ISRAEL AND MIDDLE EAST NEWS:

Ahmadinejad Wins Landslide Election Victory, Protests Erupt
Iran's Interior Ministry said Saturday that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won 63% of the vote in Friday's presidential elections, with Mir Hossein Mousavi, the top challenger, taking just under 34%. In response, the streets of Tehran erupted in the most intense protests in a decade by demonstrators who claimed that Ahmadinejad had stolen the election. Mousavi, a former prime minister who had promised to reverse Ahmadinejad's hard-line policies, declared himself the winner by a wide margin Friday night and charged widespread election irregularities. However, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, issued a statement congratulating Ahmadinejad and urging the other candidates to support him. (Robert F. Worth and Nazila Fathi, New York Times, June 14, 2009)  To read the entire article click here.

Israel Prime Minister Calls for Demilitarized Palestinian State
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel could accept a peace agreement with a "demilitarized Palestinian state" as its neighbor. Netanyahu set conditions for moving forward. Among them: unequivocal Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish national state with Jerusalem as its capital, and full demilitarization for a Palestinian state - no army, no rockets or missiles, no control of airspace. (CNN, June 14, 2009) To read the entire article click here.

Israel's Quest for Peace - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University on Sunday:
 Peace has always been our people's most ardent desire. Our prophets gave the world the vision of peace, we greet one another with wishes of peace, and our prayers conclude with the word "peace." I share President Obama's desire to bring about a new era of reconciliation in our region. I turn to all Arab leaders and say: "Let us meet. Let us speak of peace and let us make peace. I am ready to meet with you at any time. I am willing to go to Damascus, to Riyadh, to Beirut." To our Palestinian neighbors, I say: "Let's begin negotiations immediately without preconditions." (Prime Minister's Office, June 14, 2009) To read the entire article click here.

Khamenei in tough sermon defends presidential election, warns protesters

In his first public appearance since the disputed presidential election of June 12, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Iran's enemies sought to shake the people's confidence and trust in the Islamic regime. To read the full article, click here:  http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6139

Enraged Palestinians weigh return to terror for Netanyahu speech

Senior Palestinian officials in Ramallah, enraged by the Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu's conditional offer of a Palestinian state Sunday, June 14 - and even more by what they see as US president Barack Obama's perfidious welcome - are weighing extreme options for reprisal, military sources report. T read the full article, click here: http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6128

Ex-US president Carter's escapes assassination by al Qaeda-linked Palestinians

Military sources confirm that the Army of Islam, the Palestinian al Qaeda cell in Gaza tried to assassinate former US president Jimmy Carter by planting a 200-kilo bomb in the path of his exit through the Erez crossing after he held sympathetic talks with its Hamas rulers. To read the full article, click here:
http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=6134