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Benjamin Netanyahu: Israel Is Also Your Home

JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu coupled a show of solidarity with France on Sunday with a reminder to shaken French Jews that Israel is keen to welcome them as immigrants.

Netanyahu and two far-right members of his cabinet flew to Paris on Sunday to join dozens of foreign leaders and hundreds of thousands of French citizens in a march honoring the victims of Islamist militant attacks this week.

The timing of his message that “Israel is also your home” could clash with attempts by French leaders to reassure Europe’s largest Jewish community after the shock assaults that included hostage-taking at a kosher supermarket.

In a statement late on Saturday, Netanyahu said an Israeli governmental committee would convene in the coming week to find ways to boost Jewish immigration from France and other European countries “which are being hit by terrible anti-Semitism”.

“To all the Jews of France and to all the Jews of Europe, I wish to say: the State of Israel is not only the place to which you pray, the State of Israel is also your home,” he said.

In 2004, then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon angered Paris by urging French Jews to flee “the wildest anti-Semitism” in their native country and come to Israel.

In remarks to reporters as he boarded the flight to Paris, Netanyahu avoided any outright call for France’s 550,000 Jews to leave. He said only he would tell them that “any Jew who wants to immigrate to Israel will be received here with open arms”.

Under Israel’s Law of Return, anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent has a right of immigration to Israel and, once there, can receive Israeli citizenship automatically.

Faced with an upsurge in anti-Semitic attacks and threats, some 7,000 French Jews immigrated to Israel last year, an unprecedented number for that community, according to Israel’s quasi-governmental Jewish Agency.

Moshe Sebbag, rabbi of Paris’ Grand Synagogue, told Israel’s Army Radio he believed that figure could double this year.

Seventeen people, including journalists and policemen, lost their lives in three days of violence that began with a shooting attack on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday and ended with a hostage-taking at a kosher supermarket on Friday. The three gunmen were also killed.

After his arrival in Paris, Netanyahu said in a statement he had agreed to requests from the families of the four Jews killed in the supermarket to bring them to Israel for burial. Their funerals have been tentatively scheduled for Tuesday.

Source: www.todayonline.com

January 12, 2015
Mahmud Abbas And Benjamin Netanyahu Among World Leaders Linking Arms In March Against Terrorism

PARIS (AFP) – World leaders, including some who are normally implacable foes, on Sunday linked arms in unprecedented scenes of solidarity during an historic march against terrorism in Paris.

Walking arm in arm alongside President Francois Hollande were a string of leaders including British Prime Minister David Cameron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

They were joined on the front line by arch nemeses Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, who were positioned just four people apart.

Also present were Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose countries are engaged in a violent struggle in Ukraine.

“Paris is the capital of the world today,” said Hollande before the march, which attracted hundreds of thousands to the streets of Paris and many more across the rest of France and Europe.

Before he set off for the march, Britain’s David Cameron said: “We in Britain face a very similar threat, a threat of fanatical extremism.

“It’s a threat that has been with us for many years and I believe will be with us for many more years to come,” he told Sky News.

Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi vowed that Europe would “win the challenge against terrorism”.

The procession was organised in record time following a three-day extremist killing spree that saw 17 people – police, prominent cartoonists, shoppers and others – die at the hands of three gunmen.

The dramatic events ended Friday when the attackers took hostages in two separate locations and were eventually shot dead by security forces in simultaneous assaults.

Source: www.straitstimes.com

January 12, 2015
SG50 Slogans On Your Mail Courtesy Of SingPost

SingPost will celebrate Singapore’s 50th birthday with an SG50 slogan every month.

There will be 12 special slogans depicting Singaporeans’ unique and fun traits, values and characteristics. Stamped letters will be imprinted with the slogans, which include the SG50 logo.

For example, the February slogan will be “We Love Festivals”, reflecting the cultural and religious diversity of Singapore. In May, the slogan will be “We Love Shopping” to coincide with the The Great Singapore Sale. The August slogan will be “We Love Our Country”, to celebrate Singapore’s journey of independence and achievements.

The slogans were designed by Wong Wui Kong, who said the illustrations are based on a design concept of “heart”, “smile” and “SG50 logo”. He added: “The heart expresses our love for Singapore. The SG50 logo indicates that it is our nation’s 50th birthday while the smile shows that it is a joyous celebration.”

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

January 12, 2015
Cashless Payment At More Hawker Centres Soon

The public will be able to use their NETS FlashPay cards at more hawker centres this year. The card allows diners to pay for items simply by waving it, similar to how the EZ-link card works on buses and trains.

This is currently available only at three hawker centres, but the service will be expanded to another 10 to 20 more. The Bedok Hawker Centre, which was officially opened on Sunday (Jan 11), is the latest to offer this service, following the footsteps of hawker centres in Beo Crescent and Clementi Ave 3.

Some diners Channel NewsAsia spoke to welcomed the convenience. “It is a very good idea because I don’t have to carry too much cash with me. If I have insufficient money to buy food, I know my card will pay for everything I need,” said 49-year-old homemaker Julie Tenh.

“It’s convenient and easy to use; when you have no cash, you can just use the card,” added Esther Wong, a 22-year-old student who had used the FlashPay card to purchase a S$2 drink.

NETS says the service is offered free-of-charge to the hawkers at Bedok Hawker Centre for a year, after which they have to pay a fee of S$28 a month. So far, about 60 per cent of the hawkers have signed up.

NETS is also looking at introducing a system that makes it easier for diners to buy and pick up their food, which will help hawkers with manpower constraints.

“Imagine when you are ordering your chicken rice, you key in on the self-service terminal that you ordered chicken rice and you put in your mobile phone number,” said NETS CEO Jeffrey Goh. “When it is ready, they will send you a text to notify you to go and pick up your chicken rice. So in the meantime, you can go and order other food without waiting.”

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

January 12, 2015
Hamas Condemns Charlie Hebdo Attacks

GAZA – The Hamas group that controls the Gaza Strip on Saturday issued a condemnation of the deadly attacks by Islamist gunmen in France this week, saying there was no “justification for killing innocents”.

The Palestinian Islamist faction, which is designated as a terror organization by most Western countries, also challenged Israel’s “helpless attempts” to draw comparisons between its activities and the violence in France.

In the worst assault on France’s homeland security for decades, 17 victims lost their lives in three days of violence that began with an attack on the Charlie Hebdo satirical newspaper on Wednesday and ended with Friday’s dual sieges at a print works outside Paris and a kosher supermarket in the city.

“(Hamas) stresses that its position on the latest events in Paris is in line with the statement issued by the International Union of Muslim Scholars which condemned the attack on the Charlie Hebdo newspaper and that any differences in opinion are no justification for killing innocents,” Hamas said in a rare statement in French.

Islamist Gaza militants led by Hamas, whose charter includes a pledge to destroy Israel, fought a 50-day war against Israeli forces which ended in August.

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, more than 2,100 Palestinians, most of them civilians, were killed. Sixty-seven Israeli soldiers and six civilians in Israel were also killed.

Hamas added in its statement that Israelis should be tried for war crimes and condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “helpless attempts” to draw parallels between “the resistance of our people from one side and the terrorism across the world in the other side.”

The Palestinians will formally become a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC) on April 1, when the court could exercise jurisdiction over war crimes committed by anyone on Palestinian territory, without a referral from the U.N. Security Council.

Israel is not a member of the Hague-based ICC but its citizens could be tried for actions taken on Palestinian land. Palestinians could also be liable for prosecution for actions against Israelis.

On Friday, the leader of Lebanon’s Shi’ite group Hezbollah said the attacks in France had done more harm to Islam than any cartoon or book, a reference to the attack on Charlie Hebdo.

Source: www.todayonline.com

January 11, 2015