Connect with us

Washington

Analysis | Netanyahu goes to Washington in the shadow of Middle East disaster

Published

on

Analysis | Netanyahu goes to Washington in the shadow of Middle East disaster


You’re reading an excerpt from the WorldView newsletter. Sign up to get the rest free, including news from around the globe and interesting ideas and opinions to know, sent to your inbox on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

The last time Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to Washington, hopes were high for peace — or, at least, one particular vision of it. It was September 2020, and Netanyahu appeared at a White House then home to Donald Trump. Through a pact brokered by the Trump administration, Israel was normalizing ties with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, two Arab monarchies that shared Israel’s antipathy toward Iran.

The diplomatic feat was grandiosely titled the “Abraham Accords” and its promoters cast it as a civilizational breakthrough and the beginning of a new age — no matter that the two Gulf states had never been at war with Israel and already had substantial clandestine dealings with the Jewish state. “This day is a pivot of history,” Netanyahu proclaimed, alongside Trump and top officials from the UAE and Bahrain. “It heralds a new dawn of peace. For thousands of years, the Jewish people have prayed for peace. For decades, the Jewish state has prayed for peace. And this is why, today, we’re filled with such profound gratitude.”

The deals generated some lucrative business links between Israel and the monarchies, and were padded by major U.S. arms sales to the Arab kingdoms. But even as more Arab countries warmed to the prospect of normalization with Israel, the new understandings did little to build peace in the context where it was needed most: The Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Advertisement

That was arguably by design: Netanyahu, a longtime opponent of a separate, sovereign Palestinian state, saw a pathway thanks to Trump to further integrate Israel into its neighborhood while placing the “Palestinian problem” on the back burner. Israel’s burgeoning crop of Arab partners, wary of Iran and frustrated with the dysfunctions within the Palestinian national movement, seemed content to go along with the process.

GET CAUGHT UP

Stories to keep you informed

Netanyahu was forced out of power but eventually returned at the helm of the most right-wing coalition in Israeli history. He showed up in September at the dais of the U.N. General Assembly with a map of Israel’s new connections in the region labeled “The New Middle East”; any trace of Palestine or Palestinian claims was wiped off the map.

Thousands of Israelis gathered in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv on July 7, calling for members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to resign. (Video: Reuters)

Then Oct. 7 happened, and the world changed. The war that followed militant group Hamas’s deadly strike on southern Israel has convulsed the region. Israel’s ongoing campaign against Hamas pulverized the Gaza Strip, led to tens of thousands of deaths and a sprawling humanitarian catastrophe. International legal action against Israel and its right-wing government have picked up: The International Criminal Court may issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in a matter of days for their role in allegedly starving Gazans; the International Court of Justice, the U.N.’s judicial arm, is hearing a case accusing Israel of carrying out genocide and separately ruled Friday that Israel ought to end its occupation of Palestinian territory and dismantle its settlements.

Advertisement

That’s a political nonstarter for Netanyahu, under whose long tenure in power the Israeli settlement project has flourished and expanded across the West Bank. He comes to Washington this week ahead of a controversial speech to Congress, with months of trauma and ruin looming behind him, and a murky political future ahead of him.

A clutch of Israel’s Arab neighbors, along with President Biden and his allies, have fitfully tried to negotiate a truce between the warring parties. Talks have yet to yield the cease-fire desired by Palestinians and much of the international community, or the wholesale release of Israeli hostages sought by a grief-stricken Israeli public. In private conversations, some U.S. and Arab officials blame Netanyahu — whose own position may be imperiled in the event of a cessation of hostilities — for deliberately thwarting an agreement.

“Netanyahu is under pressure from all quarters. He has a coalition that is unhappy with him and [far-right] partners in Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir threatening to bring it down if he agrees to a ceasefire,” explained Michael Koplow of the Israel Policy Forum. “He has hostage families and the political opposition demonstrating in the streets in increasing numbers in favor of a ceasefire, and a security establishment that is also strongly in favor of a deal to pause the fighting and bring living hostages back home. Biden has been pushing unreservedly for a ceasefire and hostage agreement, and Israel’s regional partners all want the fighting to have come to an end months ago.”

The wily Israeli prime minister’s trip to Washington is a gambit to relieve some of this pressure. Netanyahu’s “prime directive is maintaining himself in power, and he’s succeeding,” Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a veteran former U.S. negotiator, told me. He is “coming here to use Congress and the White House as props, in demonstration of his indispensability” to the Israeli public, Miller added, suggesting Netanyahu was “playing for time.” Republicans, eager to twist the knife into an already beleaguered Biden, will probably embrace Netanyahu and his defiant position on the war.

“What Netanyahu is probably seeking is to make it to the end of the month and the parliamentary summer recess,” wrote Neri Zilber in the Financial Times. “The break stretches until late October, during which it is extremely difficult to topple or replace a sitting government. If Netanyahu makes it this far, the earliest an election could be held would be the first quarter of 2025.”

Advertisement

By that point, there may be a new occupant of the White House, and Netanyahu probably expects a second Trump term to boost his own political fortunes — much as the first term did. But the Republican presidential nominee has shown less enthusiasm for Netanyahu in recent months, while the Abraham Accords — cast by Trump as his hallmark foreign policy accomplishment — seem an irrelevance in the current moment.

Biden, meanwhile, is facing an insurgency from the left over Israel’s conduct of the war and the United States’ enabling of it. He has sought to enlist the Gulf kingdoms and some of Israel’s other Arab neighbors in an ambitious “day after” project for Gaza that would see a Palestinian technocratic entity jointly administer that territory and the West Bank, funding from the Gulf for reconstruction pour into Gaza and the Israelis and Palestinians reentering talks over a two-state solution.

As the war drags on and Netanyahu remains in office, that vision for peace also seems doomed. The Knesset, the Israeli parliament, voted on Friday to reject the establishment of a Palestinian state — a symbolic move that underscored Netanyahu’s attitude ahead of his trip to the United States.

“As long as Netanyahu is there, there’s no chance of any movement toward the ‘day after’ plan,” an Arab official involved in the talks over postwar Gaza told me, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the press.

There’s no “pivot of history” in sight, in other words. That may be exactly how Netanyahu wants it.

Advertisement



Source link

Washington

Washington Watch: CCAMPIS grant competition announced – Community College Daily

Published

on

Washington Watch: CCAMPIS grant competition announced – Community College Daily


The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), “on behalf of the Department of Education (ED),” on Monday released a Notice Inviting Grant Applications for the Child Care Access Means Parents in School (CCAMPIS) program. Applications are due by May 29.

Last November, ED announced that it had entered into an interagency agreement with HHS to administer the CCAMPIS program. This is the first CCAMPIS competition conducted under this arrangement.

Approximately $73.5 million will go to institutions of higher education that awarded at least $250,000 in Pell grants to enrolled students in FY 2025. HHS will award about 148 grants, ranging from $150,000 to $1 million.

The terms of the grant competition are not significantly different than prior competitions. As before, there are two absolute grant priorities that every application must address – leveraging non-federal resources and utilizing a sliding-fee scale for low-income parents.

Advertisement

This year’s competition includes only one invitational priority that reflects the Trump administration’s general educational policy. The new priority, entitled “Expanding Education Choice in Early Learning Settings,” encourages applications that “expand access to education choice … including by empowering parents in choosing the early learning setting that best meets their family’s needs.” Flexible childcare programs that include drop-in care and care during nontraditional hours are also encouraged.

One other notable difference from prior competitions is an expanded “Terms and Conditions” section that not only requires compliance with applicable civil rights laws, but also refers to Trump administration Executive Orders and guidance on racial discrimination that clarify “the application of federal antidiscrimination laws to programs or initiatives that may involve discriminatory practices, including those labeled as Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (“DEI”) programs.” This includes any “discriminatory equity ideology [as defined in Executive Order 14190] in violation of a federal antidiscrimination law.”

The exact scope of these terms is unclear because courts have not found many of the practices described in these Executive Orders and guidance documents to be violations of federal law.



Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Washington

A look at the roots (and routes) of immigration to Washington

Published

on

A look at the roots (and routes) of immigration to Washington


The Newsfeed

This week, the team brings you stories about how communities including Filipino immigrants, Sephardic Jews and Somalis arrived in the Pacific Northwest

Advertisement

Each week on The Newsfeed, host Paris Jackson and a team of veteran journalists dive deep into one topic and provide impactful reporting, interviews and community insights from sources you can trust. Each day this week, this post will be updated with a new story from the team.

Group hopes to boost recognition for Seattle’s Filipinotown 



By Venice Buhain

The group Filipinotown Seattle hopes to make sure that the legacy of Filipino Americans in Seattle’s Chinatown-International District isn’t forgotten. 

One of the group’s current projects is pushing for a Filipinotown placemarking sign in the CID. 

“Filipino Americans have had a presence here for over 100 years in Seattle,” said Filipinotown Seattle Executive Director Devin Israel Cabanilla.  

He said that the signage is important to remind people that “the International District is not just Chinatown. Japantown. Filipinotown is here as well.” 

Advertisement

The group held a poll on what signage might look like and where it might be located. It would be similar to the Chinatown sign on South Jackson Street and Fifth Avenue South, or the Wing Luke Museum  

In the early 20th century, the area now known as the CID was a hub full of businesses, entertainment, social groups and housing that served Seattle’s growing immigrant population from Asia and elsewhere. The communities all intermingled throughout the CID. 

“This area was a central place for Asian Pacific immigrants simply because of segregation,” Cabanilla said. 

Because the Philippines was a U.S. territory from 1898 to 1946, Filipino immigrants were unaffected by laws in the 1920s that restricted immigration from Japan or China. Many Filipinos came to study at the University of Washington or to work in burgeoning industries, like lumber, farming, canneries and factories.  

While the physical Filipino presence in terms of buildings and storefronts in the CID dwindled in the later 20th century with redevelopment, Seattle Filipinos and Filipino Americans continued to make impacts locally, regionally and nationally.  

Advertisement

“It may not have been in terms of storefronts, but our presence has always existed in terms of politics, culture as well,” Cabanilla said. 

The Seattle Department of Transportation said it is aware that the group is working on its signage request, but the Department of Neighborhoods has not yet received a formal request. They are also working to develop a clearer process for this and other similar neighborhood signage proposals. 

Filipinotown Seattle said it hopes that the sign helps remind Seattle of the CID’s unique designation as a neighborhood shaped by many immigrants and migrants to Seattle. 

“Is it Chinatown? Is it Japantown? Is it Little Saigon? It’s all those things. And I think re cultivating that this is a multicultural district, Filipinotown is helping establish: Yes, it’s more than one thing,” Cabanilla said. 

Advertisement
Venice Buhain

Venice Buhain is a multimedia journalist at Cascade PBS. She previously was the Cascade PBS’s associate news editor and education reporter. Venice has also worked for KING 5, The Seattle Globalist and TVW News.



Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Washington

The Church of Jesus Christ has announced its 384th temple

Published

on

The Church of Jesus Christ has announced its 384th temple


The state of Washington is getting a seventh temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The Marysville Washington Temple was announced Sunday night during a devotional in the Marysville Washington Stake by Elder Hugo E. Martinez, a General Authority Seventy in the church’s United States West Area Presidency.

“We are pleased to announce the construction of a temple in Marysville, Washington,” the First Presidency said in a statement. “The specific location and timing of the construction will be announced later. This is a reason for all of us to rejoice and express gratitude for such a significant blessing — one that will allow more frequent access to the ordinances, covenants and power that can only be found in the house of the Lord.”

The other temples in Washington are the Columbia River, Moses Lake, Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma and Vancouver temples.

Advertisement

The church has 214 temples in operation. Plans for another 170 temples have been announced; many of those temples are in various stages of planning and construction.

Sunday’s temple announcement follows the new practice of the church’s First Presidency, which determines where temples will be built — and when and how they will be announced.

The First Presidency directed a General Authority Seventy to announce the first temple in Maine at a fireside there in December.

In January, church President Dallin H. Oaks said the Maine announcement set the pattern for future temple announcements.

“The best place to announce a temple is in that temple district,” he told the Deseret News.

Advertisement

The First Presidency will continue to decide where future temples will be built. It then will “assign someone else to make the announcement in the place where the temple will be built,” he said.

This pattern came to him as a strong impression after he assumed leadership of the church in October, following the death of his friend, President Russell M. Nelson.

This came as a strong impression to him shortly after he assumed the leadership of the church, President Oaks said.

The church remains in the midst of an aggressive temple-building era. President Nelson announced 200 new temples from 2018 to 2025. All but one were announced at general conference.

Five dozen temples are now under construction.

Advertisement

President Oaks now has overseen the announcement of two temples, neither at a general conference.

At the October conference he said that “with the large number of temples now in the very earliest phases of planning and construction, it is appropriate that we slow down the announcement of new temples.”

Ten new temples are scheduled to be dedicated in the next six months.

  • May 3: Davao Philippines Temple.
  • May 3: Lindon Utah Temple.
  • May 31: Bacolod Philippines Temple.
  • June 7: Yorba Linda California Temple.
  • June 7: Willamette Valley Oregon Temple.
  • Aug. 16: Belo Horizonte Brazil Temple.
  • Aug. 16: Cleveland Ohio Temple.
  • Aug. 30: Phnom Penh Cambodia Temple.
  • Oct. 11: Miraflores Guatemala City Guatemala Temple.
  • Oct. 18: Managua Nicaragua Temple.

Two-thirds of the 170 temples still to be built are outside the United States.

Temples are distinct from the meetinghouses where Latter-day Saints worship Jesus Christ each Sunday. Temples are closed on Sundays, but they open during the week as sanctuaries where church members go to find peace, make covenants with God and perform proxy ordinances for deceased relatives.



Source link

Advertisement
Continue Reading
Advertisement

Trending