Opposition Leader Yair Lapid on Tuesday cheered Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s decision to throw his Blue and White party’s support behind a preliminary reading of a bill to dissolve the Knesset and call early elections.
Defense Minister Benny Gantz’s Blue and White party is expected to give initial backing to a bill to dissolve the Knesset and call early elections when it comes up for a vote Wednesday, TV reports said Monday evening, amid widespread speculation that Israelis will soon find themselves at the ballot box for the fourth time in under two years.
White House adviser Jared Kushner will travel to Saudi Arabia this week, in an apparent last-ditch effort to broker a normalization deal between the kingdom and Israel, according to a report on Sunday.
An Iranian nuclear scientist, who Israel alleges was in charge of Iran’s military nuclear program until the early 2000s, has been assassinated, the Associated Press reports. Iranian state media have reported that Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was killed on Friday. Israel has not immediately commented on the death.
Israel is on a high-speed train to new elections — the fourth in two years — as rumblings during the past few weeks over a possible government collapse manifested in a verbal threat by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and United Arab Emirates Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed have been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, the Jerusalem Post reports. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Lord David Trimble of Northern Ireland has nominated the two leaders for their pioneering agreement to normalize relations between Israel and the UAE.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Tuesday that he is planning to make his first official visit to Bahrain in the near future, the Jerusalem Post reports. Like Sudan and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain has recently signed a US-brokered normalization agreement with Israel.
In a move aimed at pressuring the centrist Blue and White party to break ranks with the coalition amid an ongoing deterioration of relations within the government, opposition leader Yair Lapid said Monday that he’ll lead a proposal next week to disperse the Knesset and call new elections.
Israel’s Channel 12 has reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Mossad chief Yossi Cohen flew to Saudi Arabia Sunday for a secret meeting with officials there, All Israel News (AIN) reports. Although the meeting has not been confirmed by the Prime Minister’s office, the news has caused speculation that, following Bahrain, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia may become the next Arab state to normalize relations with Israel.
Israel is in the final stages of talks with British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca to purchase “millions” of doses of its vaccine, which is currently under trial, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Friday.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday met said during a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Bahrain’s foreign minister that regional normalization deals leave Iran “ever more isolated”.
The speculation has a number of catalysts. First was the firing of Mark Esper as secretary of defense this past week and the replacement of him and other top Pentagon officials with Trump ideologues. Some media outlets in the US have raised the possibility that Trump wanted to get Esper out of the way, so he could more easily carry out controversial military moves.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Friday an agreement to purchase 4 million vaccines from Pfizer as early as January, an agreement that will cost well over $200 million and remains subject to the vaccine receiving approval in the United States.
Former National Security Advisor Gen. H.R. McMaster for the Trump administration said in an interview with Fox News Thursday that President-elect Joe Biden should not rejoin the 2015 Iran nuclear deal upon taking office in on January 20.
Prime Minister Netanyahu met with the Foreign Minister of Malawi on Thursday after the African country vowed to open an embassy in Jerusalem by next summer.
In another move towards a new era, Israel and Sudan agreed Friday to normalize ties in a U.S.-brokered deal.
A former Israeli communications minister has stated that the manner in which Israel treated Bahraini princess Fatima bint Khalifa in 2010 helped open the door for normalizing relations with Bahrain this year, the Jerusalem Post reports. Speaking at the second annual Israeli- Palestinian Economic Forum Tuesday, Israeli-Druze Ayoub Kara said he had helped the princess receive treatment at Israel’s Rambam Hospital in Haifa, and that this had been an opportunity to foster good relations with the Gulf states.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has bowed to requests to appear before the Knesset to explain classified portions of the normalization agreement with the United Arab Emirates – but not before Thursday, when the Knesset plenum votes to approve it.
Israel’s Cabinet has approved an agreement on normalizing relations with the United Arab Emirates, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday he and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan have agreed to meet soon.
Tens of thousands of Israelis protested against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in over 1,000 socially distanced gatherings throughout the country Saturday, the fourth such event since the government instituted a ban on mass protests as part of the national coronavirus lockdown.