Gloom and doomers warn that war with Iran could cripple the economy, but Israel has a weapon: $70 billion in dollar reserves. Many international financial wizards scoffed at Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer three years when he bought billions of dollars, ostensibly to keep the then-mighty shekel from growing even stronger. Israeli exporters were suffering from low revenue due to a lower shekel rate for the dollar and the euro. CAIRO — President Mohamed Morsi of Egypt forced the retirement on Sunday of his powerful defense minister, the army chief of staff and other senior generals, moving more aggressively than ever before to reclaim political power that the military had seized since the fall of Hosni Mubarak last year. Mr. Morsi also nullified a constitutional declaration, issued by the military before he took office on June 30, that had gutted the authority of his office. On Sunday, he replaced it with his own declaration, one that gave him broad legislative and executive powers and, potentially, a decisive role in the drafting of Egypt’s still unfinished new constitution. (Israel Government Press Office) Yediot Aharonot opines that “The elimination of the old Egyptian military elite, in one swipe of the sword, without a drop of sweat and without a blink from the direction of the Egyptian army, is a drama which is hard to describe in words. It is one of the big, surprising and most shaking achievements of the Egyptian revolution.” The author contends that “The damage to the Egyptian army – Egypt’s pro-West, secular power center – is liable in the long range to weaken one of the anchors which ensured the continued implementation of the peace agreements with Israel.” (Read more…) This is a long article and includes a lot of background. The Kurds have much more than 9% of the Syrian population and they are not near as divided as Neriah says. Ted Belman. By Jacques Neriah, JCPA, Aug 5/12 In the wake of the steady disintegration of the Assad regime, Syrian opposition activists reported that several towns, such as Amouda and Qabani in Syria’s Kurdish northeast, had passed in mid-July 2012 without a fight into the local hands of a group called the Free Kurdish Army. Thus emerged for the first time in modern Kurdish history the nucleus of an exclusively Kurdish-controlled enclave bordering the predominantly Kurdish areas of Turkey. After largely sitting on the sidelines of the Syrian revolution, political groups from Syria’s Kurdish minority in the northeastern region appear to have moved decisively to claim control of the Kurdish-populated towns.
Israel’s Dollar Reserves a Weapon Against Iranian War Disaster
(Read more…)Morsi Forces Out Military Chiefs
(Read more…)Summary of Editorials from the Hebrew Press
Kurdistan: The Next Flashpoint Between Turkey, Iraq, and the Syrian Revolt
(Read more…)
Ted Belman
Jerusalem, Israel
Tuesday, 14 August 2012
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