Daniella Peled's blog

Israel seems to have only alienated one diplomatic ally thus far through its Gaza operation – but a vital strategic one.

 Turkey is Israel’s closest Muslim partner, enjoying a far warmer relationship with the Jewish state than the cold peaces extant with Egypt and Jordan, for instance.

 And yet Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a speech on Sunday which appeared nearer the rhetoric of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than the words of an old– though not uncritical - friend.

Czech President Vaclav Klaus must be overwhelmed by his stroke of diplomatic luck. His country has been handed the EU presidency right in the middle of a major Middle East crisis. With 27 members, each country has to wait well over a decade before it gets its crack at the six-month presidency. So he is ensuring they make the most of it.

International leaders may be issuing calls for an immediate ceasefire, but Hamas leaders may be hoping for a rather different outcome.

They have been hugely damaged by Israel’s surprise attack and massive bombing campaign. Communications lie in tatters, Israel has reportedly inflicted huge damage on their local operational structure and an estimated 50 per cent of rocket silos have been destroyed.

The only way Hamas can now inflict any serious retaliatory damage is if the IDF decides to embark on a ground invasion.

Tzipi Livni went off at an interesting tangent this week.

Speaking in Tel Aviv, she was quoted as saying that Israel’s Arab population should see a future Palestinian state as the solution for their national aspirations.

“Once a Palestinian state is established, I can come to the Palestinian citizens, whom we call Israeli Arabs, and say to them ‘you are citizens with equal rights, but the national solution for you is elsewhere,’” Army Radio quoted her as saying.

This was a suggestion rather too close to the extreme-right concept of transfer for comfort.

The ancient port town of Akko has a special place in my family history. That’s where my parents went on their first date (well, strictly speaking their second, which itself was something of a miracle since they didn’t really like each other at first). But on that warm September afternoon they rambled through the souk, they strolled along the soaring Crusader battlements, they ate at the famous Abu Christo fish restaurant – and, reader, six weeks later she married him.

As if to confirm our worst suspicions and prejudices about them Europeans, the far-right in Austria stormed the polls on Sunday.
The two parties which campaigned on an anti-European Union, anti-immigrant platform won nearly a third of the vote, with the mainstream parties pushed into last place. A rather frightening scenario.

The news of the latest attack in Jerusalem came with a sense of inevitability. A vehicle driven into a crowd of people; the young driver, a resident of East Jerusalem, shot dead by a passing soldier.

Who would win in a fist fight between Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin and Kadima leadership candidate Tzipi Livni?

Thus ran the idle debate in the pub yesterday afternoon, where Mossad-trained Livni was deemed the sharper, swifter opponent, but Palin was ultimately ruled to have the muscular advantage, what with all that moose pie and elk steak she must eat (not to mention the hunting, killing and butchering of it).

So who won in the "Free Gaza" boat affair?

This band of activists was determined to sail to Gaza to break the siege with balloons and hearing aids – and they did. Israel wanted to avoid a media frenzy featuring scenes of nuns arrested by Israeli sailors and crying Palestinian children seeing their hearing aids consigned to the briny depths. They also succeeded.

Israeli travelers have been warned of a serious and heightened threat of abduction.

Apparently Hizbollah operatives are keen to avenge the assassination of its head of operations Imad Mughniyeh, killed in a February car bombing in Damascus.

The global threat to Jews and Israelis is nothing new. But this warning is especially diffuse, as it is fails to specify a particular country, or region, or even a continent where Israelis are at particular risk.