referring to his opponents.

In a separate interview with Rega Radio he was reported to have said that "foreign governments, specifically Scandinavians, are part of a worldwide campaign to topple me", according to a translation posted on Twitter by Israeli blogger and journalist Tal Schneider.

Sweden in particular has had strained relations with Israel in recent months after becoming the first western European country to formally recognize the state of Palestine.

The decision led to Israel temporarily recalling its ambassador from Stockholm and claims that Sweden's Foreign Minister Margot Wallström had been snubbed by Israeli government officials, after she cancelled a planned visit to Jerusalem.

But Netanyahu's comments about Scandinavian governments have been met with strong criticism from some social media users in Israel.

"What the hell has Scandinavia done to Benjamin Netanyahu?", wrote Jerusalem-based journalist Noga Tarnopolsky.

Israeli historian and writer Gershom Gorenberg posted: "last refuge of the fading strongman: accuse outside agitators, foreign governments".

More at link.

**Lamplighter** Sat Mar 14, 2015 1:46 pm

I see that Netanyahu has totally forgotten how Danes, from the King down managed to save Jews by sending them via sea to neutral Sweden - 99% survived. The Finns were holding off the Red Army and Norway, which was totally overrun by the Wermacht and the SS, managed to save a few hundred - they didn't have the advantage the Danes had of being able to ship the Jews out of the country as their coastline was open to the sea and the U-boats patrolling it. LL

The rescue of the Danish Jews occurred during Nazi Germany's occupation of Denmark during World War II. On October 1, 1943, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler ordered Danish Jews to be arrested and deported. Despite great personal risk, the Danish resistance movement, with the assistance of many ordinary Danish citizens, managed to evacuate 7,220 of Denmark's 7,800 Jews, plus 686 non-Jewish spouses, by sea to nearby neutral Sweden which was a very short journey.

The rescue allowed the vast majority of Denmark's Jewish population to avoid capture by the Nazis and is considered to be one of the largest actions of collective resistance to aggression in the countries occupied by Nazi Germany. As a result of the rescue, and the following Danish intercession on behalf of the 464 Danish Jews who were captured and deported to Theresienstadt transit camp in Bohemia, over 99% of Denmark's Jewish population survived the Holocaust.

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 1:54 pm

He hasn't forgotten, he just doesn't care, LL. I find it helps if you think of him not as being Jewish, but as being Zionist - a huge difference, IMO.

**Lamplighter** Sat Mar 14, 2015 2:00 pm

bb1 wrote:He hasn't forgotten, he just doesn't care, LL. I find it helps if you think of him not as being Jewish, but as being Zionist - a huge difference, IMO.

He is a follower of Secular Judaism. In other words he pays lip-service to Judaism. LL

Jewish secularism comprises the largest section of the Jewish people who are secular and the body of work produced by secular Jews over the past 250 years. Almost half of all Jews define themselves as secular.

These people build up communities where Jewish holidays are celebrated as historical and nature festivals, and where life-cycle events are marked in a secular manner.

Throughout modern history, Jewish thinkers have challenged traditional Judaism. As early as the nineteenth century, members of the Society for the Culture and Science of the Jews (Verein fur Kultur und Wissenschaft der Juden) viewed Judaism as a culture, not a religion. These secularists, building on foundations of the Enlightenment, Haskalah, were keen to integrate humanistic culture and education with a Jewish culture not linked to rabbinical dictates, or the existence of a personal God.

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 2:08 pm

He's a bit of a trougher-

http://www.timesofisrael.com/state-report-details-excessive-spending-at-prime-ministers-residence/

Netanyahu has faced scads of criticism in the press and from political opponents over reports of excessive use of state coffers, including NIS 80,000 ($20,000) a year on water at his home in Caesarea, a NIS 10,000 ($2,500) a month budget for ice cream and a flight on which he spent NIS 450,000 to have a bed put in a plane for a five-hour flight.

Read more: Bombshell report details excessive spending by prime minister | The Times of Israel http://www.timesofisrael.com/state-report-details-excessive-spending-at-prime-ministers-residence/#ixzz3UMwMMkwZ
Follow us: @timesofisrael on Twitter | timesofisrael on Facebook

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 4:00 pm

Good luck to anyone that can unravel this:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/03/14/senate-committee-probes-whether-obama-administration-funded-effort-to-oust/

Quote:

Gerald Steinberg, founder and president of NGO Monitor, which tracks money flows to unmask non-governmental organizations that deviate from their stated human rights or humanitarian agendas, said even ostensibly unrelated grants keep an organization going during periods it is not engaged in political activity.

Indeed, by January, OneVoice – whose focus on Israel’s 1967 borders as a negotiating starting point reflects Obama’s thinking but is counter to Netanyahu’s – had announced its partnership with V15.

Around the same time, Jeremy Bird, who served as Obama’s deputy national campaign director in 2008, and his national campaign director in 2012, arrived in Israel to help direct V15. Bird took with him additional former Obama campaign operatives to help V15 achieve its goal of knocking on one million doors to make the case for a change in Israel’s leadership.

OneVoice is barred from directly targeting Netanyahu by U.S. law regulating its tax-exempt status, and doing so would threaten that status.

But the recent FoxNews.com investigation showed that the nonprofit, in its 2014 Annual Report, said its Israel branch would be “embarking on a groundbreaking campaign around the Israeli elections.” In partnering with V15, the two groups have operated from adjacent offices in Tel Aviv.

That'll be this V15?

http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/look-who-is-behind-the-new-us-democratic-style-campaign-in-israel/2015/01/28/

Flying in to run the show is none other than Jeremy Bird. The same Bird who was the deputy national campaign director and then national campaign director for Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns, respectively.

The new outfit is called V15 (as in Victory 2015), and it is a project of something called OneVoice, which is itself a program of the PeaceWorks Network, a non-profit, tax-exempt entity. Really. Funding this political campaign effort.

V15 sent out a press release in which it described itself as a “a non-partisan movement founded by young adults just as the 2015 Israeli elections were announced, V15 members have set aside party affiliation to disrupt the status quo.” But just about everybody else is calling it the “Anybody but Bibi” campaign.

So who is behind this V15, in addition to Obama’s former campaigns director? Well, as we learn from J.E Dyer, over at Liberty Unyielding, when OneVoice was formed in 2003, its inaugural board of advisers included Gary Gladstein. And who is Gladstein? He used to be the chief operations officer of Soros Fund Management. As in George Soros. Doesn’t it feel as if everything really, really awful has Soros’ fingerprints somehow, someway?

Working on the theory that Obama and Soros NEVER do anything for the good of humanity, does that suggest Netenyahu may have some redeeming features?

Or are they just trying to spread the same chaos to Israel, as they have to so many other countries?

**lily** Sat Mar 14, 2015 6:38 pm

Bad luck to those who oppose Soros I would say?

Is this the fabled chaos before the birth of the fabled New World Order?

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 6:41 pm

I have a feeling they're not going to get their longed-for NWO, global government, or whatever else they want to call themselves, Lily. Possibly because they forgot to allow for human nature, and that not everyone was going to take the Soros thirty pieces?

**lily** Sat Mar 14, 2015 6:51 pm

I trust in those people who do not want it, Bonny.

Who wants a worldwide version of the EU spenders? Or the US spenders?

Would this mean a possible world dictator?

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 7:00 pm

Ah, but it wouldn't be presented as a dictatorship, Lily, nothing so nasty. It would be set up as benign people looking after the world, stopping the plebs from having Badthink, as well as doing anything dangerous like drinking too much Coke, etc - won't someone think of the children!

**lily** Sat Mar 14, 2015 7:15 pm

Oh of course, Bonny. Those wonderful panels of ~~knowitalls~~ kindly people with only the best interests of everyone in mind. Except, of course, for themselves.

Can you imagine the reams of regulations that people must conform to before they have even left their homes.

They make wonderful sensible choices for the children at the moment, don't you know! Who wants a millimeter of fat on their meat.....

**bb1** Sat Mar 14, 2015 7:26 pm

That's it, you see, there's no need to be an old-fashioned dictator, you just have to tie people up in so many petty rules and regulations - for their own good, of course! - that few have the time or energy to argue with you.

Now, if Soros and Obama are both plotting against Netenyahu - and they do seem to be - then he must, somehow, be an obstacle to whatever deranged scheme they want to inflict on Israel.

What it is, I can't quite work out yet......

**bb1** Mon Mar 16, 2015 3:44 pm

http://www.haaretz.com/st/c/prod/eng/2015/elections/center/

Netanyahu row with Obama administration deepens - Page 2 Isop10

If that's accurate, Netenyahu is going to lose on seat count, but I have NO idea how Israeli coalitions work.

I confess to being conflicted over this. I don't like Netenyahu, but no-one being plotted against by Obama and Soros can be all bad.

**Lamplighter** Tue Mar 17, 2015 9:09 am

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/03/israel-votes-election-referendum-netanyahu-150317035144469.html

From Haaretz:

Shimon Peres endorses Zionist Union's Herzog for prime minister
'He is the kind of leader that will know how to bridge gaps, and bring together Israeli society with the glue of solidarity and hope,' former Israeli president says of Isaac Herzog.

**bb1** Tue Mar 17, 2015 1:19 pm

Netenyahu seems to be in a bit of a panic, LL?

http://www.haaretz.com/news/israel-election-2015/1.647304

Home News Israel election 2015
LIVE BLOG: Netanyahu: The right-wing is in danger - Arabs are voting in droves
Live Updates: 36/7% of eligible Israelis cast their ballots by 2 P.M.; 5.8 million Israelis are expected to head to the polls Tuesday.
By Haaretz | Mar. 17, 2015 | 2:40 PM

sraelis are voting on Tuesday in an election called last December by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The election culminates a strident, personal campaign that, to the surprise of many, finds the incumbent fighting for his political life against the once implausible challenger Isaac Herzog.

Ballots are being cast at 10,372 polling stations throughout Israel, and will remain open until 10:00 P.M. There are 5,881,696 Israelis (citizens over the age of 18) who are eligible to vote today for the 20th Knesset.

The weather is expected to be good and many Israelis are likely to take outdoor advantage of the public holiday.

2:35 P.M. Lieberman responds to Netanyahu on Twitter

Avigdor Lieberman on Twitter: "Netanyahu also knows that if the Arabs are voting in droves, only a strong Lieberman can stop them." (Barak Ravid)

2:20 P.M. Signs of increased voter turnout among Arab Israelis

There are signs of increased voter turnout among the Arab Israeli population relative to the previous election. There are reports of long lines outside of polling stations in Arab villages and towns, although officials from the Joint List are reluctant to express too much optimism. Joint List chairman Ayman Oudeh recently sent a message to party activists informing them of the apparent upward trend, though he also cautioned against being too complacent. (Jack Khoury)

1:45 P.M. Netanyahu: Right-wing gov't in danger - Arabs voting in droves

Likud is troubled over high voter turnout in Arab community. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently uploaded a video to his Facebook page in which he said: "The right-wing government is in danger. Arab voters are coming out in droves to the polls. Left-wing organizations are busing them out. We have no V15, we have Order 8 [code for emergency call up to IDF reserve duty], we have only you. Get out to vote, bring your friends and family, vote Likud in order to close the gap between us and 'Labor.'"

More at link.

Any idea when we get the result? I see the polls close at 10pm local time, but I don't know if Israel has exit polls, how it counts, or anything like that.

**lily** Tue Mar 17, 2015 1:27 pm

It's just been on our news that Netanyahu will not go with a Palestinian state if he is voted in. That could be the item that does he him.

**Lamplighter** Tue Mar 17, 2015 1:36 pm

lily wrote:It's just been on our news that Netanyahu will not go with a Palestinian state if he is voted in. That could be the item that does he him.

He's been shouting that at all and sundry for the last few days. He's been making obscure threats as well. My Jewish friends say moderate Israelis are not happy with the picture that is being painted of their country by Netanyahu. They want peace and prosperity and this they aren't getting. LL

**lily** Tue Mar 17, 2015 1:40 pm

Palestine deserves to be given state status, LL.

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